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Good Girls Avoid Abortion: Difference between revisions
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Part of the reason for this is to both avoid the wrath of the [[Moral Guardians]], and as well as avoid polarizing the audience (though this can happen anyway if her decision not to abort is made in a hamfisted manner), but it's mostly because if the character had an abortion and everyone went home happy, it would make for an uninteresting and/or short story. However, if the character decides to keep the child, a large avenue of potential plot lines opens up for the writer to exploit. For example, new Characters, all manner of [[Character Development]] and [[Wedding and Engagement Tropes]], etc.
The other 'a' word (adoption) hardly ever enters into consideration even if abortion itself is ruled out. There are several reasons for this. In serial media such as television and comic books, a baby given up for adoption can be seen as a dangling plot thread that the audience will expect to be [[What Happened to
Most importantly, however, is that this trope turns upon the false [[Begging the Question]] choice between responsibility and personal freedom. From a narrative standpoint, adoption is a kind of a cheat since it allows the woman to have both, thus allowing the author to resolve the conflict [[Debate and Switch|without answering the underlying question]]. If adoption ''is'' mentioned, it will usually be ruled out with some justification or other.
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** Later we see Kenta's father with another woman, who is pregnant and demands him to pay for an abortion. He gets a ''little'' pissed off by that.
* In Nana {{spoiler|Nana K}} becomes pregnant with {{spoiler|Takumi's}} child and thinks about getting an abortion because she and her boyfriend {{spoiler|Nobu}} aren't able to support a child. However she decided against it when {{spoiler|Takumi offers to marry her and help raise the child if she goes through with the pregnancy}}. Though {{spoiler|Nana K admits that if her current boyfriend Nobu}} had asked her to get an abortion she would have gone through with it.
* Played straight in ''[[Now and Then Here
* Averted in manga ''[[Wild Adapter]]''. Pregnant teenager Saori runs away from home and befriends series leads Kubota and Tokitoh. They're investigating the mysterious drug W•A; she's looking for her missing boyfriend. {{spoiler|Turns out W•A killed him.}} In love with her boyfriend but ambivalent about her pregnancy, Saori is strongly implied to have had an abortion by the end of the story. Kubota offers sympathetic acknowledgment: "[[Positive Discrimination|women are strong, aren't they? Look at us men, we're hopeless.]]"
* Late in the ''[[
* Averted in ''[[Eternal Sabbath]]'' - when Yuri's mother finds out she's pregnant just as she's starting to rebuild her relationship with her daughter, she opts to abort, out of equal parts a desire to concentrate on Yuri and a fear she'll love the new child to the point she can't accept the one she has. The story is entirely on her side. {{spoiler|When Isaac kills her - abortion is his [[Berserk Button]] for ''very'' valid reasons - it's presented not as karma but as a tragedy, and is the crucial mistake that seals his fate.}}
* This seems to be {{spoiler|Madam Red's}} opinion in ''[[
* In ''[[Akkan Baby]]'', just about everybody suggests that Shigeru and Yuki may want to give up their child. "I don't want to kill the baby!" are practically [[Arc Words]].
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** This seems to be the case with the Fables in general. In one issue it's implied that Frau Totenkinder ([[Meaningful Name|'Mrs Dead Children']]), who used to get her magical powers from sacrificing a newborn baby annually instead makes use of the Mundy abortions for the same effect, and it's mentioned that the entire Fable community might turn against her if they found out.
* ''[[The Sandman]]'' averts the trope in one conversation, where a woman mentions having had an abortion in a way that makes it clear it didn't mess her up (though it's not a casual reference either).
* One of the first storylines in Milestone Comics' ''[[
* Somewhat averted in ''[[Exiles (Comic Book)|Exiles]]'': Nocturne and Thunderbird begin a relationship while dimension-hopping and Nocturne gets pregnant, but Thunderbird is effectively rendered brain dead by a [[Heroic Sacrifice]] and is unable to jump with the rest of the team. Nocturne tells the team that [[Convenient Miscarriage|she had a miscarriage]] at some point in their travails, but a later issue showing her reflecting on her relationship with Thunderbird implies she had an abortion (or used her powers to induce it herself) because she couldn't handle raising the baby alone.
* ''[[Runaways]]'' takes this one step further by implying that [[Even Evil Has Standards|even evil girls avoid abortion]], as well as [[Hypocritical Humor]] since both are about to take part in a ritual that involves killing an innocent youth. It is part of a super villain plot to ''wipe out all of humanity'' in exchange for twenty years of unlimited wealth and power and a fifty-fifty shot at immortality.
