The days of “safe, legal, and rare” abortions are over. In typical millennial fashion, we are in the days of convenience, denial, and selfishness.
I recently came across an article posted earlier this month titled, “I am 23 and I have had 3 abortions. YES I HAVE!,” by a woman named Heather. The article, which has since been removed with no explanation, was featured on a website called “Shout Your Abortion,” which describes itself as “a decentralized network of individuals talking about abortion on our own terms and creating space for others to do the same.” The website also declares that “abortion is normal.”
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This normalization of abortion is not new. The desensitization of women to abortion to protect women from facing what they are actually doing by encouraging them to proudly flaunt and “shout it,” however, is.
“Birth control does not always work!” Heather begins. “Why do people think that I should have a child because of an accident?”
She says she had her first abortion when she was 16 years old after she “goofed” and admits that it was not easy and that she cried, but says, “I have no regrets.”
There is no doubt that people make mistakes, and while the first abortion should have been prevented in the first place, I would at least hope she would learn from her mistake — but this clearly wasn’t the case.
She claims that when she was 19 she went on a hike and had sex with a guy she met. She says she was unable to use protection for the second time because “sadly I had no condom with me (my backpack already weighed 49 pounds).” A condom weighs no more than 0.07 ounces. This resulted in her second abortion.
In May, she says she had her third abortion when she was 12 weeks pregnant because she received a new job.
Her abortions display the millennial mindset: on the one hand, we wish to be responsible, but on the other, many of us are woefully unprepared for adulthood — even after three “mistakes.”
Heather is representative of the women who have been desensitized to what abortion actually is and the moral issues surrounding it. She openly admits that she had these abortions because she did not want to be inconvenienced. “Seriously, do you think I should be living on welfare and food stamps and living in a little studio apartment with a child that I can barely take care of? SERIOUSLY!?!?” she writes.
Heather’s article does not mention alternatives to abortion that would save a baby’s life — such as adoption — but instead demonstrates her narcissism. “I am 23, I have a good life,” she says. “I don’t want to destroy it because of a bunch of children that I am not ready for.”
In 2014, 652,639 babies were aborted. You don’t get to take away a life because you don’t want to be inconvenienced. Making the same mistake three times and being proud of it is twisted and narcissistic, not “normal.”
So millennials, admirers of convenience, take responsibility for your actions, and, if nothing else, consider that it is more convenient to use one form of birth control (or two) than to remove a baby from a womb.
Pro-choicers in the past were supportive of the act but were not flaunting it. To them, abortion was supposed to be rare and only done when they believed it was absolutely necessary. Now, the millennial generation continues to take things to the extreme and views abortion as “self-care.” Heather says she hopes that “people would look at abortion was [sic] just another surgery.” Not only is sexual education important, but facing the realities of what exactly an abortion entails — the ending of a life through extraction or a pill — is essential.
Heather’s article and the #ShoutYourAbortion website points to a growing issue among the younger generation — not only are millennials acting irresponsibly, they’re proud of it. Whether one is pro-life or pro-choice, having three abortions is nothing to brag about. Instead of celebrating mistakes, young people should reflect on what they did wrong — and learn from it.