Have ANY of these states passed laws that mandate that they lose parental rights to any and every child that results from their behavior?
Have ANY of the states allowing abortion only in cases of rape, incest, or woman's health in serious danger passed laws that greatly expedite the process of proving a rape or incest occurred? Time ticks fast when one is pregnant, and if a woman has to first prove that she was raped or victimized by an incestuous relative, she may find that that process, even if successful, takes so long that the pregnancy is too far along to end it, or to end it as safely as in weeks, months prior.
Have ANY of the states passing bans except in cases of rape, incest or woman's health endangered also passed laws that define any non-consensual introduction of sperm onto or into a woman's genitals as being a rape for the purposes of abortion? As anyone with the least bit of knowledge about human sexuality and reproduction knows, sperm can get into the vagina in numerous ways, including on fingers and other objects or body parts. Just ask Dr. Ruth, or Joseph and Mary.
2
Dear rest of the world:
As a lifelong resident of the State of Missouri, I want to tell all of you how sorry I am that this has happened. The people of the cities of Kansas City and St. Louis are not like this. We are not backward hillbillies. We have and appreciate high art and culture. You should come and see out ballet, our opera, our symphony and our world class art galleries. We also have excellent urban universities. We embrace progressive politics as most modern metropolitan cities do. We are not the Confederacy.
What has happened to our state is that is has been gerrymandered into oblivion. The large cities have no political power in the state legislature. Consequently, it has been packed with backwoods yahoos. When we had a Democratic governor, he would regularly veto the most ridiculous bills. Now we have one of their own in charge.
We just had a citizens initiative on the last election to redistrict the state. It passed with 62% of the vote. The hillbillies of the legislature and their governor want to pull some kind of legislative maneuver to override the vote of the people. This is tyranny of the worst kind. To throw out the vote of the citizenry.
But you see, backwoods yahoos are not interested in freedom and liberty. They are only interested in absolute power.
That's why this abortion abomination bill is so deadly, not just to women, but to freedom itself. If they can get away with this, they can get away with anything. So far, they are.
36
@Bruce Rozenblit As a child visiting maternal grandparents in Granite City, I used to visit the Zoo in St. Louis. It sounds to me as though the cages weren't properly locked one night, and the slow lorises and lemurs escaped into the legislature.
8
@Bruce Rozenblit
The problem is that we Coastal Types already have the Met, and the Philadelphia Orchestra, and stuff like that, so while you may have a nice art museum, nobody but a few hundred thousand Missouri folks care. We just get in our 737s and fly over your art museum on the way to Aspen or San Francisco.
I’m so ashamed of my state legislators and the people who support them
65
Weak minds think alike.
Like lemmings jumping off a cliff. When they see one do it, they all have to try.
2
Welcome to the Saudi Arabia’s of the Americas!
6
The Republican Party does not stand with women or for women.
4
My objection to this law stems from the fact that women who are raped or children who are molested should not be forced to maintain a pregnancy. While victims of rape may want to give a that child up for adoption relieving itself of the emotional and financial responsibility of the baby, they are still forced to be pregnant through no fault of their own. It means extra time off from their jobs for wellness exams, extra nutritional alterations to their diet (at their own expense). If they're single, the fact that they were raped is going to be obvious to co-workers who will raise questions. Complications in a pregnancy can increase absence from work or worse, it could even kill the mother. If the woman is married, it may cause irreversible damage to her relationship with her husband. With a child who's been molested, its worse. Take the 11 year old in Minnesota. Her little body is still trying to grow and develop--even though her reproductive system has matured, the rest of her; bones, internal organs and her brain, are still not fully developed. Being pregnant at that age can permanently damage those systems. Even if her parents tell her she did nothing wrong, it's going to be hard for her to believe when they have to hide her away for nine months and allow her to go through the trauma of giving birth. She'll be the object of cruel taunts and shame. Other parents will not allow their children in her company for fear of what they might learn. It's just plain wrong.