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'''Janet Stein:''' Of course I am. What do you take me for, some kind of ''monster?'' }}
* [[Chick Tracts]], obviously.
* Stephanie Brown ([[Batman
* Cindy of Barbara Slate's ''Angel Love'' comic book series decides to get an abortion when she gets pregnant from a night with her boyfriend, and although her friend Angel is opposed to the idea, she nonetheless accompanies Cindy to the abortion clinic where she ends up having a change of heart and mind and decides not to go through with it, but instead will marry her boyfriend so that her child will not be without a father.
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== Fanfiction ==
* The ''[[Pokémon Black and White]]'' fanfic ''[http://www.fanfiction.net/s/6867429/1/Darkest_Night Darkest Night]'' involves Hilda getting pregnant after being raped by [[Casting a Shadow|Grimsley]]. She decides not to get an abortion, for reasons that are discussed but never fully explained (what makes the situation [[Fridge Logic|even weirder]] is that the author wrote another fanfic for the same exact fandom that actually featured morning-after pills).
* There are hundred's of fics written in the ''[[
* Abortion is referenced vaguely in [http://www.fanfiction.net/s/7142570/1/ this] ''[[Avatar: The Last Airbender]]'' fic, in which Mai becomes unexpectedly pregnant. Mai's mother suggests that she get an abortion since at this point she and Zuko aren't married yet, making Mai's position in the royal court somewhat uncertain. Mai firmly asserts that she considered the option, but is going to keep the baby. A [[Justified Trope]] in this case, as the main plot--a conspiracy to usurp the throne--revolves around the baby's (eventually legitimate) birth.
* ''Horrifyingly averted'' in [http://www.toplessrobot.com/2010/03/fan_fiction_friday_the_other_story.php this] [[Dragonball Z]] fanfic, which Topless Robot found so disturbing that they refused to provide running commentary on it. {{spoiler|Videl gets an abortion because she heard it would sexually arouse her, and it's possible that she had sex to get pregnant''for this reason''}}.
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* In ''[[Dirty Dancing]]'', the dancing instructor tries to have an abortion, but because it's [[The Sixties]] and they're illegal, it goes horribly wrong. Fortunately the heroine's father is a doctor, so he manages to save her, although it does make a major misunderstanding. In this case the girl is still considered "good" both by the audience and the characters, and the blame is rightly placed on the rich snob who knocked her up and dumped her.<ref>Even then heroine's father blames him when he learns the truth.</ref>
* ''The Life Before Her Eyes'': she gets the abortion, but the film treats it as a very bad decision with lasting consequences.
* In ''[[
* In ''[[The Fly]]'', abortion is still depicted with a negative aspect, but the heroine's decision to get an abortion is given the defense that her baby might not be human. In the sequel, she didn't, and it wasn't, but he got better.
* ''[[Dogma]]'' has the protagonist working at an abortion clinic, but that doesn't stop her from getting "tapped" to do God's work. It's revealed in the deleted scenes that she chose that career because a botched abortion in her youth caused an infection, left her infertile, and led to her husband leaving her.
* In ''[[Juno]]'', the main character goes to an abortion clinic but doesn't like the place when she gets there. After a protester tells her that fetuses have fingernails (which isn't actually true at that stage in the pregnancy, in case you were wondering), she decides she'll be putting her baby up for adoption. Her exact reason for deciding against abortion isn't specified, and is pretty much left up to the imagination of the viewer. The slightly more obvious meta-reason she didn't get one is that if she got the abortion, there'd be no plot, and much of the movie can be considered a love-song to adoption and non-biological parents (particularly adoptive- and step-mothers).
* In ''[[Breakfast On Pluto]]'', Patrick "Kitten" Braden's childhood friend Charlie travels to London to have an abortion. Kitten accompanies Charlie to the clinic, assuring her that she's making the right decision, fearing the child might end up a "disaster" like [[Cloudcuckoolander|Kitten]] [[Wholesome Crossdresser|herself]]. Charlie decides against it at the last second - [[Crowning Moment of Heartwarming|turns out she wouldn't mind at all if the child ended up like Kitten.]]
* Averted in ''[[
* In ''[[Knocked Up]]'', the female lead's sister mentions the possibility of abortion, but she decides to bring the baby to term. This was a bone of contention for many critics of the film, who pointed out that a) the father was a schlub she had no previous history with and appeared to be a less-than-suitable father figure b) she had no apparent religious convictions or pre-stated beliefs as to why she might keep the baby, c) she was an anchor at E! who was rather devoted to climbing the corporate ladder and d) the sister who suggested it and Jonah Hill were portrayed very unsympathetically, and the avoidance of the actual word "abortion" - Hill's character refers to it as a "shmushmortion." One unstated by possible reason she decided not to get one is because of the potential fallout of the public finding out she had an abortion, though the film never goes into this.
