"I thought that they, like myself, simply wanted to 'save the lives of unborn babies.' I have come to the conclusion that I was a dupe."

I was going to have a couple of short links to interesting sites, but it's hard.  I know brief is good, but life is complicated and brief means simplifying the complications.  I do strive for clear, but not simple.  So I'm just going to do this one link on abortion.


How I Lost Faith In The Pro-Life Movement  - This post is several years old, and the basics are well known to anyone who has any awareness of the facts of abortion.  Basically:

• Promoting contraceptives decreases abortion more than anything else.
• Banning abortion doesn't decrease number of abortions, but increases deaths of mothers getting illegal and unsafe abortions.
• Much of the anti-abortion movement is men trying to control women

There's also an interesting discussion about when life begins and how the body sloughs off many fertilized cells naturally - more in women not taking birth control than in those using birth control pills.  Here's a sample of what it sounds like:

"I have to be honest, this blog post totally shocked me. I wondered about the numbers Sarah used, so I went looking for verification. As I did this I opted to use the pro-life movement’s own numbers on the rate of fertilized eggs that fail to implant for women on the pill. Remember, once again, that scientific studies have found again and again that the pill does not result in fertilized eggs failing to implant. However, I felt that if I used the pro-life movement’s own numbers I could not be accused of simply using studies with a liberal bias. And so I explored the numbers."

There's lots of numbers to back all this up, numbers most people don't have when discussing abortion.  And numbers I need to check up on (the link right above goes to another of her own posts that goes into more detailed numbers.  The author of all this this is listed as Libby Anne on the website Patheos which describes itself as:

"Patheos.com is the premier online destination to engage in the global dialogue about religion and spirituality, and to explore and experience the world's beliefs. Patheos is the website of choice for the millions of people looking for credible and balanced information about religion. Patheos brings together faith communities, academics, and the broader public into a single environment, and is the place where many people turn on a regular basis for insight, inspiration, and stimulating discussion."

Libby Anne's brief bio is:

"Libby Anne grew up in a large evangelical homeschool family highly involved in the Christian Right. College turned her world upside down, and she is today an atheist, a feminist, and a progressive. She blogs about leaving religion, her experience with the Christian Patriarchy and Quiverfull movements, the detrimental effects of the "purity culture," the contradictions of conservative politics, and the importance of feminism."

For now, I'm going to trust Patheos to have checked up on Libby Anne's background.  But I'll also email them and find out how they vet authors.  I'll let you know when or if I hear back.


Meanwhile, when the anti-abortion group pickets in front of Planned Parenthood, nearby, I'm going to give them all copies.  But I realize that for some people out their picketing, being anti-abortion is their self identity.  If they aren't anti-abortion, who will they become?  It's hard changing.