UK woman convicted of abortion

[Veterinari]

Full story here www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/woman-given-suspended-sentence-for-having-abortion-in-the-uk-a6968676.html

Very sad. Is there a will in NI to update legislation on this issue? As it stands everyone loses

Exalt
I think you will find that the gender selection is family/societal pressure and less individual female choice ( from anecdotal accounts).

Vintage did you just fall asleep listening to Bernie Smyth after reading a load of dystopian fiction?

You are so right about that very.

I suffer from hyperacusis and listening to her recent interview actually hurt.

Red,
Statistics are what anyone wants to make them. I think you have used the wrong term in Psychology, Sociology might fit the bill better.
Jacob,
Thats what they said when the first James Bond came out or when the mobile phone was a brick or when a computer took a warehouse to house: "it'll never happen", but it did.
Have to go now, reading about International Women's Day in my copy of the Socialist Worker before carrying on with my SJW duties.

Statistics are what anyone wants to make them.

Translates as: "No, I can't find any evidence, nor can I find any hole in your evidence."

I'm not sure why you are addressing me regarding gender selection, but once again, your ignorance shines through.

Yes, the gender balance in the populations of India and China shows that parents are deliberately manipulating it.
And despite it being illegal in India to find out the sex of the baby during pregnancy, there are ways around it which means female babies are aborted just because they are female.

But do you know what happened before ultrasound and abortion? Infanticide. Newborn babies were killed, or abandoned and left to die.

But by your batshit logic, it is better for a newborn baby to starve to death than for abortions to be available anywhere in the world?

Abortions have been legal since 1967. Ultrasound has been in widespread use since the 1980s. That means there is at least 35 years of fetal diagnosis and knowing the sex alongside access to abortion.
If your scaremongering 'in 50 years time' scenario was even slightly likely to happen, there would be evidence of it already.

And your other stupid point about there being societal pressure on parents to abort 'defective' babies... Society has never been more liberal or accepting.
Disabled rights are the strongest they've ever been, lone parents aren't stigmatised, differences are celebrated, SEN are no longer the barrier to education or employment they were
So it is just plain wrong to suggest society is going to be placing increased pressure on parents to abort.

If your argument had any validity, you would have been able to give some supporting points.
Instead, you cannot make a single one without resorting to bizarre future-gazing speculation, with points that have no basis in social economics or statistics
I can only deduce that there is zero merit in what you are saying.

Statistics are what anyone wants to make them.

No not true.

Statistics can be manipulated in how they are presented but if 4 goats out of 10 goats are white, 2 are black and 4 are brown then 4 goats out of 10 are white. You just might present it as 6 goats out of ten are not brown. The goats haven't changed colour all of a sudden. The raw data is the same thing - the issue is presentation.

Same goes for stats here. If there are lower abortion rates in one country than another, then the first thing you do is look at how the data is being recorded and are there any differences between countries? Well its harder to collect data in countries were abortion is illegal that's for sure. So we'll be good about it, give you the benefit of the doubt and leave that off the table for now.

However in European countries, particularly Western Europe where health care is not the same but there are measures in place to try and reduce differences in data recording and collection. The margin of difference from the way data is recorded is therefore much less subject to error and methodology differences and much more reliable.

Given that there is a certain consistency between rates in certain countries and no one in the EU is disputing that the way abortion rates are recorded between countries is significantly different to cause significant statistical issues in comparing data, I will happily raise you 4 white goats and 2 black goats and ask again:

Why are high abortion rates not correlating with lax abortion laws?

In what way is the data from Europe, not reliable and not comparable from country to country and can not be trusted?

In fact its quite the opposite isn't it? On both counts of both the raw data and the way it collected and the conclusions you can then draw from that information.

Or are you seriously actually trying to say we should do away with all stats within medicine because none of it what so ever can be trusted and evidence based medicine is as useful as astrology?

Just so we are all clear about what your point is - its actually exactly as AugustaFinkNottle translated isn't it?

so a different perspective here from a medical viewpoint.
In my experience women are not uncommonly buying and taking these drugs in northern ireland without appropriate medical assessment prescription and supervision.
This is so very dangerous, there is a real risk of complications such as fatal haemorrhage or septicaemia in the case of retained products of conception as well as failure of treatment
How long will it be before a woman dies because she was so desperate and resorted to what is essentially a DIY abortion?
There are strict procedures and protocols in place for medical termination of pregnancy and for a very good reason these drugs are dangerous unless prescribed by a qualified practitioners.
The law here in my opinion must be brought into line with the rest of the UK

Spare and Augusta
I don't know why the whole world just doesn't do what you say because you are both so self-evidently right. Everyone else is stupid, evil or deluded who doesn't just realise that you are right.

Abortion on Demand -where's my political candidates so 1 can tell them what the nice girls have just so nicely convinced me of. ( and while I'm at it I'll tell them What I think of those oul flat mates!)
Exit stage left, leaving behind those in the echo chamber listening to voices echoing their own thoughts back to them.

It isn't me being 'self evidently right' though, is it
The NI position has been condemned and criticised by, amongst others, the UN, Amnesty International, ARC the antenatal charity that supports parents who have had a FFA diagnosis, various medical colleges and god knows who else who knows what they are talking about

So on the one hand, you've got respected organisations, staffed by educated people, using evidence to support their stance.

And on the other hand, we've got you with your weird speculative concerns about genies and the end of civilisation as we know it, and Bernie Smyth with her fairy stories.

So forgive me if I don't give much weighting or credence to your meaningless and baseless position on this.

Lets also knock another fallacy on the head.

