Abortion for Wards of the State: HB673

Virginia House Bill #673 would, if enacted, allow judges to authorize abortions for teenagers who become wards of the state. Full text here:

http://lis.virginia.gov/cgi-bin/legp604.exe?121+ful+HB673

So far I've resisted the temptation to post a long snarky piece I wrote, at home, after reading the doomed HB1 (which would define a fetus as a person, which is a guaranteed way to start a long debate that gets nowhere). However, HB673 is not your ordinary "pro-choice statement." It says nothing about the teenager's own individual choice. It gives the choice to the judge.

It's not a topic anyone likes to think about, Gentle Readers, but whenever judges, social workers, or other state employees are permitted to discuss abortion with teenagers they've been allowed to oversee, some of them are prone to try to "sell" abortions to girls for whom abortion is not their choice. And, specifically, abortions have been recommended to certain ethnic groups, e.g. Native Americans, more than twice as often as to others, e.g. Anglo-Americans. The pain and danger of abortion are minimized, and the burden of motherhood is exaggerated, by social workers whose agenda is primarily to keep teenaged girls on the school attendance rolls as long as possible.

Funding schools on a per-pupil-per-day basis creates motivation for many harmful efforts to get students into classrooms at any cost. The largest-scale abuse starts in grade one when schools and teachers urge parents to send children with cold and flu symptoms to school. The abuse continues when parents are urged to "medicate" children who don't fit into the classroom environment rather than take time to figure out what would actually help these children. And yes, Gentle Readers, in states that have condoned encouragement of abortion for teenagers, I've personally talked to girls, including a sixteen-year-old Cherokee who repeated to me what she had to tell a pushy social worker who wouldn't shut up about abortion, "I'd kill anyone who tried to kill my baby!"

Bringing judges into the issue raises another issue. According to the original Roe v. Wade ruling, a woman's right to choose abortion rests on her right to privacy. What about the privacy of teenagers who would be forced to subject the most personal, sensitive, confidential decision they've ever thought about to a court hearing? Even if juvenile court records aren't printed in the newspaper, we can be sure these girls would see a few former classmates in the courtroom, and if they're not habitual criminals their classmates would know why they were there.

Abortion as a choice is one issue. Abortion as something that can be pushed, or even forced, upon adolescents is a different issue. Even if you're "pro-choice," you should oppose HB673.