to think America is a frightening place to be a woman right now?

[BornSicky]

Pregnant women facing murder charges

This is bullying at a nightmarish level.

I find it foul and despicable that women are being villified in such a way. How did the Christian right-wing become so powerful?

Truly, truly scary.

How can these bad laws (including the new "inspections" (read closures) of abortion clinics in Kansas) come to be passed? How can they be stopped?

Actually, from a recent thread here where several posters were referring to 'bundles of cells' and 'embryos' I'm not that convinced that everyone who has an abortion is fully aware of what they are doing. If they can't face the reality of it in a scan then maybe they should be reconsidering their decision.

Bubblemummy: in the first few weeks of conception a fertilised egg is actually only a bundle of cells which then evolves into an embyro. It is not a foetus until past the 12 week mark. I don't see why referring to them as such is a sign of people not understanding what a termination involves. Calling a foetus or an embryo a baby on the other hand is totally uncorrect.

*incorrect even

Um...okay, thread hijack.

the rubbish in the middle...they're teachers from California.

I've lived in the Midwest for my entire life. The state I live in now allows elective terminations up to 22 weeks and terminations for medical reasons up to 24.

We are often the state with the highest voter turnout. In the 2008 election, almost 80% of us voted, versus I believe 60 something of California. If you want laws to be different, get off your ass and vote for the politicians who agree with your views.

Out of the top ten most literate major cities in the US, two of them are ours. None were from California.

My state provided a significant amount of the iron ore used by the entire world for more than a hundred years.

As far as "culture" goes, though I hate that term as it's pretty relative, our major city's number of theater seats (per capita) ranks only behind NYC. We have the largest audience of any public radio network in the nation.

We have the highest percentage of the population who regularly participates in physical activity. We're actually ranked the healthiest state. Californina is 49th out of fifty.

There's an actual term for the people who live in my state and our kindness to others and our sense of community, manners, and fair play.

But yeah, we're just "the rubbish in the middle."

Sorry to rock the boat in such an un-Midwestern way, but...

GO FUCK YOURSELF, BECAUSE YOU DON'T KNOW SHIT.

@CheerfulYank - this is a thread about how superior we are in the UK, please stop confusing it with facts :o

PS Minnesota?

I'm right there with you in the middle, CheerfulYank wink. I was born in California, raised in Seattle and now live in Texas. In my experience (and it's just that, my experience) those on the coasts have a dim view of the center of the country.

:o Ya, you betcha Omigawd. I don't get riled about much, if anything, but don't you talk crap about Minne-sooooe-ta and expect to get away with it.

well said, CheerfulYank.
I wish I knew loads of facts about my New England state... I do know that homosexual marriage has been legal there for a long time

I knew all the facts, but I had to look up the actual numbers. :)

When I lost my babies I went through a stage of having nightmares about being arrested for murder. I lay awake for hours at night (until I could stay awake no longer) going over in my head every little action, in case it was my fault. Reading this brought those nightmares back, wish I hadn't read it :(.

Brave of you to share that, xstitch. This thread has made me think about my final, late, miscarriage (technically a stillbirth, I now know.) I was drinking and smoking - my H had announced he was in love with his secretary, I was piloting my employers' company through a crucial growth stage and was offered no support whatsoever by ante-natal teams.

I felt I couldn't cope without my 'props' - of course, when my baby made an exit, friends were very quick to blame me for it. In fact, it was the last in a long line of mcs and the medical cause was discovered much later.

As you can imagine, I felt like shit and couldn't help agreeing with everyone who wanted to make me feel worse by saying my actions had caused my loss. If the LAW had agreed with them - and prosecuted me! - I would have suicided. No doubt about it.

garlic and xstitch

I am very sorry indeed for your loss.

Thanks! I'm very happy I don't live in a society that seeks to make my loss worse by calling me a murderer.

Garlicnutter and Xstitch: my sympathies also.

That is one of the worst things about this sort of bullshit woman-hating legislation, the terrible and totally unjustified pain caused to women who have miscarried (as opposed to women who have decided to terminate). Losing a wanted baby is dreadful enough without being labelled a murderer and thrown in a cell. Or indeed, as the most hideous of America's woman-hating elected officials has suggested, being sentenced to death if you miscarry.

THis psychotically horrible man was elected to public office rather than being locked up for being, you know, mental. To hate women this much indicates a seriously unbalanced mind.

It does, SGB. Well said.

Yeah, he's a nut. I'd doubt he'll be voted back in.

And X and garlic I'm so sorry. :(

I really like you cheerful - have seen you on here for ages and always think you post good stuff, you seem lovely .

Can I ask you - what brought you to mumsnet? How did you find it - as far as i undertsnad you live in Minnesota and have never lived in the UK. So how the hell did mn come on your radar? And is there an american equivalent of MN as far as you know.

Oh, Garlic and X, I'm so sorry for what you've gone through :(

Why does America hate women so much?

I made that point, Lola, and I stand by it.

Because with what.....38 states is it, that are opposed to abortion & have made it illegal? That does sound to me like a huge proportion of America hates it's women. Or at least hates women around child bearing age.

Dress it up any way you like, but refusing women complete control over their bodies & prosecuting women for having miscarriages sounds pretty hateful to me.

Thanks, GetOrf.

I was just posting about how I came to Mumsnet today and realized I'd forgotten part of it. I take part in a radio trivia contest every year ('cause I'm wildly nerdy) that goes for 50 hours straight. I was up really early in the morning (I'm six hours behind you). This was when the Alfie Patten stuff was all over the news, that kid that looked about ten but was 13 and had supposedly fathered a child? One of the links was the Mumsnet discussion about it. Having always been a bit of an Anglophile , I cruised around the site for a bit and saw someone had a question about celiac disease, which I have. I created a username to answer her question and just really never left.

Having never left North America, it's really interesting to get a non-American perspective on issues and to hear about things that are happening across the world.

America has BabyCenter, which I posted on sporadically a few years ago. But I just really love Mumsnet, so I stay. :)

Differentname abortion is legal in every state.

And I am also not a fan of abortions at any time for any reason, so I suppose that might fall under a heading of "refusing women complete control over their bodies." I do not hate women.