Roe v. Wade

Alison sent me a link to an article in which a doctor described the days before Roe V. Wade. Here's the most salient point from that article:

It is important to remember that Roe v. Wade did not mean that abortions could be performed. They have always been done, dating from ancient Greek days.

What Roe said was that ending a pregnancy could be carried out by medical personnel, in a medically accepted setting, thus conferring on women, finally, the full rights of first-class citizens — and freeing their doctors to treat them as such.

I've talked before in this space about my own abortion and what that has meant for my life (primarily it's meant that I got choose when to welcome into my life the two amazing daughters I have now). So it feels like beating a dead horse to say this again, but here goes: Every child should be a choice and every woman deserves to make that choice, or not. We can force them to make that choice out of fear and desperation, or we can let women make that choice with dignity. Feminism is not a one issue movement, certainly, but my right to self-determination (which is absolutely what choosing if and when to have children is) is certainly at the top of the list, which is something we should remember when we encourage people to vote for John McCain in protest of Hilary Clinton's primary loss.