Ronald Reagan: Fan of Ayn Rand


Dennis Hardin

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No, no. no! Rights are not arbitrary. Period. I'm sorry, but I would never say that. Inventions are not necessarily arbitrary in a philosophical construct. Regarding physical things, they work or they don't. Another matter entirely. A woman owns her body. Period. It is her life. Period.

--Brant

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No, no. no! Rights are not arbitrary. Period. I'm sorry, but I would never say that. Inventions are not necessarily arbitrary in a philosophical construct. Regarding physical things, they work or they don't. Another matter entirely. A woman owns her body. Period. It is her life. Period.

--Brant

Yes, I own my own body, period. I always have and always will.

Can another human body ever be inside my body? I know I have sovereignty over it.

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Has it actually been established that Rand had an abortion?

Brant,

I think it's in the Heller book.

Michael

EDIT: See here in The New Individualist:

TNI: One of your most noted revelations in the book was that Ayn Rand probably had an abortion when she was in her twenties. Can summarize the evidence that lead you to this conclusion?

Heller: Marna Wolf, Frank O’Connor’s niece who was not yet a teenager in the 1930s, was the first person to mention that Rand had had an abortion in that decade; she recalled it as a sidelight while describing her father A.M. Papurt’s relationship with Rand and Frank. Papurt, Frank’s brother-in-law, had loaned Frank the money to pay for the abortion. As with almost every assertion in the book, I checked this with multiple sources. Mimi Sutton, Marna’s sister, who was old enough to remember both the loan and abortion, independently described the event in a taped interview from 1983. Connie Papurt, whom I interviewed, recalled hearing the story from her mother, Frank’s sister. When I asked Barbara Branden about it, she told me that Rand had mentioned the abortion to her, in an intimate setting; that's when I decided to put it in the book.

For the record, I did not print unsubstantiated gossip. If only one source—particularly one who hadn’t already proved reliable—told me something that was out of the ordinary, I didn’t print it.

Incidentally, Barbara discussed this with me, too.

My Mother lost her virginity to my Father in her ignorance about sex in it had to have been the winter of 1934. My sister, Joan (d. 2005), was the result of that. During her pregnancy she went to a hotel room in Harlem where the idea was to induce an abortion through physical exercise. She wasn't the only one there. The pregnancy was not aborted by that. Joan was her most precious and beautiful child. Mom never forgave herself for trying to end the pregnancy. Later in life, in spite of her liberal political views, her attitude was you do the sex you accept the possible consequences. I can imagine Ayn Rand getting very defensive on the subject of abortion if she had had one--and not being honest with herself and others about the matter.

--Brant

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Her is where I would argue that it is up to the man to control his own sperm.

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Has it actually been established that Rand had an abortion?

Brant,

I think it's in the Heller book.

Michael

EDIT: See here in The New Individualist:

TNI: One of your most noted revelations in the book was that Ayn Rand probably had an abortion when she was in her twenties. Can summarize the evidence that lead you to this conclusion?

Heller: Marna Wolf, Frank O’Connor’s niece who was not yet a teenager in the 1930s, was the first person to mention that Rand had had an abortion in that decade; she recalled it as a sidelight while describing her father A.M. Papurt’s relationship with Rand and Frank. Papurt, Frank’s brother-in-law, had loaned Frank the money to pay for the abortion. As with almost every assertion in the book, I checked this with multiple sources. Mimi Sutton, Marna’s sister, who was old enough to remember both the loan and abortion, independently described the event in a taped interview from 1983. Connie Papurt, whom I interviewed, recalled hearing the story from her mother, Frank’s sister. When I asked Barbara Branden about it, she told me that Rand had mentioned the abortion to her, in an intimate setting; that's when I decided to put it in the book.

For the record, I did not print unsubstantiated gossip. If only one source—particularly one who hadn’t already proved reliable—told me something that was out of the ordinary, I didn’t print it.

Incidentally, Barbara discussed this with me, too.

