I won’t deny the fact that I was very excited to have an excuse to re-watch Juno this week. I find it to be one of those movies that can somehow manage to make you feel good about a lousy situation, plus I think her step-mother is a hoot and a half.
However, this time watching I concentrated more on how the film depicted the feeling of pregnancy. I was very focused on how Juno seems to act and feel about being a mother. I found her to be interesting when comparing her to some of the women from the “26 Abortion stories” reading. I was rather surprised to see the range of emotion from all 26 women. I had assumed that a majority of them would have the same apathetic feeling since they opted to go through with the procedure. Some women just wanted “it” out of them and haven’t looked back since, some women have had multiple and don’t regret it, some women said they kept the fetus once and opted to not do it again, some women felt pressured to do it, others regret it, and some seemed to go back and fourth. I found Juno a girl who appeared apathetic, yet really did care for her child. In the movie she appears to not have gone through with an abortion for the reason that the fetus had developed finger nails and she didn’t like the clinic. I felt that Juno was very quick during the abortion scene, and in real life there is more of an inner struggle in choosing. Although Juno was presented as a sarcastic and unemotional character, looking closer could we also say that she didn’t want to go through with it because of her maternal instinct to protect the developing organism inside of her? When she said she didn’t want her child to have a life that was “shitty and broken” like everyone else’s’, I personally felt that it Juno was, in a way, a mother. She wasn’t the same uncaring and sarcastic teenager from the beginning of the movie.
My view of abortion is that it is a choice. It should always be an option for women because it is their body. I know that there are many debates about this idea, but that is my belief. Reading the 26 Abortion Stories was very interesting to me, due to the fact that it showed the emotional side to choosing an abortion that Juno failed to depict. I don’t know what I would do if I were presented with the same circumstances as Juno and the 26 women. I like to think that’s a thing no one is sure of until they find themselves sitting in the waiting room.
Thank you so much for your reflections here, especially your consideration of all the different feelings a woman might feel in this situation. You wrote of “26 Abortion stories, ” I was rather surprised to see the range of emotion from all 26 women.” That necessity of a diverse range of emotion seem such an important point to keep in mind with any representation.
I was also struck by these two observations you wrote: “I felt that Juno was very quick during the abortion scene, and in real life there is more of an inner struggle in choosing” and I don’t know what I would do if I were presented with the same circumstances as Juno and the 26 women. I like to think that’s a thing no one is sure of until they find themselves sitting in the waiting room.”
A strength of your post is drawing our attention to,and slowing down for us, that moment of “sitting in the waiting room” and allowing that moment to be filled with all the complexity and diversity of feelings that is “real life” as you say. It’s so important to question when media representations seem to flatten out the complexity of this kind of decision-making process. Thank you for your insights!