To agree with the Supreme Court's decision to overturn Roe v Wade?

[thereareotherways]

Obviously I can predict the voting already! Ha.

TL;DR (at the top!): I support abortion but think Roe v Wade (and later cases) are not legally sound, and there are better ways to secure women's rights that would have more public support.

I'm personally not opposed to abortion in most real-life circumstances. I think after viability I would prefer other options to be explored, but I think most women having later-term abortions are doing it for serious medical reasons and I don't think that should be prosecuted. That said, I also am okay in principle with regulating abortion and I'm not an absolutist re: women's control: I think the fetus/baby does have some rights (which I weight proportionally more as the baby grows).

As I understand it, Roe v Wade and Casey rely on a right to "liberty" in the US constitution (primarily the 14th amendment), which otherwise doesn't mention abortion. I'm not a lawyer at all, I find this tenuous at best. Liberty has always had implied limits based on what's acceptable in society, and abortion was illegal until fairly recently. I don't think there's any justification for claiming that there's an implied consent of the people that abortion is morally acceptable - and the polarisation of the US on this issue reflects that.

I think the decision in Roe/Casey to impose abortion via activist judges was a poor decision both legally and politically. This is a clear case where elected representatives need to pass legislation that reflects their constituents' positions. If that legislation differs from state-to-state, well, that's the whole point of a federal system. Pro-choice candidates need to get elected in red states and then they will have the actual consent of the people, not tenuous implied consent.

The decision in Dobbs is here and good reading: www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/21pdf/19-1392_6j37.pdf

I also have a faint hope that now that this has been overturned, both Republicans and Democrats might now return their focus to legislation instead of Supreme Court nominees. The power of the Supreme Court is too dominating in US politics: we should be pleased to see them ceding some power back to the legislature, i.e., the people's representatives!

Oh yes, it will be loads of them. But it think we need to understand that logic or nuance does not come into it with these people, so the point is barely worth making to be honest . It feels like we are wasting our energy just discussing it, I feel the same about gun control. Its not about having an argument, there is no reasoning with these people, their beliefs are just too batshit.

These people won't care that women die, because they don't care when primary school kids are murdered in their classrooms.

You can agree with whatever you want, just as others can disagree with whatever they want. We are a free liberal country...unlike the USA now thanks to this ruling.

They should not be allowed to opt out. They chose their profession and would have known what it entailed. Don't want to do abortions? Become a podiatrist. Same with pharmacists who don't want to prescribe the MAP. Don't be a pharmacist then. Registrars who don't want to do same sex couples? Same thing.

I disagree, as long as it doesn't form a huge part of the role in which case it becomes problematic, these medical professionals can still be a huge asset to the settings they work in. Just as patients can request an alternative HCP for any reason, I don't see why we shouldn't extend it to others. I worked in a pharmacy in my gap year and one of the female pharmacists wasn't happy to give it, she consciously chose to work in a large branch which had 2 on duty at all times so it didn't present an issue for women and didn't comprise her beliefs. She was an incredible pharmacist and it would have been a shame for her to not have been able to work in a community setting because of this. She rightfully treated the women who came in for it with respect, explained her reasons and wasn't judgemental at all.

I think I speak for a lot of people when I say...

GET FUCKED!

They should not be allowed to opt out. They chose their profession and would have known what it entailed. Don't want to do abortions? Become a podiatrist. Same with pharmacists who don't want to prescribe the MAP. Don't be a pharmacist then. Registrars who don't want to do same sex couples? Same thing.

Fewer now, because of time passing, but there would have been lots of medics and pharmacists who qualified before legal abortions or the MAP being available. Should they just quit because the law changed? Or registrars who were there before same sex marriage became legal? They may not have predicted how the law would change.

All the virtue signalling politicians should have put it into law (you Obama…), not just rely on precedent. But they didn’t want to spend the political capital.

The Conservative judges are just doing what they do. It’s like blaming a crocodile for being a crocodile.

Missouri OP? The tigger legislation which was previously passed (2019) came into force as soon as Roe v Wade was overturned. Abortion in Missouri is now effectively banned and further state legislation to tighten these laws even further has not been ruled out. Out of interest what you say to a 12 year old rape or incest victim in Missouri? Is this really how you want to see democracy in action?

imgur.com/gallery/4aYjYqp

Different laws in different states is the polar opposite of the point of a federal system. A federal system allows federal law to trump state law therefore guaranteeing a baseline level of equality on certain issues in all states.

This argument would perhaps be stronger if such a federal law existed in the United States.

No I don't. And you shouldn't be able to refuse to prescribe contraception either.

If your views are so strong that you can't cope with it, you don't work in that field.

