to have been shocked by US anti-abortion feature on Newsnight

[wimblehorse]

This was a few days ago but haven't had chance to post sooner.

The feature was about how far to the right the republican presidential candidates have been pushing on the abortion debate and showed a group in Ohio who are lobbying for abortion law there to be (further) restricted so that once a fetal heartbeat has been detected through compulsory vaginal probe ultra-sound - which can be after 5-6 weeks - then a termination cannot be carried out.

A huge number of women would not even know they were pregnant at 5-6 weeks, and even those who found out straight away it doesn't give much time to be able to arrange a termination, especially as so many clinics/hospitals have been forced to close.

Already in that state, women seeking terminations are forced to have vaginal ultrasound probes and hear/see the heartbeat before having a termination.

The group who were lobbying claimed that detection of the heartbeat was a fundamental sign of life and therefore terminating a pregnancy after this had been detected was "wrong". However it's just a sign of current medical technology. There are many people alive today who have had periods of no detectable heartbeat and have been resuscitated - brain death is what is considered the fundamental sign of life and they had no medical link between detection of ultra-sound heartbeat to development of brain function - awareness/pain etc - in a fetus.

It's an arbitrary measure that is trying to make it almost impossible to seek a safe, legal termination and I really hope that it doesn't make further headway.

Rant over.

WIBU to have been shocked?

'the arguement for abortion over adoption is that no-one should be able to force women to risk their own future health for an embryo.'

Where the woman's life is at risk is the one exception pro-lifers agree on

Well, any woman's life is at risk when she gives birth. It is a known risk.

How do you know the women's life won't be at risk from depression and suicide if they're forced to go through a pregnancy that's unwanted and potentially the result of great trauma?

Thing is, the percentage of women who have repeated abortions (which, you know, might have more to do with the fact that they are very fertile than that they are careless selfish sluts) is very small. And it's unimportant that a tiny number of women have lots of abortions. It's no one else's business. Maintaining the availablity of safe legal abortion to any woman who wants it, for whatever reason she wants it, is the most important thing.

Actually, slightly OT, I also believe that when an unplanned pregnancy occurs, a man should be allowed to walk away if he makes a formal declaration that he will never seek any contact with the child and have no rights with regard to its upbringing if it is born as long as he does this before the birth.

This a topic I feel very strongly about. I don't often debate about this because the kind of mindset I'm mostly faced with makes me sick. I'm completely pro choice and I am disgusted with the Republican agenda.

I just read all the responses to this thread and I'm so relieved that other women think like me!
I've maintained for ages that pro lifers mainly have an obsession with the foetus and are unconcerned with what happens to the child. They throw up adoption and foster care as if these options are so easily available and so grand for a child. Never once do they think what will happen to the baby if nobody adopts him/her and he/she languishes in an orphanage or goes from one foster home to another. Nobody ever stops to think how a child with feel to know that she/he was abandoned by parents at birth, even if the child is loved by the adoptive family.

Nobody ever stops to think about the fact that pregnancy and childbirth are tough to go through even for a much wanted child. They don't understand that EVERY pregnant woman is essentially putting her health and life on the line to have the baby. In what warped world is it ok to force women to take those risks?
Abortion isn't merely a way to opt out of parenthood, it is a way for women to make choices about their bodies and their health.

Whatthehell I agree with you, but would also like to add that 'pro-lifers' seldom seem to understand that the abolition of safe abortion would lead to women seeking unsafe abortions. Sorry, I have posted this on threads before, but I think it's salient to repeat it as many times as necessary!

The World Health Organization (WHO) reports that each year nearly 42 million women faced with unintended pregnancies have abortions, of which 20 million are unsafe, mostly in countries where abortion is illegal. According to WHO and Guttmacher, approximately 68,000 women die annually as a result of complications of unsafe abortion; and between two million and seven million women each year survive unsafe abortion but sustain long-term damage or disease (incomplete abortion, infection (sepsis), haemorrhage, and injury to the internal organs, such as puncturing or tearing of the uterus). They also concluded abortion is safe in countries where it's legal, but dangerous in countries where it's outlawed and performed clandestinely. The WHO reports that in developed regions, nearly all abortions (92%) are safe, whereas in developing countries, more than half (55%) are unsafe. According to WHO statistics, the risk rate for unsafe abortion is 1/270; according to other sources, unsafe abortion is responsible for one in eight maternal deaths. Worldwide, 48% of all induced abortions are unsafe.

So, these 'pro-lifers' are supporting a principle that leads to maternal death. If they think the demand for abortion will simply go away if it's made unlawful, they are frankly stupid. It won't. It will be driven underground and become unsafe.

twofingers
Thank you for posting that! You're absolutely right.

