LIFE DOES NOT COME CHEAP

I breathed in a relief hearing, the newly issued regulation on abortion, No. 61/2014, based on the 2009 Health Law, remains endorsing that abortion is prohibited in most cases, unless the mother’s life is in danger or in the case of rape. I am happy that Indonesia does not tread the path of many developed western countries that finally legalize abortion as we have more diverse as well as different socio-cultural perspective.

I support the regulation that abortion is illegal unless the pregnancy endangers the mother's life and in the case of unwanted pregnancy due to rape. A fetus is a human being once it is conceived. The baby has the right to live thus abortion is a form of murder and demeans the value of human life. Abortion eliminates legal rights of the unborn child.

To begin with, the abortion decision is often made by minors or young adults, who don't have the maturity and life experiences to make sound decisions. The decisions are often driven by the needs to avoid bad social stigma and dreadful responsibility as a parent, thinking that they are too young for such burden.

Consequently, women who have abortion in their younger years end up living the rest of their lives in perpetual guilt and often suffer major psychological damage from the experience. Even if that women doesn't consider it murder at the time, that may change as she matures. The experience will haunt them forever, and they could never turn back the time.

Back at my hometown, I have some friends who made mistakes during their younger days. Having sex out marriage, then they got pregnant. They had to drop out of the school and their parents marrying them off to the fathers of the baby. Abortion is not an option in my village.

However, in most big cities, teenagers with pregnancy because of their irresponsible sexual activities, often go to back alley abortions to get rid of the unwanted child out of shame or fear. Personally, I think this is just morally and religiously wrong to kill a child due to shame and fear. They should think a million times over before committing sex if they have not ready for the consequences!

The so-called sexual revolution leading to happy-go-lucky sexual intercourse is not something to take on lightly. Sexual licentious is not a liberty to do irresponsible act, then have an abortion!

To prevent abortion, teens should be educated that free sex only brings fleeting pleasure but lasting harms. It helps to spread sexual transmitted diseases (STD), premature pregnancy leading to abortion and family rift. It also accelerates the destruction of a marriage institution and moral debauchery as marriage is what defines human different from animals, which satiate their primal need without any rules of laws.

Therefore, abortion legalization is not the answer to protect the reproductive rights of these teenagers as has been widely campaigned by the pro-abortion activists! If abortion is not available, perhaps people wouldn't be so careless in the first place. They should have keep their pants on and perform abstinence. Free sexual intercourse out of wedlock is morally and religiously wrong so if people especially teenagers just follow this guidelines, abortion will no longer an issue. Marriage is a legal and sacred institution to bring a man and a woman exercising their basic instinct, building a family, raise and nurture their children to carry on their legacy.

Another argument comes that abortion is against doctors' Hippocratic Oath, requiring physician to uphold specific ethical standard, of saving live instead of taking live. Preserving live is a doctor’s sacred duty. Therefore, if a pregnant woman went to see her doctor, wanting an abortion while there was no emergency, any good doctor would tell her that s/he has a conscientious objection to abortion and therefore can't help.

In addition, abortion shouldn't be a form of birth control for married couples as well. Other birth control is readily available. There are dozens of birth control methods that can keep ones from becoming pregnant, including the 100 percent effective one: abstinence. Thus, it is logically wrong to kill the unwanted baby resulted in the consensual act of the couple. It’s injustice to demand only pleasures from the act and have no courage the bear the responsibility.

In a case due to economic deprivation, the couple could not care the child properly, there’s always an adoption scheme. It is healthier than having an abortion, which might endanger their reproductive organs leading to infertility. Choosing an adoption over abortion means choosing a life over a death. Adoption does not mean giving up the baby but it gives life – life instead of death.

Women should keep in mind that many families actually go on waiting lists to adopt newborn babies, couples who have been waiting for years to adopt the baby they've desperately waited to hold in their arms. Even many experienced good loving parents with wisdom, resources, and plenty of love are reaching out to adopt another child regardless of race, religion, gender, or disability. They want a baby whom they want to cherish, value, and raise for the rest of that baby’s life.

It is so sad to think that instead of babies going to these families, they go into a trash heap or down a garbage disposal. It is sometimes frustrating to think that any mothers could feel that killing their children is a better option that choosing families for their children.  

Believe me, I know exactly how it feels to see such miracles of life go in waste in garbage bin. I have circles of friends who have been for years trying to have babies of their own. How it breaks their hearts to see others who given such miracles, but throw them like a sack of rotten potatoes! It is so cruel and unfair. How many nights I’ve shed tears just to dream of the tiny little baby squirming in my arms. How I love my adopted nephew, so much as he fills my days with love, trickle of laughs and joys.

Having said that mothers should choose a life over a death for their unborn babies as these little treasures might lighten up the days of other families! Their unborn babies might be the source of happiness of others. Life is a treasure to cherish. It does not come cheap.