Can we agree that women are entitled to bodily autonomy?

Quencher some US states do apply double homicide rules. English law has a law of child destruction which applies to the deaths of some unborn babies. I don't know how it works.

What I would say though is that anyone who decides to continue a pregnancy and decide to put chemicals into their bodies and in the long run the foetus gets damaged, and if that can be proven, the child should have rights to sue that parent for continuing a pregnancy if they knew they were not going to make an effort in looking after them. I don't think children born with alcohol and drug problem is right if it could have been prevented. Probably this where I differ from most people on bodily autonomy.

@msrisotto I agree with your premise but the example you gave at 12:40 is not in anyway shape or form relatable to unborn foetuses.
1-both you and the violinist have rights. Whether one has more rights to the other person is another thing.
2-the foetus has no rights. It's rights only begin from the moment it's born and becomes a baby human being.

What I would say is that the foetus only seem to cause problems when it comes to the policing of the female body. What I find astounding is that in most countries, if not all, women get punished for either having an abortion early or late in pregnancy.
Where as men can kick a woman, punch, poison a pregnant woman and the foetus dies and the only crime is that done to the woman. With male crimes the foetus is never looked as a person with rights but it does with women and should be protected. (This includes the uk).

I think if the law is to apply to one set of sex, it should apply to all. If you kick cause an accident and a pregnant woman dies, there should be two charges and that should include the foetus until women are given bodily autonomy.

I would also, say that China is no better with its one child policy and how women are forced to have abortions for subsequent pregnancies and their choices monitored.

Why are some people so quick to think up scenarios where women should be denied choice?

Vestal raised the issue that women never actually had the right to have only female doctors and midwives present during a birth no matter what. You can have a homebirth, but if you need a cesarean section, will you be guaranteed a female surgeon doing it? No, you won't.
Same with all other operations that require you to be naked

She hasn't said if she thinks this should be a right.

No, women can't decide who's staffing a hospital. But if a woman wants to turn down medical intervention on that basis (even if that means there is a risk she will die in child birth) she should have the right to do so. I may feel she would be totally unhinged to do so, you might well feel the same, but she should still have that right.

Looking at the question again

We are allowed to impose boundaries on who we have sex with, who we get naked in front of, who we spend time with with no justification required

If that is intended to include "who is staffing the hospital theatre during an operation" then , no, there should not be a right to insist on a female surgeon.

*to smoke

I think it's absolutely right that we choose who can touch us, who can have sex with us etc.

I think a baby has a right from conception, to a healthy environment and this is supersedes any woman's right so smoke etc.

As far as I know, women never actually had the right to have only female doctors and midwives present during a birth no matter what. You can have a homebirth, but if you need a cesarean section, will you be guaranteed a female surgeon doing it? No, you won't
Same with all other operations that require you to be naked

Are you suggesting these rights should exist?

Jeepers - I dissapprove of smoking in general. I'm not going to make an exception for pregnant women!

If people pregnant ( obvs a woman in this case ) wish to smoke drink be obese that is entirely up to them - their own autonomy . There is no outright right to a female doctor on the NHS and nor should there be .

The violinist argument comes from a piece by Janet Radcliffe Richards back in the 1980s (I first read it in a collection of essays on applied ethics published by OUP).

It's a very thoughtful discussion of the idea that even were we to concede the anti-abortion claim that the foetus is a person and has a right to life, we would still have to balance its rights against other people's (specifically the mother's), and that rights short of the right to life (such as the right to bodily autonomy) could still trump the foetus's alleged right to life. It's a good essay, which I'd recommend to anyone. (Yes, the violinist example is far-fetched - it's meant to be; but Radcliffe Richards works her way through a whole set of sci-fi type thought experiments to examine things like the anti-abortion argument that "we know that contraception fails; therefore in having consensual sex you knowingly open yourself to the possibility of getting pregnant; therefore you have given up the right to have an abortion if your contraception fails," asking questions like "how much of every-day life is a person supposed to give up because of a hypothetical risk of pregnancy - for instance, are they supposed to live in a sexless marriage because contraceptive failure is a possibility?").

