From what I understand of Senator Stott-Despoja's suggestions, they basically ensure that women know what service they will be going to. I would be deeply frustrated to not have all my options put to me, simply because during a stressful time like an unplanned for pregnancy, I did not realise I was going to a Catholic based pregnancy counselling service rather than to a secular group.

Further, people are always thowing stats around like "75% of women who attended this pregnacy counselling service then aborted". Of course they did. If they were happy and excited and wanting their pregnancy they would be out buying booties and looking up baby names.

Reducing abortion would be a good thing, because it would never be an easy choice. But this should be done through reducing unwanted pregnancies through better contraception, not through restricting abortion.

It is difficult to reconcile reading some of these comments with a fair reading of Kathy Woolf’s article. Her argument is basically that the general public – including women with unintended pregnancies – would prefer fewer abortions.

It doesn’t say abortions should be banned. It doesn’t call for more restrictions on abortion, though I imagine she would want them. What it does call for is very positive and compassionate changes to ensure women don’t have abortions they don’t really want. If we can increase support for women who would otherwise feel forced by circumstances to have an abortion, surely that is a good thing.

There are a number of agencies that support women in having their children. They’re not dishonest. If asked for an abortion referral they will say they can’t offer that, but can offer alternatives. For Senator Stott-Despoja to try to censor them from the White Pages for offering a service she disagrees with shows an intolerant, narrow-minded streak.

Contrast Kathy’s positive call for reform to the conservative position of Reproductive Choice Australia. When I had a look at their web page it called on people to “Express your opposition to any change to current arrangements regarding termination in Australia”. Not seeing there is room for reform, for doing things better and that it is better for everyone to have less rather than more abortions seems a little myopic.

Abortion, abortion, abortion. That is all I ever heard about when I was faced with pregnancy at 15. My family pushed abortion, my friends pushed abortion and then when I was taken to the supposedly "unbiased" 'family planning organisation,' they pushed abortion. The counselor actually argued with me!! Yes, I even got the famous 'it's just a blob of tissue' line along with an unecessary internal examination from a doctor who hardly spoke a word to me.
I welcome any organisation that does not have a financial interest in abortion and offers abortion alternatives and support for pregnant women and their families. Looking back, I would have loved to have spoken to someone who was prepared to listen to me, (rather than argue) and I'm sure my parents would have appreciated some support and guidance as well as information about services offered to women (or girls) who would like to continue their pregnancy.
The suggestion that pro-life organisations are 'biased' and abortion clinics 'unbiased' is completely ludicrous and illogical to the extreme.

I see a bunch of single issue posters just arrived, I wonder where from.

GP, "does it mean that we should be free to choose about absolutely anything?" This is asinine, do pro-life people support restricting our ability to kill plants? It's the name of the movement, and everyone knows it's about abortion.

"If you are infavour of allowing abortion, have the guts to come out and say you are pro-abortion" Umm no, because they're not encouraging abortion or in favour of abortion so much as allowing people to have them if they want. Just because a woman is pro-choice doesn't exclude her from deciding that she will never have an abortion if she gets pregnant.

Maryse Usher, "unborn babies are not really unborn babies but something else entirely (just what has never been defined)." You've never really sought out pro-choice arguments have you? But you know in your heart abortion is wrong, yes? Unless there is more than the article is telling us, the Senator hasn't tried to prevent attempts to offer alternatives.

Magella, if that is the main reason then why is it that she starts and finishes with an attack against Stott Despoja? What is the connection? The senator presumably would like fewer abortions, and would be against a women aborting if they didn't want to. We don't need a bunch of research by social conservatives to know that people want less abortions, proper education of risks & alternatives and more support.

"They're not dishonest. If asked for an abortion referral they will say they can't offer that,"
But they could, so they're lying, how is that not dishonest? If they falsely portray themselves as being disinterested groups then they are being dishonest.

What is gained through not providing a referral? Pro-life counsellors won't feel complicit in the abortion, and the already stressed woman has another hurdle put in her path. If counsellors say upfront (eg. in the white pages) that they can't provide a referral then I see no reason to force them.

Use of the term "pro-choice" is not a hiding gambit, GP. It's simply a way of naming the premise on which I, and I daresay many many others stand on this issue. I'm happy to admit that perhaps "pro-women's choices" would state my position with even more particularity - lest anyone mistake me for a pro-rapist supporter..... (cute sophistry, GP, but let's not be silly, OK!)

And since the naming of things seems to be what's important to you, GP, how come you're not insisting the so-called Right-to-Life re-badge itself more accurately as "ANTI-choice". Unlike pro-choice clinics and counsellors, RTL explicitly demands that there be LESS options for women. It's a case of carry-to-term and keep or adopt out - or nothing - as far as that noisy little group is concerned.

A bit of truth-in-advertising would be a useful and ethical starting point in all of this, and I reckon that probably just about exactly what the senator had in mind.

As a young woman I had an abortion, never regretted it for a minute. The pro-choice organisation I went to questioned me very carefully about my decision and gave me all sorts of other alternatives, but I knew exactly what my choice was. Having been taken off the pill by my GP for health reasons and using (as advised) spermicide and condoms, one (yes, one) condom tore and I became pregnant. I felt outraged, as if it had happened to my body and not to me. I hadn't been irresponsible, but there was no way I could even contemplate becoming a mother at that time in my life, not for financial or lack of support reasons, I had enough money and plenty of support. I was simply emotionally and psychologically unable to accept the idea.
Many years later I had two much loved, much wanted (and now teenage) children. Of course I do not regret my decision all those years ago. How could I? If I'd had that child I never would have had the children I now have. I have also had a miscarriage at one point and wept bitter tears over the loss, but over the abortion? No, I wept bitter tears then about being pregnant, all I felt when I woke from the aneasthetic, no longer pregnant, was relief.
Pro lifers may want us to believe most women who have abortions are coerced into them, but my experience plus that of all the women I know who have had them, is the opposite. No-one wants to have an abortion, but sometimes it is a less horrifying alternative for the woman involved, than the unwanted pregnancy.
You can judge me, if you like, but I am not pulling my punches. This is my plain unvarnished truth. You may wish that I and women like me were always happy to find ourselves pregnant, but we're not and never will be.