US Supreme Court has voted to overturn abortion rights,

[Delphinium20]

www.politico.com/news/2022/05/02/supreme-court-abortion-draft-opinion-00029473 This is a draft opinion, but it looks like it will pass.

I know most of this board is UK based, but just wanted to share how gutted I am about this. This is a result of the GOP stacking our courts w/conservative judges and will impact hundreds of thousands of women in my country. I'm just feeling really hopeless about feminism right now. The left calls us 'pregnant people' but the right has made us as breeders under law. I'm just utterly saddened by this news.

Thinkinh about ways in which this could influence the situation here.

The most likely efforts are repeats of what's happened before - time limit bills or court cases to chip away at existing rights.

I might write to my female MP just to emphasise that I am sure she supports women's rights on this and that it is a major issue for me. Guess I'm lucky to live in a marginal seat.

Of course this is a feminist issue. It is also a spiritual issue: denying women a choice is denying them free will. That means dehumanising them. Without free will we're only machines. Abortion is most definitely not a religious issue. It's about power. This comes from the kind of men that has used religion for centuries to justify the worst horrors.

Hopefully our government (some chance) could offer visas and encourage migration from the US to here. (They did it for India) .
We need migrants, ideally skilled and educated ones. From a country that speaks the same language, has the same general culture, who are as a nation resilient and hard working and who comprise of many ethnicities. Well I suppose all good reasons for it to be screamed down.

That analogy isn't correct because your brother's condition has nothing to do with you. If we were to take out pregnancy by rape from the equation, all other pregnancies are the result of a woman choosing to have sex. Therefore, the human being - if indeed that is how we'll classify a fetus - is her responsibility.

Imagine this hypothetical scenario. A woman is snowed-in for a week in a remote cabin together with her 3 day old baby. She has enough food etc. for herself, but there is no baby formula. The only way for the baby to survive is if the mother breastfeeds it.

If she refuses to breastfeed the baby, she would be prosecuted. Even though it's her body. It's not entirely her choice, though, because there is another human being involved.

The crux of the issue is whether we recognise a fetus as a human being. If we do, the pregnant woman has no right to end its life - even if this means continuing to care for and carry the fetus.

Personally I'm still on the fence as I can see the argument for a fetus not having 'personhood' yet, and therefore not being subject to human rights. But there is certainly a very strong case to be made for a fetus to be classed as a human being, as clearly it's in the early stages of being a live baby, and it has its unique DNA etc.

That analogy isn't correct because your brother's condition has nothing to do with you.

I'm the only tissue match. He'll die without it.

And your analogy doesn't work because breastfeeding isn't potentially life-threatening and can't result in death or disability for the mother. Birthing a baby is one of the most dangerous things a women can do. Abortion isn't.

The tissue match is irrelevant because you didn't cause his condition. Pregnancy is partially caused by the woman.

You exaggerate the dangers of childbirth and underplay the dangers of abortion.

Birthing a baby is one of the most dangerous things a women can do. Abortion isn't.

A legal abortion isn't...

@Crumbler

That analogy isn't correct because your brother's condition has nothing to do with you. If we were to take out pregnancy by rape from the equation, all other pregnancies are the result of a woman choosing to have sex. Therefore, the human being - if indeed that is how we'll classify a fetus - is her responsibility.

Would you be opposed to men having mandatory reversible vasectomies until they sign a legally binding agreement guaranteeing they will provide equal care for a baby as a result of sex?

So true. This new direction will kill women. It already does all over the world.

Hmm this 'unique DNA' stuff I last heard from some elected crazy person in America saying that an ectopic pregnancy was 'a child living the early part of its life' in the fucking Fallopian tube and that it was wrong to prevent women from dying in agony. ('I just don't understand' he shrieked, the torturing wanker). It sounds a bit sciencey but tbh is meaningless.

And women choosing to have sex - ok? So? A woman who chooses to prioritise raising the children she has already (a majority of abortions in the US are to women who are already mothers). How does that fit in? What comes next- people contracting AIDS through consensual sex don't deserve treatment? People who fall downstairs because they chose to get up in the night with a chest infection don't deserve treatment? What are these arguments doing in the UK? Time was we did vaguely understand over here that medical care is something people all deserve because they are human, not a privilege for rich people.

Time for American women to go on a sex-and-unpaid-work strike.

Are there other countries which outlaw abortion?

Or is the USA low hanging fruit that we can justify anger at without fear or being called racist or phobic?

Same here. The homesickness used to get to me, and I used to dream of a life where DH and I would move over there with our younger two once DSD was at more of an adult age.

It was sometime after Sandy Hook that I let that dream go. I will not raise children in the United States.

Amen - I find it sick that my nieces and nephew go through regular active shooter drills in their schools.

worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/countries-where-abortion-is-illegal

The USA is notable because it's apparently repealing laws which have stood for decades, although there were riots in Poland, when abortion laws were made stricter.

en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abortion_in_Poland

Women struggle with access to abortion in Poland, Malta, NI, Gibraltar, IoM, Nicaragua to name a few. I have commented on it here (and elsewhere) and donated to www.asn.org.uk/get-help/ as well. I've supported women travelling from Ireland when I lived in Liverpool and I will support American women.

You, on the other hand, appear to care when you're making a point about anti-American feeling. Or you could go and donate to ASN right now and support women in other countries who need abortions. There are other charities which support women.

