Quote Us: "No Wire Hangers!"

When John McCain raised his hands to make that derisive debate reference to women’s health with “quote” fingers, I couldn’t help thinking of the ugly symbol of pre-legal abortion rights, the coat hanger hook.

Like Cindy McCain, I felt a chill run up my spine. But it was a real chill, not fake rally rhetoric… because the threat to women’s health posed by criminalizing abortion is as horrific as it gets.

In John McCain’s youth, when his well-connected family was coercing University boards to accept him in spite of his abysmal grades, and hush-hushing campus misdeeds that would have resulted in expulsion for anyone else (Rolling Stone, October, 2008 issue), when he was drinking and carousing and womanizing (same issue), he probably didn’t give a thought to back-alley abortions. As a man, abortion wasn’t his problem. And anyone who got one was probably a tramp or a hooker, not good, decent girls like the debutantes he met at parties.

True, when safe, legal abortions were unavailable, the daughters of the rich still had access to medical abortions: Daddy would place a call to a friend with a respectable medical practice, an appointment would be made, and the following week Buffy or Muffy or Cindy would have a nice, flat tummy, so their futures were protected and their virtues remained intact.

How nice for them.

But, in the real world, women who were poor, afraid, or otherwise unable to bear the burden on their lives posed by an unwanted pregnancy could, and did, seek illegal abortions. Maybe a few of them were “hookers.” (McCain has a nice gesture he can use to emphasize that.) But most were young, or sick, or abandoned by their boyfriends, or desperate for a myriad of personal reasons. And when they went to those back alley addresses for their midnight appointments, many of them never returned.

They died of infections from unsterilized instruments… like coat hangers.

They bled to death from botched procedures.

They were raped or otherwise abused by their illegal, unlicensed, unqualified abortionists.

But one thing the women of this era did NOT do was stop seeking abortions, legal or not, when circumstance drove them to the conclusion that it was a personal necessity.

That’s why, John Mcain, outside the grounds of the country club and the Ritz Carlton, safe, legal abortion is a woman’s health issue for millions of Americans. Women may or may not exercise this choice… but we are sisters, daughters, mothers and friends. We are people who love and are loved in return. We are individuals entitled to the rights of privacy and safety. And some of us are grandmothers, old enough to remember the reproductive straightjackets imposed on women who were not privileged, or lacked the resources, to fly to civilized European countries for a legal abortion when it was not available in our own country.

The truth is, the rich have always had access to medical abortions when they wanted them, abortions they could buy and then forget. And with the short memories of the privileged, they have also vilified those who sought the same remedies by whatever back-alley means were available.

So, listen up, John McCain: Compassion… common sense… fairness… choice for those who wish to exercise it… but "no wire hangers!"