Why I blog the way I do

I have a sneaking suspicion that someone I know, or someone who knows someone I know, may have stumbled upon this blog. I quite wish that weren't the case - I would like for this to be a place where I don't have to worry about people I know "in real life" think of me - but what's done is done. I never tried particularly hard to conceal my identity, and so I know it could happen.

That said, I'm thinking it might be time to explain what this blog means to me, what I use it for. Things I can talk to my friends about in real life, I talk to them about. My blog is, generally though not exclusively, for the things I can't or don't want to talk to them about. I never expected such a high proportion of my posts to be about abortion, but, for better or for worse, they are. Why? Well, there are plenty of other things I feel strongly about, but I can express most of those strong feelings in the real world.

If I were to happen across a story about a mother killing her disabled daughter because she didn't want to take care of her or wanted to spare her the pain of her continued life, I would be horrified. I could express that horror. I could send the link to others, discuss it: "Did you hear this horrible story?" But when I come across an article, equally if not more horrifying, about the 90% abortion rate of children with Down Syndrome, I can't. Not without it turning into a debate about abortion, or the other person maintaining that a woman has a right to an abortion for any reason she can come up with, Down Syndrome included, or the opinion being floated that since they're not people anyway, it doesn't matter whether they're killed.

It's nice to be able to express opinions on those matters without having to defend myself for holding, without letting my grief for unborn children - which was what I'd wanted to express in the first place - be lost to the logistics of having the argument. That's not to say that I never make pro-life arguments here. Indeed I do. And I like having this blog as a place where I can make those arguments without being judged. That's why those are the arguments I make here more than any others; because this is the only place I can make them without being judged.

In addition, because I have tried, to some extent, to mask my identity, I don't post all that much about my life. I do some, but when I try to cut back on the personally identifiable information, it all gets kind of boring. The stuff I have been blogging about - which is often pro-life, for reasons identified above - is more interesting, which is another reason it figures so heavily.