Friday, March 23, 2007

Choice? I'm All For It.

People all over the world are concerned about the fate of Knut, the baby polar bear. Its mother turned out to be a "fertile woman with no maternal instincts" (bonus points if you know the source of that quotation) and rejected the cub and its brother at birth. The second baby died. Mom still doesn't care. She's free of any obligations and restrictions now, and can go about her life doing her own thang without anything to tie her down. She hoped both of the babies would die, but ultimately, as long as she didn't have to deal with them any more, she really didn't care. They weren't babies to her; they were inconveniences. Mom has rights, you know.

There are a lot of people who don't believe Knut should have been allowed to live.

But the surviving baby has been reared and cared for by zoo officials, and it is thriving. Sweet, friendly, loving, playful. . . . people all over Europe can't wait for Knut's offical debut at the zoo.

Public outcry saved Knut from the fate certain animal activists still insist would have been the right choice. Now that the baby is thriving, these activists have backed down a bit, but they still maintain that the baby should have been killed.

Meanwhile, up in the frozen north, businessmen who deal in fur, and "sportsmen" are still advocating that clubbing baby seals is not such a bad thing. Any videos you might have seen, showing grown men clubbing a baby seal to death, or trying to run down Humane Society boats who want to film these hunts so people can SEE what's going on, or showing a skinned, still-alive baby seal swimming away, are nothing but propaganda, and that screaming running skinned baby. . . that's nothing more than a simple reflex, comparable to a beheaded chicken dancing around the barnyard. Seals eat cod, and people eat cod, and people should have ALL the cod, so the seals should be killed so people will buy have more cod. People also need to keep warm, and sealskin keeps people warm. It's not the peoples' fault if baby seals have the prettiest skin. People have rights, you know. They want to be fed and they want to be warm and they want to look good. Those are all rights. Rights that people will pay money for.

I am all for animal rights. I just find it ironic that people who will send money, protest in the streets, and offer to take in animals, people who work night and day for the right of a lobster NOT to be boiled alive, don't seem to give a shit when it comes to human babies.

They won't eat boiled lobster, or wear fur, and they are appalled when a mother polar bear would rather be free and unencumbered than deal with her own babies, but when it comes to human babies? Hey. Keep your laws off my body. I'll kill it if I want to.

Back in the seventies, I thought like that, too. I wrote paper after paper about how an inconvenient unwanted fetus was no different than an inconvenient unwanted appendix or tonsil, and that disposing of any unwanted inconvenient mass of tissue was the same as the other. I believed it, too. I marched in the streets. I carried signs. "Our bodies, our own."

And then I grew up.

And when people grow up, they are supposed to realize that each person is responsible for her own actions, and if she is inconvenienced by the consequences of those actions, well, that's too damn bad. No man is an island. Everything we do touches someone else in some way.

That is why we must be careful about what we do. Because every action has a reaction, and if you don't want that reaction, DON'T DO THE ACTION IN THE FIRST PLACE; or, if you know you're going to do it anyway, use protection. It's not rocket science. Duh.

No, I am not calling anyone a slut. I am not advocating punishment for women who love sex. I am not a nun who belongs back in a 12th-century convent. I do not live with my head in the sand. I just. . . grew up.

I am simply a grown-up woman who believes that people should not put themselves in the line of fire of a consequence they do not have the balls to carry through. I am a person who understands that all actions have consequences, and that if the original action was sloppy, then the consequence might very well be severe. Yes, you asked for it. No, your body is no longer your own; you are now sharing it with another body. Yes, you were there first. No, the other body did not ask to be invited to share yours. YOU brought it there of your own free will. Sure, you can change your mind and kill it rather than see the consequences of your own action carried through; that is your choice.

Choose wisely. You have to live with it.

As for the legislation that would require all women to see the ultrasound before they made up their minds. . . . I'm all for it.

I think only those who felt guilty in the first place would find anything objectionable in asking that the women see the faces of their victims. I think all who kill in any way should be required to look their victims in the face. If not before, then after. There is not enough guilt in the world today; people think guilt is a bad thing. It's not. Sometimes, guilt is the only thing that separates human mentality from that of a mother polar bear who kills her baby.

Thirty years ago, I would have never believed I would feel this way. Now, it's hard to believe I felt THAT way. Young women, please be careful. Show your body some respect, and don't let anybody who doesn't show it respect ever see it, let alone touch it.

Please. If you aren't smart enough to make bloody determined SURE you won't get pregnant, don't screw around. And if screwing around is your thang, PLEASE use reliable birth control. And yes, it IS my business. Babies are everybody's business. If you don't want one, make sure you don't create one, and if you've already created one and don't want it, there are a million people out there who would take it in a whipstitch and give it all the love you don't have.

I won't make friends with this post. But this issue is everywhere, and this is my take on it. And I am not talking about rape or incest or any other dealings with monsters. I am talking about a woman's CHOICE, which is: "Do I or do I not have sex with this hot guy, knowing full well what the consequences might be." THAT'S what choice is. Pregnancy is a consequence of that choice.

And as I said, thirty years ago my opinions were the exact opposite as they are now. I changed.

I grew up.

Mamacita, Scheiss Weekly