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 Posted: Sat Nov 27, 2004 2:59 pm
Howdy! Hope you had a good thanksgiving. Well today, I'm here to present info from a textbook I've been studying in. The most funny thing about using the social sciences in the abortion debate is that although it is known to be a weak form of science- it still whips up the even weaker philosophies and contortions that you see usually the pro-lifers use. At least the social sciences offer a form of emperical, objective studies. The textbook, without further adue: Quote: "Marriages and Families: Changes, Choices, and Constraints" by Nijole V. Benokraitis. 4th edition (the 5th edition is the newest, but very comparable to the last). Prentice Hall is the book publisher, and it is copyrighted 2002. I'll give a short summary first, and then I'll dig in for the details about abortion in my next post. Quote: from Chapter 10 "To be or Not to be a Parent: More Choices, More Constraints All of these points are copied from the textbook. Quote: 1) There are benefits and costs in having children. The benefits include emotional fulfillment and personal satisfaction. The costs include a decline in marital satisfaction, problems in finding adequate housing, and generally high expenditures. 2) Postponing parenthood is a common phenomenon. On one hand, remaning childless as long as possible has many attractive features, including independance and building a career. On the other hand, there are costs, such as finding it impossible to have children later in life. 3) Approximately 15% of all couples are involuntarily childless. the reasons for infertility include physical and physiological difficulties, environmental hazards, and unhealthy lifestyles. 4) Couples have a variety of options if they are infertile, including adoption, artificial insemination, in vitro fertilization, embryo transplants, and surrogacy. 5) Some emerging issues in the area of adoption include the rights of the biological father, transracial adoption, and open adoption. 6) Contrary to popular belief, women in their twenties have higher rates of unwed childbearing than do teenagers. The percentages of teenagers who are unmarried mothers have been decreasing, but vary by race and ethnicity. There are both micro- and macro- level reasons for the surge of out-of-wedlock children. 7) Improved contraceptive techniques and the availability of abortion have resulted in fewer unwanted births. The incidence of abortion has declined since 1990, but abortion continues to be a hotly debated issue in the US and some other countries. 8 ) Couples who decide not to have children are still a minority, but remaining childless is becoming more acceptable.
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Posted: Sat Nov 27, 2004 6:56 pm
In this post, I present the details from my textbook. In my next post here, you will have my personal thoughts about all of this information. Brace yourselves since it is a lengthy read. But it is an IMPORTANT read, and it's filled with fact that you may find very useful. I have bolded some parts of it for my personal emphasis only. So, without further adue~ Having Children outside of Marriage Quote: ..."Well-educated and financially autonomous women, especially, may go forward with an unplanned pregnancy if their family and friends are supportive (Mannis, 1999). ..."Normal childbearing is often accompanied by a decline of financial resources (Burton 1995; Wu, 1996)." ..." The most economically disadvantaged mothers are those who never marry and who continue to have babies (Driscoll et al., 1999)." (with variations to age) ..."Since 1980, the highest birth rates for unmarried women were for women aged 18-19 and 20-24 years, followed closely by women aged 25-29 years. While teenage unmarried births started to decline in 1994, those for women aged 20-29 continued to increase. Nonetheless, 79 percent of births to teenagers are out of wedlock (Moore et al., 1999)." (the reason for the decline in teen pregnancy)..." teenagers are becoming less sexually active, while those who are more active appear more likely to use contraceptives than in the past (Abma et al., 1997; Darroch and Singh, 1999; Ventura, Mosher et al., 2000)." ..."Another factor may be the long economic expansion of the 1990's. As more jobs with good pay become available, some teens postponed early pregnancy and parenthood (Ventura, Curtin et al., 2000)." (variations in educational attainment) ..."Unmarried women with less than a high school diploma are at least three times likely to have a baby as an unmarried woman with some college (Ventura, Bachrach et al., 1995)." ..." The finding that birth rates of college-educated women are lower than those women with lower educational levels has led some researchers to conclude that the most effective way to reduce pregnancy, especially for teenagers, is to improve teenagers' educational and earning opportunities. (Plotnick, 1993; Robinson and Frank, 1994; Trent, 1994)." ..."Educated women usually have more job opportunities, more awareness of family planning, and more decision-making power (UNICEF, 1994)." This next section deals with contraceptive practices. Quote: ..." One of the primary reasons for teenage pregnancy is the failure of teenagers to use contraceptives: Nearly 15 percent of teenage women never use contraceptives (Abma et al., 1997)." ..." Some teenagers intentionally have a baby