Once upon a time, there were at least a few things that pretty much everyone thought were bad ideas, or at least problems that needed to be addressed in some capacity. Teen pregnancy, for instance! Everyone, save for some religious cults and those girls in Gloucester, Mass, who did the pregnancy pact back in 2008, seemed to be in agreement that we did not want teenage girls getting pregnant.
In recent years, it has become far less of a problem — teen pregnancies declined to a record low of 13.2 births per 1,000 females ages 15–19, which is significantly less than the record high in 1991, when the rate was 61.8 births per 1,000 females aged 15–19.
That’s good, right? That’s what everyone wants? Well, as it turns out: no.
In a recently filed lawsuit against the FDA over their rule changes regarding abortion medication, the states of Missouri, Idaho, and Kansas argue, for real, that they have been harmed by the rule changes because states where abortion is illegal have been cruelly deprived of the rise in teen pregnancies they had hoped to see after Roe was overturned
Dead serious. Go to pages 189 and 190.
Defendants’ efforts enabling the remote dispensing of abortion drugs has caused abortions for women in Plaintiff States and decreased births in Plaintiff States. This is a sovereign injury to the State in itself. […]
These estimates also show the effect of the FDA’s decision to remove all in-person dispensing protections. When data is examined in a way that reflects sensitivity to expected birth rates, these estimates strikingly “do not show evidence of an increase in births to teenagers aged 15-19,” even in states with long driving distances despite the fact that “women aged 15-19 … are more responsive to driving distances to abortion facilities than older women.” The study thus concludes that “one explanation may be that younger women are more likely to navigate online abortion finders or websites ordering mail-order medication to self-manage abortions. This study thus suggests that remote dispensing of abortion drugs by mail, common carrier, and interactive computer service is depressing expected birth rates for teenaged mothers in Plaintiff States, even if other overall birth rates may have been lower than otherwise was projected.
And yes, they are saying this like it’s a bad thing. In fact, they claim that the FDA is harming them because without all those teen moms making babies, they might have less representation in Congress and the Electoral College.
A loss of potential population causes further injuries as well: the States subsequent “diminishment of political representation” and “loss of federal funds,” such as potentially “losing a seat in Congress or qualifying for less federal funding if their populations are” reduced or their increase diminished.
So not only are they claiming that they are harmed by not being able to force adult women to have babies they don’t want, they are also harmed by not being able to force teenage girls to have babies they don’t want.
I’d like to point out at this juncture that teen moms are significantly less likely than their peers to graduate from high school, and that teenage pregnancy is very closely related to poverty — two-thirds of teen moms who move out of their parents’ house live below the federal poverty level. Seventy-eight percent of children born to unwed teen moms live below the poverty level.
Now, sure — there are some success stories, girls who have kids and go on to college and do well for themselves. But it’s not a lot! These states are more or less saying that they are willing to condemn a significant portion of these girls and their children to poverty so that they don’t lose a vote in the Electoral College. That is truly sick.
There has always been a part of me that felt like the only logical reason anyone would support “abstinence only” education, when it has so constantly proven to be incredibly ineffective, would be if they actually wanted more teen pregnancies. After all, if your goal is to not have a bunch of teen moms, why wouldn’t you do the thing we know prevents that: comprehensive sex education. This is not to say that I actually thought they all wanted more teen pregnancies so much as I thought they were just deeply illogical, irrational, and selfish people who cared more about getting an opportunity to force their religious beliefs on others than about not ruining the lives of teenage girls.
But perhaps I was wrong! Maybe they really did want teen pregnancies the whole time. Maybe they wanted to put young women in a position where they felt like they had to marry young and skip college and spend the rest of their lives barefoot and pregnant. Maybe that was the plan all along and they’re just coming clean about it now.
Still, let’s look on the bright side here — the teen pregnancy rates haven’t increased as much as they’d “hoped.” Thats a good thing! That is something to celebrate. We should be proud of these girls for doing what they have to do to get reproductive care and protect their futures, regardless of the stupid state in which they live. Good for them!
