ari, I like your adoption idea. One problem I see with pro-life successes, when they talk women out of abortion thru sidewalk counseling or a crisis center or such, is we are encouraging a huge number of single-parent homes, with all the attendant problems.
Usually a woman going for abortion is single, with a boyfriend of some sort. Statistics show whether she goes through with the abortion OR changes her mind and keeps baby, the couple usually breaks up EITHER WAY. So, abortion is so traumatic, it destroys the relationship. Then you have a child being reared by a mom with all the accompanying economic, social and educational hardships, an no “father figure” yet many married couples with secure homes are dying for a baby.
I have a real problem that saving babies usually mean convicting them to lives without fathers. I’m not putting down single-moms, but it is a fact a child will generally do better in a financially secure, middle-class, two-parent home. If the mom really wants to keep her baby and can somehow do it, it’s of course her decision. But more incentives and emphasis should be put on adoption as one loving choice, for the baby’s sake. I realize each situation is unique, it is no doubt the greatest sacrifice, the most painful a woman could make, but in SOME situations surely it is also the best for her child.
the adoption incentive would reduce abortion as well as the problem of kids raised by women who are simply not capable of being a suitable mother. It’s usually not their fault but it may take an incentive to get them to think: “wait a minute, what am I doing? This isn’t going to work out. I can’t afford to raise my baby properly. So I’ll give him to a family that is willing to adopt.”
The incentive is like an ad: “yes, there is such an option called adoption.” The word will get around as a result (where’s the best place to go for services, etc)
Newt wanted to encourage adoption the other way, by giving a tax credit to couples who choose to adopt. But that doesn’t really make a difference since they are already well off. It’s the poor pregnant girl that needs the money.