Important Questions
How is pregnancy measured?
Pregnancy is said to typically last 40 weeks of gestation. Day one of pregnancy is set to be the first day of the person’s last menstrual period. Fertilization and implantation occur around the 2nd-week mark, which means from implantation to delivery, pregnancy is actually about 38 weeks long. Healing after pregnancy takes an average of 6 to 8 weeks, so it’s fair to say pregnancy significantly affects a person’s health for a minimum of 44 weeks (equal to 11 months). If you include breastfeeding in this calculation (given that new mothers are encouraged to lactate for at least one year after delivery) then it is fair to say pregnancy significantly affects a person’s health for a minimum of 90 weeks, which is about 22 months (almost 2 years).
Yes, pregnancy is work. Pregnancy has monetary value, as documented in surrogacy payments. Furthermore, the work of pregnancy can be measured metabolically. On average, the energy required for pregnancy is 357,000 Joules, 1,200,000 Joules, and 1,950,000 Joules per day in the first, second, and third trimesters respectively, according to N.F. Butte and J.C. King in "Energy requirements during pregnancy and lactation" from Public Health Nutr. 2005 Oct. 8(7A):1010-1027. Altogether, pregnancy requires 317,250,000 Joules. For perspective, this means pregnancy is more work than running 700 miles.
Is pregnancy work?
Is pregnancy dangerous for women?
Yes. While many women survive pregnancy, it's not without danger. According to the United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, pregnancy complications are the 6th leading cause of death for women in the United States between the ages of 15 and 34. For reference, see pages 13 and 14 of this CDC mortality rate report from 2017. For further reading, see "The Disturbing, Shameful History of Childbirth Deaths," a Slate article by Laura Helmuth and "The Scary Truth About Childbirth," a Mother Jones article by Kiera Butler.
Which is more dangerous for a pregnant person, abortion or continuing the pregnancy?
Statistically, continuing a pregnancy is more dangerous than aborting a pregnancy. According to a Guttmacher Institute data set, there were 5,575,150 pregnancies in the United States in 2017.
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3,855,500 ended in birth.
862,320 ended in abortion.
857,330 ended in miscarriage.
1,208 women died from pregnancy complications (CDC).
2 women died from abortion complications (CDC).
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Based on these statistics, the number of deaths due to pregnancy complications was 60,400% greater than the number of deaths due to abortion complications.
For every 100,000 pregnancies, there were 21.67 pregnancy-related deaths.
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For every 100,000 pregnancies, there were 0.036 abortion-related deaths.
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For every 100,000 abortions, there were 0.232 abortion-related deaths.​
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The data is clear that continuing a pregnancy is many times over more dangerous than abortion.
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(Note: Unsafe, illegal abortion is statistically more dangerous than safe, legal abortion provided by a licensed medical professional.)
Birth control for men?
Aside from vasectomies, which run the risk of being irreversible, and aside from condoms, men currently have no other highly reliable form of sperm control. Men deserve more options to be able to have consensual, recreational sex without fear of unwanted fatherhood. The good news is that new hormone-free, reliable, and efficient options for sperm control are in the works! If new sperm control options are approved by the FDA, and if men choose to use them, then the number of abortions from unwanted pregnancies can drop drastically. For more information, visit: https://www.malecontraceptive.org/
Is abortion the moral choice when it's evident that a fetal body is developing atypically?
From the beginning of pregnancy up to 23 weeks of gestation, within a womb there exists a body of living cells that does not contain and has never contained a living person. If this body is developing atypically such that the life of your future baby is likely to be torturous, aborting the developing body can be a kindness. You have to ask yourself, given whatever medical condition is occurring, if aborting the developing body is better than allowing a person to come to exist in that body.
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If a human body exists that does not contain and has never contained a person, then who owns that body?
In general, living human cells belong to the person sustaining them, which means before 23 weeks of gestation, a fetal body in a uterus belongs to the owner of the uterus. The natural follow up question here is "Does the biological father own half of that personless fetal body because he provided half of its DNA?" The answer is no, because being related to human cellular life does not grant ownership of that life. For example, consider your own life. The owner of the sperm that contributed to your existence does not own half of you. Likewise, the owner of the egg that contributed to your existence does not own half of you. You own yourself, and human cellular lives belong to the person sustaining them. There are legal cases that grant ownership of embryos created via in vitro fertilization, but these specific cases concern frozen embryos that are located in a freezer, not a person's body.
Is feminism good or bad?
Misandry and feminism are not synonyms, contrary to what misogynists will tell you. Click on the underlined words to learn their definitions.
What about religious beliefs that contradict science?
Through the right to liberty, every person deserves control over their own body, which includes their brain—the seat of their mind and beliefs. Therefore, every person deserves control over their own religious beliefs, and no person deserves to have any set of religious beliefs forced upon them. Science and religion are not mutually exclusive paradigms. All scientific, religious, and scientific-religious people and institutions ought to respect people, which requires polite, heartfelt conversations to settle disputes and absolutely no tolerance for discrimination against other people on account of race, color, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status.