For example, we no longer saw abortion is a right, we must have the right to have an abortion. We now say, it is a womyn's choice whether or not to have an abortion. So now, I often hear, well, yeah it's legal, but *I* would never have one. But you can, but *I* would never do that.

I think that what you're really asking is what to do or think when someone makes a choice that you believe is bad (or wrong, regressive, etc.). Is it safe to assume they've been brainwashed, or do you have to give their choice the benefit of the doubt?

Had a discussion once with a fellow who almost finished a Masters in psychology. He was saying that Freud and Jung were strongly opposed in their day, not particularly because of the highly sexually charged content of their psychology, but because it seemed to restrict freedom of choice. It seemed to say you, your reactions, and your choices, are entirely determined by your upbringing and miscellaneous repressions.

Meself, I've never taken any psychology, so I don't know how mechanistic or deterministic it is.

But when you consider how teen girls are influenced to anorexia by fashion magazines and gazillions of children are influenced by cartoons and Disney, and how much pop music styles affect what is considered "cool" and how advertisers tap into all that----I wonder if maybe very few of our choices are "free."

Maybe the freest people in the world are the ones who aren't influenced by any of that---the one's who aren't tapped into any pop culture at all.

I used to read "Adbusters" a lot. But whilst they talk about how to get away from advertising and pop culture, they are themselves thoroughly plugged into it---if only so they can use it as a spring-off point for their own kind of "cool."

Maybe you'd be more of a free-thinker (and hence free-chooser) if you read, I dunno, say "Persian Poetry Monthly" or something.

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I often hear, well, yeah it's legal, but *I* would never have one. But you can, but *I* would never do that.

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My favourite part was a quote from Gloria Feldt, the head of Planned Parenthood (?) in the States, who said women need abortion rights because, "As far as I know, there is no perfect contraceptive yet. And as far as I know, there are no perfect women, either."

Or, as one of my friends here joked, "Most Americans believe that abortion should be legal in four circumstances: (1) rape or incest, (2) risk to the mother's health, (3) risk to the mother's life, and (4) me."

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Maybe the freest people in the world are the ones who aren't influenced by any of that---the one's who aren't tapped into any pop culture at all.

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But when you consider how teen girls are influenced to anorexia by fashion magazines and gazillions of children are influenced by cartoons and Disney, and how much pop music styles affect what is considered "cool" and how advertisers tap into all that----I wonder if maybe very few of our choices are "free."

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Every choice has consequences. I can certainly see where the consequences of a choice could, in effect, end up "making" that choice for you. But for most choices the consequences are hardly so drastic as to force anyone to make one decision or the other.

I've seen it suggested that North American fashion oppresses women the same way fundamentalist dress such as the Burqa or Hijab does. To me that's a foolish exaggeration.

Don't wear a Burqa in some countries and you could be beaten to within an inch of your life.

Don't wear the latest fashion in North America and you might not get to be "the cool kid".

I see that as a monumental difference. Peer pressure and fashion are different from oppression.

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But for most choices the consequences are hardly so drastic as to force anyone to make one decision or the other.

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True 'nuff. Burger King vs. McDonalds ain't no earth-shattering decision. I don't things are quite as deterministic as the psychologists make it out to be. But still, there must be SOME effect from advertising or they all wouldn't be spending gazillions of dollars on it.

OK, so maybe our day-to-day choices are, on average 80% free, with the other 20% being attributed to advertising / peer pressure.

It probably varies with age, personality, etc.

And maybe part of that is an answer to your really interesting question:

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If trying to look like a fashion model makes 10% of young women anorexic, how are the other 90% escaping? How come they can make a free choice and the rest apparently cannot?

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Maybe if you are young and insecure and your appearance means a lot to you, you succumb more readily to the fashion model mystique and become anorexic.

However, if you are older, naturally kinda dorky and don't care much about fashion to start with, but also have reasonable self-confidence combined with being generally unaware of your surroundings (e.g. me), you escape it completely.

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But still, there must be SOME effect from advertising or they all wouldn't be spending gazillions of dollars on it.

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My understanding of advertising is that the vast majority of it isn't aimed at convincing you to buy something you don't want, so much as convincing you to buy a certain brand of something you already do.

