Bid in Lords to overturn move to decriminalise abortion for women

[IwantToRetire]

A landmark move to decriminalise women terminating their own pregnancies could be overturned as legislation is considered in the House of Lords.

In June, MPs in the Commons voted in favour of decriminalisation, with one saying it would remove the threat of “investigation, arrest, prosecution or imprisonment” of any woman who acts in relation to her own pregnancy. ...

But, with the Bill making its way through the Lords, an amendment has been tabled to remove the relevant clause. ...

https://nation.cymru/news/bid-in-lords-to-overturn-move-to-decriminalise-abortion-for-women/

Well many think we do need to change the law and I've given you examples of why that you refuse to engage with to explain your position. For example, in cases like my friends a change to the law would have prevented unnecessary distress in an already horrible situation and prevented a delay in her cancer treatment, that's a reason why some people support a law change. PP also shared with you examples of supporting a law change because of inappropriate and unnecessary investigation into women who have had a natural miscarriage. Instead you don't want to actually engage with why some support a law change you only want to leap to the extreme rare cases like Carla which shows your reasoning isn't based in logic or fact it's based on scaremongering and emotive examples.

Your friend was able to access a termination,
was she not? Was your complaint in the delay? What specifically is your issue?

Yes my issue is in the delay and distress it caused and the law overriding the common sense approach of her decision and her HCP medical advise, who's benefit was that in? Unless you've had to have cancer surgery and have children you're scared to leave behind, perhaps you can't relate because you seem to be belittling it as irrelevant that they had to go through red tape rather than proceed with her care. I'm surprised because that sort of dismissal, lack of empathy and coldness toward others is much closer to what I'd expect from the likes of Carla and what you're condemning about her for than to someone who actually cares about women and their lives. Basically "yeah this was distressing but it was necessary because I think women are gonna start murdering their toddlers so shut up"

PP also shared with you examples of supporting a law change because of inappropriate and unnecessary investigation into women who have had a natural miscarriage

One of those cases mentioned in the article was dodgy as hell. In all cases, police don’t investigate unless the medical professionals report it—and I don’t think they’d report unless there’s some compelling evidence of wrongdoing. But maybe you are more suspicious of medical professionals than I am.

I wanted a clear answer from you. Now that I have it, how long was the delay?

She had to wait a week until the next oncology list, probably not a lot to you but bloody awful for her. Remember you don't get booked for surgery as soon as you're diagnosed. She had already sat the with the fear of leaving her children behind while she waited on scans and MDT and a treatment plan, only to finally have a treatment date and be cancelled because of an archaic law. As I said, it didn't endanger her life but who's benefit was it in? Are you a man by any chance? You seem very unempathetic to actual womens experiences so I'm sure you'll be along to say it's not that bad to have your cancer treatment delayed, but as someone who watched her go through that it was heartbreaking.

Woman doesn’t agree 100% with you: OMG she must be a man.

Scheduling a surgical abortion itself takes a week or two, does it not? You cannot just get an abortion immediately after being seen unless you are given abortion pills. I’m not sure this could have gone much faster for her tbh

What? Apart from the 50 organisations, including medical Royal Colleges, groups attempting to end violence against women and girls, trades unions, and human rights bodies, and the 379 MP’s who voted in favour of the amendment

It's not just because you don't agree with me it's because all your posts seem to discuss the issue in a way that's completely removed from you. You don't talk about women or mothers as though you're part of a group that this issue would affect personally at all.

You seem to have skipped over my friends story. She didn't need to have an abortion procedure, that would have delayed her care even longer. She was booked to have a hysterectomy for cancer and with the permission paperwork signed they were able to proceed with removing her uterus which contained a tumour and coincidentally a small group of cells which mattered a lot more than her.

I’m not sure this could have gone much faster for her tbh

It's this kind of gross ambivalence you have to women which I really don't care how much you deny it, I highly suspect you're a bloke. All you responded to women's deaths were that they're irrelevant and to this case simply meh couldn't have been faster when it could have been faster if she wasn't sent away on the day of her op when decriminalisation would have meant it could proceed. You don't express an ounce of empathy for any women's stories not even a "that sounds hard" and I can't believe there's a woman alive who haven't been through or seen a fellow women go through a miscarriage where they could relate that there could be distress at being treated with suspicion, or relate to a mother being scared to leave her kids behind that they'd have nothing empathetic to say.