3
Under the Obama/Biden leadership, centrist democrats lost 1,000 seats to the GOP across the country. We are now suffering the consequences of this total strategy failure.
2
This is not about reducing abortions. It’s all about control and politics and buying votes with public money.
Let’s look at the numbers. 5-10 states adopt this approach. Each will likely spend 100m on the legal aspects (fighting the case and/or trying to enforce it) so about a billion dollars. The total number of abortions (all 50 states) is about 600k/y (and it’s been going down). Assume that (proportionally) these states have 60k abortions each year. They will be spending about $15000 per person just to prosecute and prevent these abortions (and significantly more on the hospitals to ensure the births, early care etc).
Imagine spending a small fraction of that on sex ed, and awareness. You would get much bigger reductions in abortions and spend less. But this is not a vote getter.
8
"The bill, which bans abortions at around eight weeks of pregnancy, often before a woman even knows she is pregnant, included no exceptions for rape or incest."
I am not sure I would support this bill but does it really take eight weeks to realize that you were raped? If you were raped then you have the obligation to go to the police and a hospital at once, and keep tabs on your periods.
I think the new Alabama law is unreasonable and will probably be overturned by the courts. But the NYT has the knee jerk habit of opposing absolutely ANY restrictions on abortion. That is not going to work any longer.
You must offer and work towards a reasonable compromise. If you criticized New York's 24 weeks as too lax, that would be a start.
Where is the American Medical Association? Where are Health Insurance Companies and HRSA? Can professional organizations please stand up for the rights of doctors and patients to privacy and professionalism? Do they prefer that non-medical professionals and DYIers return to performing abortions? Private and public health insurance companies should refuse to work with states that outlaw abortion. If a woman dies or requires much more costly care or gives the state an unwanted medically expensive child due to a botched abortion, if costly legal and medical costs result, let all liability fall upon the taxpayers of these states that are forcing births, impoverishing, and enslaving women with their false religious doctrine. What next? Forced labor camps for the obese? Death shots for those with dementia? Any other medical procedure we should let the popular vote force? Why not do back to public hangings for petty thieves? It doesn't matter what the corrupted Supreme Court does. The end of Roe is not the end of abortion. Abortion will continue as long as poverty and religious hypocrisy continues.
2
There are other good post about Federal versus State law, I am not going to wake in.
This is example of men forcing themselves on women and who owns their bodies! That this was considered settled law which is disturbing and a politization of our judicery and Supreme Court.
Practically, what I (and you can do) will do is stop buying any product which I can determine are from this or similar states, will refuse on eBay to sell to anyone from this state and will halt any further travel to Georgia.
Amazon, consider you bottom line and the impact by tens of thousands who will boycott you films and potentially service unless you halt film production and send a message to Georgia!
No young woman should go to college in this state or any of the states passing these statutes, including Missouri.
4
I'm 46, female. I am Texan. I am a Christian. Since my teens I have identified as Republican and consider myself conservative. I could not morally justify voting for Trump (voting for him was a stamp of approval on sexual assault). Today's Republican party & vigilante style conservatism saddens me to my core. I have very strong opinions & beliefs, one of them being that govt should not be in the business of legislating morals (abortion, same-sex marriage).
As each state passes a new bill drastically limiting access to abortions I become more dismayed. I hate that for some abortion is nothing more than a form of birth control, because I DO believe that life begins at conception. I believe abortion is a sin. But - I strongly defend the right to make these choices for yourself. I was unable to conceive. I am childless. I could never abort a pregnancy. But that does NOT give me the right to force someone else to carry a child to term.
In 1971 my mom was early in the 3rd trimester when she started hemorrhaging. The baby had no heartbeat & she had to decide if she wanted to list it as an abortion or still birth (requiring her to take a dead baby home for burial). In haste & mom near death my parents decided the easiest course would be to label it as an abortion. For them the label didn't matter, it was their 2nd miscarriage.
These new laws would make the care my mom received in 1971 illegal/impossible today.