My Mother lost her virginity to my Father in her ignorance about sex in it had to have been the winter of 1934. My sister, Joan (d. 2005), was the result of that. During her pregnancy she went to a hotel room in Harlem where the idea was to induce an abortion through physical exercise. She wasn't the only one there. The pregnancy was not aborted by that. Joan was her most precious and beautiful child. Mom never forgave herself for trying to end the pregnancy. Later in life, in spite of her liberal political views, her attitude was you do the sex you accept the possible consequences. I can imagine Ayn Rand getting very defensive on the subject of abortion if she had had one--and not being honest with herself and others about the matter.

--Brant

She certainly was not the only one there. Every woman in the world has been there. I have had the great good luck , that I was never pregnant when I did not want to be - except for one time I have come to think was probably an early miscarriage , I did not think of it so at the time, but in retrospect it is the likeliest explanation of something which had never happened to me before or since. I have read that there is a regular percentage of conceptions that spontaneously abort within 3 months, and most of the time the women do not realize it. Nature's way.

Abortion has always existed and should always be a woman;s right, society can make it easier or harder. In necessity and sorrow.

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You guys just don’t get it, do you? Reasoned, logical debate on abortion? Bah! Objectivism means never acknowledging that an issue is nuanced--or debatable.

Comrade Sonia (along with her co-author, Ari Armstrong) explains it all for you in the latest issue of The Objective Standard.

The Assault on Abortion Rights Undermines All Our Liberties

Putting it quite simply, as long as the fetus remains inside a woman’s womb, regardless of its stage of development, the mother has an absolute right to destroy it if she wishes. .

And here is a key component of their argument:

Rights are factual requirements of human survival and flourishing in society. . .

An embryo or fetus in the womb, in contrast (to the mother), is not an individual. . .The fetus cannot know or interact with the world outside the womb in any meaningful way. It is not an individual member of society, but rather a part of the pregnant woman. None of this changes until the fetus departs from the woman’s body at birth and thereby becomes an individual human person.

As long as the embryo or fetus resides in the womb, it is not living its own life, it is not an individual, it is not a rational being, and it does not exist in a social context. As such, it is not a person with the right to life; it is only a potential person.

This argument confuses the origin of a concept with its full meaning and application. A person’s right to his own life is not an issue outside of society because there is no one to deprive you of your life. But the fact that the concept of rights arises in the context of social interaction does not mean that someone who has no "social context" therefore has no rights.

If living in society were a precondition of having a right to your life, then a hermit who chooses to live on an isolated island without any human contact also does not have a right to his life. Those who live in society can feel free to use his island as a nuclear test site, because the hermit avoids all social interaction. And a mother can feel free to smash her unborn baby’s brains in at any point before (or perhaps even after) her water breaks.

Isn’t it fascinating that the advocates of "closed Objectivism" (e.g., ARI, Peikoff and Comrade Sonia) are clearly taking a position at variance with that of Ayn Rand, who restricted her argument favoring abortion to the early stages of pregnancy?

Evidently they believe that Objectivism is only what Ayn Rand said it was—except when it comes to abortion.

Unfuckingbelievable.

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Dennis Hardin wrote:

Isn’t it fascinating that the advocates of "closed Objectivism" (e.g., ARI, Peikoff and Comrade Sonia) are clearly taking a position at variance with that of Ayn Rand, who restricted her argument favoring abortion to the early stages of pregnancy?

end quote

Exactly. It is instructive and fascinating. I want to thank Msk and Dh for their insights. It is the cult members chanting a mantra for the Dear Leader to hear and beam her approval. I have a historical quote list somewhere that shows Rand’s evolution on the issue of abortion which is never mentioned. Comrade Sonya, the cultists at OO, and the ARI crowd have fixated on one of Rand’s earliest pronouncements, circa 1965, and ignored her further nuanced thinking on the issue. Freezing the Lexicon at one snapshot is deception. Yet, to be historically fair, the last two entries in the Lexicon on abortion are the only two dated, hint hint, and are from 1981. They do show Rand returning to her 1965 position which we also know doesn’t reflect her “full” “nuanced” view.

