Late term abortion, high court

[Anycrispsleft]

I saw this on the BBC this morning - it's High Court review of the rules on late term abortions. The campaigners are seeking to remove the exception to the ban on post 24 week abortion that allows it in the case of "non-lethal" disabilities. The woman who is asking for the review wants the law to be changed on the grounds that it's discrimination against disabled people.

Apologies if this case has been covered before, I'm a newcomer to FWR having been radicalised by you people on Twitter. I just wanted to express this thought that occurred to me: the trans debate has shown me that whatever good-thinking progressives think, rights are sometimes like pie, in that giving one person more rights can mean less rights for someone else. And this is also like that, isn't it? There's a balancing of the rights of the foetus (not that a foetus has legal rights, at least not yet) and the rights of the mother. Until now I used to sort of shy away from this bit of the ethics of abortion. I am very strongly pro choice, but I always wanted to be able to justify that stance in a sort of objective way, considering the cases of the foetus and the mother as though I had no skin in the game. And I realised I can't actually do that, because I do have skin in the game, because I am a woman, I have two girls, and I want all of us to have control over our own bodies. It's not that I think I am objectively right. I want to win this. I don't care about the rights and wrongs from an academic point of view. I don't want my children to have to carry a child they don't want to term. Full stop. I'm sure others would be able to put this in a much more eloquent way but I feel like I've reached a new point in my feminism and I wanted to share it. I'm not neutral. I'm team woman.

I guess the pro choice crew don’t want me on their team either, since I would support abortions generally available before 24 weeks (and a system that gets 20 week scans in time) but I cannot just stand up and fight for the right to abort a baby post 24 weeks. I can’t. I understand the arguments but really it is an ethnical minefield. That’s a shame as I’d really like to be part of supporting abortion availability pre 24 weeks. Dh & I were considering various hypothetical possibilities recently and I’m so glad to live somewhere we can have these options.

Curious - are all of you whatever a woman’s wants people strongly in support of surrogacy?

codlingmoths, did you read the story about the mum who had to carry her daughter to full term because she was denied an abortion because she was around the 24 week mark and had to watch her daughter die in agony that took 44 hours? That is why safe abortion needs to be available in case of situation like that. For both mother and child.

And I hate it when people use commercial surrogacy to drive a wedge into abortion rights or the other way round. You can be against surrogacy and still support the right to safe abortions.

No, I didn’t , and I’m on board with abortion for severely life limiting conditions. I myself would probably choose to terminate for Edwards or patau I think, I don’t think the pregnancy should be prioritised for a baby to live a few days in misery. I would obviously do it as early as possible. But I can’t get on board with anyone campaigning for any time for any reason. I’m far from alone in this stance and you can say you’re the enemy or you can accept these are legitimate viewpoints.

the surrogacy question was genuine- you must see it’s hard to marry the two stances, that Women should not be permitted to carry a strangers baby for money and women should be permitted to abort at any time; I’m not trying to derail the thread.

It is a legitimate viewpoint to be against abortion at any time for any reason but it's not a viewpoint I agree with. These campaigners are correct that the current law is discriminatory against disabled foetuses (or it would be if foetuses had human rights). A way of eliminating that discrimination would be for the time limit to be removed for all pregnancies. That doesn't mean that women will be queueing up for third trimester abortions 'just because'. It's nonsense to think women would put themselves through that and even more nonsense to suggest they would find doctors willing to perform such abortions, bound as they are by ethical codes and a strong duty to act in the best interests of their patients.

Regarding surrogacy (which I am against) it comes down to the human rights of the child - which begin at birth.

Also, and unlike abortion, it's an industry which has the proven potential to exploit women on low incomes. In that sense surrogacy is more akin to the sex industry or selling kidneys than it is to abortion.

Heidi Crowter has herself tweeted, 'UK Gov needs to read this: “Wherever Parliament sets the number of weeks after which abortion is not permitted, it should be exactly the same whether the pregnancy is likely to result in a disabled or a non-disabled child. All lives are equal.”'

https://twitter.com/HeidiCrowter95/status/1659650732054675457

So to take these activists at face value, the easiest way of satisfying everyone is to remove all time limits. The New Zealand model looks good to me.

(HC's mother runs her twitter a lot of the time, but anyway ...)

My opinion is that we should have abortion available up until a baby is technically "viable" (24 weeks nowadays) then after that point the mother should be allowed to "end" the pregnancy by C-section or other means and supported to give the baby up for adoption if they no longer want it.

I just do think once the baby can survive outside the womb and is "viable" then it has rights tbh. But the mum also has rights to abort it before that point - or have the baby removed and looked after by another family if she doesn't want it once it's viable.

@MsCactus the problem with your idea is that is moves us into foetal 'personhood' territory. Which means that women who genuinely have very late natural miscarriages will end up investigated/persecuted/prosecuted. This is already happening in countries around the world, including the US. So no, that is a very very very bad idea.

I think the New Zealand solution is a good one.

It's quite a step to go from "women should be supported to end their pregnancies late term but babies kept alive if they can survive" to "women prosecuted for late natural miscarriages"...

I don't really see the link there?? Very different positions.

Of course we can't take these activists at face value because they are the same people behind 'Don't Screen Us Out' so they are also against early screening, which helps women avoid late abortions.

They are also evangelical christians who would like to see abortion banned altogether.

But as they happen, for once, to have said something semi-sensible then let's call their bluff and campaign for an end to time limits on all abortions.

