The Abortion-Breast Cancer Link

October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month—an occasion to promote knowledge about the disease and commemorate those who have battled it. But in the hoopla of pink ribbons and 5k runs, a vital medical fact has gone unnoticed by the mainstream media: Abortion is an independent risk factor for breast cancer.

To the great detriment of women, this fact is little known. Radical feminists have successfully hijacked breast cancer awareness month as a time to spur their liberal propaganda, and have bullied a handful of breast cancer organizations into doing the same.

However, the biology of the breast confirms that induced abortion is indeed a risk factor for breast cancer. In developmental biology a lobule, or a unit of breast tissue, can undergo four stages. An infant is born with Type 1 lobules. After puberty, the number of Type 1 lobules increases, and some Type 1 lobules become Type 2 lobules.  Both Type 1 lobules and Type 2 lobules are vulnerable to cancer. During the first half of pregnancy, the number of Type 1 and Type 2 lobules greatly increases. However, around 20 weeks after conception, these cancer vulnerable cells mature into cancer-resistant Type 4 lobules. After 32 weeks of pregnancy, sufficient Type 4 lobules have developed that a mother is protected against breast cancer, and she begins to incrementally gain the benefit of risk reduction that will maximize at 40 weeks. By the end of a normal pregnancy, 70 to 90 percent of the mother’s breast is composed of cancer-resistant Type 4 lobules. After birth and after a mother has lactated and breastfed, Type 4 lobules regress to Type 3 lobules, which retain the epigenetic changes that protect against the development of cancer. With each additional pregnancy subsequent to her first, a woman’s risk of breast cancer will decrease another 10 percent.

Therefore, disruption to a pregnancy—and the corresponding termination of lobule development—can leave a woman with an excessive amount of Type 1 and Type 2 cancer-vulnerable lobules that have not yet maturated.  As a result, an induced abortion (presumably prior to 32 weeks) as well as a miscarriage in the second trimester increase the risk of breast cancer.

In the case of an induced abortion, the woman’s breasts contain an increased number of cancer-vulnerable Type 1 and Type 2 lobules, but hav not yet developed cancer-resistant Type 4 lobules. The longer a woman is pregnant before an induced abortion, the more cancer-vulnerable Type 1 and Type 2 lobules she will develop.

A miscarriage (also known as spontaneous abortion) may increase a woman’s risk factor for breast cancer, depending on when the miscarriage occurs. First trimester miscarriages do not increase the risk factor for breast cancer. First trimester miscarriages generally occur because a woman has not produced enough estrogen and progesterone to sustain the pregnancy. These low levels of estrogen and progesterone are also insufficient to stimulate breast development (ie. increase the number of Type 1 and Type 2 lobules). However, a second trimester miscarriage does increase a woman’s risk factor for breast cancer. These miscarriages generally occur due to physical abnormalities. Therefore, the breasts have an increased number of Type 1 and Type 2 lobules that have not yet matured into Type 4 lobules. Sadly, the same applies to premature deliveries prior to 32 weeks.

Because radical feminists distort this information, millions of women have been deprived of basic knowledge of medical care. However, the Marriage and Religion Research Institute is committed to empowering women by providing the facts and statistics for them to make their own informed decisions. Therefore, we have composed two easily accessible reports on the abortion breast cancer link: first, “Induced Abortion and Breast Cancer (Short version)” summarizes the most important biological facts about the link; second, “Induced Abortion and Breast Cancer” delves into specific scientific explanations. Both reports include easy-to-read diagrams, and explain why studies claiming to debunk the abortion-breast cancer link are fatally flawed.

What do NFL Abusers Have in Common?

Media outlets have been ringing with stories of domestic violence in the NFL: Greg Hardy, Rod Smith, Anthony Ray Jefferson, and, most recently, Ray Rice. But in its obsession with the NFL’s response to its players, the media has overlooked one growing root cause of abuse in these cases: cohabitation. Cohabitation is a breeding ground for domestic abuse against both women and children alike. And, not surprisingly, each NFL player was or had been cohabiting with the woman he beat.

This is, of course, not to blame any of these women for their abuse.  Rather, the link between cohabitation and domestic violence highlights the massive attitudinal differences between what it takes to cohabit and what it takes to marry. If the NFL wants to reduce domestic violence it will become a booster for marriage and it could do well by distributing these charts to all its NFL players and fans.

Social science data confirms this claim. One study found that cohabiting couples were more likely to face difficulties with adultery, drugs, and alcohol than couples who did not cohabit. Likewise, those couples who lived together prior to marring were more likely to exhibit marital issues like permissive sexual relationships and drug problems. Not surprisingly, therefore, cohabiting couples tend to have lower relationship quality, less stability, and more frequent and more extreme disagreements.

The frequency of abuse among cohabiting couples is especially alarming. The rate of violence among cohabiting couples is double the rate for married couples, and the rate for severe violence is almost five times as high. Cohabiters are more likely than married couple to be aggressive, and are more likely to hit, push, or throw things at their partner.

Having unmarried, cohabiting parents also poses a number of risk factors for children. Data shows that children of divorced or never-married mothers are six to 30 times more likely to suffer from serious child abuse than are children raised by their married biological parents. As the British data shows, children whose biological mother cohabits are 73 percent more likely to die from abuse than are children whose biological parents are married. We do not have analogous US data on fatalities, but we have very good federal data on rates of abuse as the other three charts show.

Many support cohabitation as a means to “test drive” a potential marriage. However, far from strengthening future marriages, cohabitation produces risk factors for a slew of marital problems like drinking, fighting, and violence. It’d be best if people stick to watching NFL players for their football skills, and take relationship advice from the experts.