I think the entries from 1981 shows her repugnance for Doris Gordon who changed her views on abortion and challenged Rand. It shows her dislike for the Libs for Life who stalked her for a quote. It shows Rand’s fear that Social Conservatives would turn back the clock on this issue. In the quote below, observe how persuasive Rand attempts to be. It is as if she is coaxing back those being swayed by the Science. Rand is warning those of us who are true Objectivists thinking contextually and rationally for ourselves, to bewary of her wrath.

Peter Taylor

“The Age of Mediocrity”

The Objectivist Forum, June 1981, 3

If any among you are confused or taken in by the argument that the cells of an embryo are living human cells, remember that so are all the cells of your body, including the cells of your skin, your tonsils, or your ruptured appendix—and that cutting them is murder, according to the notions of that proposed law. Remember also that a potentiality is not the equivalent of an actuality—and that a human being’s life begins at birth.

The question of abortion involves much more than the termination of a pregnancy: it is a question of the entire life of the parents. As I have said before, parenthood is an enormous responsibility; it is an impossible responsibility for young people who are ambitious and struggling, but poor; particularly if they are intelligent and conscientious enough not to abandon their child on a doorstep nor to surrender it to adoption. For such young people, pregnancy is a death sentence: parenthood would force them to give up their future, and condemn them to a life of hopeless drudgery, of slavery to a child’s physical and financial needs. The situation of an unwed mother, abandoned by her lover, is even worse.

I cannot quite imagine the state of mind of a person who would wish to condemn a fellow human being to such a horror. I cannot project the degree of hatred required to make those women run around in crusades against abortion. Hatred is what they certainly project, not love for the embryos, which is a piece of nonsense no one could experience, but hatred, a virulent hatred for an unnamed object. Judging by the degree of those women’s intensity, I would say that it is an issue of self-esteem and that their fear is metaphysical. Their hatred is directed against human beings as such, against the mind, against reason, against ambition, against success, against love, against any value that brings happiness to human life. In compliance with the dishonesty that dominates today’s intellectual field, they call themselves “pro-life.”

By what right does anyone claim the power to dispose of the lives of others and to dictate their personal choices?

end quote

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I cannot quite imagine the state of mind of a person who would wish to condemn a fellow human being to such a horror.

. . .

Their hatred is directed against human beings as such, against the mind, against reason, against ambition, against success, against love, against any value that brings happiness to human life.

Peter,

Looks like Ayn Rand imagined that state quite well. At least she imagined it well enough in the same paragraph to point an accusing finger at pro-life people and tell them what's really in their minds--that they are moved by unspeakable hatred.

Maybe some are, who knows? In my experience, I have yet to meet one. I admit I have met some insufferable control freaks who are pro-life, but no one moved by deep hatred of humanity, happiness and the good life.

But what about the overblown vicious Rand-hating we sometimes come across that discuss her views on abortion?

Well, my following comment does not apply to all of it (as some people are fanatical Rand-haters), but it does apply to some of it.

When Rand gets bitchy and points her accusing finger at people with edgy temperaments, her hostile rhetoric pisses them off. They can get nasty right back. But this is a cat fight, bickering over manners, not some kind of momentous war over life-and-death issues.

They are responding to the mean-spirited unfairness and inaccuracy of Rand's accusation. They are not spewing out a demonic hatred welling up and exploding because it has suddenly been exposed.

And others? The silent majority?

Heh.

Since Rand is popular with many of the very pro-life people she condemns, I imagine they look at a passage like that, scratch their heads and wonder, "What's her problem all of a sudden?" That happens right before they dismiss it as unimportant and move on to the parts of Rand's thinking they agree with.

Sorry. No monsters at home. Just people. Mostly good people at that.