to satisfy emotional or status needs. "Babies may become a sought-after status symbol, a passage to adulthood, of being a 'grown' woman" (Anderson, 1990)." ..."those who were socioeconomically disadvantaged, however, tended to view paternity as a source of self-esteem (Anderson, 1990)." ..."There is one other important influence that cuts across these choices. A number of female adolescent sexual experiences are coercive. One national survey found that 24 percent of women aged 13 or younger and 10 percent of those aged 19-24 at the time of their first premarital intercourse reported that the experience was nonvoluntary. The same study found that women who as children have lived with a single parent from birth or had left home at ages younger than 16 were more likely than others to have experienced nonvoluntary first intercourse (Abma et al., 199 cool ." ..."Family planning services are now less available to many teenagers, especially those in inner cities, than they were a decade ago (Moore and Snyder, 1994)." ..."Many people claim that the availability of public assistance encourages out-of-wedlock births. However, a team of researchers who studied 37 countries found that welfare supoprt was much higher in all other Western countries. ... Nonetheless, they still had lower teenage birth rates (Jones et al., 1986). Now to the meat of the issue, abortion itself. Quote: ..."Abortion is a fiercely controversial isue in the United States. According to a recent Roper poll, only 40 percent of the respondents said that a woman should be able to get an abortion is she wants one, no matter what the reason. while 64 percent felt that an abortion should be "generally legal" in the first three months of pregancny, only 26 percent said it should be legal in the second trimester ("Abortion now divides Americans...," 199 cool ." ..." Practiced by people in all socieities, abortion was not forbidden by the Catholic Church until 1869 and was legal in the United States until the mid-nineteenth century. It became illegal not for moral or religious reasons but out of political, economic, and ideological considerations. According to Rothman (1989), physicians redefined abortion and childbirth as medical issues to eliminate competition from midwives and other nonmedical practitioners, most whom were women. Furthermore, Mohr (1981) claims, when abortion became widespread among white, married, Protestant, American-born women in the middle and upper classes, concern that the country would be overpopulated by "inferior" new ethnic groups with higher birth rates led to the outlawing of the procedure during the late 1800s." ..."Throughout the 1990s, some radical anti-abortion organizations murdered several doctors, burned or bomed 39 clinics, and attempted 16 murders of physicians or staff who performed abortions. Others set up internet "hit lists" of physicians, clinic owners and workers, and judges and polititians who supported abortion rights. the sites listed doctors by name, gave their home addresses, identified their spouses and children, and detailed the routes that doctors used to go to work every day. doctors who had been murdered had a line crossed through their names. (Lafferty, 1999; Sanchez, 1999)." ..."Because of pressure from antiabortion activists, few doctors in rural areas perform abortions. It is estimated that in 83 percent of countries in the United states, not a single physician is willing to provide abortion services. In some states, like the Dakotas, women have to travel hundred of miles for proper medical attention (Goodman, 1993; Banisky, 1994). In addition, fewer hispitals offer abortion services or include such training during the obstretrics residency program for young physicians. as a result, fewer new physicians are skilled in performing abortions. some seek such experience at local clinics, but many don't because they fear being picketed at home or even murdered by extreme antiabortion groups (Goldstein, 199 cool ." Characteristics of women who seek abortions Quote: ..." the number of abortions performed in the US dropped from 1.6 million in 1990 to 1.2 million in 1996. Some of the reasons for this decrease include the greater use of condoms because of the fear of HIV/AIDS; the decision by more single women to keep their babies; and better contraceptive use, especially by teenagers (Vobejda, 1997). Nearly 33 percent of all pregancies are terminated by abortion, and 91 percent of these are within the first trimester. Abortion is most common among women who are young, white, and unmarried, but black women are almost twice as likely as women of other racial groups to get an abortion. These variations are probably related to socioeconomic differences rather than to race. For example, women with annual incomes of less than $15,000 are four times as likely to have an abortion as women with family incomes of $60,000 or above (Wagner, 199 cool ." ..."However, women aged 20-24 obtain approximately one-third of all abortions Moore et al., 1999). The decline in the unmarried birth rate we discussed in the previous section is not due to an increase in abortion. as you saw earlier, much of the decrease in unmarried teen births has been due to less sexual activity and an increase in the percentage of adolescent females who report using contraception. " Is abortion safe? Quote: ..."Safety can be measured on two levels- physical and emotional. On the physical