Woman & Child First - A Plea for Action

I propose that our society prioritize. There are endless good causes and issues in which people are passionate. I am a feminist and am thankful every day that I was born in the USA. However, there are still serious problems impacting women and children in this country. And the atrocities committed against women and children around the world are heartbreaking.

I understand that abortion is a difficult topic. The fact is that abortions are legal in this country at this time and have been for over 40 years. I am outraged to think of the money, time and energy that has been expended to challenge the legalities.

People get some common sense. Let us unite and change the conversation. I would like every minute and every dollar spent to maintain or overturn Roe v. Wade to be diverted as follows:

• All 463,000 children in foster care are adopted or in a loving, safe home.

• Single mothers living at or below the poverty level are provided job training, affordable childcare and assistance to gain employment allowing them to pay all expenses without welfare. There are 8,000,000 homes with children being raised without a father and below the poverty line. 

• Ensure all single mothers receive child support from the father from the moment birth occurs whether married or not. Over 25% of custodial parents do not received child support as awarded and these are just the ones that actually get to court. 

• Provide affordable and easy access to birth control from the time a woman is able to have a child. 40.2% of births are to unmarried women. There were 249,000 babies born to females ages 15 - 19 in 2014.

• Eliminate child abuse that includes physical, sexual, emotional and neglect.

 "Annually, there 6,600,000 referrals to state child protective services of which there are 3,200,000 children subject to investigation. The were 702,000 children who are victims of maltreatment in 2014. In 2014, state agencies identified an estimated 1,580 children who died as a result of abuse and neglect — between four and five children a day. However, studies also indicate significant undercounting of child maltreatment fatalities by state agencies — by 50% or more. That's roughly ¼ of your child's elementary school class. More than 70% of the children who died as a result of child abuse or neglect were two years of age or younger. More than 80% were not yet old enough for kindergarten. Around 80% of child maltreatment fatalities involve at least one parent as perpetrator."

There are over 125,000,000 adult women in the USA. Women are loving and tenacious and can move mountains for our children. Let's define ourselves by commonalities and work together to solve these five problems I described above FIRST. Frankly, the men in power will not and have not.

Perhaps a modern day abortion cease-fire is the solution - leave Roe v. Wade alone and quit passing state laws to marginalize abortion access - until every child in every home is safe and healthy. We can work on the problems in which we all agree and focus on our similar priorities instead of wasting limited and valuable resources on the differences. Your priorities are how you spend your time.

... then we will prioritize the next five problems and the next five problems ... and eventually we will get to abortion ethics which I promise you will be much less of a stalemate at that point.

Please bring up every one of these reference sites and read them. All the statistics in this post are from these sites. These are just a few of the resources defining the problems facing women and children with facts and statistics.

https://www.fosterclub.com/article/statistics-foster-care

http://www.tlc4kids.org/blog/admin/02-17-2015/foster-care-statistics

https://adoption.com/photolisting

https://singlemotherguide.com/single-mother-statistics/

http://singleparents.about.com/od/statebystateresources/p/child_support_statistics.htm

https://www.childhelp.org/child-abuse-statistics/

http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/births.htm

http://www.hhs.gov/ash/oah/adolescent-health-topics/reproductive-health/teen-pregnancy/trends.html