NPR forced me to have the talk with my six-year-old

You see, the car radio was on, and the National Public Radio (NPR) lead-in sounded innocuous enough: “In the central market in San Salvador, you can buy just about anything you want: tomatoes by the wheelbarrow full. Fresh goat’s milk straight from the goat. Underwear. Plumbing supplies. Fruit. Hollywood’s latest blockbusters burned straight onto a DVD.”

But it quickly segued to bitter tea and stronger pills to take care of an unwanted pregnancy (“Even when Abortion is Illegal, The Market May Sell Pills For Abortion”). Suddenly I had the talk—about abortion!—with my newly turned six-year old daughter.

What may have best captured the incident is my six-year old’s flummoxed response at the end of our conversation: “But, mommy, they’re going to give people ideas!” And those ideas are to buy illegal drugs and take the wrong medicines on purpose because you have a baby inside you.

Pro-choice America, you had your chance to educate my daughter, and in less than two minutes you taught my daughter that pregnancy is to be feared and silenced.