Gay abortion doctor who wants to adopt

November 24, 2010 By

Doing a story on abortion doctors must be terribly challenging, since it would be impossible to create a sweeping generalization of religious, political, ethical views and backgrounds. The Toronto Star tackles this challenge in a lengthy piece exploring the dimensions of trying to be an abortion provider. The hook is really fascinating: it begins with a gay doctor, Dr. Evan James, who never wavered in his determination to become an abortion provider.

He found that he enjoyed the work and was not put off by a woman’s tears or the tissue he extracted from her womb.

Nor did he fear the violence–bomb threats, stabbings, sniper shootings–that for years has stalked abortion doctors in North America.

Only when his personal life was thrust up against his professional beliefs was his firm stance on abortion shaken.

James and his partner desperately wanted to adopt a child.

The story goes on to say that James “began to see shades of grey instead of just black and white.” There really is a lot to like in this piece by Megan Ogilvie. There’s some basic info, like how about one in four Canadian women will have an abortion in her lifetime. Telling a story through one doctor’s unusual situation makes it even more interesting.

However, you can guess GetReligion’s complaint. There isn’t a single mention of religion or faith. Since people’s views on abortion are often connected to their religious beliefs (or lack thereof), you would think that could make the article even more interesting.

As James’s desire to have a family deepened, he began to think an uneasy thing: how could he terminate pregnancies when each abortion meant there would be one less child for adoption?

He also wondered how he would explain what he did for a living to his adopted child. After all, wouldn’t his son or daughter have been born because the birth mother had not chosen abortion?

The writer shows how the decision to become an abortion doctor can be quite challenging for some. “They must also find ways to reckon with the ethical and personal dilemmas that can accompany their work,” she writes. We’re left wondering what those ethical dilemmas are with little explanation.

James remembers feeling a gentle shock each of those first few times [watching an abortion]. But even after viewing a second-term abortion, he was not haunted by what he saw.

“During the direct examination, you might see an arm or an umbilical cord or, even, the body. It doesn’t all come out in one piece. With your imagination, you can see that it resembles a human.

“I could understand how some people would be turned off by that or very moved by that.”

The writer paints most of the downsides to being an abortion doctor is being targeted by violent groups. Perhaps she could have quoted some doctors who chose not to be an abortion doctor for ethical reasons. Further, are there emotional or perhaps financial disadvantage to being an abortion doctor? For example, an earlier New York Times magazine piece suggested that malpractice insurance costs $10-$15,000 a year.

The story later describes what takes place during an abortion procedure, which seems pretty rare but needed in a story like this. It’s clear that second-trimester abortions are more disturbing to this doctor than first-trimester ones.

But James, who knows only one young doctor in Ontario who intends to do second-term abortion, is not troubled by this. He focuses his attention on the woman in front of him.

“The biggest risk factor for a second-trimester abortion is lack of referral for a first-trimester abortion,” says James. “I see second-trimester abortion as a bit of a tragedy, because to me it means the medical system has failed. Then it becomes our job to fix it.”

The story’s tension continues until we find out that he has decided to remain an abortion doctor.

One year after questions started to swirl through his mind, he has made his choice.

James will be an abortion doctor.

Not only that, but James plans to do second-trimester abortions as part of his practice. He will step to the very front line, the place where there is greatest need–and greatest risk.

We’re left feeling pretty warm and fuzzy about James’ decision, even though it was supposedly tough.

More questions might come to him, and doubts may again creep into his mind. Already he wonders whether he should be open and proud of being an abortion doctor.

James accepts that he has tough road ahead.

He hopes his child will be proud of him for taking it.

The slightly one-sided look story still offered some good information and an intriguing hook. We’re still left wondering whether his faith (or lack thereof) play any part in what he sees as ethnical or unethical and why being an abortion doctor is so complex for him.

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Filed Under: Marriage & family, Sex, Social Issues
  • Truth Unites… and Divides

    “A gay abortion doctor who wants to adopt”

    That’s the best blog post title I’ve ever seen on Get Religion.

    • Sarah Pulliam Bailey

      Why thank you….though it really reflects the nature of the story.

    • Jon in the Nati

      It delivers what it promises

  • http://www.priestsforlife.org Leslie Palma

    I find myself not only wondering about his faith or lack thereof, but also about his humanity (or lack thereof). He is performing a surgical procedure on two human beings — one of whom is crying and the other who is dying — and by his own admission, cares about neither of them. If this is the face of the new abortionist, we have much to fear.