level, a legal abortion in the first trimester (up to 12 weeks) is safer than driving a car, using oral contraceptives, undergoing sterilization, or even continuing a pregnancy (Koonin et al., 1999). " ..." As for emotional health, there is no evidence that abortion has long-term, negative psychological consequences. In the mid-80's, C. Evertt Koop, YS Surgeon General, outraged conservatives when he reported that the scientific research did not show that abortion has harmful effects. Several recent studies have drawn the same conclusions. In one study, women who underwent an abortion in the first trimester showed no later psychological distress (Raymond, 1990). A longitudinal study of unmarried black teenagers who were 17 years old or younger found that those who had abortions were more likely to graduate from high school and were less likely to become pregnant over the subsequent two years than were their counterparts who bore a child (zabin et al., 1986). One study suggests that, without abortion, many young single mothers would have closely spaced children, which would increase economic stress and risk more child abuse and neglect. This does not mean that women who have abortions never suffer from emotional problems. Anecdoctal data suggest that some women have feelings of sadness, guilt, sin, or remorse. (Kushner, 1997). " Attitudes about abortion Quote: ..." Antiabortion proponents insist that the embryo/fetus is not just a mass of cells but a human being from the time of conception and therefore has the right to live. On the other hand, many abortion advocates believe that the organism at the moment of conception lacks a brain and other specifically and uniquely human attributes like consciousness and reasoning. Abortion proponents also believe that a pregnant woman has a right to decide what will happen in and to her body"... ..."White adults are more likely (52 percent) than black adults (45 percent) to support abortion (Benson and Herrmann, 1999). ..."Many teenage mothers reject abortion. Black and Latino adolescents are more likely than white and asian adolescents to feel that if they get pregnant, most of the people important to them would be against having an abortion (Adler and Tschann, 1993). Older black women are more likely than their white counterparts or younger black women to discourage abortion because of religious beliefs or the view that family planning is a form of black genocide (Lynxwiler and Gay, 1994). Moreover, because many black communities place a high value on having children, they are more accepting of the out-of-wedlock child than are many white communities. Some observers also note that Latino teenagers are reluctant to seek information about contraception because of the catholic church's adament opposition to contraception and abortion. " Abortion in other countries Quote: ..."About 38 percent of the world's population lives in countries where abortion is available upon request. Another 46 percent lives in countries where abortion is legal in certain circumstances.... The remaining 16 percent of the population lives in countries whre abortion is legal only when it is neccesarry to save the woman's life.... Only a few countries-Chile, Andorra, Djibouti, and Malta- do not allow abortion for any reason at all (Neft and Levine, 1997). ..."Every year and estimated 20 million women world-wide resort to unsafe, illegal abortions. the vast majority live in developing countries with strict abortion laws and strong cultural and religious prohibitions against the use of contraceptives. The highest incidence of illegal abortion is in South America, where an estimated 41 out of every 1000 women of childbearing age undergo this procedure each year. It is estimated that in many developing countries, complications from illegal abortions may account for as many a 70 percent al all gynecological hospital admissions (Neft and Levine, 1997). Abortion is a highly controversial issue in many countries. " omg... that was a lot of typing. my fingers are frozen also. You guys better thank me at least for this work!! blaugh Yes, you are more than welcome to borrow these passages in your own arguments. Also, feel free to ask me questions about what I have presented. Also, I love comments.
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Posted: Sat Nov 27, 2004 8:10 pm
I was reading about alot of this in an abortion book iI was reading. Very Informative!!!
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Posted: Sat Nov 27, 2004 8:20 pm
Grippy, hon, will you marry me? Or at least have sex with me so we can abort our children? heart
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Posted: Sat Nov 27, 2004 8:35 pm
Grippy, hon, will you marry me? Or at least have sex with me so we can abort our children? heart
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Posted: Sun Nov 28, 2004 1:02 pm
Embyr Arrikanez Grippy, hon, will you marry me? Or at least have sex with me so we can abort our children? heart Hey, the question musta been important enough it had to be asked twice wink lol.. ( yes, I knew it was just the silly forum messing up too.) rawr, lesbian action!
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Posted: Sun Nov 28, 2004 2:55 pm
Xanaphia, I'm glad to know that the facts are uniform throughout other books. It's a good sign. smile
Here, I will expound on some of my own ruminations of the above formentioned facts.
