DIY Abortions at the University of Tennessee

Once upon a time, before everything was intersectional and people found great joy in making themselves and everyone around them miserable, college was a time for growing up. Theoretically, one should already be grown up by the time one moves into his dorms during his freshman year. But then again, one should be grown up by the time one is an actor on cable news, a columnist for a major American newspaper, a school teacher, or a college professor. We've seen how well that has worked out. 

Be that as it may, college is the de facto time when one makes the last of one's dumb mistakes before entering the real world and discovering heretofore secret knowledge like the fact that debts need to be paid and that gravity works. Many people who came of age before the advent of social media can recall a few... shall we say, "poor decisions." — not necessarily catastrophic or criminal mistakes, just dumb things. 

Now, college is a four- to possibly eight-or-more-year exercise in telling people that they have the rights of adults and the responsibilities of toddlers. Small wonder that a young woman on TikTok was recently reduced to tears upon discovering that adults are required to hold jobs and pay bills. Well, most of the time. Some of the time. Now and then. College students no longer learn how to function in the real world, and worse yet, they are caught completely unaware when that real world catches up with their choices. Upon graduation, they receive a diploma, a vape pen, and a BDS Elmo doll.

This infantilization of adults was visible in an Oct. 19 meeting at the University of Tennessee. Campus Reform notes that the student organization The University of Tennessee’s Women’s Coordinating Council hosted Maxine Carwile, who is with the organization “Self-Managed Abortion; Safe and Supported” or SASS. The event was billed as abortion pill training. It directed students to a website through which they could purchase abortion pills that are often manufactured in India. The website that Carwile recommended offers links to companies that sell the pills without requiring a medical exam, consultation, or prescription. The pills themselves are generic versions of pills that have been approved by the FDA. 

This activity violates Tennessee law, which prohibits the use of abortifacient drugs. But Carwile calls the ability to purchase such drugs via the web a "beautiful miracle." And since the purchaser is breaking the law, Carwile notes that secrecy is paramount, commenting, "If anyone ever does end their own pregnancy, or help someone end their own pregnancy, they need to keep their mouth absolutely, completely shut. Trust no one.” 

Should complications arise, such as a fever, nausea, diarrhea, or headaches, women are told to lie to their doctors or primary healthcare providers and claim that they suffered a miscarriage. I talked to some people in the medical profession. They explained that taking such a drug without the care of a physician could result in even more dangerous complications than the flu-like symptoms mentioned above. If for some reason the woman fails to explain all of the productions of conception, also known as POC, she could experience bleeding and require surgery. There is also the risk of an infection that could lead to sepsis and even death. 

I do not know if those topics were covered in the event, but Carwile did refer to the process of ordering and ingesting the pill as minor. She commented that everyone "does minor crimes every day." She said that the act of aborting a child was tantamount to speeding down a highway. So an abortion is the same as going 70 in a 65 MPH zone? Does this mean that a woman dying from sepsis because she concealed things from a doctor is comparable to her being involved in a fender bender?  

Even if we look past the death of a child, the fact that colleges are encouraging young women to deal with adult problems from the standpoint of an angst-ridden teen and engage in behavior that has the potential to kill them shows that the Left prefers that its acolytes — or perhaps victims — be kept at a puerile level where they act on impulse. And in this case, such impulses could prove to be deadly.