Michael

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T

The question of abortion involves much more than the termination of a pregnancy: it is a question of the entire life of the parents. As I have said before, parenthood is an enormous responsibility; it is an impossible responsibility for young people who are ambitious and struggling, but poor; particularly if they are intelligent and conscientious enough not to abandon their child on a doorstep nor to surrender it to adoption. For such young people, pregnancy is a death sentence: parenthood would force them to give up their future, and condemn them to a life of hopeless drudgery, of slavery to a child’s physical and financial needs. The situation of an unwed mother, abandoned by her lover, is even worse.

end quote

This has got to be one of the very wackiest things Ayn Rand ever wrote.

Having observed several of those doomed couples on Death Row over the years in their lives of hopeless drudgery, and the even worse post-death slavery of several single mothers, I have to say that they seemed to enjoy their non-lives more than Rand ever did hers, most of the time.

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Daunce wrote:

I have to say that they seemed to enjoy their non-lives more than Rand ever did hers, most of the time.

end quote

She was a scolder. The joy in her life. Hmmm? How about this conspiracy theory? Nathaniel Branden was her son. Sort of. Branden equals Ben Rand which means son of Rand. So she spiced up her life by . . . oh, I can’t say it. My apologies to all those involved.

Peter

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Daunce wrote:

I have to say that they seemed to enjoy their non-lives more than Rand ever did hers, most of the time.

end quote

She was a scolder. The joy in her life. Hmmm? How about this conspiracy theory? Nathaniel Branden was her son. Sort of. Branden equals Ben Rand which means son of Rand. So she spiced up her life by . . . oh, I can’t say it. My apologies to all those involved.

Peter

Well, NB and BB and others were "the children" as she said, and she considered herself a good matchmaker. Yet she pretty much mandated, that having children was the very last thing a serious student of Objectivism should do with her life., and we all know what happened to that devoted mother in the tunnel in AS. Adds up to a strange psychological formula for "living on earth.," or at the least replenishing human life on earth.

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She was a scolder. The joy in her life. Hmmm? How about this conspiracy theory? Nathaniel Branden was her son. Sort of. Branden equals Ben Rand which means son of Rand. So she spiced up her life by . . . oh, I can’t say it. My apologies to all those involved.

Peter

A son and mother? Doing the nasty? Yuchhh! You actually made me blush.

Ba'al Chatzaf

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Carol:

These irrational threads in her cape were unfortunate to see. The smoking, abortion. anti-child bearing, anti political were dissonant messages in her pro happiness, living on Earth credo which could be reached by achieving your best in pursuit of your highest values.

I'll take her gifts to us with those threads anytime.

Adam

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The Ben-Rand story has been knocking around for decades, and it isn't true. That is why nobody has ever presented evidence for it.

(As far as I know the first to tell the story was Nora Ephron in the NYT Book Review in 1968. She gave no source and no evidence, and she never met Rand or either Branden.)

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Carol:

These irrational threads in her cape were unfortunate to see. The smoking, abortion. anti-child bearing, anti political were dissonant messages in her pro happiness, living on Earth credo which could be reached by achieving your best in pursuit of your highest values.

I'll take her gifts to us with those threads anytime.

Adam

I think that is the attitude of most of the regulars here, one reason it is rewarding to interact with them;

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The question of abortion involves much more than the termination of a pregnancy: it is a question of the entire life of the parents. As I have said before, parenthood is an enormous responsibility; it is an impossible responsibility for young people who are ambitious and struggling, but poor; particularly if they are intelligent and conscientious enough not to abandon their child on a doorstep nor to surrender it to adoption. For such young people, pregnancy is a death sentence: parenthood would force them to give up their future, and condemn them to a life of hopeless drudgery, of slavery to a child’s physical and financial needs. The situation of an unwed mother, abandoned by her lover, is even worse.

This has got to be one of the very wackiest things Ayn Rand ever wrote.

