Compulsory motherhood is not ennobling, although the friends of the foetus are at pains to point out that most women denied abortions end up loving their issue just the same. Whether they love them just the same as they would have if they had wanted them is of course unverifiable; most women are not so perverse and unjust as to punish their children for the crimes of society (their fathers), but the oppression of their circumstances is real notwithstanding. For the oppressors themselves to take credit for the women's magnanimity is sickeningly smug. The compelled mother loves her child as the caged bird sings. The song does not justify the cage nor the love the enforcement.


"Abortion ii" (21 May 1972), p. 115 - The Madwoman's Underclothes (1986)

Germaine Greer Quotes

Compulsory motherhood is not ennobling, although the friends of the foetus are at pains to point out that most women denied abortions end up loving...

Compulsory motherhood is not ennobling, although the friends of the foetus are at pains to point out that most women denied abortions end up loving...

Compulsory motherhood is not ennobling, although the friends of the foetus are at pains to point out that most women denied abortions end up loving...

Compulsory motherhood is not ennobling, although the friends of the foetus are at pains to point out that most women denied abortions end up loving...