Nothing will be solved if these two issues are put up against one another. All women face different circumstances and its a personal choice. Paying women to give birth instead of having abortions seems very sick to me. Men should stay out of this discussion as they are not the ones getting pregnant. Why should any woman have to postpone her education?

Frankly I think if a woman wants an emotional bond with the child she gives birth to, then she should keep it, but she adopts it out then she should stay out of the child's life. I think this puts a barrier to adoption. Woman have choices now.

I found that exchange distasteful and illogical on so many levels. Beyond the points brought up in this article, why does society have a vested interest in encouraging more women to have children? There are plenty of children up for adoption in the US; they just aren't the "desirable" kind, either because of age, race, disability, or drug and alcohol problems in pregnancy. Once we bring the market into human reproduction, will we pay more for the kinds of babies couples like to adopt? Will a non-disabled baby be worth more than one with a disability? Will we dock the pay of pregnant women for every drink they consume? Will white babies bring a higher price than brown babies? I'm just taking this argument to the logical conclusion....

Rather than paying women to give up their babies, maybe we should create more financial incentives for couples who choose to adopt the babies and children who are in our horrible foster system. Frankly, the last thing we need is more unwanted and abandoned children.

And I agree that Waldman talks about women as if they are just vessels. Personally, I think that abortion is a tragedy if the woman would have preferred to carry the baby to term and couldn’t because of a lack of support. Otherwise, it doesn’t damage society one bit. We have plenty of people in this world.

but for a thousand bucks I'm not sure what shape the product would be in.

Nobody ever got airtime by saying, "You know, as an uninvolved man the issue of a woman's personal reproductive choices are basically none of my business, and in any decent society ought to remain that way."

and trying to appease the anti-choice crowd with the reduction of the number of abortions line will only end up in more of this foolish attempt to justify forcing women to give birth (or not give birth, for that matter). This is the sort of exchange that reaffirms my belief that reproductive choices do not belong in the political realm.

who turn out not to be theirs?

Next time the issue comes up, say, "How about fetal transplants? Have some of your side's women agree to having existing fetuses transplanted into THEM as an alternative to abortion, and these women would take the babies to term, give birth to them and raise them!"

(I'd love to see him try to round up the volunteers!)

Waldman admitted he was stumbling for ideas, and clumsy with words, and that it didn't sound right, yet you rake him over the coals and crucify him.

This scathing attack just goes to show how arrogant and mean-spirited women are when it comes to men trying to participate and understand women's issues. And it is a man's issue too, because there is always a father, and because sometimes the child is a boy. And gee, maybe, perhaps, one half of the adoptive couple would be a man?

I think an apt response to Amy from Waldman would go something like "Fuck you."

"Let’s say it again: You are asking a woman to give up her child. And that’s worth a hell of a lot more than a thousand dollars."

Isn't a woman who has an abortion also giving up her child?

I'm surprised it took nine letters for someone to ask the question that I was waiting for. HeavyG asked it.

There is a difference. Having an abortion is ending the prospect of having a child. Carrying a fetus for nine months, giving birth, and then giving the baby up for adoption is acutally giving up a child. During those nine months of physical attachment the woman has developed an emotional attachment, too.

this whole thing about two men discussing women's pregnancy, no women present... it's like out of the 1930's, or saudi arabia, or an SNL skit.

Yeah, men are involved, but they don't get the stretch marks, they don't risk death, their body chemistry doesn't change, they don't have a huge belly for months, they don't hold on to this kid like it's part of their own body for a year, feeding it with their own milk. Men can't even make milk if the mother's gone. The day after conception, the guy could move to Africa, or die, and the baby is OK. She can't take a weekend vacation from it all. If the woman dies at 6 months, the baby's done. As much as I feel I'd want a part in it all, she does the heavy lifting.

If it's a woman's right to choose then why can't she choose to be an employee of a baby mill?

Do you think there aren't women who choose to abort instead of carry a baby to term because of economic reasons? That some of those women would be happier giving their baby up for adoption, but fear they will lose their jobs or be unable to continue school through pregnancy? What about that is not believable?

There are better ways to express that than others, and the idea of $1000 payments to women to give babies for adoption has a lot of problems. But since some people - including politicians - seem to be in a moment of We Need to Reduce Abortions, it's not ridiculous to talk about how pregnancy and childbirth can be economically quite difficult for women, and how that is an element of why some women have abortions - and how that might be fixable to some degree.

[And, yes, the other part of this is: if you incentivize most things enough financially, you will produce more of that behavior. The reason the "women have babies to collect welfare" thing was silly was because the payments were so low, not because the idea of people being affected by financial incentives in their baby-having was inherently ridiculous. Of course peoples' reproductive behavior is affected by economic concerns.]