(This is part of a FB and Twitter post that I am expanding on.  Trigger Warning for fetal picture and frank discussion of medical squick below)

You won’t believe this, but, I have a lot of respect for certain pro-lifers.  The ones that would not chose an abortion for themselves or suggest not doing it if asked, but will not get in the way (physically, legally, or otherwise) of anyone who wants and/or needs one. They don’t pass around links chock full of gory pictures of ripped up fetuses, and they sure as shit don’t show up to bully patients outside of clinics. They do themselves, and let others do..um…themselves.

I respect that. Honestly.

On the other hand, I have NOOOO respect for so-called “pro-choicers” too chickenshit to say what they are, lest someone ‘think’ they support abortions in situations that DO. NOT. FUCKING. HAPPEN. (i.e. for “funsies!”) or who have some-odd conditionals a person has to meet in order for them to be OK with it.

Because if you had the first fucking clue what is involved in any abortion procedure, that idea would hopefully die a quick painful death. Now, I have proposed a talk for the upcoming FTBCon 3 in which I go through the three most common procedures in the hopes of educating folks who want to know exactly what a person goes through.  Hopefully, hearing about the pain, the discomfort, the awkward positioning, will be enough to finally squash the fear of the supposed spree abortionist!

You know, the ones who treat it like birth control*, those who get it done for FUNSIES? Those harlots who sneak into the “pro-choice” tent, who must be tolerated, but never accepted as One Of Us.  They make us look bad, and pro-lifers love to mention them first when they fight to strip away our rights!  They suck.

They are also, for the most part, imaginary.  I mean, think about for more than a second.  Abortions are expensive, and in most cases you have to cough up that dough up front.  A lot of clinics are closing, so the ones that are still open are miles and miles and hours and hours away, if you’re lucky enough to not live in or near a major city. You will have to take time off work.   A lot of laws limit how long you can go before you can’t have an abortion done, and a lot of laws demand that you take a day or so to “think” about it between appointments.  Some laws force you to look at an ultrasound, whether you want to or not.  Some laws force doctors to rattle off long debunked claims about abortion, whether you want to listen or not.  And that’s just GETTING in the doctor’s office.

You show up for the actual procedure, probably hungry (you can’t eat that day until the procedure is done), probably cranky, probably mourning.  In a lot of places, you have to walk past a gauntlet of bullshit.  Merry bands of morons, waving signs, yelling at you, calling you “Mommy”, calling you a murderer, begging you to stop so they can ‘counsel’ you, shoving brochures of complete crap at you.

You get inside, and you wait.  Nearly all day.  In a waiting room with other people who are in the same spot as you.  And that’s not even counting the “put your legs up in the stirrups, let’s numb and dilate your cervix in ways that you will absolutely feel. For those without the requisite parts, just imagine having your urethra dilated, with one of these:

Did your legs just slam shut?  Then welcome to the party!

Oh, and I forgot, afterwards, you might have what has got to be the heaviest period of your possible life.  And if you think taking the pills are a neat way to skip all that, heh, you are aware the contents of the uterus has to go somewhere, right?

Doesn’t that sound like fun? Sign me the fuck up!

Now, just think about for a moment.  Who the fuck would sign up for this…unless they had a DAMNED good reason?

Also, when we, as pro-choicers, entertain that little “..for the lolz” myth, we are repeating the same nonsense the other side does as if such a thing actually exists. And we should stop that shit immediately.  We can’t call ourselves for the right to abortion, if we’re going to separate some into “good reasons” and “bad reasons”.  That’s what the other side does when they are kind enough to offer such “generous’ compromises like the “rape, incest and health of the pregnant person” exemptions, because it’s damned hard to run on the backs of rape victims, incest victims and dead people.  Not that the more far off types don’t try.

There are three reasons we should be acknowledging for any and all abortion procedures:

1. The person doesn’t want to be pregnant. That covers a lot of ground.  Lack of support, done with having kids, not wanting kids at all, was raped or a victim of incest, they all boil down to “I don’t want to be pregnant.”
2. The pregnancy is wanted, but will harm/kill the person carrying it. Only the most special of the pro-lifers find any problem with that.
3. The pregnancy is wanted, but no longer viable. Tragic. And yet, the special pro-lifers don’t seem to care, from what I’ve seen on the sidewalk.

We can force both sides to deal with this reality.  We especially need to step in and make sure those who say they are our allies realize this as well. A lot of people need to reexamine what they mean when they say they are “pro-choice”.  Adding exceptions, or a “but..” isn’t pro-choice. Right now, the right for a safe, legal abortion is under attack, and the other side so far is gaining ground.  We need our side to remember what we are fighting for, and to stop wasting our time and breath acknowledging silly hypotheticals like “what if the person’s going in for her seventh abortion and she’s just doing it for fun or something?”.

In the words of my favorite meme:

*Yes, everyone has a story of some friend’s cousin’s sibling twice removed who used abortion as birth control.  They never seem to know anything more about the person though. I can’t find the link, but there was a tumblr post from a woman who, because of her various reactions to various BC methods, chose with her partner to, I think, use fertility awareness, and had a couple of abortions done.  I think we can be grown-up enough to realize there are always exceptions to the “abortion as BC” line, and those reasons are usually more than just “too lazy/poor/stupid/whatever to put on a condom” or whatever.