* Averted in ''[[The Godfather Part II]]''. Kay supposedly aborts her second son because she knows the kid is just gonna grow up to be a mafioso like all the other men in the family. This is what leads to her and Michael's final split when he finds out that she had the abortion. It's never really made clear whether we're supposed to root for her or not, [[Black and Grey Morality|which is just as it should be]]. [[Alternate Character Interpretation|There is also a possibility Kay was lying to Michael about the abortion and really did have a]] [[Convenient Miscarriage|miscarriage]].
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* The Romanian film ''4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days'' averts this trope, as the main focus is on a woman trying to get an abortion. And, since it's set in Ceausescu's Romania, it avoids the whole "neat abortion = no drama" bit, seeing as abortion is illegal and carries a hefty penalty.
* Averted in the horror film ''Pin''. Leon's sister, Ursula, discovers that she's pregnant as a result of constantly having unprotected sex. She immediately chooses to have an abortion, which is successful. Afterward, she cleans up her life and the incident is never mentioned again.
* Averted in ''[[Fast Times
* The movie ''Bella'' is all about a (recently unemployed) single woman dealing with the knowledge that she is pregnant and making a decision of what to do about it. Abortion is certainly considered, with her saying things like 'I said I was pregnant; I didn't say I was having a baby.' In the end, {{spoiler|she allows a friend to adopt her child, after seeing what a great family he has.}} Whether or not she is a 'good girl' depends on definitions, but she is certainly portrayed as a sympathetic character with good intentions.
* Played straight in ''[[Saved]]!''. It doesn't even occur to the main character to have an abortion when she falls pregnant, though this is in-character as a born-again Christian who lives in a very conservative neighborhood and attends a private religious school. The subject of abortion is only brought up twice, and never actually named, both times by the rebellious Cassandra; only once to Mary's face, and by then, it's "too late."
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* In ''[[Manny And Lo]]'', the delinquent teen figures she's just getting fat from her diet of convenience store junk food. When she finally goes into the clinic to "get it done," the doctor informs her she's too far along to get an abortion. Solution? [[Values Dissonance|Kidnap]] [[Broken Aesop|a baby store clerk]].
* An example of only thoroughly messed-up girls getting abortions: in the Dutch movie ''Godforsaken'', the psychotic gangster's [[All Girls Want Bad Boys|girlfriend]] finds out that she's pregnant and then [[Nightmare Fuel|does her own dirty work with a clothes hanger]].
* ''Vera Drake'' is about a kind, loving 1950 London housewife who secretly performs illegal abortions. The film is entirely sympathetic toward Vera and presents multiple perspectives on the issue, both with realistic patients (including a careless floozy, an exhausted housewife who couldn't afford to raise another child, and a [[Rape
* Similar to ''[[Fast Times
* Subverted in ''[[A Nightmare On Elm Street 5 The Dream Child]]''. Protagonist Alice knows she's pregnant. Alice has magic dream powers that let her dream while awake and affect reality through dreams, but she too can be affected. Alice soon realizes that her unborn son Jacob is exercising the same powers. Freddy Krueger can ordinarily only kill people in dreams, but he can use Jacob's dreams to start murdering Alice's friends pretty much whenever he pleases. one of Alice's friends suggests that she stop Freddy by having an abortion, which would end Jacob's dreams. Alice refuses to do so because she wants to keep the baby and thinks she can destroy Freddy through other means. Alice's other means aren't entirely successful and ultimately her unborn son Jacob has to destroy Freddy in the dream world by copying Freddy's powers. The film's final scene shows Alice and her father cooing over the baby. As the camera pans back, we see girls in old-fashioned white dresses playing jump-rope and singing a song that always heralds Freddy's reappearance in a Nightmare on Elm Street film. {{spoiler|Thanks for giving birth to Freddy's new incarnation, Alice. You probably should've just had the abortion.}}
* Played with in ''Blue Denim'': After a teenaged couple, Janet and Arthur, find themselves expecting a baby, they seek help to pay for an abortion, and find a doctor willing to perform the procedure; however, because it takes place in the 1950's, there is some worry over the safety of the procedure itself and in the end {{spoiler|Arthur, worried that Janet will die, breaks down confessing to his parents, and they go to rescue her ''just'' in the nick of time. They go home, and the parents of both teenagers have a discussion before agreeing, with Janet's consent, to send her to [[Stigmatic Pregnancy Euphemism|live with her aunt.]] }} The characters constantly skate around the word "abortion", but the euphemisms, and the characters' worry about the procedure, makes it pretty clear to the audience as to what it is they're planning to do. In play {{spoiler|Janet has the abortion after all, and lives through the procedure.}}
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* Bizarrely averted in one of [[Karen Traviss]]' ''Wess'har'' books, where the protagonist's [[God Mode]] is so strong that she can't have a normal abortion, so she has to cut the fetus out and ''blow it up with a grenade''.