Having observed several of those doomed couples on Death Row over the years in their lives of hopeless drudgery, and the even worse post-death slavery of several single mothers, I have to say that they seemed to enjoy their non-lives more than Rand ever did hers, most of the time.

I completely agree with Rand’s arguments here. It’s not as though Rand was alone in her warnings about the potential damage children can have on a relationship. Ellen Peck’s courageous book, The Baby Trap, published in 1976, presented the case for childless marriage, and gave a lot of young couples the confidence to defy conventionality.and think twice before starting a family. Peck’s message was a simple one: consider the consequences before yielding to social pressures just because everyone says that’s what you should do.

Some recent studies have provided further evidence in support of Rand.

Kids Curb Marital Satisfaction

An eight-year study of 218 couples found 90 percent experienced a decrease in marital satisfaction once the first child was born.

"Couples who do not have children also show diminished marital quality over time," says Scott Stanley, research professor of psychology at University of Denver. "However, having a baby accelerates the deterioration, especially seen during periods of adjustment right after the birth of a child."

Kids are Depressing, Study of Parents Finds

The depressing results seem to be across the board in a study of 13,000 people. No type of parent reported less depression than non-parents, Simon said.

If Ayn Rand and Frank O'Connor had chosen to have children, it is quite possible that the financial pressures would have severely curtailed her writing career, with disastrous consequences not only for her but for the millions of people whose lives have been infinitely enriched by her words and ideas. Many of the recent studies of Rand's life have highlighted some of the suffering she endured, especially in her later years. It is pure speculative nonsense and the worst kind of baseless psychologizing to assume that she was, therefore, an unhappy person throughout most of her life, or that she did not experience extraordinary levels of joy and satisfaction.

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I wonder how courageous The Baby Trap and the people who took its advice really were in late-twentieth-century America. What was the worst that could have happened to a couple who followed up? Nagging from the in-laws and nosy questions. Parents get that, too.

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The only danger in preaching a childless lifestyle is that your group eventually dies off. You are totally dependent on the arrival of newbies to keep the culture alive since you can't pass it on through parenting.

I see nothing wrong in accepting reproduction as a normal condition of life, just as I see nothing wrong in letting people choose a childless lifestyle if that is more to their liking. But I see nothing to gain in making a case for the superiority of one over the other.

With one caveat at this perspective.

As a species, we have to reproduce to survive. So long as some of the members carry this load, the others are free not to. There are plenty of other things the species needs to survive, also.

I have seen some in O-Land forums make the case that an individual should not be concerned with the survival of the human species, that this issue is not connected with the survival of the individual, so it doesn't matter. I claim that we are not just individuals, but individual human beings. We are not just rational, but rational animals.

Therefore keeping an eye on the health of the species, and keeping balance in things like reproduction in mind to maintain such health, is perfectly rational.

Michael

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I wonder how courageous The Baby Trap and the people who took its advice really were in late-twentieth-century America. What was the worst that could have happened to a couple who followed up? Nagging from the in-laws and nosy questions. Parents get that, too.

It is mainly women who require courage to remain childless, because of the pressures to fulfill their "biological destiny." No doubt a lot of that pressure does emanate from parents, but women hear it constantly, both from their peers and the culture at large. A great many women have children without ever considering that they might have done otherwise. Those women who deliberately choose career (or just the freedom to spend their money and time in other ways) over motherhood deserve enormous credit for their strength and independence.

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Yes, a lot of women have children without thinking it through, but (my impression is) they tend to be low in income and education, not the educated professionals ("yuppies" hadn't been coined yet) Peck was addressing. I'm going strictly by my impressions, and I get the impression you're doing the same, but I doubt that remaining childless has taken any significant amount of courage in our lifetimes. Or maybe you're not going by your impressions. Do you have any hard data on this?

