Editor's note. Part Two looks at the shift away from embryonic stem cell research in favor of unobjectionable alternatives. Part Three explains how to download free comparison flyers. Comments on any or all are welcome at daveandrusko@hotmail.com

Since it is unlikely I will have the time to read "Abortion and Life" any time soon, I will have to rely on one or more of the swooning reviews that laud author and film maker Jennifer Baumgardner's ongoing campaign to "destigmatize" abortion. My guess is that the book cover tells you everything you need to know.

You see two women, arms around each other's waist. One smiling woman is wearing a shirt which reads, "I had an abortion." Her left hand rests on the abdomen of a pregnant woman who appears to be looking off to the side at someone else. The message? Presumably, life or death, cradle or curettage, we affirm each other's "choice."

But I understood the strategy, the oldest in the book. Flaunt what most people find, at a minimum, moral unsettling, and, over time, the edge of disapproval will wear off. This in-your-face strategy went mainstream, so to speak, when the largest abortion provider in the world, Planned Parenthood, started producing the tee-shirts.

Anyway, according to a review by Deirdre Fulton that appears in the Phoenix, an alternative newspaper, the "pro-choice" movement has stagnated, in no small part because many members "still shy away from telling personal abortion stories, finding it more comfortable to talk about reproductive rights as intangible concepts rather than concrete situations."

Baumgardner's three-part campaign included producing the first batch of these "wildly popular [and controversial]" tee-shirts, a 2005 movie, "I Had an Abortion," and the new book.

"This month, Akashic Books released Abortion and Life, in which Baumgardner and photographer Tara Todras-Whitehill translate the ideas (and some of the narratives) from I Had An Abortion into print," Fulton tells us. There are 14 "narratives" and each "is accompanied by a photograph of that woman wearing the black 'I had an abortion' T-shirt.'"

Fulton offers one very interesting insight/admission. It's risky (my word) for a "pro-choice" woman to be "ambivalent" about her abortion ("she would seem too vulnerable") or cavalier ("too callous"). So how to walk the tightrope? Fulton quotes from the "mission letter" for the film.

"In encouraging women to tell their stories, we hope to demonstrate that women might have complex, or even painful, experiences with abortion, but they are still grateful to have had access to the procedure -- very, very grateful."

The crux of the strategy is the assumption that a "narrative"--a story--"is not a debate, it doesn't have sides. Unlike an argument or a slogan, a story can be as complex as a woman's life."

But this is silly, in the extreme, when all the stories have the same moral. The woman may say she felt nothing, or she may have described it as "physically unbearable, emotionally difficult," but the conclusion is always the same: a variation of "If there is a baby in here, it's not staying..."

Obviously the reader only has the sample Fulton chooses for her review. But consider these three examples.

The woman who talked about abortion #1 being "physically unbearable, emotionally difficult" is just fine by abortion #2. Another talks about "My abortions [plural] were not morally or emotionally wrenching for me. I was just relieved each time I had the procedure." The third woman ("co-author on two previous feminist books") aborts two of her triplets.

Aside from bucking up one another's spirits, what would these "narratives" say to those who have no firm position on abortion?

This kind of laying bare what is, after all, the ultimate betrayal of parental responsibility may be a "feminist act" to Fulton, but to most others it is a deeply disturbing portrait of neglect and abandonment.

Please send your comments to daveandrusko@hotmail.com.

Part Two -- Tide Turning Against Use of Embryonic Stem Cells?
Part Three -- Updated Comparison Flyers Available Free of Charge