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?

It wasn't that she wasn't allowed an abortion, they weren't allowed to induce labour either. So doctors can induce labour in an almost full-term mum because it might interfere with their holiday or because mum is sick of being pg (eye roll), but you can't do it so a couple who are in the worst kind of grief feel that it might ease their suffering a little.

It makes me sick.

One thing I completely fail to understand about anti-abortion people is this:

How come they're perfectly happy to put women in charge of helpless infants when they obviously don't even trust us with our own bodies?

It's mind-boggling, really!

A good piece written by a man with some sense.

Dear UK,

Thank you ever so much for allowing me to move to your country. My hubbie is a UK citizen and my 3 daughters and I are moving outside of London in 3 weeks.

As an American, I have always been disgusted with the Republican agenda and so many other things, I don't need to add to this thread.

Too bad those Patriots won the war those many years ago. Had the Loyalists prevailed maybe the States wouldn't be so messed up today.

oopsi

have you ever heard the term 'mole'? Do you consider that a human being?

a person should have rights over their own body AS LONG AS IT DOESN'T HURT ANYBODY ELSE!

ALL pregnancies cause harm to the mother, it may be just stretch marks, it may be a tear that needs a few stiches.

It may be diabetes, or in 1/1000 cases it is heart disease, severe enough to need a heart transplant - don't believe me? Ask Tanya, wife of Vinnie Jones.

It may be severe depression, it may be a ruptured uterus, in rare cases it is death.

Why do you give an underdeveloped human being more rights than a fully formed, walking talking, able to think human being?

absolutely 100% pro choice. I wouldnt make judgements on womens reasons for it anyway.

having a child is far too dangerous and potentially damaging, and raising a child is so expensive and difficult, it really shouldnt be undertaken by anyone who doesnt actually even really want it

Ironically the GOP stance on 'pro-life' seems to taper off somewhat after a baby is born... god help you if once born the person has a congenital medical condition or gets sick and needs medical care during their life...they have no problem with a healthcare system which denies screening programs to significant numbers of the population, puts basic medicine out of reach due to prohibitive 'co-pay' and deductibles etc.

As regards abortion not being available even to victims of rape - that's just abhorrent. How can anyone have the right to insist a rape victim continues a pregnancy, the psychological trauma of having a rapist's child growing inside you is unimaginable...Long term damage to the child as well when they grow up knowing how they were conceived and what their 'father' did is also surely likely.

Re the Talk Show host someone mentioned further up the thread - that sounds like it was Rush Limbaugh

I'm pro life. I also identify as liberal and a feminist. I think the right of the fetus to live is important.

I'm pro choice. I also identify as a liberal and a feminist. I think the rights of the mother override the rights of a foetus and that she, and only she, should be allowed to decide what happens to and in her body.

Article 1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights starts:
All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights.

An unborn foetus is not equal in rights to its mother.

YANBU - It is terrible. Really worrying where it will lead / end

There are plenty of loving couples desperate for a baby to adopt.Nobody is forced to take on a baby they don't want to.

that is a very simplistic view. Plus you are putting a woman through childbirth who doesn't necessarily want to. Mortality from childbirth is rare but a risk, and long term or permanent health problems are another risk.

Oopsi: do you think that women should be forbidden to terminate a pregnancy even though the foetus has died inside them? Do you think it's better for a raped 12-year-old to continue with her pregnancy rather than terminate it? Or is it just those dirty sluts who persist in having sex when they want to who should be 'punished' by enforced childbirth?

Before I had children I thought that adoption would be a better option than abortion. I had no idea how tiring, stressful and emotionally difficult pregnancy would be. And how traumatic giving birth could be. The hormones involved were horrendous and I can't imagine how it would be to then give up the baby at the end. To put a woman through that to satisfy your conscience is unacceptable.

Watching the film Juno made me quite angry as it made the whole process look so easy.

im glad someone else said that about Juno. So many people rave about it, but it really pissed me off

Oopsi, bollocks to the adoption argument. Forced pregnancy and childbirth makes a slave of the woman. The risks of pregnancy and childbirth are not inconsiderable - why should they be forced to go through it just so someone 'might' adopt the child?

One of my relatives had to have a late termination because the (much wanted) foetus did not have a brain. Do you really think that women in those cases should have to go through the risks of childbirth just so no abortion takes place?

The 'give them up for abortion' argument really riles me. Women are not incubators. Fine if that's what they want to do, but absolutely no-one should be forced to continue a pregnancy to term if they don't want to.

Going back to the OP, you were not BU to be shocked, but given the rise of the Christian right in America you were BU to be surprised. Unfortunately, there are many groups (often affiliated to religious groups) in the UK who are following their lead like sheep.

I was thinking about the hideous old days of backstreet abortions and Vera Drake type health risks.

However, on a vaguely positive note, health and medicine has moved on so far since then. Even if the retrograde step was taken re abortion rights, I like to think that enough HCPs would be willing to risk breaking the law to ensure safe and healthy abortions for women who can't afford to travel to a more enlightened state/ country.

Failing that, enough people care passionately about this to provide donations or transport by voluntary or charitable means.

Hell, I'll drive the bus myself.

I suppose what I mean is that they don't all think this way. There are loving, kind, respectful Americans who support women's rights and are vocal and charitable on the subject. They aren't going to be silenced.

The problem with that (your second paragraph), Morris, would be that we would have a two-tier system where some people were educated/rich/brave enough to be able to access this service, while others were not.

Unfortunately, this anti abortion stance seems to be a bit of a vote winner in America - wasn't Romney pro-choice until he realised how many anti-abortionists would vote for him if he said something different?

"There are plenty of loving couples desperate for a baby to adopt.Nobody is forced to take on a baby they don't want to."

Even if were true that there were enough couples (and ignoring the rights of single people to adopt, hey?) ready to adopt babies straight from birth, I cannot understand the point of view that anyone could think it right, or just to force a woman to carry a fetus she does not want for 30 plus weeks and give birth to a baby, with all the inherent physical medical risks entailed by it and have no compassion for the utter mental trauma she would go through. Totally agree with the poster who said it is making slaves and incubators out of women.

As for denying terminations in cases where the fetus has/will die, words fail me.