To Our Dear, Righteous, Godly, Home-Grown Terrorists: Fuck Off

via alas, a blog, from third wave agenda:

Boston Magazine
Confessions of an Abortion Doctor
by (As told to) Cheryl Alkon
From the December 2004 issue

Ten years after the bloody Brookline clinic attacks, one doctor explains why she still performs abortions.

Ten years ago this month, John Salvi sprayed bullets into two Brookline abortion clinics, killing two people and wounding five. Since then, the number of doctors willing to perform abortions has dwindled, increasing the workload for those remaining. One local obstetrician and gynecologist, whose clinic asked that she withhold her name for safety reasons, now performs as many as 10 abortions a day, twice a week.

One morning years ago, when I was working as a resident, a nurse brought me in to talk to a pregnant girl. When I walked into the room, there was this child -- an 11-year-old. She had come in for a procedure, and it soon became obvious that she had no understanding of sex -- she didn't really understand that she'd even had it, or that it had any connection to her pregnancy. We literally had to teach this girl about what it means to have sex -- about STDS, abstinence, and pregnancy. I remember thinking: In a world where people don't want kids to learn about these things, how can you not give them the choice to terminate a pregnancy? Even if she had chosen to continue the pregnancy and opt for adoption, what would that have done to her own childhood? How can we not provide a child with any education about sex, then force her to become a parent long before she's ready?

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via third wave agenda, from Horror Stories by Molly Ivans:

We already have a parental notification requirement in Texas, so how much different can consent be? Of course you don't want your underage daughter getting an abortion without your knowledge, what parent would?

But there are those occasional horrible exceptions, which is why the judicial bypass exists. If a minor can go before a court and prove she either cannot or clearly should not notify her parents, a judge can grant her exemption from the requirement. The system barely works now, and the new bill would make it all but impossible for most girls by limiting venue to the girls' county of residence and those neighboring it, and other changes. There are 254 counties in Texas, and as surveys have shown, most of the county clerks don't even know there is such a procedure, much less how to file one ("Honey, I have no idea," is the classic response). The problems of small-town application should be apparent to all.

Please believe that you do not know what "dysfunctional family" means until you have studied applications for judicial bypass. These cases are from the files of Jane's Due Process, a Texas organization that provides lawyers for pregnant minors seeking a bypass.

Social worker for a 13-year-old: "She ran away from her foster home and was gone for eight weeks. Now she's in an emergency shelter and is pregnant. Her mother is deceased. Her father raped her when she was 8 years old and is still in prison for it. I knew her when she had to testify against him. I don't know if I can convince her to go back to court, but she definitely wants an abortion."