* Completely averted in Lynn Margulis's ''Luminous Fish'', where René, one of the main characters, {{spoiler|has a back alley abortion in her college years because her boyfriend could not stand to see her future ruined. She ends up as a perfectly fine atmospheric chemist later, even if she can't have children (and is happier for it)}}. Note that Margulis is the biologist who made symbiogenesis a mainstream evolutionary theory, and therefore doesn't [[You Fail Biology Forever|fail biology forever]].
* In the final book of the ''[[Twilight (
* Similarly, in ''The Whitby Child'', Nelda, one of a race of magical Fisher Folk, refuses a magical herb that will end her pregnancy, and the character who offers it to her is presented as evil for even suggesting it. This is even though 1) Nelda's people are under a curse that causes all laboring women ''and'' almost all their babies to die slow and agonizing deaths and 2)we're told that at in human terms Nelda's ''approximately eight years old''. Got that? Good girls are willing to ''die'' to avoid abortion even if they're minors and there's no realistic prospect the baby will even survive.
* Averted by {{spoiler|Lyra Volfrieds, the protagonist}} in Ursula Vernon's ''[[
* In ''[[The Sword of Truth]]'' Kahlan considers having an abortion due to having been told by a semi-reliable source that the child would be male, and the last time male Confessors were allowed to live past infancy they turned out to be [[Always Chaotic Evil]]; since then male Confessor children have always been killed at birth. She eventually decides against it...two minutes before she's beaten very nearly to death, [[Convenient Miscarriage|causing a miscarriage anyway]].
* Averted in Stephen Chbosky's ''[[The Perks of Being a Wallflower]]'', when main character Charlie escorts his sister to the abortion clinic after discovering she is knocked up by her abusive [[Jerkass]] boyfriend.
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* In ''[[The Pale King]]'', a teenaged Lane Dean secretly hopes that his Christian girlfriend will break up with him, but still keep their unborn child. {{spoiler|It's eventually revealed that they're still together and raising the child.}}
* Inverted in [[Lois McMaster Bujold]]'s [[Vorkosigan Saga]] novel ''Barrayar'', when an assassination attempt nearly kills Cordelia Vorkosigan, and does severe, permanent damage to her unborn child. Pretty much everybody thinks she should abort and start over. She doesn't.
* Cersei Lannister reveals to Eddard Stark in ''[[A Song of Ice and Fire|Games of Thrones]]'' that when her husband Robert impregnated her she had the child aborted. In the [[Game of Thrones
** And Lysa Arryn, nee Tully, is revealed to have had an abortion when she was young when she was impregnated by a man she was not married to and was below her station ({{spoiler|Petry Baelish}}) which resulted in her father making her drink "moon tea" to abort the child. Worse, Lysa says that she would've gladly born the child and didn't even know what they were giving her until it was too late. It's also implied that her later issues with multiple miscarriages once she is married might be a result of this, though it's not certain since this was also said to have happened to Lysa's mother as well.
* ''[[
* Averted in ''[[The Red Tent]]''. [[Shrinking Violet|Ruti]] has been suffering at the hands of her husband [[Complete Monster|Laban]], and she does not want to give him any more children, because she does not believe he [[Heir Club for Men|deserves the honor of more sons]] and she knows he will molest a daughter, so she asks Rachel to help her terminate the pregnancy, threatening to [[Mercy Killing|kill]] [[Offing the Offspring|the child]] anyway after it's born. Rachel agrees, and next month (when the women enter the menstruation tent), she gives Ruti an [[I Ate What?|unidentified black brew]] that induces a miscarriage. The women are all supportive of Ruti's choice, on the grounds that ''they'' don't much care for Laban or the way he treats her either.
* Built into the way healing works in [[
== Live-Action TV ==
* Averted in the very first TV abortion, that of the 47-year-old protagonist of ''[[Maude]]''. No complications are referred to, and her family supports her choice. Her daughter's encouragement included explaining why a 47-year-old shouldn't have a baby, and Adrienne Barbeau played the daughter. Ironically, the episode aired ''before'' Roe v. Wade became law, but abortion had recently been made legal in New York, which was one of only four states to have abortion on request, with no reason required. Some people interpreted the episode as a subtle PSA regarding this fact.
