the pro-choice morality play, part three

Beth
You’re going to have a baby! You’ve got to focus on that. Babies are miracles, and this one even more so.

Dick
But I don’t want it. I have plans and goals that don’t include …

Laina
It’s not about you anymore; it’s about that precious gift living in your body.

Beth
Sharing your every experience.

Laina
Maybe if you saw it, you’d understand what this means.

Beth
Yes! Every mother needs to see his baby. It’ll help develop that strong bond between the two of you. You’ll really know how precious that little life is. (Laina has pulled the ultrasound machine into the space and started it up. I imagine that high pitched whine like when old TVs were turned on.)

Laina
Beth, can you get Dick ready?

Beth
Certainly. (Beth pulls Dick’s shirt and squirts a clear jelly on his belly)

Dick
Stop. You can’t do this. Leave me alone.

Laina
We’re just going to shoot sound waves through your body so you can get a picture of your baby. There’s nothing to be afraid of.

Dick
That’s not my baby! I don’t want it. Take it out!

Beth
Dick. If we do that, the child will die. It cannot survive another transplant.

Dick
I don’t care!

Laina
Hush! (silences Dick however it can be done; I imagine something with duct tape) You are just being selfish!

Beth
Now look. (she puts the device over his belly and slowly draws it across; Laina holds his head facing the monitor) There! Do you see that?

Dick
(Shaking his head) Uh uh.

Laina
It’s right… here. I think. That bit of fuzz.

Beth
No. It’s this right here.

Laina
No. That’s not it! It’s right here.

Dick
Mmmph mmmph mmph mmmph mmmph.

Beth
That’s what they all say. Oldest excuse in the book: If we can’t even pick it out, how’re you supposed to feel connected to it? Well, Dick, because you are. You are connected to it.

Dick
Mmmmph mmmph mmmmph mmmph mmmph.

Laina
Heard that one too, but women as the baby carriers is only a technicality now. And frankly, we are tired of having our uteruses held over their heads… so to speak, because they could one day maybe have a chance at hosting a baby for any length of time for any number of reasons.

Beth
We’ve decided that it’s your turn. You can spend nine months being told how to live, eat, be, think; having people think they can touch your belly whenever they want because "really" they are touching the baby.

Laina
As if the baby would say yes to every hand coming its way if it had the option to say no.

Beth
Right. To have doctors dictating how you bring your child into the world and ignoring your requests

Beth & Laina
For the baby.

Laina
To have motherhood used as a punishment.

Beth
Because you are not a human being alone.

Laina
Without a family.

Beth
You might as well be dead.

Laina
You need that husband to help you make decisions.

Beth
You can’t be trusted to make them yourself.

Laina
And god help you if you like women.

Beth
But that’s a discussion for another time.

Laina
We’ve decided since men are the only ones to be trusted, it is time we cut out the middle-women.

I'm really into this counter of "using motherhood as a punishment". I'm sure I've heard it before, but I just can't place where. I am definitely in the part of the process where I need to get as many ideas/anger out, so we'll see how it goes.

Part One; Part Two