    On another note, I gave up hoping for any balance way up top, when the writer referred to “the tissue” he was removing. The writer doesn’t seem overly concerned with the woman, or “the tissue” either.

    • Sarah Pulliam Bailey

      Leslie, this is a tough one. If you’re a reporter writing where abortion is legal, how would you describe “the tissue” instead? I’m not criticizing or defending this doctor, but I’m more interested in how the article is written.

    • Julia

      In defense of the reporter:

      Back in the 1960s, preparing slides for the pathologist in a very Catholic hospital, the materials to be examined under microscope after a spontaneous abortion (a miscarriage in popular terms) was known as the “products of conception”. This was 10 years before Roe v. Wade. Medical terminology often sounds deliberately cold; it’s not – it’s just clinically accurate.

      Same goes for the reporter’s use of “the tissue”. In a different place in the article he does mention arms, legs and torsos.

      • James

        No, “the tissue” is biologically inaccurate. “Tissue” refers to a specific level of unity and organization of a living thing. I.e., we have molecules organized as organelles, organized as cells; cells organized as tissues; tissues organized as organs and other entities like skin, bones, nerves, etc.; and all of these together organized as body. I suppose it could be described as “tissue” if the organ or part to which it belongs is damaged; but then what is removed would almost always be an amalgam of various tissues, and not one single, neatly-extracted tissue. One would also not say, “not put off by … the organ he removed.” “Amalgam of tissues” is already better than tissue in the singular. This may sound like splitting hairs, but since we are speaking of a body which is being dismembered or otherwise violated and removed, the choice of language seems to be consciously emphasizing a part divorced from the whole. It would be like, in describing animal or human experiments, saying: “The doctor was not bothered by the effects produced on the tissues he was studying,” after describing an animal or human who had been dismembered or otherwise killed by the experiment. Such language invites one to consider the violence done on a level of unity which is less profound than that of a whole animal or human being. A fetus is in no sense merely “tissue” any more than you or I are just “tissue.”

  • Jerry

    Apparently “Evan James” is a pseudonym if the internet “chatter” is to be believed.

    But I do agree: we should have read about his religious beliefs or lack thereof.

    • Sarah Pulliam Bailey

      Yes, I think it explains in the article that he was concerned for his safety.

  • Tioedong

    that “one in four women will have an abortion” is twisting statistics that show one in four pregnancies are aborted.

    In reality, a lot of women have repeat abortions.

    • Sarah Pulliam Bailey

      Do you have a link? If so, I can post an update. Thanks.

      • James

        Sarah, this study: http://www.guttmacher.org/pubs/gpr/10/2/gpr100208.html shows that in the U.S., about half of women in the U.S. who have had an abortion have had one previously. The same study says that about 1/3 of all U.S. women will have had an abortion before the age of 45. The situation is obviously different in the U.S. – one of the very few countries where the practice of partial-birth abortion, up to the moment of birth, is legal. However, it’s unlikely that Canadian women never have repeat abortions, if the statistic in the U.S. is so high. Even if the statistic of Canadian repeat abortions is only half of the U.S. figure, the number of women in Canada who had had an abortion would more likely be between 1/4 and 1/8.

      • James

        I forgot to add:

        Thank you, Sarah, for this great story. A very good job here.

  • http://pulse.yahoo.com/_2HS7GEGQ2K2XTJTTTPSSRPXOQY Amanda

    Abortion is the result of the inability or lack of desire to continue a pregnancy.Adoption is the result of the inability or lack of desire to parent.When a woman does not desire to be pregnant—what in the world does adoption have to do with that? What the doctor (and the vast and wide majority of the surrounding universe) fail to understand is that an “unwanted” pregnancy has little to do with the child also being “unwanted” once it is born. Most women who birth children of unplanned pregnancies love and cherish their children. But without the proper support, they may find difficulty raising them. When we talk about abortion vs. adoption and a woman “choosing” adoption instead, we’re not talking about her finding a more “loving” way to handle her unwanted pregnancy, we’re talking about her surrendering a wanted child because she has no resources or support. Two VERY different social issues.I wish people could understand how oppressive and horribly untrue the abortion vs. adoption stereotype and the “unwanted” stereotype is for adopted persons (and our mothers).

  • Jeffrey

    I kept wondering if this is a difference between Canada and the U.S. Canadians are more secular than Americans and their religion is more mainline than traditional or Evangelical. What exists of the pro-life movement in Canada is made up of a very week Catholic church and Evangelicals in the Prairies. So I’m not sure a reporter in Toronto thinks much about the faith life of people she interviews since Canadians are pretty unlikely to talk about faith in public.