I also understand neo units… The company I was Chief Operating Officer of was Sheridan Healthcare. At the time we had a large women’s health care practice as I said earlier, we also had the second largest neonatology group practice in the country and I have been present in many neo units mostly level 3 and level 4 units. The company largely exited the OB/GYN practices because of the liability associated with it, but continues to have a large presence in treating high risk babies both during and after delivery.

You are right, I am a man. I will never understand the experiences of a woman anymore than you will understand the experiences of the unborn baby. But I can be empathetic to the issues women face and the issues of the baby. And so I advocate a position that does not ignore the rights of women or the rights of the babies. Can you be empathetic to the baby?

You have not seen me take a position that an abortion is never warranted. What I have said is that the decision regarding an abortion only belongs exclusively to the mother until the unborn baby is viable or as long as the mother wants to have the baby. I have also said, I think rather than viability that someday the decision will be based on when the baby begins to have cognitive function.

This is why the Roe v Wade decision was determined as it was. The underlying assumption is that a mother who wants to have her baby will act in the baby’s self interest and so society trusts the mother to make the right decisions with regard to the baby’s future. But once a mother opts for an abortion, then her interest and the baby’s interest may deviate. At that point, society has an obligation to insure the baby’s rights are also taken into consideration when determining whether or not it is legal to terminate a baby’s life.

But you want to make the decision totally about “what the woman wants” and exclude “what the baby wants”. That seems unfair. You will never know what it is like to have a doctor crush your skull so you can be extracted from a woman’s uterus with forceps or have your arms and legs ripped off in the process as you are extracted piece by piece. But if you are an OB/GYN or one of the many other health care personnel present during a mid term abortion, you may not ever truly “feel it” but you will have seen it and it is horrible…

Your solution totally denies a baby’s rights. Which other humans are you prepared to deny rights to. How about the elderly that cannot take care of themselves if no one wants to bother caring for them should we just terminate them? What about children or adults who because of serious handicaps will be institutionalized and abandoned for life, should we terminate them? Why limit the power of people to make life and death decisions only to unborn children?

As for society having claims on a “woman’s body”, growing up I was required to register for the draft. That provided this country the right to send my “body” into war whether I supported the war or not. The draft is not gone, it simply has not been used for awhile. So the idea of society having a claim on the body of its members is not unique to women at all. True men do not have abortions, but women were never drafted into war in the past… so what? Forget gender, Congress often makes decisions over people lives and bodies, that are not their own.

So women are not the only ones, who have no control over their body. Children get little say so as infants and the elderly often give up control over their bodies involuntarily. You may never know what its like to make plans knowing at any moment a letter could arrive in the mail and a few months later you will be sitting in rice paddy half a world away and someone wants to kill you, but does that mean you can’t understand what that would feel like?

Also if you believe a woman has the right to terminate a baby’s life, why not society. After all, the woman will bear the burden of pregnancy for up to 9 months and society will bear the financial burden for 18 years. If that child has birth defects, society may bare the burden for the baby’s lifetime. Should society have a say… if they are going to pay? What about the father? If the baby is born, he can be held responsible for financial support until the child reaches an age of majority, should he be able to require an abortion? If the unborn baby is not a “life”, then what right does a mother have to be the only decision maker?

Abortion is not gender issue, it never has been. It is a societal issue with ramifications that extend far beyond the abortion itself. The Supreme Court knew this which is why they picked “viability” since the same criteria is used with end of life decisions in health care. In all states, no one but you (and even that is limited in many states) can choose to end your life. But once you are no longer “viable” without life sustaining medical technology, they can legally withdraw it. The parallels to abortion are very significant.