Georgia (USA) makes abortion punishable by life imprisonment.

[Oldstyle]

New legislation HB 481 only allows abortion up to 6 weeks. It has massive consequences for women who get abortions from doctors or miscarry. A woman who seeks out an illegal abortion from a health care provider would be a party to murder, subject to life in prison. And a woman who miscarries because of her own conduct—say, using drugs or alcohol while pregnant—would be liable for second-degree murder, punishable by 10 to 30 years’ imprisonment. Prosecutors may interrogate women who miscarry to determine whether they can be held responsible; if they find evidence of culpability, they may charge, detain, and try these women for the death of their fetuses.

Even women who seek lawful abortions out of state may not escape punishment. If a Georgia resident plans to travel elsewhere to obtain an abortion, she may be charged with conspiracy to commit murder, punishable by 10 years’ imprisonment. An individual who helps a woman plan her trip to get an out-of-state abortion, or transports her to the clinic, may also be charged with conspiracy to end of the life of a “person” with “full legal recognition” under Georgia law.

This is a shocking assault on women's health, autonomy and reproductive rights. The intention to 'interrogate' women who miscarry to check for 'blame' is inhuman. Apparently 28 other states are intending to follow Georgia's lead.

Well, it’s all to do with the fundamental Christian belief that All Sex Should Be For The Procreation if Children Otherwise It Is Sinful.

In the end women will only have two choices- have sex only if you want to make a baby, or don’t have sex at all. And the abstinence rhetoric wins the day.

Except for rape victims of course. They’re the bottom of the food chain, nobody gives a fuck about them.

Well, it’s all to do with the fundamental Christian belief that All Sex Should Be For The Procreation if Children Otherwise It Is Sinful.

Not in this country it's not. The C of E isn't anti abortion or contraception, nor are other denominations. It's really only Catholics. Many members of my family (and some of my friends too) are devout Christians and only one of them is anti abortion and he's very extreme, almost obsessive about religion.

Catholics in the UK don't have a higher birth rate than average, which tells us they're using contraception even if they are anti abortion.

Its really only Catholics

NACALT

www.catholicsforchoice.org/about-us/

US organisation who make a catholic moral argument for a woman’s choice on abortion.

There can be a big difference between what any faith leader says believers should be doing and what those believers do in their own lives in the interests of themselves or their families. People aren’t stupid, or blindly obedient sheep because of their religiosity. Everyone has to find their own moral balance whatever they believe or don’t believe in terms of God. There’s also plenty of dangerous misogynistic arseholes who aren’t involved in religious groups, patriarchy is a much bigger religion or belief system than any god belief, IMO.

I suppose by fundamental I meant extremist. Poor choice of word on my part.

The important thing I think is to remember which direction cause and effect go in.

It's not their religious beliefs which cause these men to be misogynistic arseholes. It's their misogynistic arseholeness which drives them to enact these shitty laws, then grope around cherry-picking their religious beliefs to give themselves a spurious sense of possessing the moral high ground.

Any ideology would do. You get left-wing misogynist arseholes who shit all over women because "socialism is all about defending the working man." You get woke misogynist arseholes who shit all over women because they "centre the needs of trans people." You get atheist misogynist arseholes who shit all over women because "my defence of free speech requires me to defend, nay, champion violent porn." The arseholeness comes first, the choice of ideology is just a convenient fig-leaf.

So, what does the Alabama legislature think of IVF then? Because that involves sacrificing multiple embryos for a single baby.

Ah that's okay Lang 'cos IVF is eyewateringly expensive, so only rich people do it, and there's different rules for them... And it doesn't involve any of that nasty sex stuff...

Ah that's okay Lang 'cos IVF is eyewateringly expensive, so only rich people do it, and there's different rules for them... And it doesn't involve any of that nasty sex stuff...

It's so obviously about the women, not the foetuses/potential babies, isn't it?

I'd like to know what they do differently in Kansas.

''The Kansas Supreme Court on Friday blocked a law that would have banned the most commonly used procedure for second-trimester abortions, arguing that the state Constitution protected the right of women to “decide whether to continue a pregnancy.”'
www.nytimes.com/2019/04/26/us/kansas-abortion-ruling.html

I've been reading my Facebook timeline this morning. What I've noticed is the doubling down from people I have openly challenged about the genuinely anti-woman nature of all this, and the deliberate framing of pro choice views and people as very extreme and no attempt to understand the arguments at all.

It surprised me from some people, actually, but that naivete is wearing off.

I realized that this is one of the reasons tribalism has such a foothold in lots of issues - particularly why there is a cult mentality over specific issues we discuss on FWR.

They didn't even notice they were posting memes and angry arguments against straw men, they were simply swept along by the approval of their tribe and a sense of their own righteousness.

In fact, this sense of their own righteousness meant that my challenging some of them about why it didn't seem to worry them that women were frightened and this wouldn't stop abortion but it would put women at risk meant that I wasn't part of the tribe. No attempt was made to convince me rationally- there was simply a dismissal of any concerns as real and a restating of the righteousness of their beliefs.