* In the first series of ''[[The OC]]'', Ryan gets a girl pregnant, and she says she's not going to have an abortion. It's quite probably not his, but he won't even consider this, despite the fact that it seems like his ex-girlfriend is trying to force him back into a relationship after her boyfriend - the probable actual father of her child - dumped her. But then, in the next season, she said she had [[Convenient Miscarriage]] off-screen and drops off the face of the Earth, only for it to revealed later that she ''faked'' the miscarriage and has the kid, who wasn't his anyway.
* ''[[
** Jordan mentioned having an abortion, and although she probably doesn't fall under the category of "good girl", it's notable that though she's shown to feel quite sad about it when talking to her young child about it, she says it was the most reasonable decision she could have made at the time, as she told the couple asking for advice. This is one of the few instances where the choice of abortion is shown sympathetically and realistically. However the problem comes at the end of the conversation when they decide to play the trope straight. When Jordan tells them to go with their gut and they'll know the right decision, they ask "what if we don't feel anything?" She tells them that might be their answer. Jordan's advice and all logic suggests the decision of abortion (they had only been on a single date together) but they decide to have the kid anyway.
** When J.D. gets his girlfriend pregnant, he has one of his daydreams where he discusses abortions with [[Jesus]]:
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'''J.D.:''' Really? <br />
'''Jesus:''' NO abortions! How are you people not getting this?! }}
* In ''[[Sex and
* In the ''[[Star Trek:
* Averted in ''[[Six Feet Under]]''. Claire gets pregnant from her cheating sleazy boyfriend, and ends up having an abortion. There are no ill side effects, but she does end up seeing her baby in the arms of Nate's dead wife in a hallucination/trip to the afterlife/whatever the hell that was.
* In ''[[Frontline]]'', hard-nosed bitch reporter Brooke finds out she's pregnant, and wants to keep the baby. However, she's not married and the producers blackmail her with mentions that she's being considered for the star of a new show - but that would be impossible if she was pregnant on-air. They mention that she could discreetly deal with the problem and call the absence a family emergency. At the end of the episode, she's absent for a day due to "a grandmother's funeral."
* In the UK mini-series ''The Duchess of Duke Street'', Louisa Trotter becomes pregnant by her lover, Charlie Tyrrell, in 1903. When she and Charlie discuss what to do they both dismiss abortion out of hand because of the very real danger of infection. The decision not to abort was justifiable given the time frame, but the decision to have the character become pregnant was less defensible given that she was [[Very Loosely Based on a True Story]] on a historical individual who never had a child and probably never slept with a man.
* Famously averted on ''[[All My Children]]'' in 1973, where a young Erica Kane has an abortion. She did, however, gain a life-threatening infection from the procedure. This was later infamously [[Retcon|Ret Coned]] decades later into the abortion doctor harvesting Erica's fetus and implanting it in his own wife, resulting in the character of Josh Madden. Never mind that [[You Fail Biology Forever|that's not even possible now, let alone in the seventies!]]
* On ''[[Malcolm in
* ''[[
** Season two's "Aftermath" has a serial rapist that is attacking girls at a religious school, then switches to an older demographic when one of the religious girls "chooses the sin of suicide over the sin of abortion."
** Averted in a third season episode, a stalking victim admits to having had an abortion about a year earlier, and though her fiancé is upset when he finds out, it does not seriously damage her or her relationship with him.
** Averted again in the fourth season, we find out that {{spoiler|Prentiss had an abortion when she was fifteen. Though this fact is mentioned in the context of revealing why she's screwed up, the abortion is never treated as the reason; it is instead the negative reaction of her priest which damages not her, but her friend.}} In neither of these cases does the character revealing the abortion ''or'' the character hearing about it imply that abortion is an immoral act.
* Frequently subverted in ''[[House (TV series)|House]]'', usually when there are medical implications. In "Babies And Bathwater", the mother died before she could have the abortion that would allow her to receive cancer treatment; in ''the very next episode'', the pregnancy was the underlying cause of the Patient Of The Week's condition; and in "One Day, One Room", House's patient (after much persuading) adheres to the one exception - that abortion seems to be okay when the pregnancy resulted from rape.
** Played straight(ish) in "Fetal Position". Where a women refuses to terminate a live threatening pregnancy, forcing House to perform a risky operation on the fetus in a [[Shout-Out]] [[wikipedia:Samuel Armas|Samuel Armas]]. He maintains that they took an unacceptable risk to their patient, but starts using the word 'baby' over 'it' from then on.