So a Pepsi ad isn't trying to woo you away from drinking plain old water. It's trying to lure a Coke drinker away from Coke. In that respect, it's not really affecting our choice in the way we believe it is. The choice to drink carbonated sugarwater instead of something healthy would be a profound choice and change. But convincing us to switch from one brand to another isn't really much interference in our choices if you ask me.

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Maybe if you are young and insecure and your appearance means a lot to you, you succumb more readily to the fashion model mystique and become anorexic.

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My understanding of anorexia is that it's not really about trying to "become" an image of beauty that's found in the media. If it were, young women would stop when they weigh what a model weighs. There wouldn't be much sense in dropping another 30 or 40 pounds, thereby making yourself decidedly NOT resemble that model.

Anorexia is about control. Look into an anorexic's life and you're more likely to find a controlling family than a stack of Cosmo magazines. For these young women, anorexia isn't evidence of the lack of a choice. It's proof of the only choice they feel they have to take back some measure of control in their lives.

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Originally posted by marcella:
A word that comes up a lot, perhaps it is a third wave feminism concept, is that of choice.

We now say, it is a womyn's choice whether or not to have an abortion. So now, I often hear, well, yeah it's legal, but *I* would never have one. But you can, but *I* would never do that.

We talk about how important choice is, could this term however be used to accept misogynist aspects of life under the guise of freedom??

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marcella,

Returning to your original question, as I recall the abortion wars of the 1980s, is that abortion was always framed as a "choice". The pro-choice movement was called that since the early 80s at least.

This would make the word choice more of a second wave concept.

However, I have also had issues with the framing of the feminist concept of choice. For example some women say they choose to work for pay outside the home. Many women don't have that choice. So Woman A is working outside the home for pay because she chooses to, while Woman B is working outside the home for pay to pay the rent, bills, shoes for the kiddies, etc. Very different politics that bring each woman to paid work.

The concept of choice only has meaning when someone or someones else does *not* have a choice.

The logic behind using the word during the abortion wars is that if there are plentiful safe, clean clinics that provide abortions, in an ideal world, women can then choose to have an abortion _without__risk__to__their__health_. (aside: Of course in a super-ideal world there would be no need for abortions, but that's too far beyond the beyond for me to conceptualize.)

If abortion is illegal or harder to obtain, like for women in rural Canada, poor women, etc, women will continue to have abortions, scary and illegal abortions, that place women in grave medical and health risk. This is a state of women not having "choice" as framed by the argument. And I agree with that argument.

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Fed wrote - If you are going to discuss "choice" you have to discuss "freedom of choice." Nothing is a true choice unless it is free.
Had a discussion once with a fellow who almost finished a Masters in psychology. He was saying that Freud and Jung were strongly opposed in their day, not particularly because of the highly sexually charged content of their psychology, but because it seemed to restrict freedom of choice. It seemed to say you, your reactions, and your choices, are entirely determined by your upbringing and miscellaneous repressions.

Meself, I've never taken any psychology, so I don't know how mechanistic or deterministic it is.

But when you consider how teen girls are influenced to anorexia by fashion magazines and gazillions of children are influenced by cartoons and Disney, and how much pop music styles affect what is considered "cool" and how advertisers tap into all that----I wonder if maybe very few of our choices are "free."

Maybe the freest people in the world are the ones who aren't influenced by any of that---the one's who aren't tapped into any pop culture at all.

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the stigma formerly attached to "unwed mothers" is much reduced. I hope this is an indication that there are more real alternatives for women out there and that the choice of abortion is now not the only one being offered.

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Indeed, it is feminists -- pro-choice feminists -- who have advocated for, and achieved (to the extent advances have occurred), the crucial societal supports that make real reproductive "choice" a genuine possibility for more women. Here are a few examples of such advances, which feminists have achieved through community mobilization, legislative pressure, litigation, unions and other means: legalization of and widespread access to contraception and emergency contraception; equal pay for work of equal value; reduction in social acceptance of sexual assault and other violence against women; the legal prohibition of sex discrimination and discrimination against pregnant women in education, employment and housing; alleviation of the stigma on premarital sex and unwed motherhood; child support for marital and nonmarital children; paid parental leave; girls' and women's access to education; improved access to nontraditional jobs (like lawyering and unionized factory work), and better pay for traditional women's jobs (like teaching and nursing); and many more that I can't think of off the top of my head.

