What on earth is going on in America??

[Nanny0gg]

www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-48275795

How can a supposedly 'civilised' society pass such a retrograde law?

And other states following suit?

There were plenty of activists campaigning in the UK and all over the world to repeal the 8th. I was one of them.

Yeah I don't doubt there were many supporters for Repeal the 8th in the UK, but that doesn't mean the UK gets to claim it as being down to their influence.

@Gth1234
www.irishexaminer.com/breakingnews/ireland/northern-irish-women-will-be-allowed-to-access-abortion-in-republic-885683.html

@DeadWife there's no need for the snark. This is people's lives we're talking about. It's not 'embarrassing' it's actually a tragedy. Choose something else to make your anti American digs please.

So awful. Abortions won’t stop. Safe abortions will stop

Women and young girls will die

@bliminy I think we're from the same State.

We're lucky to have Mills. And for us locally we have some wonderful female senators/politicians that I've spoken to at length about this and am happy they're doing all they can to avoid any shit show like Alabama.

Theyre backwards and no i dont careif it offends anyone-the fact it was all males that voted for this aswell is insulting

@GabsAlot who's backwards?

There's plenty of the same sentiment here! There was just last week a post from a woman considering a second trimester abortion. The responses were a litany in woman-shaming and hating bollocks. 'It's too late now!', tales of miscarriages at the same stage and how it felt to lose the foetus at that stage, she needed to give birth and give the baby up for adoption, scorn for the woman, etc. Go on any thread concerning pregnant children age 13 or 14 and there's mostly hostility towards suggestion of termination, the parents have to 'support' and child-rear, etc etc.

alabama in general ive seen other programs where people have gone their their ideals and morals are shocking

For anyone worried the UK was being left behind, at least we're trying to keep up.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-48279388

Single parents and their children have lost challenges against the government's controversial benefits cap at the UK's highest court.

They said it was discriminatory to cap state benefits at £20,000 a year, or £23,000 for those in London.

Lawyers for the group of five women said the cap had left many families unable to afford basic necessities.

But Supreme Court justices rejected their appeals on Wednesday, saying it did not breach their human rights.

Parents can escape the cap by going out for work - a lone parent must do so for 16 hours a week.

(contd)

It will be hard. It will be tough. We will face challenges. There will be setbacks. But as long as we pretend to love Jesus, then one day we will put women in their place. Amen.

Now praise the Lord and pass the ammunition.

(That's irony, btw ...)

@sheettent
Fuck me all those empty churches!

2016 survey -
Roughly 51 percent of Americans say they go to church or another worship service somewhere between once a month and multiple times per week

Internalised misogyny is a cornerstone of the American right. They'd fall apart without it.

Extreme conservative Christianity being another cornerstone, apparently.

Yeah I don't doubt there were many supporters for Repeal the 8th in the UK, but that doesn't mean the UK gets to claim it as being down to their influence

Yep. No claiming the UK is somehow responsible for the result.

And no claiming that RoI is part of the British Isles or that we ever travel to somewhere called "the mainland" or even consider that such a place exists. It isn't rocket science to realise that the adjective British when applied to "Isles" implies ownership/dominion. The islands of Britain and Ireland might be a bit longer but it isn't particularly challenging to get to grips with, and it has the benefit of being accurate and inoffensive.

Internalised misogyny is a cornerstone of the American right. They'd fall apart without it.

They learned from the best, their father! Don't delude yourself we're any better. Brexit, anyone?

Ffs the rape clause is not the same. The govt made a policy to decision to only fund CB for 2 children (entirely fair). Without the rape clause families would continue having third fourth and fifth children and falsely claiming the woman had been raped so they could get CB for those additional children.

It must be awful for women who have genuinely been raped to have to detail / evidence that to support a CB claim IF they decide to keep the child (let's face it, many won't) but what the hell else can you do? Just trust families not to lie when free money is offered?

Exactly Quintella

It wasn't CB, Dexy, it was Child Tax Credits and now, UC. But let's just accuse people of wanting to grab 'free money' and procreating especially to that end.

Have none of these senators read Freakonomics?

Economists showed a link in NY State directly between the time when abortion became legal and a drop in crime 16 to 18 years later.

Women who do not want to become mothers usually have a reason for this.

They may not be mentally, emotionally or physically ready to raise a child, which leads to social problems when they are forced into parenthood.

This law is sickening and barbaric.

There's also a cosmic irony in the fact that Alabama is a proud exponent of capital punishment. Ideally as painful as possible.

While the Alabama senators who voted for this are all men, the person who introduced the bill into the Alabama house is a woman. Many Alabama women are anti-choice.

For those who would like to help, you can donate to Planned Parenthood or other organizations. But it's now in the hands of the courts (though legal fights are expensive). Alabama wanted a 'clean' bill partly because they want it to be a pure test case for SCOTUS.

Georgia's bill is, to me, far more invasive than Alabama's, though Alabama's is more stark. Not being able to leave the state is such a weird nullification of the states rights argument you hear so often. But it's also far more likely to get overturned. The last election in Georgia was so close that many think it should have gone another way. I would guess that this will stir up a lot of support for Georgia Democrats.

Alabama, on the other hand, is red through and through. There's no way their law is overturned at the ballot box. A significant minority of people (40%? 45%?) will hate this bill, but between gerrymandering, voter ID laws, and just the pure numbers game, it's not going to be changed legislatively.

Garnier I am not suggesting people would have a child for 'free money'. Children cost more than a claimant receives, i think everyone knows that. But if a family decides to have a third child and there is no mechanism in place to prevent them simply lying on claimant paperwork i think it's exceptionally naive to rely on the rigorous honesty of the general UK population

A PP stated that women in NI do not face life imprisonment for abortion but they do. A rape victim who gets abortion pills online can be prosecuted and get a life sentence. In recent prosecutions women have recent suspended sentences but the law allows a life sentence.

The change has to come from Westminster. In NI even if the majority of the members of the assembly vote to change the law on abortion it is not enough. Laws can be blocked by a minority using a procedure called a petition of concern. This is how the DUP have stopped marriage equality and pro choice laws coming into effect. These are the people who are keeping the current UK government in power. That should matter to every pro choice voter in the UK,

@badlydrawnperson ok. I just live here. But you know America better.

Garnier I am not suggesting people would have a child for 'free money'. Children cost more than a claimant receives, i think everyone knows that. But if a family decides to have a third child and there is no mechanism in place to prevent them simply lying on claimant paperwork i think it's exceptionally naive to rely on the rigorous honesty of the general UK population

That argument - saving money - might have had some backing if we hadn't seen our government spunk thousands of times that saving into Brexit "preparations". Including settling court cases on the sly over invisible ferry contracts.

If you really cared about protecting the hard pressed taxpayer, you'd look at this presentation of statistics, and go after the biggest single win. Which isn't benefits.

Fundamentalist Christianity voters are a major part of the Republican party in the United States. FC is a minority group in the US, but it has a stranglehold on the Republican party and abortion is their number one issue. Generally, the more fundamentalist Christians in a state, the more likely they are to be against abortion (even though roughly 70% of the US is for some form of abortion rights). This is all a ploy to get the increasingly conservative Supreme Court to overturn Roe v Wade, which is an extreme possibility at this point. All the more reason, if you are female, to move to a so-called "blue" state.