Irrespective of the law change, if a very premature baby is born and dies (or is found dead) outside of a hospital environment, there's going to be a postmortem, investigation etc. If a woman has a stillbirth at home, for example.

Whilst with the law change it will be entirely legal for her to cause a fetus to die inside her, they won't be sure whether it had been born alive, smothered at birth etc. Obviously if the baby was born alive but barely and the mum finished it off, it would be murder, and it may be manslaughter if she watched it die and did nothing due to the duty of care parents have to their children. The law would have an obligation to investigate. So the intrusive investigations will remain because they are necessary.

It's not just because you don't agree with me it's because all your posts seem to discuss the issue in a way that's completely removed from you. You don't talk about women or mothers as though you're part of a group that this issue would affect personally at all

And you discern this from just a smattering of posts? It affects me as a mother and someone who is TTC at somewhat of an advanced age and would have a TMFR if necessary. I could have had this under the old system, though.

But it’s not really about me, is it?

You seem to have skipped over my friends story. She didn't need to have an abortion procedure, that would have delayed her care even longer. She was booked to have a hysterectomy for cancer and with the permission paperwork signed they were able to proceed with removing her uterus which contained a tumour and coincidentally a small group of cells which mattered a lot more than her

But do you know for certain they could have just removed the uterus right then and there? For one thing, she has the right to know and then review her options? The surgeons themselves may not have been able to proceed as normally, not a doctor though so don’t know.

It's this kind of gross ambivalence you have to women which I really don't care how much you deny it, I highly suspect you're a bloke

It’s really tiresome. I’m not pro-life but you know that the pro-life movement (in the US anyway) is full of Catholic women. I suppose you think they are men too, spiritually.

All you responded to women's deaths were that they're irrelevant

Ireland is a completely different country, that’s why it’s irrelevant. You intentionally misread it

when it could have been faster if she wasn't sent away on the day of her op when decriminalisation would have meant it could proceed

I don’t think decriminalizing means they could just ‘proceed’ because the hospital is going to have its own procedures that won’t be dictated by the government. Why do you think otherwise?

You don't express an ounce of empathy for any women's stories not even a "that sounds hard" and I can't believe there's a woman alive who haven't been through or seen a fellow women go through a miscarriage where they could relate that there could be distress at being treated with suspicion, or relate to a mother being scared to leave her kids behind that they'd have nothing empathetic to say

I’m not going to be tone-policed for what has been a very reasonable position.

Investigations by police would be very rare, and only opened by medical staff when they have a reasonable suspicion (although I grant that there could be people out there that could have malicious intent)

@RingoJuice , are you from the U.K. or are you American?

American expat, I’ve never hid this.

@Mmmchocolatebuttons did you actually start a thread about me in AIBU? A thread about a thread is against MN rules, but you went even further a posted specifically about me. That obviously then invited criticism of me specifically, not just the issue.

Do you mean your an American living as immigrant in this country, or are you British living as an immigrant in the US?

It's an offshoot discussion, and a very interesting one. It's not discussion this thread directly, but a point that was raised in it. That's not technically a TAAT. Would you rather this discussion is further derailed here?

So, an American living in the U.K.? I only asked because obviously people living in a different country don’t have to live under the effects of our laws.

And you discern this from just a smattering of posts? It affects me as a mother and someone who is TTC at somewhat of an advanced age and would have a TMFR if necessary. I could have had this under the old system, though.
So you would want access to TMFR if you needed it but you cant relate to any women's experience that they don't want the law involved in their decision to do that relevant? You couldn't necessarily without suspicion which PP already linked you examples of. For example of you had been informed of a issue that for you would be a reason to terminate and then went on to naturally miscarry, you could face suspicion you procured a termination outside the proper methods. The only thing that would require a HCP to raise suspicion of that is them being anti abortion and a belief you may have done so. If you can't relate as a woman to the women who have been pardoned with this law but have before that had to declare that they were investigated for their miscarriages then again I'm very shocked.

