Perhaps I'm not as old as I think I am, but I have reached an age where I have to consider that the sageacity that I attempt to empart may add up to nothing more than the unfortunate sounds that my body creates with growing enthusiasm.
However I can not resist another attempt at speaking from my place on high.(he he whoops! don't look down!)
Many so called primitives believe that even after birth one does not become a human being until certain milestones are reached. Some for example one year, on up to puberty or beyond to some form of induction rights into the adult society. I believe this is due to mortality rates in less technologically advanced societies. This is a value system that continues to evolve towards the fetus as life expectancy increases in all societies.( I am not claiming this to be true across the board. ) In modern American society we are not only coming to terms with advances in health care, we are also colliding with our redefinition of spiritual values under the pressures of modernity.
It was not uncommon in my time for people to use natural substances to abort an unwanted fetus ( codliver oil, penaroil, are these "old wifes tales"?, someone please correct me if I'm wrong here) But although these matters were common knowledge they were not discussed openly in society as a matter of good form. There were also doctors who would perform the procedure in a hush hush underworld and the dangerous and sinister back alley procedures performed by often grossly under qualified individuals for a "price" that often ended in tragedy, also not discussed in proper society.
I fear that if we are not careful we may be headed back in the direction of a less informed underworld where abortion is performed but not acknowledged by society as a matter of propriety so that we may bare witness to our rightiousness and hide our dirty little secrets behind closed doors in a false representation of our values.
I know that some of you may take the position that birth control amounts to promoting promiscuity, but coming from a time when the alternatives where so gastly, I can not but think that this is the time for us to overcome our smoke and mirror deceptions and deal with sex openly and honestly with ourselves and our children. We can speak not only of abstinence, but also protection from unwanted pregnancy and disease. I feel that if these young ladies had been offered balanced council from responsible elders and a responsible society that things may not have taken the coarse that they did.