* The trope is toyed with in an early episode of ''[[Third Watch]]''. Officer Yokas gets pregnant, but given her family's financial difficulties and the stresses of her job, decides she wants an abortion. Her husband encourages her to keep it. During a foot chase, a thug hits her in the stomach with a pipe, which, she tells her husband, caused a [[Convenient Miscarriage]]. She's later shown getting an abortion. The moral issue in this case seemed to be presented not as the abortion itself, but that she lied to her husband in order to avoid having to talk or argue about it.
* Averted in ''[[
** One first season episode centers on an underground abortion service during the 1960s. Both of the (highly sympathetic) victims worked for the service and two other sympathetic witnesses in the case also had.
** One third season episode involved a high school couple who decide not to get an abortion after seeing photos given to them by a militantly pro-life (and hypocritical) nurse. It ruins both their lives ([[Anvilicious]], but on the other side).
** One sixth season episode involved a character who had suffered through a botched abortion (the episode was again set in the 1960s - in both cases the botched abortions highlighted the trouble illegalizing abortion could cause, rather than serving to punish the characters).
* ''[[
* One plot line on ''[[South of Nowhere]]'' involved Chelsea getting pregnant to Clay and going for an abortion. At the last minute, she opts out and keeps the baby, which she later [[Convenient Miscarriage|loses in a car crash]].
* In a Russian teen TV series ''Kadetstvo'', a Good Girl ponders over the option of abortion, decides to go through with it and sticks to that decision. Her Good Boy boyfriend objects to that, and she promptly breaks up with him. Considering how common abortion is in Russia, around 2.7 million annually, this could be [[Values Dissonance]].
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* On a ''[[Gilmore Girls]]'' flashback episode, when Lorelai was pregnant with Rory, Chris's father (who had been established as a jerk in a previous episode) tacitly suggests to the other parents that Lorelai simply "get rid" of the baby. This leads to a rather stunned silence, which makes some sense, since both sets of parents are upper-class conservatives.
** From the audience's perspective, his behavior is shocking, not because he suggests an abortion, [[Values Dissonance|but because he never shows a moment's interest in what Lorelai wants.]]
* Played with in ''[[
* Played with in ''[[
* Used in ''[[Murphy Brown]]'': Murphy mulls her options after getting pregnant, abortion clearly being one of them. Eventually she decides against it. It's implied that the father assumed she would abort. In a pointed fantasy sequence, she considers aborting the child, only to turn and find the entire Supreme Court wagging their fingers at her in disapproval.
* Averted in the second season of ''[[The Real World]]'' when roommate Tammy decided to undergo the procedure after finding out she's pregnant. When she returned to the house, the producers asked her if she wanted all references to her pregnancy edited out, but she gave them her blessing to keep it in since it was something young people could learn from. MTV showed both sides of the issue without being polarizing: another roommate thought what Tammy did was wrong, but knew that wasn't what she needed to hear and stood by her as a friend.
* Quinn of ''[[
* On ''[[Private Practice]]'' when Maya {{spoiler|becomes pregnant at the age of 16}} her pro-life OB-GYN mother tries to force her to have an abortion. Addison offers to perform the abortion, but once inside the exam room, {{spoiler|Maya can't go through with it. She decides to have her baby, which leads to a temporary estrangement from her mother. Eventually, her mother falls in love with the baby once it is born and acknowledges how thankful she is that her daughter chose life}}.
* Averted on ''[[Spenser For Hire]]'', as Susan Silverman has an abortion in spite of Spenser's opposition.
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** Lynette becomes pregnant with twins at the end of season 5. Early in season 6, she becomes depressed when she sees them on the ultrasound, telling Tom that she doesn't love them like she loved her other kids and doesn't want them. She has a change of heart after having a talk with Susan about it.
* On ''[[The Facts of Life]]'', Blair's mother visits her and tells her that she's pregnant, but not going to go through with it. Blair is very disappointed with her mother's decision and how little thought she put into it (this was very true-to-life for Lisa Whelchel, as she was a devout born-again Christian). Blair eventually talks her mother into going through with the pregnancy, and the baby (a girl) is born later in the season in a [[Christmas Episode]].
* Charlie Kelly's mother on ''[[It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia
* Averted twice on ''[[Nip Tuck]]'': in season 2, Liz had one when she finds out that the baby she's carrying would be born with Down's Syndrome. In season 6, Kimber has one when [[Jerkass]] Christian tells her that she could either choose between keeping him as her boyfriend or receive child support checks but lose him completely as he already has 3 kids and does not want another. There are some complications during the procedure and afterward Kimber is told that she can't have kids anymore.
