The Abortion War

A thought...

Pro-choicers love the statement 'My Body, My Choice,' as validation for abortion rights.

Alright. That can be understandable.

However, what if a woman is in an abusive relationship with a man who beats her constantly?

 Do I have a right to tell her to get out of it or do I say, well 'your body, your choice?'

Or a woman is abusing herself with drugs and alcohol? 

Do I tell her she should get into therapy and rehab or do I say, it's your body, do what you want with it?

Or a woman is cutting herself because of depression or anger? 

Do I smile and state that she is free to do what she wants to her body?

And if any of these women end up dead, will I feel guiltless and know that I let her choose what was right for herself?

It was her choice to stay with an abusive partner.

It was her choice to become addicted to alcohol and narcotics.

It was her choice to mutilate herself.

Should I say to others, I could never let a man abuse me or become addicted to drugs or alcohol. However, I'm not going to dictate to someone else what they can or cannot do with their bodies.

Why is 'My Body, My Choice' only validated when it's someone elses life laying in the balance? Someone who cannot speak for themselves?

     While the Avengers have been trying to end Thanos and his Endgame war, another war has been boiling over and it's about to blow over the top. The war of abortion. 2019 started off with a bang when New York signed it's abortion bill allowing abortion up to or even after birth. The world celebrated! Celebrities were screaming freedom for woman and their bodies.

     Meanwhile the pro-lifers continued to work hard knowing that they would eventually be heard. Then the state of Utah approved a downs syndrome ban on abortion. I and many others were very  happy about this news, however many others (including self proclaiming pro-lifers) were not. I wrote about my thoughts on that issue here.

     The world has certainly been at war this week. With winners and losers on both sides, depending on which side you're on. The states of Georgia, Mississippi, Alabama, Ohio and Missouri have signed respective bills banning abortion. The Washington Post has been surprisingly fair and unbiased in its reporting of the new abortion bans. This article breaks down the three biggest bills in Alabama, Georgia and Missouri.

Everything you need to know about the abortion ban news

By Marisa Iati and
Deanna Paul May 17 at 3:31 PM

The rush of Republican-controlled states to mount a challenge to the Supreme Court’s landmark Roe v. Wade ruling legalizing abortion nationwide has sparked confusion about what these new laws actually do. Here’s what you need to know.

Lawmakers in Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Kentucky, Mississippi, Missouri, Ohio, and Utah have passed new antiabortion bills, and similar measures are pending in other states. The new laws have prompted questions about whether women who have abortions could be punished and why some of the pieces of legislation are called “heartbeat bills,” among other topics.

These restrictions generally are meant to provoke legal challenges that ultimately elevate the issue to the Supreme Court.

“I have prayed my way through this bill,” said Alabama state Rep. Terri Collins (R), who sponsored that state’s abortion ban, on Tuesday. “This is the way we get where we want to get eventually.”

Now that two Trump-appointed justices are on the Supreme Court, social conservatives see potential for a reversal of the court’s 1973 decision in Roe v. Wade — although the court tends to make incremental changes to its interpretation of law, instead of dramatically overturning precedent.

New York and Vermont, meanwhile, have enacted protections of abortion rights.

So, why is everyone talking about Alabama’s new law?

The bill signed by Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey (R) on Wednesday prohibits abortion in almost every circumstance and is considered the most restrictive abortion law in the country. The legislation makes exceptions only for the health of the mother and for fetuses with “fatal anomalies” that make them unlikely to survive outside the womb. Rape and incest are not exceptions to Alabama’s ban

Which state most recently passed an abortion law?

Missouri’s Republican-controlled House on Friday voted to ban abortions at eight weeks of pregnancy, after the state’s Senate passed the measure a day earlier. Gov. Mike Parson (R), who has said the bill would make Missouri “one of the strongest pro-life states in the country,” has said he would sign it into law.

Like with the law in Alabama, rape and incest would not be exceptions to the ban in Missouri.

[Graphic: Which states are blocking abortions, and which are enacting protections]

Can a woman who has an abortion be punished? 

The laws in Alabama and Missouri specifically exempt women from being criminally liable, said Katherine Kraschel, the executive director of Solomon Center for Health Law and Policy at Yale Law School.

Georgia’s new bill, she said, is less clear because it defines a fetus or embryo as an unborn child, but other provisions of Georgia law protect the rights of pregnant women.

