Over the years, medical practice has gotten more sanitary, comfortable, and safer for the patients. Technology has also drastically improved which gives women many more options for reproductive health. Currently, there are several forms of birth control which are all pretty reliable. Also, abortions have become much safer and cheaper. Because of this, I think that women are using abortion as a way of somewhat solving their problems instead of just in case of emergencies. Abortions are so much easier to obtain and pay for that women are not being as cautious as they used to be when it comes to having safe sex. I think that women are still worried about becoming pregnant but they know that if they do happen to get pregnant they can get an abortion without much hassle. This is also probably one of the reasons why sexually transmitted infections are spreading so rapidly-condoms are not being used as often as they should be.
Personally, I am pro-choice but I think that the controversy of reproductive health should be much broader than just the issue on abortion. All of these other forms of birth control that we can choose from today, such as the pill, condoms, and sponges are still "going against God's will". The issue of "what is a life" needs to be discussed and defined before any decision can be made on abortion. Sure, abortions may be "murdering" a fetus but other types of birth control make it so that these fetuses never even have a chance. This may be a far-fetched argument, but I feel that it has some validity. I know that some of my Catholic friends don't believe in using any type of birth control for this reason.
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I took a class on Catholicism last spring, and the church's stance on birth control that you mention here was really surprising to me. I’m not a Catholic (I’m not sure if you are, but it sounds like you know about the religion at least!) and that was the first time I learned why the church opposed it. While it is a position I disagree with, I admire the extent of the conviction about the potential life, because a life would have existed if not for your intervention.
ReplyDeleteI think this has negative effects as well; it often comes hand in hand with absence-only teaching, which isn’t an effective strategy for reducing pregnancy (if one does not manage to hold to these convictions all of the time). In addition, what do you do once you want to stop having kids? You can abstain of course, but I think that’s limiting human nature somewhat (I don’t know how to say it exactly, but like biology and all?). I’m curious how hysterectomies and sterilization factor into this; my mom had the former because cervical cancer runs in our family, but is that going against God’s will as well? What about vasectomies – is that limiting life as well? I imagine so. I guess my rambling point is that I agree that defining where life starts and what is stopping life is incredibly difficult.