* The third season of ''[[Dexter]]'' has {{spoiler|Rita}} discover that she's pregnant and -- despite coming to the conclusion that having the child would be a stressful, near-unmanageable complication to an already complex situation -- she decides to have the child.
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** And when Spike was pregnant with Emma on [[Degrassi Junior High]], she did briefly consider abortion, even at the protest of her boyfriend, but (obviously, or else there'd be no Next Generation) decided to have the baby.
* Averted on ''[[Friday Night Lights]]'', where a minor female character falls pregnant from a one-night stand, and spends an episode considering all her options before ultimately going through with it. The episode does a pretty amazing job of never making the story a political issue, and keeping it focused on the characters that are affected.
* Used in ''[[One Tree Hill]]'', where Peyton chooses to continue a pregnancy against ''medical orders'' and is seemly quite willing to sacrifice [[Death
{{quote| "Lucas, if you want to talk about it, call it what it is...''[[Narm|an abortion!]]''"}}
* On ''[[
* Played somewhat straight on ''[[
* In ''[[The Secret Life of the American Teenager]]'', at first it was Amy. To be fair, she considered abortion to the point of going to the abortion clinic, but ultimately realized that she couldn't go through with it and it wasn't the best choice for her. This example was far more prominent later in the series, when bad girl, Adrian becomes pregnant and goes through with the pregnancy [[Recycled Script|using exactly the same reason as Amy]], [[They Just Didn't Care|word for word]].
* Laura from ''[[Emily of New Moon]]'' is horrified at the very idea of abortion, yet has little qualms about whoring herself out to the cruel factory overseer.
* The first episode of ''[[That's My Bush]]'' has an highly fictionalized [[George W. Bush]] trying to unite both sides of the abortion issue in a summit. It fails spectacularly with the pro choice spokeswoman (a stereotypical [[Straw Feminist]]) gets mistaken for a stripper and the pro life spokesmen (an survived [[Squick|aborted fetus]], which ''has'' happened in real life) getting [[Black Comedy|drag off by a dog]]. Laura Bush comforts him by telling him that those who believe that the unborn have a right to life and those who believe that a women has final say on her body will ''never'' see eye to eye as because at the end of the day [[Golden Mean Fallacy|they are both sort of right]].
* In series three of ''[[Big Love]],'' Sarah discovers she's pregnant to her ex-boyfriend. She initially decides to put the baby up for adoption, then decides to keep it and raise it with her best friend Heather while she's at college in Arizona. However, she suffers a [[Convenient Miscarriage]] soon after.
* ''[[Arrested Development (TV series)|Arrested Development]]'': Apparently, Lindsay Bluth was pregnant "loads of times"...just never with Maebe. {{spoiler|Except she was.}}
** GOB cautions George Michael that if a religious girl gets pregnant, "she stays pregnant." "When GOB was in high school, he had sex with these women. These women got pregnant. This one had a baby."
* Arlene of ''[[True Blood]]'' finds herself pregnant with {{spoiler|her serial killer ex-husband's baby}}, which she decidedly doesn't want. However, she's against abortion, and instead tries to get a witch to do a magical abortion (which she, for some reason, considers OK). {{spoiler|It doesn't work}}.
* ''[[
* ''[[
* On ''The Sarah Silverman Show,'' Sarah's non-moral (not amoral), and not too bright, character, admits to having had several previous abortions, oblivious to the fact that this is a hot topic, and people may judge her for this. Later, she makes friends with a group of fundamentalist Christian women she meets at a clinic, and they're very nice to her, even though she has had abortions, because they believe she regrets them, and will be a mouthpiece for their cause, talking about how traumatic the experience was. It takes a while for this to dawn on Sarah, who at one point says that not only does she not regret having abortions, but doesn't think she's done having them. Her new "friends" drop her like a hot potato, but she's not too upset, because she's pretty happy-go-lucky. By the end of the episode {{spoiler|she's having another abortion}}.
* Both played straight and averted ''hard'' in ''[[Deadwood]]''. It's made clear that Doc Cochran is the Gem's abortionist-in-residence, and Trixie mentions that she's had several abortions. But when widowed Alma Garrett becomes pregnant by a married man, she decides to keep the pregnancy. Ellsworth generously offers to marry her, and it's only after this marriage that the pregnancy fails and she has to have an [[Convenient Miscarriage|abortion to save her life]].