Pro-choice supporters do not want a high abortion rate. They want to change the landscape of attitudes with a series of measures designed to improve health's health and autonomy which goes beyond just abortion of both babies and women. They often think they can reduce abortions if they bring these measures in, in parallel with relaxing abortion law.

A lot of the premise of the pro-life point does rest on the idea that no woman is going to break the law and that the law (and social effect from the law) is the thing that is going to stop abortions. The blind belief that illegal abortion does not happen. Morality and the law are actually very much at odds with each other.

Then lets talk about abortion and suffering. Lets remove the woman from the equation completely as the baby seems to be the focal point and priority for pro-lifers.

If we accept the idea that all abortions cause the baby to suffer (I don't think this is true btw), and we also accept the idea that women are continuing to have abortions regardless of the law (because this is what is happening in reality) THEN can we also have the admittedly unpleasant conversation about whether an illegal abortion or a legal one under medical supervision is going to cause the same amount of suffering to the baby? And which is more likely to be carried out later? Surely it should be a consideration if the baby's suffering is an important issue?

Like I say, not a pleasant thought or way of wording it (I could have been worse and used some emotive comparison but thought the better of it, but you get the idea).

The total lack of pragmatism and total inability to be able to see the bigger picture is one I don't get.

Sad what this case has come to and as medical staff have said,this could now stop woman who have taken such pills coming forward for help if side effects should happen etc.

The flatmates can't really paint themselves in a good light.Espically given what they've said the reasons are for reporting in the first place!!Not remorseful enough and acting as if everything normal what on earth?!

The whole situation is wrong and it's time things to change law wise but sadly looks like that is unlikely

Funny how the obscene and offensive language has just stopped.
I think you will find that there are MANY educated people (myself included) who reach a different conclusion.
I am sure you will win out saying as you apparently have only myself and Bernie Smyth to overcome Oh, and the two "fucking judgemental cunts of flat mates, one of whom is not a 'well' woman" ( once they have finished getting their "just desserts on line" of course, as it was put).
You lost any credence right at the beginning of the post when the obscene tirade against these two ladies was allowed to continue unabated, although Spare may not have been there at that point.
Vilification of Bernie Smyth, might I suggest, will not help your chosen cause either.
I think it was Red who actually said that abuse of the flat mates on line was a good tactic to stop anyone else from acting similarly.
To try and bully people into thinking as you do is fascism.
People will make their own minds up. When you are in the majority you can change the Law. However, even then, you will not be able to police how people think, and people WILL think differently to you on lots of things.
Back to my copy of the Socialist Worker and all my SJW projects -the world could be so nice if only Socialist Feminists were allowed to rule it. Darn!

Vintage, everyone here is an adult and as such can use whatever language they like.

Saying fuck doesn't negate a point being made.

And unless you know the housemates personally, it's more than a little odd that you take such a vested interest in what strangers on the Internet say about them...

There has not been a fuck since 17.10

Thats like a century in mumsnet years

As I said several pages ago, vintage, you really should have reported any post you believed broke talk guidelines. The reason the posts still stand is because no-one reported them, you included.

Wah wah. I'm not doing very well at arguing the point. Therefore I'm going to suggest that everyone is picking on me, rather than admitting my argument js more holey than holy.

I am going to put my head in the sand and say that stats are manipulated because I can't find any stats I like the look off.

If I talk about swearing enough, then people will be distracted from the lack of substance to my argument and it will give me time to think of something else to say.

I will suggest that my point of view is being silenced rather than admit my point of view is just being proved to not really be the way to solve the problem in the first place. And is well.... Shit. (oops swearing).

Sigh. No you are right. It IS impossible to argue the point with someone who is that close minded and rigid in their thinking...

I think you will find that there are MANY educated people (myself included) who reach a different conclusion.

That may well be the case; the problem is that we just haven't seen any evidence-based argument on the thread from the people who reach that different conclusion to show how they did so. Instead we see a lot of faux shock at the use of obscenities, and specific attacks on me and spare, despite the fact that I for one have not used the language you deplore. spare has very carefully gone through the statistics, and you have completely ignored everything she said, instead going for the personal attack and the somewhat childish "I don't know why the whole world just doesn't do what you say because you are both so self-evidently right." That very approach is in effect a copy of what gone did before she flounced. Do you not see that that is why it is in fact you who have lost all credence?

red tooth
Returned to the thread as the sun has set :) I like your thinking. You're wrong about the blind belief that illegal abortion doesn't happen. There seem to be limitless variation on both sides of this, and in my experience, many people are aware that illegal abortion would happen anyway - and support legal abortion for no other reason. That's in my culture.

Re: suffering to the baby. Why isn't more known about this? I read something about anaesthesia not routinely being given for some reason despite agreement that pain may be caused - but don't quote me. I would like to hear more about this side of things because surely it's something that the pro-choice movement need to care deeply about also?

Just saw your analysis of why I flounced Augusta [grin grin grin]
No, that wasn't why. It was the quality of your English. And the fact that the sun was shining. I would be perfectly happy to debate it on another day, when you're not using too many commas and its raining.

Victoriaplum I agree. That's the real matter for debate here. It's only a matter of time before someone does die, probably someone in more difficult circumstances than most (because Ryan Air is cheap). Encouraging a culture of secrecy and looking the other way as the Right Thing To Do is only likely to speed that day along.

There really is no reason why Northern Ireland should be different to the UK in this respect. No one is benefiting; we don't have fewer abortions, we just have them off site, and on the quiet.That's not helping anyone.

not helping

Gone, thanks so much for confirming the evidence of your inability to put together a reasoned argument by your resort to yet further infantile personal attacks. I'm happily not in the least insecure about my ability to use English so the attack isn't working.

Oh, and I've just noticed the splendid example of Muphry's law in your post, gone.