I don't know if John Rudd is another of our old pale, stale males, but his rhetoric certainly is.

Once again, a man dictating and laying the blame and responsibility at the feet of women. Shame on you.

Only a man can get a woman pregnant. A woman cannot get a woman pregnant. A woman can only get pregnant once in a nine month period. Men have the ability to cause pregnancies several times a day. So where should the responsibility for contraception lie? Change your rhetoric John. Bring some accountability to the male of the species.

The consequence generally becomes the woman's responsibility by default. Your account of abortion is so sanitized it's almost beyond belief that you can state such passive, bland reasons for abortion such as 'a woman knows how to use contraception” pfft!

I'm pro-choice, not pro-abortion, and as an adopted person I wished over the majority of my life that I had been aborted, because I was always searching for a sense of connection and belonging, and a face that I could see myself in.

I never got a voice either – it was always assumed by others – the child's voice is never heard and you cannot assume John that you know what the child would want to say.

Your sanitized account also doesn't take into account the women who were brutally gang raped and became pregnant as a result. No idea who the father was – are you blaming them too?

There is more at stake than murder here, so please stop minimising, denying and blaming – become part of a movement to get men to step up and be good men. If criminalisation is continued, it should lie with the men for not checking whether the woman wants a baby before they get her pregnant.

Sue Brooke, Otumoetai