Abortion without parental notification protects not so much the child as the adult who is unable to handle his or her own failures as a parent. I think my daughter sells families short, as young people do, and that youth's not yet mature perception of parents is part of the problem. Parents will take extreme positions on moral issues to emphasize their importance - but when reality comes knocking most of us toss the rhetoric and do whatever is necessary to help and protect our children. She fears the parental grand-standing and is reluctant to come to people she thinks actually believe their own hypocritical posturing. If so, that family wasn't worthy of the name.
Real families rally.
That young girl never will know the lengths to which her parents will go to stand with her if the law encourages her to sneak off without them and carry the burden of an abortion alone. I hope not. I hope those dangers can be minimized - and it is not as though only one of the options here is hazardous. Legally, the parent is responsible for the child. We cannot maintain that basic tenet if we have laws to the contrary.