No one is entitled to anything from me.

I agree wholeheartedly.

There are now regulations in place regarding getting finance because of previous scandals that almost led to a world finance meltdown. The consent forms you now fill in are clear and explicit. They have to be.

The same agency should be applied to bodily autonomy. An understanding that consent is sacred and should be enshrined in our conscious decisions that we make when it comes to human interactions.

... the violinist argument is plagiarism... coff.

You have the right to judge anyone who is doing something you disapprove of. However, if it is within the law you do not have the right to stop them.

And that's the thing, isn't it?
Those who view women as subhuman, as deserving less rights than a corpse (for a corpse will not have organs taken away if the person did not consent to it while still alive), want, and in most countries actually managed to have it written into law that women have no bodily autonomy.

But the original topic of the thread was about women's right to choose who we get naked in front of.

That right is being chipped away before we ever fully succeeded in having it.

As far as I know, women never actually had the right to have only female doctors and midwives present during a birth no matter what. You can have a homebirth, but if you need a cesarean section, will you be guaranteed a female surgeon doing it? No, you won't.
Same with all other operations that require you to be naked.

Okay, I got carried away. Point is, now people pretend that they don't know fucking exactly what we mean when we say that we only want to get naked in front of other females.
And/Or take offense at us explaining what, exactly, we mean by female even though they fucking KNOW and are well aware of what kind of people have been oppressed under patriarchy for at least two thousand years, and it is not the bepenised kind of person.

You have the right to judge anyone who is doing something you disapprove of. However, if it is within the law you do not have the right to stop them.

The "world famous violinist" argument is a ridiculous point and is in no way comparable to disapproving of a woman smoking when pregnant

It's not meant to be it's about abortion rights

And in my opinion, as a supporter of the right to choose, still a fatuous argument.

Bodily autonomy is a basic human right.

The "world famous violinist" argument is a ridiculous point and is in no way comparable to disapproving of a woman smoking when pregnant

It's not meant to be it's about abortion rights.

I think it is crucial to distinguish between passing moral judgement on and legislating against an act.

By all means tut all you want at pregnant women who smoke. (I am an avid non-smoker, incidentally, but think you are wrong to do so. My DSis smoked till it killed her - it's a shitty addiction - and tutting does not help the person doing the smoking, however much it might be a satisfying experience to the "tuttee".)

But do not legislate, because that way lies authoritarian madness of the sort being enacted in some American states where women can now be imprisoned for endangering their foetus. The moment the law takes the rights of the foetus more seriously than the rights of the women then you have created a society where the rights of born, adult women mean fuck-all.

The "world famous violinist" argument is a ridiculous point and is in no way comparable to disapproving of a woman smoking when pregnant.

We are allowed to impose boundaries on who we have sex with, who we get naked in front of, who we spend time with with no justification required

Of course. Not a problem.

Like the threads where we have posters 'glaring', 'tutting', at smokers who are pregnant

Oh I promise I won't glare or tutt in public but you are not going to police my thoughts that the woman doing this is incredibly selfish and it is an incredibly stupid, selfish and immoral thing to do.

I remember reading a harrowing account from a woman who was an alcoholic and raped by her husband (Ireland circa late 80s). She had no choice but to keep the pregnancy. Her drinking increased daily until one day she collapsed in a street in Dublin whilst out shopping with her three young children - she was drunk and about 7 months at that time. She was being abused physically and sexually throughout the pregnancy and was very fortunate to have met a non judgemental consultant - she was avid to point out that this is what saved her.

That person turned her life around. She was given all the help she needed and fortunately the baby was born healthy with no lasting after effects. She separated from her husband and her family took care of her - they had no idea that this middle class woman was being so terribly treated by her 'adoring' husband.

Being judgemental doesn't help the person who needs it.

I do agree that women are entitled to bodily autonomy.