7
When I was 16 years old I was at my (at the time) boyfriends house watching a movie with him in the living room. 10+ years ago being 16 was different than it is today. I was a virgin and had been dating him for over a year. So watching a movie at his house without adults there, wasn’t a big deal. Or I didn’t think it was.
I lost my virginity to someone I thought I was “in love” with. If that rape would have resulted in a pregnancy I would have had an abortion.. 8 weeks is forever and nothing. I didn’t tell anyone what happened to me for years.
If I didn’t find out in time and the option to abort was take away from me, I would have killed myself. I felt disgusting. I was so sad and tired and confused. My best friend was his sister. My other best friend was his cousin. I love his parents. We were in the same class. I felt so hopeless and ashamed. That is what this bill does. Eliminates the option for anything else.
The fetus of a rape victim or incest is just as innocent as a fetus conceived through consensual sex. Please keep in mind the girl/woman now carrying this child, did not consent to action that directly put them in this position. THEY ARE INNOCENT. And should have the right to make this decision since they didn’t get a say in the last one.
To those of you preaching on what you would do.. your speculations make you sound ignorant. You cannot truly say how you would react in a situation until you are there.
28
@Dr. John I personally know that but younger women might not. .
2
It’s not a short cheap drive to a border state if you live in Texas. And why should a young woman be required to travel for a time-sensitive medical procedure?
I swear, if men were the ones bearing children, none of this would be happening. Honestly, just try to imagine it.
23
My parents were married when they had to classify their 2nd failed pregnancy as an abortion because classifying it as a still birth meant giving it a name, paying to transport a corpse 400 miles home, purchasing a coffin, and placing it in a burial plot. Given that my parents were young & my mom was hemorrhaging and near death & they were facing what would likely be a HUGE emergency hospital bill & were frantic, they chose to classify the procedure as an abortion. A late-term abortion. I guess my mom should have just died in order to not have an abortion.
Not every abortion is something that you have the luxury of planning out & looking at a map to see where you can travel in an easy day of road trip in order to get the medical care that you feel you need.
Your flippant response to someone else's very real tragic experience examplifies what the problem is when it comes to those who are hell bent on eliminating abortion and a woman's right to seek appropriate medical care for her condition. These laws lack ANY compassion and those writing the laws and enacting the laws (Male or female) have zero empathy and little to no ability to view life from any lens but their own.
You see, I'm a conservative, Christian, Republican (who did NOT vote for Trump on moral grounds) - I believe life begins at conception. I believe abortion is a sin. I also believe that you can't legislate morals and I can't judge ANYONE who chooses abortion & that ultimately the choice is theirs.
3
Governments can only legislate in areas which they are empowered to legislate. I'll keep asking this question - Where are the powers to do this?
If reproductive rights are a matter of belief or freedom of speech, First Amendment: they can't do it.
If these legislative rights are a matter of powers granted by state constitutions, they still can't do it because of the US Constitution, which has precedence.
If the state has no power granted specifically to legislate in relation to abortion, they can't do it, period.
(This isn't "health" legislation. It's criminal law, targeted legislation criminalizing an action which isn't even mentioned in any constitution.)
The net result in states which pass this sort of legislation will be more human misery, more people in jail, and lots more money for lawyers to fight cases about laws which have no sane basis. Sound familiar?
4
If I understand correctly, a twelve year old girl who is a raped by her father or other close relative would be forced to carry a pregnancy to delivery. So not only would she have to bear the health risks of giving birth while still a child, she also would have to carry the burden of such a traumatic experience for 9 months.
Heartless,cruel, and inhumane...
14
@Mike "If I understand correctly, a twelve year old girl who is a raped by her father or other close relative would be forced to carry a pregnancy to delivery."
You do not understand correctly and it could be that you misunderstand deliberately.
What the law requires is that she terminate her pregnancy quickly.
This is obviously hateful legislation. It’s also obviously an attempt to get to the Supreme Court to overturn RvW. With so many states passing this legislation, a solution just now popped into my mind. Every woman of reproductive age should stock pregnancy tests the same way they stock tampons. Just run a test every week. Too expensive? Let’s start test banks the same way we support food banks. Awful? Yes. Effective? Yes.
