An anti-choice, rape-conceived woman tells you why you should be anti-choice too!
"Please understand that whenever you identify yourself as being “pro-choice,” or whenever you make that exception for rape, what that really translates into is you being able to stand before me, look me in the eye, and say to me, “I think your mother should have been able to abort you.” That’s a pretty powerful statement. I would never say anything like that to someone. I would say never to someone, “If I had my way, you’d be dead right now.” But that is the reality with which I live. I challenge anyone to describe for me how it’s not. It’s not like people say, “Oh well, I‘m pro-choice except for that little window of opportunity in 1968/69, so that you, Rebecca, could have been born.” No — this is the ruthless reality of that position, and I can tell you that it hurts and it’s mean. But I know that most people don’t put a face to this issue. For them, it’s just a concept — a quick cliche, and they sweep it under the rug and forget about it. I do hope that, as a child of rape, I can help to put a face, a voice, and a story to this issue."
This is one of the most egotistical statements I have ever seen. Apparently being pro-choice is the equivalent of walking up to this woman and saying, “If I had my way, you’d be dead right now” (because being pro-choice means that every pregnancy that results from rape MUST be aborted!). I would actually like to see Rebecca Kiessling talk somewhere so that when she started this part of her spiel, I could stand up and say, “Yes, your mother should have been able to abort you.” Everyone’s mother should have had the choice to abort them or carry them to term! My mother did have the choice to abort me. She chose not to. If she had chosen to get an abortion, then I’m sure that would have been the right choice for her.
And what’s even worse, if you read this website, is that her birth mother, a rape victim, desperately wanted an abortion and wasn’t able to access one (although she tried). This horrible woman cannot even feel compassion for the mother who was forced to carry her to term after she had been raped.
What Rebecca Kiessling fails to grasp (because she is seemingly delusional) or maybe just doesn’t care to consider is the toll that a forced pregnancy can take on a rape victim. Pregnancy is hard. It’s dangerous. Many rape victims do choose to go through with their pregnancies and either keep their children or give them up for adoption. But for others, the pregnancy is a continued violation. Rape is a crime of power, during which the victim cannot control what is happening to them, to their body. Forcing rape victims to continue pregnancies they would otherwise have aborted only perpetuates the loss of control that began with the rape.
ETA: She calls her children “second generation abortion survivors.” I can’t even…
Just gonna check ,Rebecca…
all the people that are alive RIGHT NOW because they’re mothers HAD the chance to abort a pregnancy before…it’s okay for YOU to tell THEM that THEY shouldn’t be alive and that if you had YOUR way, they’d be nonexistant right now, right?
Because I wouldn’t be able to stand it if you WEREN’T were hypocritical!I really don’t get why anti-choice people think that, because I believe every woman should have the right to a safe, legal abortion, that every pregnancy should be aborted. We’re pro-CHOICE. The CHOICE to have an abortion.
Yes, it sucks that Rebecca wouldn’t be alive if her mother had access to abortion. But it’s not like she would know. She would never have been born. She wouldn’t be Rebecca. She wouldn’t exist.
Lots of readers have written to me about how they wouldn’t have been born IF their mother had NOT had an abortion. One person’s mother was pregnant with a fetus with terrible birth defects. The mother aborted the pregnancy when she found out, at around 5 months, and then got pregnant again two months later. So if you think she shouldn’t have had an abortion, then the person who wrote to me would never have been born.
So the idea of threatening people with an alternate timeline (“you never would have been born!!!”) is ridiculous, because it works both ways. We’re talking about abortion legislation today, in the present. It doesn’t matter whether you WOULD HAVE been aborted, because you weren’t and you’re alive now.
It’s like when anti-choicers say, “What if that baby would have cured cancer???” What if it would have been a serial killer? What if it took the spot in med school from the scientist who otherwise would have cured cancer? Again, this theoretical argument goes both ways, so it doesn’t make sense for either side to use it as proof.
Reblogging to agree with all the above commentary. I actually have no problem with that line of thinking. I do think your mother should have been able to abort you – if she wanted. Just like I think my mother should have been able to abort me – again, if she wanted. Just like I think I should have been able to abort my child – if I wanted. The point here is, all of us made a choice, and that choice was, “No, I’m good, I want to keep this pregnancy.” Which is the definition of pro-choice, and it makes us no more “right” than a woman who wants to terminate their pregnancy. You know, since that’s what being able to choose is and all that.
Brought to you by someone who seriously has been asked if she’s now anti-abortion because she’s pregnant. Really?
hawberries
