In a bizarre move, a Huffington Post blogger is wishing women a “Happy Mother’s Day!” – by calling for an end to mothers’ “unwanted” babies.
In a May 6 Huffington Post piece, blogger Kristine Holmgren argued for “No More Angry Mothers; Embracing Accessible Abortion and Affordable Contraception.” In it, she announced that before “safe, affordable, accessible abortion” existed, most mothers were “angry mothers.” To prevent future “angry mothers,” Holmgren declared that women should “protect our liberties,” including “our birthright” to abortion this Mother’s Day.
Kristine Holmgren, a self-described “Feminist [Presbyterian] theologian and produced playwright” stressed a “deep commitment to the welfare of American children and the women who raise them.” A media-favorite, she has been published by outlets including The Guardian and The New York Times.
To begin her piece, Holmgren told the story of a pregnant 13-year-old girl who didn’t have an abortion –choosing life against Holmgren’s advice.
“And so it came to pass that an unwanted child brought an unwanted baby to a cold, cold world,” Holmgren lamented, “And another angry mother was spawned.”
That story haunts Holmgren every Mother’s Day, she said, and reminds her that “angry mothers are everywhere.”
“If you were born before women had access to safe, affordable, accessible abortion, chances are your mother was an angry mother,” she elaborated.
Even Holmgren’s own mother fit the description.
“So – I wasn't (how shall I say this?) – planned,” Holmgren admitted. “Sometimes my mom called me her ‘baby.’ Most of the time she called me, ‘her final mistake.’”
But despite the “hard-earned lessons” from “our frustrated, angry mothers,” she continued, “American women are still vulnerable to poverty and the burden of unwanted childrearing.”
With the “near-perfect oral contraceptive” in the ‘60s and Roe v. Wade, Holmgren used to hold hope for women’s “ability to control our reproduction - the ability to choose - to be free.”
“I thought American women gained a glimpse into a world where every child was a wanted child,” she said, and “Every mother a happy mother.”
Those hopes evaporated as American women started calling feminists "feminazis" and hearing the “lie” that “abortion is murder."
“We watched young vulnerable girls turn away from the morning after pill, shun the opportunity to abort their unwanted children,” Holmgren lamented.
Now, she said, abortion access is “limited and shrinking” while contraception is “demonized in our public schools” and even “erroneously linked to female death.”
“Abortion is not murder,” she retorted, and “[t]he birth control pill is not toxic, dangerous or destructive.”
To get that message out there, Holmgren “challenge[d] American women to renew their commitment to responsible, thoughtful motherhood” for this Mother’s Day.
“Let's protect our liberties, reclaim safe, accessible abortion and contraception as our birthright,” she demanded, and “let us commit to a new future and a new promise” – the promise of “[n]o more angry mothers.”
Holmgren’s stance fit in well with The Huffington Post’s pro-abortion agenda in past pieces, including a blog arguing that “We Can Have Morally Good Abortions.”
