US anti-abortion group lobbying Westminster

It is my position. But I also think it's much easier to have absolute clarity at the extreme ends of a spectrum of opinions as the message is cleaner.
Ordinarily I'm all about the centre ground but not when it comes to female bodily autonomy.

(I also personally don't think the forced birth of an unwanted child just because it reached a certain gestation is good for that child either. There are all sorts of separation trauma issues or neglectful parenting issues that could ensue.)

In the context of US Christian Evangelicals it's good to remember they are a different to UK Christian evangelicals - who are majority leftwing politically, even if socially more small c conservative.

For me, I do believe that a foetus has life and that this life is significant. I also believe that the needs of the woman are significant. Ultimately, life is messy and it's not for me to judge nor would I ever want women to be forced into back street abortions by a greater restriction on access to terminations.

Like most women (religious or not) I see a difference between a termination at 30 weeks than at 13 weeks. There is also a difference between a termination for medical reasons and because of choice. I don't think it's extreme to want the law to have some nuance, which our current law has. It recognises that life is complex.

I also strongly believe that the best way to be "pro-life" is to support women financially and with fantastic childcare and NHS as a country so that any woman who falls pregnant unexpectantly is making a real choice. Ironically the same politicians who are "pro life" and the ones who voted for the two child limit on benefits and who consistently underfund maternity services, sure start and education.

The reason I'm saying this is that even for those of us who are "very religious" in UK, many of us absolutely don't align ourselves with the American Christian right. I wouldn't want their brand of "pro-life" where women and girls suffer to be thought of as 'the Christian position'.

The only change in the law I would seek is to improve women's right to state support to raise their child, to make chosen adoption a more realistic choice, alongside legal and safe terminations.

Personally I wouldn't use the term 'pro choice' or 'pro-life' to describe my position and I wouldn't want a polarisation where everyone has to take a more and more extreme position. As you can see from the states, often that has really negative consequences.

This saddens me, but doesn't at all surprise me.

I am anti -abortion, but I do not think that a group from another country should be lobbying or protesting in this way in the UK. That said I personally would like to see the abortion limit reduced, I am a feminist and do not see the that my view is contradictory

The aim for me is easy access to safe abortions, as others have said, as early as possible as late as necessary.

If that's thought of in terms of medical necessity rather than a womens right to choose, i dont think thats the worst fudge in the world.

I don't want a debate where we are treating some women as immoral for not wanting to be pregnant and others as part of the right for thinking of their pregnancy as a child with rights. We all could be both at different times in our life.

This.

Fuck off with your cultural imperialism. We don't want your conservative Christians or your loony liberals in the UK, thanks very much.

We are, for the most part, more sane and sensible than you.

I'm really sorry you experienced that @GrammarTeacher . I'm an evangelical Christian and I'm really horrified someone said that to you. Totally unacceptable, whatever the reasons were for your D&C.

"As early as possible, as late as necessary" isn't a black and white position. How early is "early as possible"? How "necessary"
if late? What is "late"? It sounds good but it is immediately open to query and a range of views, which unanchor us from the current position. No good can come of that.

This has happened in Glasgow at Sandyford, despite women's groups specifically asking that vigil protestors were not met with counter protestors, because it was escalating the situation into a confrontation which was not helping women trying to access the clinic.

(Transwoman/activist Beth Douglas had attended with inflammatory signage.)

I think we should as feminists be more hard line the other way, and support abortion "as early as possible, as late as necessary". It's easier to hold a black and white position and it would help stop these pro-life American groups nibbling round the edges.

I'd prefer to look at what position I actually want to hold, rather than simply plumping for an "equal and opposite" position to these campaigners.

Rushing to the polar opposite means they set the terms. One has the fight they chose, on the ground they chose – often from the position they chose for us.

No good can come...

(NB obviously if "as early as possible, as late as necessary" is already your personal position, then that comment doesn't apply to you. It does to me, though, as I am slightly happier with something close to the current situation in GB, perhaps with tweaks which improve access.)

All Party Parliamentary Groups can do excellent work, but are also well-known to be vulnerable to outside actors

True. Or where deals are done and then go wrong when pesky wims exercise their democratic rights and certain MPs have a public shitfit, giving the game away...

Possibly they can also be where issues are parked and never dealt with. There's been (still is?) one on whistleblowing, which appears to have done some interesting and important work. But it's never had much action as a result. Speculatively, I wondered if it might have served a purpose (doing something without it doing anything IYSWIM).

All Party Parliamentary Groups can do excellent work, but are also well-known to be vulnerable to outside actors.