Radical Feminists and Fathers

“Why are we here today?” she asked.
“To make revolution,” they answered.
“What kind of revolution?” she replied.
“The Cultural Revolution,” they chanted.
“And how do we make Cultural Revolution?” she demanded.
“By destroying the American family!” they answered.
“How do we destroy the family?” she came back.
“By destroying the American Patriarch,” they cried exuberantly.
“And how do we destroy the American Patriarch?” she replied.
“By taking away his power!”
“How do we do that?”
“By destroying monogamy!” they shouted.
“How can we destroy monogamy?”

“By promoting promiscuity, eroticism, prostitution and homosexuality!” they resounded.

Disconcerting? Yes. Unordinary? Not at all. Mallory Millet recalls this exchange as a typical chanting ritual among her sister, Kate Millet, and similarly minded feminist activists. The breakdown of the family following the sexual revolution was no coincidence; it was its very goal.

Feminists have largely succeeded in debilitating and eradicating fatherhood. Today, 1 in 3 children in the United States live in a fatherless home, and by age 17 only 46 percent are living with both their mother and father. This fatherless family is the root cause of the majority of social ills. Children deprived of a father are robbed of physical, emotional, intellectual, and economic benefits throughout their lifetime.

For example, children without a father are less likely to have stable relationships. Studies show that adolescents who live without their father are more likely to engage in greater and earlier sexual activity, are more likely to become pregnant as a teenager, and are more likely to have a child outside of marriage. Boys that are close with their fathers have better attitudes about intimacy and the prospect of their own married lives than boys who do not feel close to their fathers. A girl whose father leaves before she is five years old is eight times more likely to have an adolescent pregnancy than a girl whose father remains in her home.

This trend extends into other deviant behaviors. Boys and girls who live without their fathers are less likely to be able to delay gratification, have poor impulse control over anger and sexual gratification, and have a weaker sense of right and wrong. Correspondingly, children who live without their fathers are, on average, more likely to choose deviant peers, have trouble getting along with other children, be at higher risk for peer problems, and be more aggressive.

The importance of a father to children is also evident in school. Children who live without their fathers are more likely to have decreased school performance, and children who do not live with their father are more likely to experience behavioral problems at school. Furthermore, 71 percent of all high school dropouts come from fatherless homes.

Children also reap great economic benefits from having a father at home. Intact married families have the largest annual income of all family structures with children under 18. In contrast, children raised in single-mother families, intact cohabiting families, and (biological father or mother) cohabiting stepfamilies are significantly more likely than children from married families to receive most forms of welfare, including TANF, food stamps, and Medicaid.

Every child has a fundamental right to a married mother and father. However, radical feminists have forced their neo-Marxist ideology into society’s most vulnerable and far-reaching unit: the family.  They have ripped children apart from their fathers and persecuted women who remain faithful to their husbands. The repercussions of replacing the devout father with the welfare state are rapidly compounding, and are hurling society into a bottomless pit. What is the appropriate  response today: Why are we here today?  To make revolution. What kind of revolution? The Cultural Revolution. And how do we make Cultural Revolution? By rebuilding the American patriarchal family! By reuniting fathers with their spouses and their children!

The Deconstructionist’s War on Girls: An AG who Protects the Predators Not the Victim

Sexual abuse of adolescent girls inflicts enduring wounds on the victim’s heart, mind, body, and soul. Young girls seduced into an early sexual debut—generally victimized by their partners—exhibit these consequences over their lifetime. Disconcertingly, about 60 percent of sexual abuse cases are never reported to authorities; the majority of these are young females.

However, in a backdoor attempt to facilitate the abortion industry, Virginia Attorney General Mark Herring relaxed reporting rules for healthcare providers.  This decision issues implicit support for sexual licentiousness and statutory rape. Most unnerving, the repercussions for young women have been grossly ignored by political pundits and the mainstream media. 

An early sexual debut is likely to bring about negative physical, mental, social, and economic outcomes. These effects are frequently permanent because the earlier a woman begins sexual activity, the more sexual partners she is likely to have over her lifetime. For example, girls who began sexual activity at age 13 are twice as likely to become infected by an STD as girls who started sexual activity at age 21. Correspondingly, early sexual intercourse is negatively linked to happiness. This parallels the finding that early intercourse leads to an increased likelihood of forcing a partner to have sex, having sex while drunk or high, unstable relationships, and having an unplanned pregnancy. Not surprisingly, this life pattern increases abortions. While 30 percent of girls who started sexual activity at ages 13 or 14 have had an abortion, some 12 percent of girls who began sexual activity in their early 20s have had an abortion. This figure is especially alarming given the biological link between abortion and breast cancer.

Early sexual debut also has economic ramifications. Women who became sexually active at ages 13 or 14 are more than three times as likely to become single parents than are women who initiate sexual activity in their early 20s. This contributes to maternal poverty. One study found that 27 percent of mothers who began sexual activity at ages 13 or 14 were living in poverty, whereas 11.7 percent of mothers who began sexual activity in their early 20s were poor.

Herring’s ruling is an abomination to the parents of young girls. He is in essence saying:  I will not protect your young adolescent girls from older predators.  Where are the feminists on this?  On his side!  Promoting abortion and the radical sexualization and  “dysfunctionalization” of young adolescent girls. Protector he is not.  Who now guards the guardians?  Who guards this rogue guardian?

Promoting women’s well-being mandates widespread support for the intact married family. It is within this environment that girls are most protected from sexual abuse, and it is within this environment that young women are most likely to cultivate a healthy sexual relationship with her husband before God.  Herring seems bent on the agenda to wreck the future family life of these young girls. But that is the price he and his allies are willing to pay. This is war on the family of that girl, her present family and her own future family.