5
@Jean There is no need to run a test "every week". Every three weeks would be quite sufficient. Indeed nature itself provides a "pregnancy test" when you miss your period. What you are suggesting is merely a supplement to what nature already provides.
@Ludwig - are you female? Not every woman is regular with her menses. Although I agree a test every 2-3 weeks would be sufficient. The idea popped into my head when I read the article before 5am this morning......I did not fully think it out 😏
1
I fail to understand outrage expressed below and by some quoted in the article.
Ours is a States rights dominated system where Federal government powers are limited.
Like education where the States dominate in public policies - ditto here when it comes to issues like abortion.
I am not a lawyer but Roe has been overturned in many ways by SCOTUS allowing more restrictions on access to abortions.
What started as a legitimate concern over women having a say over their health - abortion supporters have tarnished image of Roe by demanding it as a right.
I am a man - to be sure. But conceptions happen because of males providing sperm to the eggs that a woman provides.
Except in cases of crimes etc - it's only fair that abortions be performed with a consent that involves many and not just the female.
In any event, even SCOTUS allowed in Roe that the States may choose to impose additional requirements on access to abortions.
And so, here we are with several states going on record that abortion on demand needs to be curtailed.
And I, for one, applaud these efforts.
2
If you could get pregnant, would you want the state to dictate what you could do regardless of your own opinions and beliefs? Would you want the state to have control over your body and reproductive health? Would you be content to have government decide your personal health choices for you and have no say in the matter?
1
@Neil You don't understand the outrage? When you can get pregnant, when you can be forced to carry a fetus inside your body for nine months, give birth to a child (an event that happens at no small risk to your own health, by the way), and then to provide for that child's physical, mental, and financial wellbeing for a minimum of 18 years but, as every parent knows, more likely many, many years after that--and when you can be forced to do all of this by "the many," but without the help of 'the many," then you might be able to understand the outrage.
As to what's "fair" when it comes to making decisions about whether or not to terminate a pregnancy, I'm sorry to tell you that being a "sperm provider" doesn't give you an equal stake. If you are part of a committed couple, and both you and your partner have agreed ahead of time to discuss whether or not to bring a child into this world should a pregnancy occur, then it might be fair for you to participate in a decision about that particular pregnancy. But it certainly does not give you the right to participate in a decision about the pregnancies of all the other women in the country.
1
@Neil - Nope. States don't get to dictate people's civil right.
Using your logic, why don't we let many people decided what to do with your body. In my opinion you should have a vasectomy. Are you willing to let me make that choice for you?
2
I am a snowbird and I am looking at maps to avoid driving through any southern state that passed this heinous legislation against our gender and our fertility.
I won’t be stopping at Loves Truck stops either. Boycott all corporate truck stops on highways south of the mason Dixon and west of New England. I am checking all products I buy and vacations south I take. Boycotting and if there are womens’ marches and clandestine health clinics to volunteer at I am there.
Our talk talk talk is cheap. Boots on ground and intellects turned on to seek and destroy southern state tourist commerce. Men in these states and women who agree with the new laws should feel social isolation and exposure.
Vote 2020
11
Ending the horror of slavery? Of course. But preserving the union? Lincoln was obsessed with an idea that may never prove to be workable for North or South.
5
I fail to understand outrage expressed below and by some quoted in the article.
Ours is a States rights dominated system where Federal government powers are limited.
Like education where the States dominate in public policies - ditto here when it comes to issues like abortion.
I am not a lawyer but Roe has been overturned in many ways by SCOTUS allowing more restrictions on access to abortions.
What started as a legitimate concern over women having a say over their health - abortion supporters have tarnished image of Roe by demanding it as a right.
I am a man - to be sure. But conceptions happen because of males providing sperm to the eggs that a woman provides.
Except in cases of crimes etc - it's only fair that abortions be performed with a consent that involves many and not just the female.
In any event, even SCOTUS allowed in Roe that the States may choose to impose additional requirements on access to abortions.