[Could miscarriages land women in jail? Let’s clarify these Georgia and Alabama abortion bills.]

Can a health-care provider who performs an abortion be punished?

Alabama’s bill explicitly states that women are exempt from criminal and civil liability. Instead, the law targets doctors, who can be prosecuted for performing an abortion, a felony punishable by up to 99 years imprisonment.

Carol Sanger, professor at Columbia Law School, said such penalties on doctors were “just another way to make women frightened” and create “more disincentives for physicians and residents to take up this practice.”

The Georgia law also says that doctors who perform abortions will be prosecuted, but is more vague about women.

The measure could not be used to successfully prosecute women, Planned Parenthood’s Staci Fox previously told The Post. But if a woman had a miscarriage, she could be pulled into an investigation looking at whether someone performed an illegal abortion on her.

“You don’t want a woman to be forced to prove how she lost her baby,” said Sanger.

Georgia’s law does not unequivocally say that women are exempt, but legal experts point to other areas of Georgia’s penal code which have specific defenses for women, including those who miscarry.

[Alabama’s new plan to ban abortion could jail doctors. In some countries, laws already do.]

Why are some of these abortion bans called “heartbeat bills?”

Some bills, like the one in Georgia, prohibit abortion after the detection of what the bills call the fetal heartbeat,which usually happens about six weeks into pregnancy. This time period is about two weeks after a woman’s missed period, when many women do not yet know they are pregnant.

Supporters of this type of abortion ban refer to the legislation as “heartbeat bills,” while many abortion rights activists say the term is inaccurate because an embryo’s heart has not fully formed at that point.

An ultrasound will usually show electric activity in an embryo’s forming heart at about six weeks of pregnancy, said Jen Villavicencio, an OB/GYN and member of The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists. She said although that activity is not the same as a heartbeat that pumps blood, she often uses the term “heartbeat” with her patients at that point because they are familiar with that terminology.

Villavicencio said it technically is an inaccurate description.

“I think that when you are legislating biology in this way, you need to be really, really precise,” she said.

Abortion rights supporters protest in front of the Alabama State House on May 14. (Chris Aluka Berry/Reuters) (Christopher Aluka Berry/Reuters)

Why are some people objecting to the six-week cutoff written into these “heartbeat bills?”

Doctors date a pregnancy from the first day of a woman’s last period, not from the date when she had sexual intercourse. Most women are at least four weeks pregnant when they discover the pregnancy, Villavicencio said.

Many women do not realize it until the fifth or sixth week, she said, especially if they did not expect to become pregnant. Women are taught to suspect pregnancy if they miss their period, but other factors — like stress, obesity or new medications — can also disrupt a woman’s menstrual cycle.

These high-profile conservatives oppose Alabama's abortion law

Televangelist Pat Robertson, Tomi Lahren and other conservatives voiced opposition to the Alabama abortion law signed on May 15. (Allie Caren/The Washington Post)

How likely is emergency contraception to prevent pregnancy, as an alternative to abortion?
Over-the-counter morning-after pills generally prevent pregnancy when taken within 72 hours of sexual intercourse, Villavicencio said, although the pills are much less effective in women who weigh more than 170 pounds. Emergency contraception that requires a prescription should be taken within five days of sexual contact, Villavicencio said.

Women who want to avoid becoming pregnant, she said, “have a very tight timeline to access emergency contraception over the counter.”

Does banning abortion reduce the rate of abortion?

Not significantly. Countries with total or partial bans have an abortion rate of 37 in 1,000 people, while 34 in 1,000 people have abortions in countries with no restrictions on it, according to the Guttmacher Institute, a research and policy organization that advocates for abortion rights.

Expanding access to contraception, however, does correlate with lower rates of abortion, the Guttmacher Institute says. A study by Washington University in St. Louis found in 2012 that giving women free birth control reduces abortion rates by 62 to 78 percent, compared to the national rate.

Lindsey Bever, Ariana Eunjung Cha, Carol Eisenberg, Laura Helmuth and Josh White contributed to this report.

Credit: Washington Post

     I myself am very happy with bills taking place, but it will be some time for them to take full effect. This is also showing that there is more humanity in the American people than I thought! Abortion is an evil and inhumane practice. It is not an issue to be taken lightly either. My heart really does grieve for woman who are faced with such a monumental decision. However, I cannot and never will support the act of abortion or the ideology that it 'empowers women.'

