Dueling Post Abortion Stories in Australian Fight over Fate of RU-486

She (Lyn Allison, leader of the minority Australian Democrats) said:

An estimated one in three women have had an abortion, and I am one of those," she told parliament.

It is galling listening to the men - and it is mostly men - who have such contempt for women who terminate unwanted pregnancies, who have neither the compassion nor the understanding of the huge and, for many, daunting task of taking an embryo the size of a grain of rice to adulthood.

He (Finance Minister Nick Minchin) said:

"I bring to this debate personal experience in that a former girlfriend of mine had an abortion when we were in a monogamous relationship," he told parliament.

"I cannot divorce that experience in my life from this consideration."

Read it all here.

If there is nothing wrong with surgical abortion why the mad dash to chemical abortion? Maybe because they know there is something wrong with abortion. After all, Miss Allison's hyperbole and emotionalism makes a compelling case that her abortion didn't go so well for her and that perhaps chemical abortion might be an improvement.

The abortion pill is seen as a magic bullet but, as Rachel M. MacNair points out in this chapter of Achieving Peace in the Abortion Wars, it is doubtful that it will provide the improvements that Miss Allison hopes for.