It certaintly appears that the sociology textbook is biased towards pro-choice, doesn't it? In actuality, there is no side taken. However, the facts presented certaintly show heavy support towards a pro-choice orientation, which can confuse some people into thinking that the sociology textbook endorses it.
I'll make this post addressing the summary of the text. I'll address other points later since I am busy too.
On the benefits and costs to having children: This shows that adults have infact "selfish" reasons to have children. Children are a big investment of resources, so it is only fitting that an adult would want a healthy, advantaged child that would make the investment much more worthwhile. Comparably, pro-lifers make the claim that most abortions are out of "selfish" reasons. Yet, being a parent is also "selfish". And some statistics even point out some of the attitudes about being a parent (particularly from the poorer people)- that a child is a status symbol or a rite of passage to adulthood. One has to ask themselves if these parents with such fixated attitudes on themselves are truly capable of properly raising a child.
On postponing parenthood: Parents are making a wise decision to hold off on having chlidren until they feel they are ready to be parents. It's not neccessarily irresponsible to be a young parent, but it is also not irresponsible for one to get a head start on career, intimacy, and identity formation before jumping into life-altering parenthood. At least these parents acknowledge how such a decision to have children shouldn't be taken so lightly.
On the infertile couples: There is now methods they can engage in so they can have children. This actually lowers the pool of potential adopting parents. I wonder what pro-life thinks about this group of people? I wonder if some of the particularly religious-driven people think it's unnatural/wrong for infertile couples to have their own kids?
On the emerging issues of adoption: It only attests to the multi-faceted, mutli-gray-shades nature of the debates. Also, I'd like to add gay families to the picture. If gays cannot adopt, then this lessons the pool of adopting parents.
I like how the belief about the "irresponsible-teenage-whore-who-has-sex-and-then-deserves-the-consequences of-carrying-a-child-full-term" is challenged in that much of the abortions is with women in the twenties. In actuality, the social sciences seem to point out that such "irresponsible teenage whores" are probably very poor women with a hard past, with little social support, and with very little to look forward to in life (no career or education). These are people who are very disadvantaged in society and are precisely the people we need to help, not slander/condemn.
How interesting it is to know that the rate of abortion has actually dwindled. I suppose this challenges some pro-lifers assumptions that if abortion is legal, then people will ballistically abort. The increase of contraception use is noteable. But then again, you have to consider a later statistic I presented that shows that abortion isn't available in many counties throughout the U.S. Remember, there is hardly just one reason for any phenomenon to occur.
About the statistics about how there is less abortions because of improved contraception use and abstinence: it supports the idea that this current generation is actually MORE "conservative", or "traditional", than our own parents! This is striking to note because there are some religious people who think that life is just getting worse and people are getting more irresponsible and have less values. Some of the christians who believe that this is the "end of the ages" (the end of world "gloom and doom" news) use the legalization of abortion to support their beliefs, despite the fact stated earlier that abortion has existed throughout history.
And for my last point on the summary. Childless couples are an important enough group to raise up. Childlessness is becoming more acceptable in society, although it's still stigmatized in religious communities. Do you expect a childless couple not to engage in sex if they do not want children? Pro-lifers have not adequately and sensitively addressed how a couple can be sexually satisfied/intimate with their partner that doesn't want kids... if that contraception failed for any reason. On a human race scale, sex is definitely for the perpetuation of the race. But on the individual level, having children is not the main reason for engaging in sex, at least for a lot of people. Expecting celibacy is not a very sufficient solution to this problem. Not only doesn't everyone believe in the repressive sex ideology presented in Christianity, but the human urge is to have sex; we are sexual beings by nature.
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Posted: Sun Nov 28, 2004 3:41 pm
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Posted: Sun Dec 05, 2004 11:44 am
I felt the need to bump this topic.
I'll probably add more thoughts about these statistics after I am over with school (it's finals week) redface , as well as I will be glad to rummage through other school textbooks.
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Posted: Sun Dec 05, 2004 1:41 pm
Wow, that was an incredibly informative post!
I'm in a sociology class right now, and the last unit of information we took was on the sociological role of the family. A lot of attention was given to the role of a parent and the dismantling of the "extended family" living situation (roughly three or more generations living under one roof), the topics of voluntary childlessness and delayed childbearing were addressed as well, but the issue of abortion rights was sort of danced around. It was really great to read your post and have some of those statistical blanks filled in, thanks a lot for posting that information!
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