America is notable because it's a very large, very populous, very rich country where pride in democracy, freedom and rights is supposedly high. It calls itself the leader of the 'free' world FFS. Unless you're female.

Ignoring some random idiot who wanted ectopic pregnancies to end naturally, ie with the mother dying, the rest of your argument is incoherent.

It's clear to everyone that a mother cannot kill her born child just because they're a nuisance or hinder her. She cannot even refuse to keep it alive, we call that neglect. That is because the child is a human being and as such entitled to all human rights.

It's also fairly agreed across the board that sperm and unfertilised eggs are not human beings.

The question is at what point to we confer human status on the child. There can be arguments for doing so at the point of conception, heartbeat, viability outside of the womb, sentience, or whatever other point we decide. But whatever the case may be, the moment we agree that the child is an actual human being with human rights, the wishes or inconvenience of the mother become irrelevant. Same as we don't allow killings of born children.

But that is the only pertinent issue. It's not about women's rights or persecution of women. It's about the protection of a small human being, and the question of when that being is granted humanity and human rights.

There might be an argument for a woman being allowed to abort the unborn child that was foisted upon her without her consent (rape), but if she went along with the conception, she has no right to kill the child. So we're back to the question of what is considered a child/human being.

You can be very pro women's rights yet believe a fetus with its own heartbeat is already a human being with human rights, and conversely, you can be the biggest misogynist yet think a human being is only one who is actually born. These two issues are not connected.

@Crumbler

How about males having to have mandatory reversible vasectomies until they sign an agreement that they are prepared to be a co-parent and all that entails? Would you think that was OK? If not why not?

I ignored the idiotic question first time around, and asking it again isn't going to make me change my mind.

@Crumbler

How is it idiotic to ask if you would be on board with something that would stop unplanned pregnancies entirely? Because it would require the government having a legal right to dictate what men do with their bodies?

If your concern is the wellbeing of babies, wouldn't you prefer unplanned and unwanted pregnancies were prevented rather than having to be addressed after they have already happened?

Louisiana, with some of the worst maternal and infant mortality rates in the entire US, has passed House Bill 813 - The Abolition of Abortion in Louisiana Act of 2022.

www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/louisiana-bill-abortion-homicide-1347890/

From the dismantling of the USPS by one of Trump's goons, to blatant voter suppression, to the steal the vote 'recounts', to the packing of federal and state legislatures with Trumpettes/evangelical Christians/GOP cultists - all these breadcrumbs have led to this.

Anti-science, racists and evangelical Christians have 'infiltrated' at every level - school boards, town and city councils, state governance and beyond.

www.theguardian.com/world/2021/jan/15/christian-nationalist-religious-right-legislation-bills

It has taken years to get to this point and it will take decades to get back from this Handmaid's Tale dystopia

www.theguardian.com/world/2018/jun/04/project-blitz-the-legislative-assault-by-christian-nationalists-to-reshape-america

time.com/6052051/anti-democratic-threat-christian-nationalism/

www.vox.com/22696286/evangelicals-texas-georgia-voting-law-trump

I'm saddened by this, truly saddened.

I cant comprehend how as one of the most westernised and modern nations it has now denied rights to 50% of its population.

You can bet your bottom dollar that states also add clauses that will criminalise women who leave state borders to get an abortion legally and then return to their home.

You can bet men will weaponise this and we will see modern "with trials" as they report the bad women who killed their babies. Not that they were going to step up and raise this child themselves.

We will see enormous amounts of women undergo illegal and dangerous abortions, we will see deaths, we will see the criminalisation of women, we will see women abused and coerced, we will see women displaced and homeless as they can't return "home" . We will see abandoned babies, women giving birth in horrific situations to hide a pregnancy and baby.

Women will suffer. And it's absolutely atrocious.

But that is the only pertinent issue. It's not about women's rights or persecution of women. It's about the protection of a small human being, and the question of when that being is granted humanity and human rights.

The absolute best case you have is COMPETING human rights. And the competition is always with a women, which is to do with her protected characteristic of being a woman. It isn't the right of the 'person' (foetus) to life. It's the right of the foetus to life and the right of the mother to determine her own healthcare, her own bodily autonomy, her own mental health, her own use of legal substances, her own choices regarding her behaviour.

Because if a foetus is a human, I can't abort but then I can't also do anything to harm it. Drink, take meds, including life-saving meds, use substances, eat cheese or sushi or any one of thousands of things. I certainly can't travel to murder it. Essentially a form of prison sentence while I'm pregnant.

And I also, in the States, have to pay the 10s of thousands of dollars to birth it. And suffer any birth injuries up to and including death (much more likely for poor Black women of course, see human rights).

Human rights aren't absolute. A common standard is a duty to accommodate up to an unreasonable burden on another. An example might be an Orthodox Jewish man not wanting to sit beside a woman. He has that right, but that doesn't mean she has to move. I think being forced to go through unwanted pregnancy and birth is unreasonable to expect the woman to do, so we're back to abortion being legal. Women have personhood too. And rights.

Also @Crumbler are you a women? Because you seem very happy to tell everyone what is a women's rights issue and what isn't. Abortion has long been considered one. I can see how pro-forced-birthers would love to make it not so. It very clearly is though.