Today I was talking with a girl whose friend was thinking about having an abortion. She said that if she found out that she herself was pregnant, she would keep the child. When I asked what advice she would give to her friend, she said that it depended on whether or not her friend's school would work with her to help her graduate. It sounded as if to her, it would be acceptable to abort a child in order to graduate from high school on time. I couldn't fathom that she really meant what she was saying, so I asked her about a hypothetical situation that pit education against life. "Let's go back four years or so, when you were in high school. Let's say that you are in health class one day, and the principle comes in with a living newborn child, gives you a cup of bleach, and tells you that if you want to graduate, you have to pour all of the bleach down that child's mouth. What would you do?" Immediately, she responded, "I wouldn't do it." She had yet to see the similarity. "Why not?" "Because that would be murder." Without a trace of judgement in either my heart or my voice, I essentially pointed out to her that committing infanticide (murder, in her words) in order to graduate from high school was no worse than having an abortion in order to graduate from high school.
All that said, young women shouldn't have to choose between education and motherhood. I was glad to hear this young woman mention that one of her relatives had kept her child, and the high school worked with her to help her graduate. That same attitude, seen in this ad for Technical Career Institutes, debunks the myth that motherhood and education are mutually exclusive.
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