OP I think you are unreasonable for the simple reason that nobody tells a woman what they can do with their own body. And definitely not men. If men don't like abortion, they should keep their willies in their trousers.

What's happened here is so outside the norms of the court, it's almost impossible to understand

Not really. Women are not allowed to have rights.

If women were the main carriers of guns and perpetrators of gun crime, gun laws would have been restricted years/decades ago.

there would have been lots of medics and pharmacists who qualified before legal abortions or the MAP being available. Should they just quit because the law changed? Or registrars who were there before same sex marriage became legal? They may not have predicted how the law would change

Abortion has been legal since 1967 in the UK so I don't think anyone working now can claim it was a surprise to them. Anyway in my view beliefs are a choice and should not be viewed in the same way as other protected characteristics that you can't change. Not sure how same sex marriage is relevant in this context?

Sorry in GB. Obviously not in Northern Ireland!

Democracy rarely works well on single issues. The fact remains that the majority of Americans believe that abortion should be legal. www.pewresearch.org/religion/fact-sheet/public-opinion-on-abortion/

It is a principle that I believe should be decided at federal level, not state level. In the same way as certain principles should be decided EU-wide rather than state-wide because they are such important principles for the rights of many, many citizens of the country. Why should the lives and physical welfare of women in Texas be less valued than those in California, for example? This is inherently wrong and there can be no competing rights when we are talking about a non-viable foetus.

@Wallaw thanks for the insights, you have more background than me on this one 😄

@EBearhug yes, those people too. If you go into a profession and working life thinking nothing will ever change, you're naive. Pharmacists should be au fait with medicine development so should have known the MAP was inevitable. Registrars should keep up with legal developments and seen the change coming. Plenty of time to cross skill and move on, and no excuse for refusing to accept the law. There should be zero privilege for religion in any case.

Apologies as I do not know US law but is there ANY possibility of this getting reversed?

I would like to be you, OP. Gullible, simple-minded, seeing the world through nice pink glasses of naivety. Saves people from the feeling of dread, when things like overturning Roe v Wade happen.

@Rabbitholedigger In the near future? No chance of reversal in my view. The only body that can overturn a decision by the Supreme Court is the Supreme Court. That would mean a fundamental change in the make-up of the court. The court currently has a 6-3 conservative majority. It may take decades for that to shift, given the relatively young age of many of the conservatives on the court. I know there’s speculation about expanding the court, but I don’t think the democrats are keen on unleashing that particular genie from the bottle.

There are other ways to establish abortion rights. A constitutional amendment would do it but requires a huge degree of political consensus to pass. Getting an amendment that replicates the protections offered by Roe would be a political impossibility right now. However, there might be some legs in an amendment that protects first trimester abortions (which the majority of Americans support).

There’s also the potential for federal legislation. Whether the court would find such legislation to be constitutional is another matter.

I think, unfortunately, this is going to be a long struggle. It was always the inherent risk that came with abortion rights being based on a court judgement . Establishing the right through the court was significantly easier than trying to do it through the process of constitutional amendment, but it also made its reversal just a matter of waiting for there to be enough conservatives on the court to do it.

I would have to quit my job if overnight I suddenly decided that I didn’t agree with everything moving into the cloud. I qualified using one tool and if I want to keep my job, I need to stay current, stay relevant and keep doing what my boss wants me to do.

@thereareotherways

speak for yourself and dont far other people with your misogynistic brush.

I wouldn’t have a problem with the 12 year old in that scenario wanting to abort at 37 weeks, none at all. And neither should you unless you plan on raising that baby yourself.

A foetus has no rights whatsoever. It is completely up to the woman as it is her body. It really is that simple.

@Mango101

I think they should fuck off and get another job.

and maybe try to develop some empathy and understanding of women’s rights.

This is such an ignorant comment. It's ridiculously unlikely that a HCP who is uncomfortable would work somewhere where the majority of their work was related, same with pharmacists, this will be a small part of their job. There is also a global shortage of healthcare professionals so it would be absolutely ridiculous. As an aside, just because in your role you have to be subservient to your boss it doesn't mean its a good thing does it.

So that’s the thing about being employed you do actually have to be subservient to the person that pays your wages otherwise you can fuck off and get another job with somebody who does agree that you can opt out of doing part of the role but frankly using the fact that there’s a shortage of healthcare professionals is a pretty pathetic argument.

there was a huge shortage of dentists in the UK in the 1970s one of my friends Mums went off to university and study dentistry with two DD’s at her A-levels, she’s a phenomenal dentist.

So if I’m faced with a bigoted pharmacist with no empathy towards women’s rights or a pharmacist that maybe just got 2 A’s and a B at uni instead of the current IIIa stars requires seems like there’s a logical solution to the “shortage” right there.