I have logged off Facebook this morning saddenned and challenged. Firstly, I need to make damned sure I am not letting tribalism distort my own thinking by always rationally engaging.

But it got me thinking about so many of the Anti-women ideologies we talk about here - the tribalism and the emotionalism we come up against, the mantras and memes, the utter refusal to analyse arguments and ideas and the denial that any negative consequences to what is demanded are real.

I've never been happier and more sure it's right to step away from conservatist Christian bubbles. But I am determined to take those lessons with me and not replicate it all in another bubble.

I agree that this is all misogynistic and it is led by men. But what absolutely astonishes me, all over the world, is how many women support this. Women voted those politicians into power - why??????

I really want to understand this as I am often involved in political campaigns and I can honestly say, there are almost as many women hating women out there as there are women hating men.

It really is the triumph of the patriarchy to have made women hate other women, to have made us compete with each other for the crumbs from the table so that we see other women as competitors not allies. I noticed this all through my corporate career, I was the only woman who supported other women, all the other women at the top felt women lower down needed to "man up" and suck it up. It seems conservative women (ie republicans in the US) all over the world, from the US and Saudi Arabia to Turkey and South America, will vote to deny other women power at every turn. If we could understand this we could unravel how men have held women hostage to religion for millennia.

It's because there are considerable rewards for those of us who support the prevailing power. The rewards take a number of different forms, but I know when I used to write anti-feminist polemic, I was roundly accepted and celebrated by prominent conservative men, so I had the psychological payoff of feeling respected, which managed to circumvent the voices of feminists telling me men were oppressing me - because here I was, respected, and that's not oppression, is it? Obviously for me there was the religious payoff too, that I was 'in God's will.'

It's only since I have begun to ask awkward questions and not use my intellect to back up the status quo that I have seen clearly that I was being used.

Atleast the Catholic Church (the Pope) pays lip service towards the idea that theoretically children should be supported post-birth and helped out of poverty.

The people who passed this bill don’t even believe that.

It's because there are considerable rewards for those of us who support the prevailing power.

Yes. Women are forced into choosing between trying to expand the power accessible to them and trying to gain power within the circumscription currently available to them.

Andrea Dworkin's Right Wing Women very good on this.

Why would one count and not the other?

Brian Lyman
‏*@lyman*_brian
Chambliss, responding to the IVF argument from Smitherman, cites a part of the bill that says it applies to a pregnant woman. "The egg in the lab doesn’t apply. It’s not in a woman. She’s not pregnant." #alpolitics

So in other words, the bastards admit it's not really about the foetus at all, it's about the woman container.

Maybe because it's mainly rich, white, middle-class people who are able to pay for IVF? And it's mainly rich, white, middle-class people who voted this through (and male people too of course). As long as IVF is needed by them and their friends, it won't be outlawed. This is a flagrant abuse of male power.

Not in this country it's not. The C of E isn't anti abortion or contraception, nor are other denominations. It's really only Catholics.

By 'this country', I think you meant the U.K? Never let us forget that includes Northern Ireland, where (correct me if I'm wrong) some of the the Ulster Protestant sects are more fervently anti abortion than the Catholics nowadays.

I've not read all of this thread properly today, have you all seen this?

https://www.mumsnet.com/Talk/inthee_news/3586136-Alabama-has-made-abortion-illegal

Please consider these new laws (designed explicitly to bring Roe challenges before the Supreme Court) in the context of our broken democracy:

twitter.com/DataProgress/status/1128481533273178112

Caption: "There is no state in the country where support for banning abortion reaches even 25 percent."

Bloomerpool

I have often heard it said that women and other civil liberty protesters should be grateful that we're not living in North Korea.
I have asked in return - how would we know if we were?? What seriously worries me as well, as a Brit, is that Britain follows America.

Not only will women and girls kill themselves there thinking that they are better off dead... they may well be right. All of these laws never restrict male sperm and male penis.

What seriously worries me as well, as a Brit, is that Britain follows America.

Hate to bring Brexit into this but when we're out of Europe we'll be even more dependent on the US for trade, security...terrifying how much influence they could have over us and how this might impact women's rights as they're setting a truly horrific example just now.

I've been having conversations with people telling me it's all scaremongering and that actually women who miscarry will not be subject to prosecution, just investigation. And they're genuinely saying this like I'm meant to be reassured.

Did anyone hear Stella Creasy on the news today?
She made a very good point, we should be concerned about this, but our own house in the UK is far from in order. Abortion is not actually legal in this country but we have well established exceptions. Unless you live in Northern Ireland, in which case you'll have to travel to the UK. This breaks some kind of UN rule about treating all your residents equally and the UK have been rebuked twice already by the UN for flouting this.

I was managing not to think about Brexit. Yep, if that goes through, we are screwed. It is truly scary how they're still pushing it through regardless. It's either the European sphere of influence, with law and order and democracy, as flawed as it is: or America. Roosevelt would be ashamed of America as it is now.