Letters to the Editor
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Don't make policy based on anecdotes
Wow, reading these letters you'd think that every parent in the state of California is an incestuous rapist who's also a violent, rabidly anti-abortion ideologue. I feel for everyone who's had bad encounters with parents (and those of you who read some horror story in a newspaper somehwere) but government policy should not be based on anecdotal evidence. If we're going to have a real debate about this issue, we need to look at reliable statistics from states where parental notification laws are in place, and not just keep highlighting frightening examples.
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Forced pregnancy
I'd like to re-emphasize a point made here: In a perfect world, parents would be compassionate and kind and think about what is best for their daughters. But the fact is, girls with those parents would tell them anyway, without a law in place telling them to.
I'm concerned for those girls whose parents would beat them, or verbally abuse them. Or the parents who would kick the girl out of their home. Or the parents who would make the girl carry the child to term, forcing her to deal with her mistake for the rest of her life and foisting responsibility on her she isn't ready for (or she wouldn't want the abortion in the first place). We have to protect those girls. They aren't alone in their decision--most clinics and Planned Parenthood programs have counseling. We have to leave the decision up to the girl having the abortion.
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So, basically...
The teens who would've told their parents anyways, will do so. You won't be penalizing them by requiring parental consent. The only teens you'd be harming by requiring parental consent would be the ones who know darned well what they are in for if they tell their parents, or their parents find out some other way.
And then, at the magical age of 18, that teen suddenly morphs into someone capable of making decisions for herself.
You've got to be kidding me!
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ugh.. are you kidding me?
You must be completely disconnected from the realities of life for millions of teenage girls to vote for such a measure. I grew up with restraining orders against both of my parents at various points in my life... I had an abortion at age 19, and thank god I didn't have to tell either of them. How dare you attempt to dictate the content of MY family communication.
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Why
The case for parental notification is absurd. Why would it be more appropriate to let a teenager go through pregnancy, delivery, and possibly motherhood, on her own than to let her have an outpatient medical procedure? A teenager does not need parental consent to get pregnant. In nearly all states a girl can get privacy-protected reproductive care without parental consent, and she can become an emancipated minor via the pregnancy. So if carrying pregnancy to term merits a girl the ability to make her own decision...so why exactly does making a mature, informed decision that having a baby she is unprepared to deal with is not in her best interests keep her a child?
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Do teens have any civil rights?
That's the basic question.
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Government Interference in Families? Are you kidding?
"I just don't think ... that the government has the right to interfere with how families run themselves."
But that's EXACTLY what the government is doing with this measure! The state is dictating that all families act the same way, and go through the same legally required motions, because that is what the government has deemed acceptable and appropriate for parents to do.
Teenagers who are mature enough to have sex are mature enough to decide whether they will carry a pregnancy to term or have an abortion.
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Good point, Samantha...
So here's another example of a teenager dying because of a parental notification law: Becky Bell.
Becky Bell got preganant at seventeen. She was close to her mother, but she also knew that her mother would be terribly disapointed if she found out her daughter was pregnant. So she had to have a back alley abortion.
Becky Bell died days later.
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Parental Notification Can Jeopardize Teens
I'm distressed to find well-thought feminists and humanists supporting parental notification for abortion. Oh yes, theoretically, the court can award the right to teens living in an abusive household. If a girl is so afraid that she can't go home and talk to her own family about an unwanted pregnancy, do you really think she's going to have the nerve to go to COURT? In addition, not all abuse manifests itself in bruises or other visible damage that make it clear that a homelife is abusive. Many abusive parents and households present very well and would likely not be ruled abusive by the court, or the teen would not be seen as being "abused" even based on her own testimony. Many abused children -- even teenage ones -- are afraid to give voice to their own abuse. Children of truly controlling parents often cannot give voice to their own feelings even when alone. Please, read up!
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You lost, because most people know the real score
Whether a minor decides to continue her pregnancy or not, she should have a parent or trusted guardian beside her.
I must congratulate you for having had the kind of wonderful Norman Rockwell life where this is a scene between parents or trusted guardian and minor that is not only realistic but inevitable.
Unfortunately for you, 54.15% of California voters voted "NO".
I think they realized that some parents are WORSE than abortion. Those kinds of parents shouldn't be notified, because the more those kinds of parents get involved in anything, the more harmful the situation becomes for the child.
It's sad and terrible to say something like that, but it's a fact and we need to accept it and acknowledge it in our decisions about public policy.
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...and the outcome
Well, fortunately the majority of voters in California have more common sense than Ms. So.
I grew up in a state with a parental notification law. I went to high school with a girl whose parents were Iranian immigrants. She got pregnant, and was afraid that "her father would kill her" if he found out that she was pregnant (regardless of what she decided to do about it). She hid the pregnancy, gave birth secretly, and left the baby in the latrine of a public park. The baby died. She went to jail.
Yep, letting her choose abortion on her own would have been SOOOO much worse.