* At the beginning of Roz's unplanned pregnancy arc in Season 5 of ''[[
* Somewhat averted in season seven of ''[[
* In season five of ''[[Stromberg]]'', Jennifer gets pregnant by Stromberg. It was unwanted and she seriously considers the option of abortion, but then decides against it, after some persuasion by Ernie. Then she miscarries.
* In the 2012 ''[[Upstairs, Downstairs]]'', Lady Persie insists upon an (illegal) abortion and does go through with it; this is played as another sign of what an infinitely petty and morally bankrupt individual she is.
* ''[[Awake (TV series)|Awake]]'' plays this perfectly straight... except with adoption. By the time the pregnancy in question is known to the protagonists, it's five months along, too late for an abortion.
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** There's also "Mandy Goes To Med School", by Palmer with her band The Dresden Dolls, a slinky, jazzy tune about [[Crosses the Line Twice|operating a back-alley abortion clinic in an SUV]]. Both could be considered satirical [[Protest Song|Protest Songs]].
** Aaand then again there's "Sex Changes" by the Dresden Dolls, which reads as a bitter song about having disappointing sex and getting an abortion ("You get more than you're asking for without the right protection", "the knife is nearing", "this little feat of engineering"...). Comes across as more of a straight-up [[Protest Song]] than Oasis, for sure (the video for which includes "annoying fundamentalist Christians" protesting with signs that read "Jesus Hates You").
* [[Playing
== Printed Media ==
* [[Mad]] Magazine had one article about telling the difference between a Drama, a Comedy, and a Reality Show (which was useful with shows like ''Laguna Beach: The Real OC'' and ''[[The Hills]]'', when you couldn't tell [[Worked Shoot|what was scripted and what wasn't]]). One of the examples was pregnancy. If it's a comedy, she'll keep it and have lots of wacky jokes about pregnancy and henpecked husbands (citing ''[[Friends]]''); If it's a drama, she'll abort it and be scarred for life (possibly referencing ''The OC'' or ''[[Law
== Theatre ==
* In ''[[A Raisin in
* In the musical ''[[Spring Awakening]]'', Wendla gets an abortion though it's implied she does not want to; her mother takes her to get one by force, {{spoiler|and then Wendla dies}}. This is even sadder in the original play on which the musical is based because {{spoiler|her child is the product of rape. Not to mention that in both the musical and play, Wendla does not even know what abortion is.}}
* In ''[[Cabaret]]'', Sally gets an abortion as part of her character's downward spiral.
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== Video Games ==
* At some point in Nagisa's pregnancy in ''[[
* Played with in ''[[Ef:
* You learn fairly early that Rokushiki in ''[[Kara no Shoujo]]'' in large part targeted women who were uncomfortable about their pregnancies and either had abortions or might have been considering one. This also makes up part of the motive of the first serial killer.
* In ''[[The Elder Scrolls]]'', a book series that has appeared since ''[[The Elder Scrolls II Daggerfall
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* ''[[Anders Loves Maria]]'' brings this up several times, with Maria and Tina both having abortions in the back story. Tina is also going in for an abortion when {{spoiler|she finds out that she's had a [[Convenient Miscarriage]]}}.
* Aiko of ''[[Red String]]'' casually announces she "had that little problem taken care of" and giggles when Reika mentions her pregnancy. Aiko is also very slutty and is caught trying to seduce her fiance's younger brother while both of their love interests are in the next room.
* Sil'lice implies in ''[[
* [[Inverted]] in [[Moon Over June]], with Hatsuki, she choose to keep her child [[Squick|in order to do pregnancy photoshoots]] and [[Disproportionate Retribution|to hide the kid from her parents]].
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** There is an episode of Family Guy where Lois agrees to be a surrogate mother for another couple, however, the couple dies and she must decide whether or not to get an abortion. The episode was finished but it was banned from airing on FOX, however, it is available on DVD and it is not known if it will air on Adult Swim.
** Peter's mother tried to get an abortion when she had Peter because it was from an affair. Because it was in Mexico, the abortion process involved hanging from a bar and being beaten like a pinata by a bunch of kids. As she was already full term when she decided to abort, Peter is born full size and healthy. When she sees him, she falls in love and keeps him. Though knowing [[Jerkass|Peter]], he may very well have gotten brain damage from the procedure.
** Also spoofed in a quick gag when the family is watching ''[[Murder, She Wrote]]'' and Jessica casually mentions that she once had an abortion. "Aha!" says Peter, "So ''she's'' the murderer!"
* Skewered by ''[[The Simpsons]]''.
{{quote| '''Kang:''' (pretending to be Bob Dole) Abortions for all!<br />
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