Has anyone heard of any horror stories coming out of NZ?

Don't you? Really? When this sort of thing is already actually happening?

Are you also not aware that women do not abort in the third trimester for the funsies? They do it because they have received a devastating diagnosis of some kind. That's what all the evidence says. So your scenario is both hypothetical and somewhat ignorant.

Lastly, your suggestion of forcing women in this position to go through invasive major surgery is horrific. Fortunately it would never happen because see my point above.

You said, 'I just do think once the baby can survive outside the womb and is "viable" then it has rights tbh.'

If you ascribe rights to foetuses then women will be investigated for manslaughter and/or murder if they have an unexplained miscarriage or stillbirth. If foetuses are granted Article 2 rights then they have the right to have their deaths investigated.

"Your suggestion of forcing women in this position to go through invasive major surgery is horrific."

A late stage abortion is going to involve a birth regardless. I'm not advocating for anything different - just that childbirth is quite a hard experience (having been through it), and women ending their pregnancies should be given the choice of how to end it, not forced to go through labour if they don't want to.

My position is better for women's rights than the current UK position - that you can't abort apart from for medical reasons after 24 weeks. This way you'd be able to end the pregnancy at any point, for any reason, but if the baby was viable it would also be allowed to survive, if it's able to survive without the mother.

@MsCactus but in practice nobody would take that up, so that rule is not needed. There aren't hordes of women happily deciding that oopsie, they don't fancy being pregnant any more even though they're past 24 weeks. It. Does. Not. Happen.

And you say there would not be prosecutions for late term miscarriages - @LangClegsInSpace has quoted you the law on that one, and apart from that you really, really need to read what's happening in places like the US, Argentina and El Salvador.

A late stage abortion involves a procedure to kill the foetus, then delivery/birth of the foetus.

I just think if a foetus is viable to survive outside the womb then instead of killing the foetus and delivering it - it should just be delivered then allowed to see if it survives on its own.

The foetus/baby doesn't have human rights until it's born - I'm not advocating that foetuses have rights before they're born and that's not my position.

Currently in the UK you can't abort a foetus after 24 weeks unless for medical reasons, so my position would extend abortion rights further than they're currently allowed

Surviving birth does not necessarily mean a life worth living. Some women are faced with the dreadful choice of terminating 'viable' pregnancies at a very late stage to spare their much wanted, much loved babies from a traumatic birth followed by hours, days or weeks of constant pain, followed by inevitable death.

The idea that these babies would be better off also being born prematurely is frankly obscene.

Some women faced with this dillema have shared their experiences upthread. I suggest you go back and read.

I just do think once the baby can survive outside the womb and is "viable" then it has rights tbh.

But also -

The foetus/baby doesn't have human rights until it's born - I'm not advocating that foetuses have rights before they're born and that's not my position.

Pick one.

I’m out. I can’t go along with the radical at any time view and it’s quite clear that this crowd don’t want any support from the women like me, a number of whom have appeared on this thread.

You said you couldn't agree with abortion at any stage for any reason and went on to imply that posters here would view you as 'the enemy' or would not consider your viewpoint legitimate because of that.

I did neither of those, I just explained why I disagreed with your legitimate viewpoint. Instead of engaging you are flouncing.

You are however correct that we will cope just fine without your heavily conditional support.

Have you considered that maybe this is just not about you?

Huh? Have you got me confused with someone else? I said I’m pro choice up to 24 weeks and also later for seriously life limiting conditions.

No, I don't think so.

You said, 'I cannot just stand up and fight for the right to abort a baby post 24 weeks. I can’t.'

Until your latest post it was not clear that you supported any abortions at all past that time limit. Now you say yes to abortions past 24 weeks for 'seriously life limiting conditions'.

When you say 'life limiting' do you mean length of life or quality of life? It's very often impossible to know before they are born how long a child with severe disabilities might live or how profound their disabilities might be. How would you define a 'seriously life limiting condition'? What should the criteria be for late terminations, in your opinion?

This is the bravest thing I have read on this forum.

I'm glad that you got to say hello and goodbye.

I'm sorry, I don't have the words.

I’m feeling misquoted when you extract the second half of that sentence. Here’s the whole sentence. You are deliberately misquoting me to say you don’t think I was clear as to whether I support abortions ever. I think my next post or two I clarified that I do support late term for serious medical reasons. I’ve never lied on a thread to start an argument or intentionally misunderstood someone else either.

It really does happen. I was also surprised when I learned about this, but there you are.

The typical scenario involves a young woman with a history of things like depression, substance abuse and toxic relationship. Sometimes she’s with the father of her child and sometimes she isn’t. Or she is with him and then he gets sent to jail. Or she takes up with a new boyfriend who is not the father of the fetus and wants to keep him (or he pressures her because he wants her to get rid of it).

Around half of abortions after 20 weeks in the States involve the above (the rest are for medical reasons). I don’t know about the UK, and would imagine the figure is lower, but I bet it’s not zero.

https://www.guttmacher.org/journals/psrh/2013/11/who-seeks-abortions-or-after-20-weeks

I agree, and feel that once a foetus reaches viability that a woman who says "I do not wish to continue this pregnancy" should have the option to end it via induction. The baby still needs to be born, why kill it first? Then usual legal processes would take over to determine what medical treatment is provided, and who makes the decisions. Depending on the woman's capacity and/or preferences.