475. The abysmal (VI)

A common sentiment expressed by the most religious Catholics and rightists in general is that women who have abortions deeply regret the decision—perhaps spend their sterile years with the cursor hovering over baby boots, tears in their eyes; however, such sentimental illusions are not real. To think this way is too cute—“It’s the biggest regret of my life.” Women might be more maternal than men—softer in some respects—but they are not as soft as all that. There is a certain feminine ruthlessness that, while not expressed as in the male form, definitely exists; after all, some women have multiple miscarriages and roll on—and an abortion is no more than an induced miscarriage.

For political and religious reasons, people want there to be poetic justice; they want people to have that realisation where they say, “I was wrong. What have I done?” Except they have watched too many soap operas; they think there is going to be a sudden moment, complete with dramatic music, where the person realises their terrible mistake: “Pedro, I never should have left you. Please, tell me you still love me?” “No, it’s all over, I’m married to Melissa now. I love her.” Cue commercial break. Of course, there are probably women who can gain notoriety and cash on the Catholic circuit by confessing they made a mistake—they give the audience what they want.

From personal observation, what characterises women who have had abortions and then never had children is not regret or sadness but rather tremendous pent-up energy—they buzz with energy. Not in the hackneyed Freudian sense “to cover up the sadness”—there is no sadness, not really (“Imagine the life that could have been…” Cue the second commercial break). As I say, women might be more emotional than men, but they are not as emotional as all that. She will get over it, and she did—in some ways, being adapted to be captured as slaves, women accept negative life events with greater ease than men. Women are born slaves, born to bear misfortune—it is men who rent their clothes and go mad when misfortune hits. Women are born accommodators.

So women who are sort-of-spinsters, not exactly left on the shelf and not exactly whores—in other words, live in this weird interstitial category modernity has created—just buzz with energy. Personally, I think it is the energy that should have been injected into the aborted baby; it was meant to be transferred but instead buzzes away in the sixty-something—it wants exit. On another level, it is unfulfilled biological necessity: women exist to have babies or—for the few—to be nuns. Despite the lies, there are no other ways.

I am not against abortion, I just think it should only be the man’s choice—it is only set up in a particular way today to destroy the family. I dislike Catholic sentimental propaganda that shows “happy families” with their Down’s syndrome kids. It is kinder to screen and abort these children before birth. Children, let alone adults, are endlessly cruel to the weak and deformed; and the parents who birth these children set them up for a life of abuse. They never think what happens to these permanent dependents in their old age. I saw a mature Down’s syndrome child at her mother’s funeral. “Where’s mum?” she said, again and again. There is a pathos to that. Come see the real, John Paul II. Of course, her state-appointed “carers” had already robbed her money—and, given what so-called carers are like, she would be fortunate if they did not rape her, or, at minimum, mock her every day.

I would not make a state rule that the deformed be aborted, I would just have an ethos of beauty and health—so that a man, when he saw the scan, would confidently abort an unfit child and start again; and thus spare the child the enormous pain its existence would inevitably entail.