"Brainwashed" may sound diminishing or condescending but when it comes to religion I think the definition is soundly met. Children are raised with a terror of saying anything against matters of faith; parents take them to church at young ages and scare the shit out of them with the weird sight of those they regard as authority figures obediently standing and sitting and kneeling, all in a threatening atmosphere of intense reverence.

Everything about religion is off-limits to reflection and question, exempt from examination and logic (especially logic). Anyone not wholly on the side of Jesus is pure evil, and the indoctrination of religious "values" is for many ineradicable. NO educated person should believe in God; this is as supernatural as ghosts, witches, and magic. But even many scientists are unable to tunnel out.

My own atheism came at the age of eleven, fifteen seconds of unrestrained thought that began with wanting to go back to sleep instead of Sunday school and ending with the realization that I got nothing out of the experience because I didn't believe a word of it.

That kind of unrestrained thought is simply unavailable to most people, and not just women.

Look at the religious absurdity of "pro-life"; life begins at conception (ova and spermatozoa are dead?), a blastula is a human being (yeah, a homunculus), abortion is sin (70% of embryos fail to implant in the endometrium and die). I say and will continue to say that anyone educated and who still believes in this pretty lie is, yes, brainwashed. We have thousands of years' experience at this and a predilection that's easily manipulated

I don't seek to insult those who believe but they all know as well as I do that religion is absurd, they won't abandon it because it inspires emotions they enjoy experiencing (neurochemical explosions sort of like cocaine). Just look at that glint of freshly washed brains when they start with the thee and thou and "the Lord Jesus Christ."

Take this away and abortion ceases to be any kind of moral issue.