[Coach]

It's a big issue in the past few weeks. I don't really want to get into the Alabama BS, as that's an obvious disgusting troll job to try and overturn existing law and there is plenty of room in the America Is No Good Thread for that.

There are a lot of opinions and emotions involved in this issue, and those opinions include opinions on who should even have an opinion (or at least one that actually affects policy). But it seems pretty rare that I see someone with actual experience share theirs. I'll state my own position and experience first.

I'm a white man pushing 30. Some people think that excludes me from having a meaningful opinion, and I guess that's fine. I've been pro-choice since I was really old enough to critically consider it. That said, I have had experience with abortion myself where a girlfriend of mine got pregnant while we were in our early 20's. She went through all the processes of finding out she was sure before telling me. And even when she did, she was extremely nervous about it. She had no reason to be, we were in a committed relationship and loved each other, but she still spent weeks having symptoms and suspicions that she never discussed with me. When she finally did tell me, I asked her what she wanted to do, she told me "she'd already made the appointment." At the time I won't say I wasn't relieved. That said, there wasn't really a legitimate reason to have the abortion outside of really "no thanks." We loved each other, I did want to marry her, I was starting a stable career, she was just finishing school, we both have families who were more than capable of helping, etc... It would have absolutely changed the direction we thought our lives were going, but babies are what happens when you have lots of unprotected sex...

So I offered to pay for the procedure, or at least split it, when I found out in AB you get "3 for free" which sounded like a really weird deal at WalMart or something. She also told me her sister had had two. Some of this didn't really sit well with me, even as a very liberal progressive person. I'm all for choice and the reasons abortion is necessary, but here I'm sitting in the middle of what is pretty much every conservatives argument against abortion. And not only that, as 1/2 the parent of this zygote, I didn't really have a part of the discussion about whether or not we were going to keep this kid. That was her choice to keep me out of, probably more out of fear than anything. What if I said I wanted to keep it? Did she want me to say that? What if I told her to get rid of it? What would that conversation reveal about me that maybe she didn't want to know? Would it change her mind? These are all questions that, as a man, I will never have to deal with. Or at least, she relieved me of the responsibility of dealing with it. Because, in the end, I could have gone through all those questions, but I'm not the one that would have to carry this child. Yes I would harbour responsibility for her and the baby, but only if she chooses to do so. But what if she wanted to keep it? What are my choices as a parent that maybe doesn't want to be involved? Obviously I can't force an abortion on her, it would be insane to force a medical procedure on someone that they didnt want and that could potentially change them forever... So if she wants to keep it, the options left are raise it responsibly, or be a dirtbag and leave. Not great options, but hey, we had the sex. And leaving is a choice that I could make, no different than her aborting it is a choice that she could make. Both are ####ty choices. But one is an invasive medical procedure, so.... kind of a deal breaker there. And so while, to this day I'm a little disappointed I wasn't included in her thought process in that situation, none of this changed my opinion on whether or not it's absolutely her choice. And to see what she went through in those coming weeks in regards to emotional and physical stress, I can imagine only the rarest of people would want to risk going through that more than necessary.

All this said, I don't think completely excluding men from the conversation is a positive (or even possible) way to go. There should probably have all female panels that draft the laws surrounding these policies, but there will always be men involved in law making, so there's not really a way around that other than to make them understand that a person should have total autonomy over their body and access to proper information and healthcare. I'm a firm believer that you can't stop people from doing the things they want or need to do, regardless of what you personally consider right or moral. Drugs, abortion, polygamy, all types of sexual behavior, etc... outlawing it has never done anything but harm everyone, including those doing the persecuting as they themselves will inevitably be faced with the same questions in their own lives/families.

And (if money is all you care about) the tax dollars spent to enforce policies outlawing these types of activities is monstrous compared to the cost it takes to roll with the problems and invest in preventative care. You'd rather pay an entire justice system to investigate and incriminate millions of people than for a few hundred dollar medical procedure, and the left are the virtue signalers? Whoops, I said this wasn't going to be about the abortion laws in the US, my bad.

Anyways, I encourage people to share their own stories regardless of which way you lean on it, and if the experienced changed your thoughts at all.