It’s a right for a woman to decide what to do with her body. That’s a phrase I can live without hearing ever again. If a person tries to commit suicide, why does he/she have to get counseling, be committed for a period of time, be watched over because they might hurt themselves? Isn’t that their right to choose what they want to do with their body?

Why can’t strong men beat up others? Isn’t that their right to use their bodies as they please? Why is it illegal to kill our children perhaps at the age of 2 when we’ve realized that they are an inconvenience? Why is it offensive that a commercial on TV which shows a baby in the uterus responding to what’s being advertised because it looks too much like a baby? Don’t they get it, it is a baby.

This business of abortion is way out of hand. I can think of a few rare exceptions when a doctor might advise the woman it is best not to complete the pregnancy, but abortions have become as normal as getting a tooth filled. What happened to do no harm? Doctors, isn’t that a part of the Hippocratic oath? Just because it became a law that it’s all right to kill babies inside of mothers doesn’t make it OK. God gave us many gifts, one of which is that women can have babies; that doesn’t give women the right to use that gift and proclaim it is their choice. Don’t you fathers of those babies have any say? It’s clear the babies have no say and no life to live.

I say — go ahead and do what you want with YOUR body but don’t kill the baby, the life growing inside you. Biologically, you are the incubator; if your baby were in an incubator, would you be allowed to destroy the baby then? There was a time when women felt guilty after they had an abortion; now, it is totally justified. The law says so, the press says so, politicians say so. What does your conscience say, or can’t you hear it any more? What have you accomplished in life that never would’ve happened had you been aborted? And that includes your good deeds, your successes, your children, your grandchildren, your great-grandchildren.

Frances Stahl,

A woman, a mother, a grandmother

Tamaqua