The New York Times has a disturbing piece on the recent success of the US Christian Right’s War on Contraception. Apparently not forcing women to get pregnant when they have sex goes against a Culture Of Life, whatever that may be.
Although I think abortion anti-choicers are wrong, there is actually an issue to debate – something is destroyed in an abortion; the questions are whether this can be classed as ‘a human life’ and whether, if so, taking it can be justifiable. This is not the case for contraception: if you oppose it you are merely a mindless loony and a fanatic (and yes, I know this includes millions of Catholics – all I can say in response is that it’s a shame we stopped burning them at the stake).
An interesting stat from the piece, and not one that I’d necessarily expect given that an abortion is almost impossible to get in some of the more fanatical parts of the US, is that the US’s annual abortion rate is 22 per 1000 women (compared to 18 in the UK and nine in the den of sin that is the Netherlands). Still, I’m sure the War on Contraception will bring this rate down…