It’s really tiresome. I’m not pro-life but you know that the pro-life movement (in the US anyway) is full of Catholic women. I suppose you think they are men too, spiritually.

Why would I think they're men? On ab anonymous forum where they barely acknowledge women's humanity and lived experience then I might. In person I tend to think they're completely misinformed about the harms they're promoting in wanting to restrict women's access to abortion because it they understood the risk to life I think they'd struggle to defend falling themselves prolife instead of anti choice.

Ireland is a completely different country, that’s why it’s irrelevant. You intentionally misread

No I didn't intentionally misread that the only response you had to a young woman who died from being denied an abortion was that it was irrelevant. I'm sure you're aware that those ales also affected Northern Ireland which is part of the UK which had massive burdens to northern Irish women accessing abortion compared to women from England. All just common women's experiences though so irrelevant to you.

I don’t think decriminalizing means they could just ‘proceed’ because the hospital is going to have its own procedures that won’t be dictated by the government. Why do you think otherwise?

Because I know my friend and I know the discussions she had with the HCPs who were very apologetic that the reason they couldn't proceed with her wishes and the care she needed was because they needed to sort the necessary paperwork to comply with abortion legislation. You still haven't answered to who's benefit?

I’m not going to be tone-policed for what has been a very reasonable position.

You kind of lost the standing of holding a reasonable position in your first post where you said decriminalisation was the same as infanticide, no?

Investigations by police would be very rare, and only opened by medical staff when they have a reasonable suspicion (although I grant that there could be people out there that could have malicious intent)
Malicious intent could literally be the attitudes expressed by some that every pregnancy (that they know nothing about) is precious to them as an outsider and they're morally opposed to it.

Married a Brit. I haven’t lived in the US for a long time tbh. And yes, my home country is very uneven when it comes to this issue,
unfortunately, and I don’t think it’s going to improve anytime soon.

But that doesn’t mean I have to agree with this. It’s too far …

Are you ever going to clarify your belief on a foetus not being alive? I really am genuinely curious. Do you mean legal personhood? I kind of assumed you would have mentioned it by now, if that's what you had meant.

Apologies if you're offended by my AIBU thread. You can report it, if you like. I don't believe it comes under the TAAT rule and it's been very interesting to read.

It wasn’t started as a general thread though. @Mmmchocolatebuttons wrote specifically about me in most of her posts, which obviously then invited criticism of specifically me, rather than the general issue. That crosses a line.

her opening post was “I had a discussion with someone, who believes that a foetus is not alive, until the point they are born. They also asserted that this was not an uncommon view”

she then added more details about me

“Female with children. In a discussion about the recent decriminalisation of abortion”

“There was no indication that they meant not having the legal rights of a person.”

“The person I was arguing with did not mention anything about personhood”

@Mmmchocolatebuttons have you read some of the comments specifically about me that you invited. Comments about how I cant possibly be a woman or even a mother. Does that sit well with you given I shared details about my pregnancy losses? can you even imagine what it is like to open up a thread and read all of those comments about me?

Your inability to engage in discussion in a respectful manner is shocking. You have crossed such a line.

And yes, I have emailed MNHQ

It frequently happens where an interesting point is raised in a thread, and rather than derail it, it's discussed elsewhere. It might be borderline ambiguous on the rules, but it's something that IMO Mumsnet should allow because it means a topic can stay on track. Back a long time ago I was on the handbag.com forum, and they actually had a fork symbol you could press to fork a thread, so that offshoots about specific topics could continue. The prohibition on TAAT should be used with common sense in mind and not to stifle debate.

I mean, every post in the night watch is a TAAT, people are allowed dto post their own follow up threads.

But I'm any event, you claimed your view was the majority view, so if that's the case, buttons could have been talking about pretty much anyone right?

@Batties your constant side stepping of any questions about your beliefs make me think that you're haven't engaged in this discussion in good faith either tbh.

I am sorry that some posters were offensive. Someone asked and I thought that you being a woman with children was relevant.