Still, even with all those improvements (and even if we achieved utopia regarding universal access to economic and social justice and perfectly safe, perfectly effective, easy-to-use, acceptable-to-partners contraception) -- i.e. not the world we live in today -- women would still need abortion rights.

This, in my view, is why: if, for whatever reason, a woman finds herself pregnant and decides for herself that she wants (needs) an abortion, continued pregnancy (whether leading to motherhood or adoption) is not a "real alternative". Moreover, if abortion is not available, motherhood (or adoption) is not a "choice". And if a judge, her husband, her parents, her in-laws, her doctor or anyone other than the pregnant woman is allowed to force a woman to become a mother when she does not want to be one, she is not an equal citizen. She lacks "choice" over one of the most fundamental life decisions a person can make.

[ 22 July 2005: Message edited by: puzzlic ]

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Originally posted by marcella:
A word that comes up a lot, perhaps it is a third wave feminism concept, is that of choice. We no longer discuss rights. I wonder what people have to say on the use of this concept.

For example, we no longer saw abortion is a right, we must have the right to have an abortion. We now say, it is a womyn's choice whether or not to have an abortion. So now, I often hear, well, yeah it's legal, but *I* would never have one. But you can, but *I* would never do that.

We talk about how important choice is, could this term however be used to accept misogynist aspects of life under the guise of freedom??

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Women have the right to choose an abortion or to choose not to have an abortion.

I would probably have an abortion if I got pregnant now. I don't want a child right now and my life would be a lot more stressful and difficult. It wouldn't be fair to the kid either, since I'm 20 and in university (read: broke, busy student). I want to get an education so that when I do have kids, I'll be financially stable and mature enough to handle it and be a good mum.

thank you for another wonderful post. You mentioned many points that I overlooked and I'm glad of it.

I especially like this:

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Originally posted by puzzlic:

Still, even with all those improvements (and even if we achieved utopia regarding universal access to economic and social justice and perfectly safe, perfectly effective, easy-to-use, acceptable-to-partners contraception) -- i.e. not the world we live in today -- women would still need abortion rights.

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Originally posted by Mr. Magoo:
My understanding of advertising is that the vast majority of it isn't aimed at convincing you to buy something you don't want, so much as convincing you to buy a certain brand of something you already do.

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Sure, it's about market share, but it's not just about market share. And even if it were, the net effect is for people to buy more stuff generally than they would otherwise.

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Originally posted by Sven:
What I find interesting is statements like this (paraphrasing Clinton when he was president): Abortions should be legal, available...and rare.

What I don't get is the "and rare" part. If abortion is just like getting a knee operation, why should it be "rarer" than any other medical procedure?

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Originally posted by Nikita:
I hardly think abortions are like knee surgery. Having knee surgery doesn't carry a social stigma and Christian fanatics don't shoot or bomb knee surgeons.

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Clearly in that sense, you are correct.

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Originally posted by fern hill:
Rare because cheap, safe, effective birth control is universally available.

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That makes sense: Birth control is cheaper than an abortion procedure (I'm assuming). So, why not go with the cheaper route (society benefits).

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Originally posted by fern hill:
Rare because women have control over situations in which they may become pregnant.

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I'm not sure why that's an argument for why abortions should be rare. From a "control" perspective, women can control pregnancy by using birth control at the outset or having an abortion later. So, I'm not sure how "rare" gives women more control.

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Originally posted by fern hill:
Rare because health and sex education are effective in educating women (and men) about the consequences of unprotected sex.

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I'm inferring from this that it's less of a hassle to handle pregnancy matters with birth control than go through an abortion. But, from a social perspective, why should Clinton, for example, care about that?

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Originally posted by fern hill:
Rare because women have economic and educational alternatives to becoming chattels.

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I'm sorry I just don't understand that one.

The only rationale that makes any sense (from society's perspective) is that abortions cost more than birth control so it would be better to keep abortions "rare" (less of a social cost). The other reasons don't seem to me to be things that society should have any say over one way or the other (it's the woman's choice).

