The Repugs thrive on misinformation and scare tact

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Gilbert’s implication—that, if it were legal, women would routinely wait until they were physically in labor before making an impulsive decision to terminate an unwanted pregnancy— is a timeworn right-wing scare tactic.

Abortions late in pregnancy are rare—in 2015, just 1.3 percent of abortions occurred at or after 21 weeks’ gestation, the same as it was in 1992. And in 1992, one study found that only about 2 percent of that 1 percent of abortions were performed at more than 26 weeks’ gestation.

But pregnant women are not as capricious, nor doctors as slapdash, as anti-abortion advocates make them out to be. There are plenty of legitimate reasons that a woman might want or need an abortion later in her pregnancy.

As doctor and public health researcher Daniel Grossman explained in a Twitter thread on Thursday, changes in the health of the fetus or pregnant woman, late-in-pregnancy test results revealing fetal abnormalities or nonviability, and legal restrictions—”Everything from medically unnecessary waiting periods and ultrasound laws to shuttering of clinics and insurance bans,” Grossman writes—can all contribute to a woman’s decision to get an abortion in her second or third trimester.

There’s also the fact that the experiences of pregnancy, birth, and human development don’t lend themselves easily to the broad yet hyperspecific generalizations that pieces of legislation require. Every body—of a pregnant woman, of a fetus—is different, as is every set of life circumstances that might lead a woman to choose abortion as the best option for her and her family.

Arguing for the right to third-trimester abortion means arguing that the exceptions should become the rule: Even though third-trimester abortions are extraordinarily rare, if restrictions on them are too strict, they could prevent women in unimaginably difficult and dangerous situations from getting the care they need.

But it’s hard to convince the general public that loosening abortion restrictions to account for these few cases won’t then allow all manner of women to wait until they’re 30 weeks pregnant to request elective abortions.

The reality is, there’s no reason why any woman would decide of her own free will to opt for a more dangerous, painful, and wildly expensive procedure over an earlier, easier one.

But in a culture that believes women to be fundamentally irrational and untrustworthy—in issues of sexual harassment, assault, and discrimination as well as reproductive health—an If they can, they will argument is more convincing than the simple truth of They won’t.

In a series of tweets on the controversy, conservative New York Times columnist Ross Douthat pointed out that, for anti-abortion advocates, “if you’re trying to awaken consciences why wouldn’t you highlight the cruelest cases?”

It’s in the anti-choice crowd’s interest to make exceedingly rare abortions involving a fetus that looks like a baby seem like not only the norm, but the inevitable outcome when women and doctors are empowered to make emotionally fraught and medically necessary decisions.

The real cruelty is that it’s easier to generate sympathy for a fake scenario conjured by a Republican legislator than for real pregnant women who, faced with devastating decisions they never wanted to make, find they’re not trusted to make those decisions themselves.

https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2019/02/v...-tran.html

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