LB writes:
Continuing that pregnancy wouldn't have been an epic tragedy for me; any proposal for abortion rights that requires abortion to be permissible only when the only alternative would be starving on the streets would leave me right outside.
But man, did I not want to be pregnant. I did not want to be locked into a minimum eighteen-year relationship with someone I'd been dating for a couple of months. I did not want to be responsible forever for someone who didn't exist yet. I didn't want to be physically pregnant. I had no idea of where I was going professionally -- I was a temp receptionist, thinking about maybe taking the LSATs -- or of how I would support myself or a child, and had no idea of how I'd find my way into a career with a new baby. The only thing being able to get an abortion did for me was give me some control over the course of the entire rest of my life.
So, politically useful as it is, I get a little edgy about rhetoric that stipulates that abortion is always a strongly morally weighted decision. I don't think it is, and if it were I'm not certain that my reasons for not wanting to continue a pregnancy at the time qualify as sufficient to do a wrong thing -- if abortion is an evil, it's not clear to me what evil would have been the lesser under those circumstances. But I am thankful every day of my life that I had the option to end that pregnancy back in 1995.
The abortion rhetoric is so fraught and culturally weighted, it's hard sometimes to remember that abortions are, above all, frequent things and, for many women, they aren't life changing -- they're life preserving. LB's story -- which she calls "a politically counter-productive personal history" -- is a worthwhile one, and I encourage you to read it.
Update: I agree with Kevin's additions here. Speaking of abortion in a sensitive and conflicted way is probably good politics, but I fear the impact on individuals. If we disingenuously hold that abortions are morally excruciating, and keep driving home the anguish all women should/must feel after having one, we risk causing further pain to women who'd otherwise find the removal of a clump of cells unproblematic, or do find the procedure unproblematic and but fret over their "callousness." That's possibly all right if your goal is to reduce the number of abortions, but if you don't think individuals shouldn be tormented because a condom broke or a cycle of antibiotics interfered with the pill, it's more worrisome.