So, if the principal reason that abortions should be rare is to save money, then why would abortions, of all medical procedures, be singled out? We don't say, "Heart bypass surgery should be legal, available...and rare." But, it would make sense to do that because a healthy lifestyle is cheaper than open-heart surgery.

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I just read an interesting Glamour magazine article (someone copied it for me! I swear I don't subscribe! ) which I can't find online. Polls show that the women under 30 disapprove of abortion more than ever before, but there's no corresponding drop in abortion rates.

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I read the same article but obviously with less detail as I hadn't noted that reference to the reduction in abortion being absent.

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Puzzlic, I, too, have read in a couple of places that the under-30 crowd is becoming more pro-life. But I've also read the abortion rate (in Canada at least) is at its lowest level in some number of years.

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I have read that as well. I've often speculated it had to do with the possibility that people's views on this are often shaped in childhood. I am fairly certain that studies would show that the larger the family the more likelihood is that they are prolife. I would also speculate that couples that don't have a family are more likely prochoice. I believe that is a big factor.

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aside: Of course in a super-ideal world there would be no need for abortions,

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I agree although I think we'd probably disagree on how that fleshed itself out.

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What I don't get is the "and rare" part. If abortion is just like getting a knee operation, why should it be "rarer" than any other medical procedure?

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I've brought that forward before and persons believe that it should be rare because it is a medical procedure and the risks associated with it, even if you believe they are limited, still outweigh the absolute NON risks of not having an abortion because you are not even pregnant.

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Originally posted by Sven:

Clearly in that sense, you are correct.

My point is this: Putting aside for a moment the Christian fanatics and the Randolphs of the world, why would a Pro-Choice person make a judgmental statement that abortions should be "rare"? It's a standard medical procedure. So, why should it be stigmatized with: Abortions should be "rare"? In other words: Why should abortions be "rare" if there's nothing wrong with them?

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I can certainly see why this comment would cause concern, standing by itself. And there have been some very good points here regarding why it should. But I don't think the intent behind it was as troubling as a literal interpretation makes it out to be.

If I were to guess what he was thinking (or what he thought his audience would think of his remark - one has to think like a politician when dealing with them) I would have to conclude that he would say such a thing for two reasons.

First, based on the self-evident and simple justification that, like all routine medical procedures, it is preferable that abortion not be necessary in the first place. Me, I'd rather not need knee surgery, or ocular surgery, or any other kind of routine operative procedure if it can be avoided, no matter how 'routine' it might be.

It is not just money. Even the pro-est of pro-choicers would not say that abortion is good. Anyone who's had one would not say that it was a real good time.

Let's try this again. Rare because women would not get pregnant unless they wanted to, they were not coerced, the financial situation was tolerable, etc. Pregnancy would not be the result of ignorance, coercion, violence, or muddleheaded romance. It would be chosen.

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Originally posted by Hailey:
But I've also read the abortion rate (in Canada at least) is at its lowest level in some number of years.

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Originally posted by Hailey:

I've brought that forward before and persons believe that it should be rare because it is a medical procedure and the risks associated with it, even if you believe they are limited, still outweigh the absolute NON risks of not having an abortion because you are not even pregnant.

Any medical procedure has risks.

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Originally posted by fern hill:
First, Sven, I'm talking about women in general, not just USian women.

It is not just money. Even the pro-est of pro-choicers would not say that abortion is good. Anyone who's had one would not say that it was a real good time.

Let's try this again. Rare because women would not get pregnant unless they wanted to, they were not coerced, the financial situation was tolerable, etc. Pregnancy would not be the result of ignorance, coercion, violence, or muddleheaded romance. It would be chosen.

Abortion then would be rare because the pregnancy was a result of accident (failed birth control), coercion, or violence. And these things themselves would be rare, in a better world.

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Originally posted by fern hill:
Sven, you're new here, so here's a clue: Hailey is anti-abortion, anti-feminist.

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First, based on the self-evident and simple justification that, like all routine medical procedures, it is preferable that abortion not be necessary in the first place. Me, I'd rather not need knee surgery, or ocular surgery, or any other kind of routine operative procedure if it can be avoided, no matter how 'routine' it might be.

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Yes, I was trying to convey that. You did a better job.

