Furth and Fortune blog by Will Murray

I certainly understand and sympathize with both sides of the abortion issue. What I cannot understand is the latest idiocy coming from the Bush administration related to the issue.

If the administration has its way, birth control will be reclassified as a form of abortion by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. If that happens, the laws of 27 states that require insurance companies to provide coverage for contraception for those women who ask for it. It would also nullify the laws in 14 states requiring that victims of rape receive counseling and access to emergency, day-after contraception.

While those concerns are bad enough, my first thought were of a more pragmatic and economic nature. What are we as a society going to do with boom in unwanted pregnancies? In the 1940s, we experienced the “Baby Boom”. Today, our Social Security and health care systems are starting to buckle under the weight of all those Boomers hitting their senior years. Without inexpensive, legally available contraceptives, we are going to face an baby boom of epidemic scale. Our society, and our natural resources, cannot afford such an egregious and narrow-minded plan to come about.

Here are a few ways you can help:

• Sign the MoveOn.org petition to tell the government that birth control is NOT a form of abortion.
• If you are registered on Facebook.com (an excellent, probably the best, social networking site for anyone a bit more mature than the average high schooler), join the related Group. I think that you can join Facebook and the Group at the same time if you aren’t already registered.
• Spread the word. Blog, write letters to the editor, write to or call your legislators. Let them know your reasons for opposing this issue, whether it’s economic, moral, or you just plain hate seeing insanely stupid ideas like this codified into law (or all of the above).

Here is what I wrote in my petition to Health and Human Services Secretary Mike Leavitt:

I cannot believe that anyone would be so short sighted as to even consider such a policy change. Birth control helps PREVENT abortions! Assuming that “life begins at conception”, the best way to prevent against abortion is to prevent conception. That’s what birth control is all about. It’s the first (and really the only) line against unwanted and unplanned pregnancy.

Without unfettered and unbiased access to birth control, there will be a population explosion in the United States. We are already overpopulated in many parts of the country. These unwanted pregnancies will likely hit a disproportionate number of low income and minority families, who already are dependent upon publicly funded health and prenatal care. Orphanages, already over capacity, would soon resemble prisons with the amount of overcrowding that would be likely.

No. This is 180-degrees from what the government should be advocating. Birth control AND abstinence should both be taught AND promoted in schools starting in 4th and 5th grades. Waiting until later is too late, and ignoring birth control as an option for those who do not wish to abstain is simply sticking your head in the sand on a problem that will not go away but can be minimized with better education.

So, no, birth control should not be tarnished, but promoted as the best alternative to abstinence.

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