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The question of abortion involves much more than the termination of a pregnancy: it is a question of the entire life of the parents. As I have said before, parenthood is an enormous responsibility; it is an impossible responsibility for young people who are ambitious and struggling, but poor; particularly if they are intelligent and conscientious enough not to abandon their child on a doorstep nor to surrender it to adoption. For such young people, pregnancy is a death sentence: parenthood would force them to give up their future, and condemn them to a life of hopeless drudgery, of slavery to a child’s physical and financial needs. The situation of an unwed mother, abandoned by her lover, is even worse.

This has got to be one of the very wackiest things Ayn Rand ever wrote.

Having observed several of those doomed couples on Death Row over the years in their lives of hopeless drudgery, and the even worse post-death slavery of several single mothers, I have to say that they seemed to enjoy their non-lives more than Rand ever did hers, most of the time.

I completely agree with Rand’s arguments here. It’s not as though Rand was alone in her warnings about the potential damage children can have on a relationship. Ellen Peck’s courageous book, The Baby Trap, published in 1976, presented the case for childless marriage, and gave a lot of young couples the confidence to defy conventionality.and think twice before starting a family. Peck’s message was a simple one: consider the consequences before yielding to social pressures just because everyone says that’s what you should do.

Some recent studies have provided further evidence in support of Rand.

Kids Curb Marital Satisfaction

An eight-year study of 218 couples found 90 percent experienced a decrease in marital satisfaction once the first child was born.

"Couples who do not have children also show diminished marital quality over time," says Scott Stanley, research professor of psychology at University of Denver. "However, having a baby accelerates the deterioration, especially seen during periods of adjustment right after the birth of a child."

Kids are Depressing, Study of Parents Finds

The depressing results seem to be across the board in a study of 13,000 people. No type of parent reported less depression than non-parents, Simon said.

If Ayn Rand and Frank O'Connor had chosen to have children, it is quite possible that the financial pressures would have severely curtailed her writing career, with disastrous consequences not only for her but for the millions of people whose lives have been infinitely enriched by her words and ideas. Many of the recent studies of Rand's life have highlighted some of the suffering she endured, especially in her later years. It is pure speculative nonsense and the worst kind of baseless psychologizing to assume that she was, therefore, an unhappy person throughout most of her life, or that she did not experience extraordinary levels of joy and satisfaction.

Nevertheless Dennis, I maintain my position, and furthermore I think that the "speculative nonsense and the worst kind of baseless psychologizing" is the assumption that unwanted fetuses kill all possible future happiness or career achievement for all their parents,and the presentation of kids or achievement is, or even was in 1965 or 1983, the either/or situation Rand said it was. Susannah Moodie anybody? Mary Wollstonecraft and her daughter Mary Shelley? Fay Weldon, who produced several excellent novels, journalism and screenplays along with four sons and is still producing? Er, J.K. Rowling? I leave out my personal heroine, L.M. Montgomery, whose career was well established long before she married. But the "lady novelists" of yesteryear did not produce their novels instead of children, but often along with them. It is true that children risked the physical lives of the mothers, and I along with many am glad that Jane Austen never managed to catch a husband as she could have died in childbirth before she ever published. But productive, ambitious, talented people will manage to be productive despite the hindrances of everyday life, even a hindrance that yells for food every four hours.

I repeat, Rand's statement was wacky.

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How many folks who ascribe to Dennis' position wish that their mothers had mad the same choice?

How about if Anna Rosenbaum's mother had made that decision?

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As to the depression and unhappiness of poor young couples saddled with parenthood, and the lifelong ruin of their dreams, I think Rand may have been surprised, if parenthood had somehow been foisted on the young O'Connors against their intentions. From what I have read of Frank, he was a wonderful man whose main job was to look after his wife, and I think he could have easily looked after a child also. And been a fine father.

Just a baseless speculation.

Her decision was entirely right, for her. She did not want to be a parent. But for her to be so emphatic that accepting parenthood is accepting total self-extinction, was foolish and unrealistic.

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Well at least it would not make a young woman who agreed with her philosophical ideas guilty if she had a child...oops...forget that idea.

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