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But, why single out abortions only for this kind of specific admonition?

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I'm not sure that I'd agree that that occurs. At least it hasn't with the person I've met that are in favour of abortion rights.

The reality is that the discussion about abortion doesn't usually spill over into a discussion about knee surgery or eye surgery. I am sure that none of them would advocate for anyone undergoing a medical procedure routinely.

I don't see the inconsistency.

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I think this is a genuine question. It made me think of something i read of D. Quinn "Thinkers aren't limited by what they know, because they can always increase what they know. Rather, they're limited by what puzzles them."

When something is widely considered to be choice, rather than a right, it automatically creates a pair of opposites. Suddenly the thinking is more focused: in this example, to abort or not. It sets up a system of values. Soceity is changed.

I've always wondered what women long ago did regarding abortion. It is hard to find out because women's place in the world has changed so greatly so fast. A lot of our history has been silenced.
If you think of how recently birth control has appeared as a widely accepted and available thing, it looks to me that we are doing really well with the whole deal! It's not surprising that some women want, and need, abortions.

Honestly, the big question that has always lurked in my mind is "Are women really meant to use birth control?"
This is not a moral thing for me, i just wonder if our bodies, minds, and all are able to keep up with such a change so fast. Our technology often moves faster than we can keep up with. I have read many things about the effects on women now, and listened to word of mouth, but what about generations later? It's definetly affecting the choices we make, and the world we live in. Before not long ago, a women had sex knowing she could very well get pregnant. Now, we often have sex without the thought of bearing a child. It's interesting to think about.

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Originally posted by flushd:

I've always wondered what women long ago did regarding abortion. .

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Women have always had abortions, with and without medical safety. There's very little documented for obvious reasons, but using a recent example of previous post here in which a young man was sentenced to prison for "inducing" an abortion in his girlfriend, I would say it still happens a fair bit when such access is unavailable.

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Honestly, the big question that has always lurked in my mind is "Are women really meant to use birth control?" .

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I'm really not sure what you mean by this. I don't believe there's been any phenomenon in history when women have given birth to every possible conception, which would mean a child a year from puberty to menopause. To my mind this means that some sort of birth control is being used, even extending nursing to extend lactation (altho that's not guaranteed to prevent conception).

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One more thing, since this IS a feminism board:
Our bodies are our own. We aren't given much when we are born, but we can choose to be free.

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Right-wing think tanks, especially in the U.S. but here too, have had a concerted program in place for the last twenty years to co-opt such terms and to use them for quite different purposes, often to reverse social advances made by liberation movements.

We can all think of blatantly Orwellian examples of such co-optation: just as the Bush administration will give a bill that loosens environmental controls some happy-clappy Green title, so they will announce the privatization of many social programs (often by handing power and money over to faith groups) as schemes that will increase people's "choices" (when in fact they both increase people's vulnerability to improper evangelism and tend to the destruction of social programs).

So simply running on slogans and positive rhetoric has become a problem. We can't lose our command of the history behind the struggle for abortion rights, nor of the logic of the arguments that won the day a generation ago. Puzzlic and bcg and fern hill have laid those out admirably above.

Hailey -- it was toward the end of the Glamour article, last page or two. I should also clarify -- it was inaccurate for me to say that US and Canadian abortion rates have not dropped 1992-present, which is the time frame during which approval ratings have dropped among young women. Abortion rates have declined over the past 13 years, but gradually. During the same time frame, abortion approval ratings among young women have dropped precipitously. This suggests that women's attitude toward abortion doesn't necessarily determine their behaviour when faced with an unwanted pregnancy -- i.e., some young women who disapprove of abortion, or favour greater restrictions on it, nonetheless have abortions when they need them.

(I think there was an Alan Guttmacher Institute study linking the drop in abortion rates to increased and more consistent use of contraception during the 1990s.)

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Honestly, the big question that has always lurked in my mind is "Are women really meant to use birth control?" .

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So to the extent you question whether women are "meant" to use birth control rather than have 8 kids, you might equally question whether women are "meant" to survive their childbearing years or, rather, die in childbirth as nature intended.

Thank God -- er, humanity, actually -- for modern medicine.

[ 23 July 2005: Message edited by: puzzlic ]