    All social media is on fire with these new bills. Accounts run by pro-choicers are demanding that anyone who is pro-life unfollow them because somehow they are so frightened by a disagreeing opinion. I don't mind an opposing argument, as long as you're civil and respectful. The funny thing is, a lot of these accounts are fandom accounts. So what does ones personal and political beliefs have to do with who is going to sit on the Iron Throne or whether Loki is dead or alive?

     It didn't take long for Hollywood to voice their opinions and they have certainly voiced them loud and clear. Several actresses that I follow on Instagram Gal Gadot (Wonder Woman), Elizabeth Olsen (Avengers) and Emma Watson (Harry Potter) are all intense self proclaimed women's rights activists. Well, as long as they women have already been born. Their reactions to the abortion bans were not surprisingly filled with liberal sentimentality.

     Gal Gadot and Elizabeth Olsen simply reposted typical pro-choice propaganda. Obviously lacking creativity and inability to really voice what they think.

    Meanwhile, Emma Watson--who should put professional third wave, millennial feminist among her credentials--went off in typical Hermione Granger fashion, combining emotion and politics as a plee for the injustice for all women. However, this emotion also brought on some misinformation as well. 

[Could miscarriages land women in jail? Let’s clarify these Georgia and Alabama abortion bills.]

The Georgia law is more complex.

Like Alabama, it explicitly states that doctors who perform abortions will be prosecuted. It is clear about those penalties. The bill is more vague about the prosecution (or non-prosecution) of women.

On Tuesday, Slate published an article with a not-entirely-accurate headline: “Georgia just criminalized abortion. Women who terminate their pregnancies would receive life in prison.”

It suggested that under the Georgia law, women who terminate their pregnancies would be prosecuted and sentenced to either life in prison or death.

That is incorrect.

“The news headlines and social media headlines that speculate about the bills’ unintended consequences are – at the very least – not productive. At most, they’re harmful,” Planned Parenthood’s Staci Fox told The Post on Friday.

HB 481 could not be used to successfully prosecute women, she argued. But if a woman had a miscarriage, she could be pulled into an investigation looking at whether someone performed an illegal abortion on her.

“You don’t want a woman to be forced to prove how she lost her baby,” said Sanger.

Georgia’s law does not unequivocally say that women are exempt, but legal experts point to other areas of Georgia’s penal code which have specific defenses for women, including those who miscarry.

     I truly believe that these governors have the true intention of wanting to help women and not harm them. No, absolutely no pro-lifer would be dancing in the streets if  natural miscarrying was criminalized. Natural miscarriage meaning that there are general complications in the pregnancy and the baby could not survive. These complications can be unavoidable and cannot be caught in time to save the baby. However, there are abortion procedures that will cause miscarrying (abortion pills) and that is what may have many people worried. I would be too. My mother had five miscarriages and I certainly would never think her capable of purposely bringing on a miscarriage herself. 

     These have been some majorly huge wins for the pro-life community and I hope that it gets stronger. Yet, with these victories there are going to have to be greater responsibility in the pro-life communities. With more and more abortion facilities closing down, pro-life clinics such as Crisis Pregnancy Centers and churches must be completely open and available. Counseling for victims of rape and abuse must be accessible for everyone. We have to fight for easier access in adoptions and to clean up the foster care systems. Also, prevention of backstreet abortions must be an absolute top priority. 

     If you haven't seen this season of Call The Midwife, I highly suggest you do. Season 8 is dealing with the abortion issue heavily and you're seeing it from both sides. The show has dealt with abortion very well and has been very unbiased toward both pro-life and pro-choice ideologies. While many fans view the show as the enlightenment of 'women's choice', I'm not seeing many people in the show itself happy about these said abortions. Only misery, pain, tears and heartbreak. Which is why I have always appreciated the truth that is so deeply embedded in Call The Midwife.

     To wrap this up, I want to say that 2019 is definitely the year on 'the war of abortion' and things are only now getting started. When we lose, it hits hard. When we win, we still get hit from the backlash of a predominately liberal society. However, the media is becoming more open and accepting (such as The Washington Post's great articles on the abortion ban bills) and movies such as Gosnall and Unplanned are opening up the eyes to the atrocities of pro-choice ideologies. We can take what has damaged and broken society and recreate the idea that all life is sacred and must be fought for.