Don't forget, anti-choice isn't about 'saving babies', it's about hating women and wanting them kept under control.

JuneBear: your point seems to be that some women have too much sex and should be prevented from doing so. Again, it is absolutely none of your business.

What penalty do you think a man should have for getting a woman pregnant with a child either he or she doesn't want, Junebear? Or should punishments/ penalties only be meted out to women?

am horribly reminded of the old Contagious Diseases Act:
It was supposed to be a way of keeping known prostitutes from spreading VD, (not the men who frequented them mind). But was horribly abused so that the men in power could take any young unaccompanied woman off the streets and abuse them (Laundresses delivering clean laundry, milk maids, etc.) Because of course, no respectable woman would be walking the streets alone....

"Should a member of a special force or a registered doctor believe that a woman was a common prostitute (a term left undefined), then he might lay such information before a Justice of the Peace who was then to summon the woman to a certified hospital established under the act for medical examination. Should she refuse, then the magistrate could order her to be taken to the hospital and there forcibly examined and if found, in either case, to be suffering from venereal disease,

then she could be detained in a hospital for a period of up to three months. Resistance to examination or refusal to obey the hospital rules could be visited with one month?s imprisonment for the first offense and two months for any subsequent offense. They might, however, submit voluntarily to examination without a magistrate?s order, but if infected became liable for detention"

We don't seem to have come very far do we?
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contagious_Diseases_Acts

YANBU

JuneBear - in the context of the US debate though, we're not really talking about 'precious resources' as contraception isn't free - see for example the current on-going House Committee hearings about employers being able to sepcify that contraception isn't to be made available under their health insurance plans.

I find the GOP and Tea Party supporters frightening. On twitter you only need to look at the #prochoice and #prolife tags to see how far some people what to take anti abortion laws. A large proportion (on twitter) also want the contraceptive pill and coil banned as they believe these may cause chemical abortions. "Slut Shaming" propaganda is used a lot. I am so pleased I live in the UK.

I am so pleased I live in the UK.

Me too. But you should be aware that anti abortion groups like this are growing in strength within the UK and that if we are apathetic and fail to oppose them/challenge their lies (like the 'breast cancer' and 'mental illness' lies) they will gain ground.

Groups like 40 Days for Life, Abort67 and, of course, SPUC are already behaving in a similar fashion to US groups, standing outside clinics with their placards, harassing women who are on their way to have legal terminations. Read this article and see what is going on here. All groups are, of course, headed by men (funny that...) and all describe themselves as Christian (surprise!)

You might dismiss them as nut jobs but I find the rise of the Christian right in the UK worrying.

Me too, Gideon. And then they claim that they are being sooo marginalised and discriminated against...

Junebear: Having an abortion uses fewer NHS resources than continuing the pregnancy and having the baby.

I do not understand why Junebear feels it is her right to decide when an abortion is genuinely needed or not. Who dies and made her god, I wonder.

I'm also sick of this faffing about over the number of abortions. if abortion is murder one is too many. if abortion is ethically permissible than what difference how many one person has, or how many are performed in the country as a whole. I hate misogyny but I think I hate illogicality even more. Have the courage of your fucking convictions; if it's wrong it's wrong, and it's not for you to say in what circumstacnes it's acceptable or how many another woman is "allowed."

exactly the same, june bear? so you would subject a man to weeks of being sick ( perhaps by administering drugs to cause nausea), deplete his calcium reserves so that he is more vulnerable to conditions which threaten his bones and teeth, randomly throw in some long term effects such as diabetes or spd, then after a few months, subject him to grueling physical pain for about 8 to 12 hours, followed by a permanent reduction in earning potential? don't you think that's a bit cruel?

I also tend to think that the women who have very many repeat abortions are the ones who are least suited to be parents...

Basil as someone who suffered 24/7 sickness for the first 20 weeks both times I have to applaud your suggestion but agree that it would probably not be allowed under the Geneva Convention.

acekicker and the same anti-choice people are the ones who are against contraception as well. Mind boggles..
I guess we are supposed to stay virgins until married and then pop out a kid per year?

Hazle: Yes. That's what women are for - well, that and domestic service.

IME the women who have repeat abortions are most likely to be just very very fertile.

boards.askmen.com/showthread.php?130715-Then-End-of-a-relationship-before-and-after-an-Abortion&p=1310120&posted=1#post1310120

Read this thread from a most chauvinistic website to see how callous men in the USA can be towards women's choices. Seriously, just read it.