And so, here we are with several states going on record that abortion on demand needs to be curtailed.
And I, for one, applaud these efforts.
1
Thanks, you guys for helping millions of current and future prospective college, professional and graduate school applicants and their families narrow down their choices -- many of us would rather send our kids to local community colleges than have them attend school in a state where they and their sisters are so devalued and where rapists have more rights than their victims (eg, no cruel and unusual punishment) and get lighter sentences than doctors.
24
Here's an idea: if all these state lawmakers are going to be allowed to treat women this way, denying them the basic dignity of autonomy over their own bodies, then the bodily autonomy of men doesn't have to be as important either.
So: ALL men old enough to father a child, country-wide, should have to submit DNA to the state.
– Rapists could be more easily identified and made to pay for the children their victims will now be forced to have. After their worldly goods have been taken toward the lifetime costs of rearing their children, they can be safely tossed in jail.
– This might actually have a chilling effect on the incidence of rape, thus rendering many abortions unnecessary in the first place while stigmatizing those more often responsible for them.
– Additionally, if any man could immediately be identified as the father, men in general might have a greater incentive to take more responsibility for birth control.
21
This is by far one of the best responses!
3
The title of their new law more accurately would be "Missouri Stands Against the Already-Born"
15
It is difficult to fathom the assertion that life is “a beating heart “.
If that were so, we would have to outlaw hospice, whose administration of palliative narcotics suppresses respiration and hastens cardiac arrest.
No one would be allowed to have a living will or advance medical directive, because each beating heart would be required to be prolonged as long as medically and technologically possible.
No one would be allowed to terminate life support (ventilators, gastric feeding tubes or such), because to do so would end the beating of a heart and thus be an impermissible termination of “life”, under this archaic definition.
As a society we came to the conclusion in the 1970’s that life is not a beating heart. It would be foolhardy and cruel to unlearn that lesson now.
Those facing difficult end of life decisions for themselves and their loved ones do not want a pack of knee-jerking, knuckle-dragging legislators telling them what they can and cannot do with their own bodies based on someone else’s archaic understanding of “life”.
Women have beating hearts too, and they should have no less autonomy over their own bodies than others.
By all means protect viable fetuses. They are a “life” under any reasonable definition. But do not impose subjective external control over women just because it is convenient to invoke a societally rejected dogma in doing so.
21
Maybe one of the most insightful post today. I’ve done a lecture on medically defined death as it has changed over the last couple centuries. You capture its essence.
3
Yet another state to BOYCOTT as they outrageously and egregiously VIOLATE THE 1st AMENDMENT of the US Constitution (and probably equal protection and other guarantees of the Constitution).
11
Anti-abortion Republicans want to overturn Roe vs Wade and end abortions throughout the USA. The courts may give them what they want, but the USA will not be abortion-free.
It's easy to buy illegal drugs from dealers in almost every community in the USA. If abortions are illegal, dealers peddling drugs like meth and opiates will sell Abortion Pills.
Picture a teen being wined and dined by an older man. She's in love and wants to please him. Then he disappears after she tells him she's pregnant.
Desperate, she approaches a local drug dealer. He tells her she doesn't have enough money. But he turns on the charm. He'll give her the pills and the instructions on how to take them if she'll meet him at his apartment. He just scored a new customer.
She ends the pregnancy. After a while she feels sad and lonely. Now the drug dealer offers her something that make her feel much better.
Overturn Roe and pregnant teens won't see medical professionals. But drug dealers will deal with them. The courts may just create a society far worse then what we have now.
10
States also deny medically informed sexual education. Which leads to more unintended pregnancies, sexually transmitted disease, and poverty.
1
Let the country know where the money is coming from to pay for the advocacy of this coordinated campaign to overturn Roe v Wade.
12
Why did Democrats vote down OTC birth control pills for women?
4
@Dr. John - I'm a woman and I can tell you why. Because there are a lot of different kinds of the Pill out there and if you take the wrong one it can have some very serious consequences, risk of stroke etc.
