Common Anti-Abortion Myths

themixedfeminist:

Here is a list of some of the most common anti-abortion myths that I have seen.

Federal Money Funds Abortions

Many, many prolifers seem to believe that federal money (i.e their tax dollars) is being used to help fund abortions. This is completely untrue. The Hyde Amendment passed in 1976 barred the use of federal money being used to help pay for abortions with the only exceptions being given for life of the pregnant person and rape/incest.

Margaret Sanger Wanted to “Control” the Black Population 

Many prolifers claim that Marageret Sangers the founder of Planned Parenthood, founded Planned Parenthood partly to push forward her “anti-black beliefs.” Something that they claim comes from this quote of hers:

“We want to exterminate the Negro population”

However, the above quote is taken completely out of context. The full quote is:

“We do not want word to go out that we want to exterminate the Negro population and the minister is the man who can straighten out that idea if it ever occurs to any of their more rebellious members.”

Additionally, this quote comes from a letter that Sanger wrote about how they needed to employ black doctors for their clinics in the black community. Sangers made an effort to recruit black leaders to help run those clinics instead of white men. 

While Sangers did believe in the eugenics movement (as did many other people), she did not have nay secret goals to “kill off” or “exterminate” black americans or the poor.

Banning Abortion Will Stop Abortions

There seems to be this prevalent beliefs among the prolife community that people are only getting abortions now because it is legal. And that once we get rid of Roe v Wade, the abortion rate will significantly drop. This is not true.

Countries that have restrictive abortion laws still see about the same rate of people getting abortion as countries with lax abortion laws. 

There are many reasons for this. Banning abortions does not address the reasons why people get abortions, such as lack of access to contraceptives, economic status, etc. Additionally, because most abortions happen during the first trimester, it is easier for pregnant people to end their pregnancies at home without seeing a doctor. One researcher noted that in countries wehere abortion is completely illegal, many pregnant people use abortifacient drugs such as misoprostol to end their pregancies. 

Ending Abortion Will Save Lives

This is one of the biggest myths I see from the prolife community. This idea that by banning abortions, you get to “save lives”. If the goal is to “save” fetal lives, then as stated above banning abortions does not do that. What banning abortions will do is increase the maternal mortality rate. This is because in countries where abortion is illegal the number of safe abortions decrease, and the number of unsafe abortions rise.

According to the World Health Organization (WHO) 45% of all abortions worlwide are unsafe. A majority of unsafe abortions are happening in countries where abortion is completely banned or only allowed in certain circumstances. Additionally, unsafe abortions are one of the leading causes of maternal mortality worldwide. 

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If there were any other common myths I didn’t add, feel free to add them below.