By Mallory Schlabach, Editor in Chief

Face the Facts

Wednesday the House of Representatives passed the Unborn Child Pain Awareness Act that instructs abortion clinics to tell a woman considering an abortion that the fetus will feel pain at 20 weeks. The bill also requires the doctor to ask the woman if she’d like to have anesthesia for the unborn child before the procedure.

Since the House’s vote, protestors on both sides are in an uproar over fact disputes and if informing women about the pain and giving them an anesthesia option will actually dissuade the woman from going through with an abortion.

When it comes down to it, regardless of if the unborn child can feel pain, it’s still a child. Why would it ever be OK to end the life of a child? While some who are pro-life support abortion in the case of incest or rape or if the mother’s life is in danger, I feel that only in the case if the mother’s life is truly in danger and both cannot be saved, should abortion be an option. Even if someone impregnates a woman when committing a horrible crime like rape or incest doesn’t mean she should end the child’s life because of the crime of the father. A woman who wants to choose whether to deliver the child she’s conceived because it is a right, doesn’t sit well with me.

Her choice came when the woman decided to engage in sexual intercourse that created the growing child within her. If you can’t make an educated, well-thought out decision to not have sex, which always has the chance of resulting in a pregnancy, then you should not have the right to decide whether to let your child live or die.

Someone once said, "Pregnancy is survivable. There are much worse things in life than pregnancy."

As a pregnant woman only two options should exist: delivering the child and raising it, or giving it up for adoption.

Even if a child is unwanted by the mother, it is still a wanted child.

More than 240,000 women are waiting to adopt a child because of fertility problems or simply because they don’t want to have children naturally, according to the Child Welfare Gateway Information Web site.

As politicians, pro-choice and pro-life advocates argue over if a mother should have the option of giving her unborn child anesthesia before killing it, or when a fetus really does feel pain, think about who they’re talking about: a living, breathing baby with a heartbeat, ten fingers and ten toes, and then make the decision to choose life.