After Tiller Guided Reflection

  This documentary definitely makes the list of top films I've watched. Even the a pro-choice view, it was still an eye opener to the many reasons why some women not necessarily want, but need to have abortions.

Multiple scenes stood out two me and its hard to choose just one that was significant. One in particular made me sad and tear up a little. A 16 year old girl came in to talk with the doctors about her pregnancy. Mind you, she was pro-life and a catholic. They spoke with her parents and her boyfriend's parents to talk about what they should do and they all insisted that she keep the baby. They told her that if she went through with the abortion she would be a "murder." She also said that if she had the baby, she wouldn't be able to walk away from it and she didn't want to have one in the first place.

I felt sad for her because whether someone is pro-choice or pro-life, this isn't something anyone should go through. Even some of the doctors working with the young girl didn't want to go through with it because of how she would feel afterwards. One thing that stood out to me is how the doctor's were very understanding. I feel like most people who are pro-life view abortion doctors as just people who have no remorse and do whatever the patient tells them but that isn't the case. Throughout the whole film we saw these doctors specifically feeling remorse and having empathy for their patients. Some of which even thought that the patient shouldn't have one.

I wasn't surprised by the amount of protests that took place. Protests are something that always happen when there is a cause that people want to change. What did surprise me were the amount of people that resorted to willful violence and harassment outside of the doctor's workplace. It was shocking to me because these same people are claimed to be "pro-life" yet go out of their way to harm and harass doctors and patients. One doctor, LeRoy Carhart, had one of his barns burned down where 21 of 25 or his horses were killed. His daughter was also no where to be found but was luckily safe at his clinic. What seemed to bother me was that he received messages from people saying that this was justified because he was "murdering" children.

Something else that was really shocking to me was how the protesters, politicians, and pro-lifers were more concerned with a baby just being alive rather than its quality of life. Most of the patients that were interviewed in the film had very good reasons to why they needed to get an abortion. The cases that were talked about showed that the baby had fatal and life threatening disease that would either make their life miserable or overall very difficult and eventually fatal. Most of the patients didn't even want to get the procedure done, but they knew they had to for the sake of their child.

After watching, I still ask why some people were so upset. I can see where pro-lifers come from. I can see how they can view this as murder. I just wish that they were able to think deeper into why most women get these procedures. Some are not financially or mentally ready to have a child, some simply aren't strong enough or capable to carry a baby, and other's personal space was violated and were forced into this. Women do not owe anyone a reason to why they decide to get one. Unfortunately, in the film most were required to give a story to their doctor to decide if it was enough to get an abortion.

I don't know exactly how I felt after the film. A little anger and little sadness. It makes me sad because this can happen to anyone. This hasn't popped up in my life before but I have spoken to my mom about this one time to see what she thought. After a short argument, I asked her the question, that if it was me who ended up in that situation, what would she do. Side note, I don't want to be pregnant in the future, maybe I'd adopt, but having kids of my own is something that I don't want to go through. Her response was that she would make me have the child and she would raise it. This made me deeply sad that my own mother would say that without considering my own feelings and how traumatic it would be.

Putting research in summaries could take away the meaning from a documentary. For example, using data taken from across a whole country could diminish the meaning of a documentary when specific people were interviewed and had their story shared. Specifically to this film, if we put research of why women chose to get abortions, it would take away from the women that shared their story and their specific reasons for why. I think that out of respect, research should rarely be mentioned in summaries.