I have never written a serious blog before, but I feel that since I am studying journalism and journalism is moving further and further away from print and towards the web, I should really be involved in this phenomenon. It's not that I have never written a blog. I was one of those people who had the blog that told everyone how my day, month, week, year was going without actually saying anything of any significance.

When trying to decide what to write about, the first thing that came to mind is an article that I am thinking about writing for the local student newspaper. I suppose that it is in some ways ironic that I am still thinking along the lines of what I would write for a newspaper when thinking about what I would write for blogs. The two mediums are supposed to be so entirely different, but everything that affects me personally lately also makes me think whether I could make that into an article. I suppose that is what studying journalism does to a person.

The subject of my first ever serious blog (as you may have noticed from the heading) is abortion. The reason for this is a story that I very recently heard that truly disturbed me and made me slightly sick to the stomach. I don't know the full story, and in fact only had it related to me from a friend (let's call him John) who knew one of the people this girl was living with (let's call her Sarah). But even only knowing part of the story disturbs me enough to know that I don't want to know the rest of the gory details.

What I do know is that this girl (let's call her Anne) was pregnant and beyond the point of no return, when abortion is illegal. Anne didn't have a place to live and was going from friend to friend, sleeping on couches. Eventually she ended up sleeping on Sarah's couch. One day Sarah came home from work to find the bathroom splattered with blood. She went to each of her housemates and they eventually worked out that the blood was Anne's. So they approached Anne and asked her about it. She told them that it was only bloody diarrhea. They decided that there had to be something seriously wrong with her if there was that much blood, so they took her to the hospital. There they were told that Anne had induced an abortion on herself.
Now as disturbing as I find the idea of inducing one's own abortion, what I find more disturbing is the part that follows...
Sarah went home with the housemates, leaving Anne at the hospital for the night. They went to clean up the bathroom and in the process of cleaning they found the foetus in the toilet.

Now, as far as I understand the story, Anne was underage, because according to the law, as a minor she had more rights than the foetus did. Even though it was illegal to perform an abortion on herself, her rights prevent her from being arrested or made an example of. I am not sure of the whole story behind that part, but it disturbs me that a person could even do such a thing to themselves.

Don't get me wrong. I am all for abortion. I think it is a fantastic thing that women should be able to choose for themselves whether to have children or not. You can be as careful as you like, but short of abstinence or immaculate conception, accidents can happen. People fall pregnant while on the pill and while using condoms. Nothing is 100% fail safe other than abstinence. And considering that some women are raped without condoms or any protection being used to prevent them from becoming pregnant, I believe women should have the right to say no to having a child depending on their situation. I also believe that in cases like that of women with HIV, it would be absolutely irresponsible to bring a baby into the world knowing that you are putting it at risk of contracting HIV. In cases such as these, abortion is fabulous.

But past the point where abortion is legal I believe that people who try to do it themselves are stupid and dangerous individuals. I believe that they are stupid for two reasons. First of all, shouldn't they have done it before the pregnancy got they got to the point where abortion was illegal. Fair enough, it is sometimes the case that they do not realise that they are pregnant until it is too late, but that is in a minority of cases as far as I can tell. Second of all, the limit is there for a reason. After 20 weeks, to have an abortion is a dangerous procedure for women and there can often be serious complications that can lead to death. So anyone who would try to induce an abortion on themselves when a doctor won't do it for them is endangering their own lives which is a stupid thing to do. They evidently don't want to die themselves, otherwise they wouldn't object to staying pregnant. If they didn't want to baby and they didn't want to live, then they wouldn't have bothered with the abortion. They could have just killed themselves and the baby would have died at the same time. They obviously want to live, but they are putting themselves at risk by inducing pregnancy. Their stupidity is what I believe makes them dangerous individuals.

Anyway, I don't know how much longer I can talk about this without it becoming a rant. It might have gone beyond that point already, in which case I feel sorry for anyone who might happen across this blog and read it. I will stop now though, however, and end the pain.