Where is the pop culture?

Last week at the fabulous Words of Choice performance, an audience member was speaking about his time as a TV writer, and how difficult it was to even mention the word abortion in a script.

And that got me thinking -- why is it so rare to see stories about abortion (unless they're cautionary tales that is) in mainstream pop culture?

Penny Lane, the creator of the great documentary The Abortion Diaries has a wonderful resource up on her site: a timeline of when abortion has been mentioned in pop culture. And it's pretty rare! Or at least pretty rare when the character considering an abortion doesn't a) change her mind or b) have something horrible and life-threatening happen to her.

For me, it's a no-brainer that there's so much stigma attached to the issue when we can't even talk about it in the mainstream media. But what do you think? Why are networks so afraid of presenting the procedure when it doesn't have dire consequences?