Moral Issues in a Soap Opera - Eastenders, Ricky and Bianca’s abortion
Abortion, rape, marriage, death and murder may all be things used to make soap operas more realistic and ‘in-touch’ with today’s current affairs. All of the issues mentioned above are written into the scripts to make this realism seem possible.
A perfect example of a moral issue used, is an episode of where the main protagonists, a young couple called Bianca and Ricky, decide on having an abortion after they find out that their child will be born with an illness called Spina Bifida.
In an episode of Eastenders, Ricky and Bianca are going to have a child and they are both excited about having the child, and they are both discussing what gender they think that their baby will be and they both say what gender they want it to be. When they go to get the first ultrasound they find out that the baby will be a girl, as the nurse tells Bianca and Ricky this she rushes out of the room to get a doctor. In the doctor’s office he reveals to Bianca and Ricky that their baby has spina bifida and Hydrocephalus which would cause the baby to be severely disabled, both physically and mentally. When offered an abortion, Bianca automatically says no. the doctor continues to explain that if she did have an apportion that it would be a late abortion, as she was twenty weeks pregnant, and she would have to “give birth” and when born the baby would be dead.
