Poor women. They are so stupid, each one who gets an abortion without realizing that what they have in their uteri is a comma of flesh that, with some imagination, can be made to be thought of as vaguely human, and which has a heartbeat. Thank you, Rick Perry, Governor of Texas, for helping stupid women understand this.
Today, on this day after Mother's Day, I have been ruminating about the ramifications of procreation, and I offer some of my thoughts.
1. Women who choose to not have abortions ought to be required to view a 24 minute video of their teenager sulking, see a montage of photos about what the living room and kitchen look like after a pack of teenagers has come through, and undergo a simulation in which they are forced to drive a minivan to multiple sports events. They should also be required to view a graph demonstrating their diminished earning power as the result of being unable to work as much as they might have had they not had parenting responsibilities.
2. Men who do not have vasectomies, and who have had sex with a woman in the previous 12 months, should be required to view a graph showing how much money, per year, will be required to support a child from birth of the child through the man's death (which may be premature due to the additional stress imposed by parenthood). This graph could be attached to the Income Tax return. Men could waive graph perusal by submitting a vasectomy certificate or certificate of same-sex marriage/domestic partnership.
3. No man who does not have a vasectomy, and/or who has had sex with a woman, should be allowed to opine on the morality of abortion. As long as abortion is legal, if a man deposits sperm into a woman, he is automatically culpable in the event that a woman decides to have an abortion. Therefore anytime a man deposits sperm into a vagina, he is, de facto, an accessory before the fact to the possibility of an abortion. This little rule, by itself, would eliminate approximately 99% of male bloviating about abortion.
4. Every woman and man should be required to read the many scientific studies that come to the conclusion that becoming a parent leads to greater unhappiness at least once per year (it could be included with tax returns) and/or, prior to not having an abortion. Women who decide to continue their pregnancy and place their child up for an adoption should be urged to obtain a liability release from prospective adoptive parents in order to avoid liability for future diminution of happiness.
5. Women who are not considering abortion should be required to pick out the human fetus at a 21-day gestation point from the fetus of a frog, a dog, a pig, and a teddy bear.
Seriously, though, Republicans, parenting is a difficult, costly, and draining experience, and shouldn't a woman be able to choose the best time to embark on this journey? And aren't the 45 years after the child is born more important than the nine months that precede this? And since Rick Santorum believes that single parent has only an 85% chance of success, versus a 95% chance of success for a two-(hetero)-sex couple, shouldn't a mother be urged to wait to have the best chance of success for her child?