"APPGs are able to issue their own official-looking reports, generate media coverage, and, crucially, can receive outside funding — including from foreign entities — to aid their work. They can also provide a route for “secretariats” funded by private companies to gain passes allowing them access to the parliamentary estate, as well as the ability to shape the work of MPs sympathetic to their causes."

https://www.politico.eu/article/uk-parliament-rishi-sunak-mp-westminster-warned-to-clean-up-its-act-on-parliamentary-groups-branded-total-jokes/

If the courts can find ways to not prision sex offenders, they can find ways to not prison women for having abortions.

We dont have to force a debate and risk losing in other areas. Its not just a religious right that are interested in using abortion legislation to control women, left wing TRA and surrogacy industries are interested too.

I dont trust the current crop of politicans of either side to have the foresight and the will to protect women as a class while drafting legislation.

Given the vast majority of late abortions are for medical reasons, and its the viability of life that people are concerned with, there isnt that much of a difference in attitude for the majority of people.

Conflict occurs when it becomes a debate between a right to choose verses life begins at conception. We dont need to go there to protect women having safe medical procedures.

Thanks for that link, @Theeyeballsinthesky .

Yes, so that's a list of MPs to whom the ADF has immediate access.

From their name, it looks like this organisation has lighted on "religious freedom" as its choice of Trojan horse.

A push for abortion on demand right up to birth would have the same effect.

Which may well be why that is suddenly being funded (if what a PP states is accurate).

There has for many years been a fairly stable situation in Great Britain (excluding NI), where anti-abortionists agitate while most other people ignore them and treat the whole matter of abortion as settled.

It's very hard to effect change in that environment.

So the first step is to disrupt that stability by starting fights. Fights in either direction - never mind the detail as long as it's passionate and engaging and polarising.

This creates opportunities for those primed and ready to move in.

So I'm not at all surprised to hear of some unlooked-for campaigning for abortion on demand up to birth. The anti-abortionists need a Something to have their fight against, which isn't the fairly stable and well-supported current situation.

(Of course some actors will start fights on any issue; the Russian troll farms specialise in "slipping a knife into the cracks and wiggling". They interfered in both directions in black rights campaigning in the US:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russia_and_Black_Lives_Matter
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2017/sep/30/blacktivist-facebook-account-russia-us-election )

A couple of weeks ago I noticed a large Trans/Progress Pride flag draped outside of the local abortion clinic. I'm imagining that the staff had, as yet, become unaware of this, and would remove it once they had. I hope so, anyway.

It occurred to me that trans activists were appropriating women's abortion rights in the service of their own agenda - and I do not see how any good can come of this. It seemed an act of provocation; and furthermore was drawing attention to the clinic, which keeps a low profile, and at which many vulnerable women turn up hoping to enter and leave quietly and without a fuss.

Yes.
The current push on the rights of Doens Syndrome foetuses is also a trojan horse designed to attack the current "fudge". If that gained traction and went through it would put a stop to a lot of TFMR and also open a door to a discussion about what disability is "bad enough" for TFMR. Which then allows restriction of abortion, and also starts to set a precedent for what "acceptable" grounds are.

I think we should as feminists be more hard line the other way, and support abortion "as early as possible, as late as necessary". It's easier to hold a black and white position and it would help stop these pro-life American groups nibbling round the edges.

I’m assuming this is the APPG to which the article refers. It was founded in 2012 and includes a wide range of MPs & peers from all parties and cross benchers

https://appgfreedomofreligionorbelief.org/appg/

there are 25 stakeholders of which ADF is one, others include Islamic, Jewish, Christian, and humanist groups

Why can't they just fuck off.
I had to have a TFMR for medical reasons. Horrific position to be in however I'm glad that I had the choice to be able to do this.
I know it's a very loaded subject and each has their own opinion which is fair enough.
It's just sad that this day and age, we as women have to have other peoples choices shoved down our throats with no regards to our own choices. It's disgusting.

I think you'd be interested to look more closely at the right wing think tanks. They get millions from overseas donors, donate a lot to the Conservative government and are very influential.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/what-is-55-tufton-street-b2205193.html

They may not be pushing the same agenda as Dentons but they are a way for organisations to use money to influence UK politics in a covert way.

Yes, you missed a detail in the article. The para I quoted above:

"The UK branch of the US-based Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF) has more than doubled its spending since 2020 and been appointed a stakeholder in a parliamentary group on religious freedoms in a role that grants it direct access to MPs."

This group's got the key of the side door.

This from a country that has absurd gun laws they cannot get rid of (probably the same group as the anti-abortionists), the U.S. maternal mortality rate at a 32.9 deaths per 100,000 births, provides no social security or health system for all, and many still believe the earth is flat.

America is just backward is many ways - they need to get their own house before they come telling us what to do.

Quite. Well said 👏

*in a different area, I mean.

That survey is extremely reassuring, Noicant, but money is being spent to gain influence. We are a very different country to the USA, but we can't be complacent. As a pp said, look how readily the left imports US ideas.