What Democrats have done (e.g. the ACA) is make health care and contraception more affordable and available and as a result unplanned pregnancies and abortions have decreased in recent years.
7
The war on women continues, unabated. Republicans abuse the idea of democracy, repeatedly.
15
@David reese Note that half othe fetuses which are killed are female. They may not matter to you but to me with two grand daughters, the fact of abortion of female fetuses is outrageous.
Missouri, the home of “legitimate rape” and “consensual rape”. Republicans see rape as normal, just another sexual encounter that happens to involve sexual assault. In any case, it’s the women’s own fault for making them do it.
18
In that sense, those guys are right in line with ISIS/ISIL, al-Qaida, and Iran's Republican Guard.
If only they'd move in with those like-minded, like-hearted buddies in the Mid-East instead of ruining millions of lives and separation of religion and government in America's Mid-West.
15
Reminder to rural Missourians supporting these clowns: smart, professional, working women don't want to live in oppressive, anti-female rural towns, and pretty soon they won't want to live in states like these. Oh, by the by, the St Louis metropolitan region provides 40% of your state's income tax.
And don't whine when you are bankrupt, (for lack of tax income and Trump's tariffs), alone, (because even your kids don't want to live in the horrible rural towns you've created(, and childless, (because there aren't enough women living near you). You have brought the plague upon yourselves, dudes.
26
@Rapaki - Isn't that the whole point? They don't want smart, professional working women. Women like that scare the heck out of these men. I'm guessing these men have been frequently rejected by that kind of woman.
They want women to be uneducated, poor and helpless.
5
People, you are missing the point. If it has not been said before, and I may have missed the something, we are not discussing the existence of a fetus. But first let me state that I am 100% pro choice. My belief is that the point is not a fetus but a human soul, which is invested at conception. With that understanding, abortion at any time, regardless of the circumstances of conception, is the same as murdering any other human soul: these new laws do not go far enough. But that is just my view as a Roman Catholic and a person who believes in the existence of the soul. Arguing about what constitutes a fetal heartbeat totally misses the point. Nevertheless, I have no right to force my beliefs on others.
7
A hearty welcome to Missouri (along with Ohio, Georgia, Alabama, etc.) in joining the United States of Theocracy. Why not consider secession?
11
Congratulations, Missouri. Making Kansas look GOOD.
Sad.
12
Perhaps we can start some GoFundMe campaigns to help women escape these cruel misogynistic pro-rape states.
Democrats, are you listening? When you campaign, campaign on what's right, not what you think is politically safe.
11
Just another depressing day to be a woman in this country. Back to the 50s. When white men were in charge and women knew their place. Vote them out of office, the sooner the better.
15
Liberal minded people who would choose how they live and not be dictated to, and businesses should move out of these repressive states and let them flounder. Conferences should be relocated as well as pro ball games.
8
@Rick Tornello American men are cowards with women.
Uneducated ( the less educated among the industrialized nations ) , unethica ( highest inequality between men and women ) l, the most violent in the world by far ( 6 times more than in Europe ).
Bravo Americans ! You made America Great again !
Weak and coward people.
4
I suggest that the pro-life legislators in Missouri get themselves right to Venezuela to feed and care for thousands of innocent babies.
17
Missouri is now truly the state of misery. Hope it has lots of funds to care for all new borns.
12
https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/style/what-we-dont-know-about-how-a-uterus-works-is-going-to-hurt-us-all/2019/05/10/d210ab16-7366-11e9-8be0-ca575670e91c_story.html
Politicians and government have no business interfering with the rights of women to take care of their personal health. And to the folks who comment that - “oh, joy, now more babies can be born” - read your history. More women will die from unsafe abortions. BY the thousands! I lived through those years before Roe v. Wade became the law of the land. Women who are desperate will find a way, and have done so throughout history. And the rich will continue to have safe, legal or not, abortions.
From the above link: “What we don’t know about how a uterus works is going to hurt us” by Monica Hesse, WaPo, May 13:
“I once snorted at my desk while skimming a complaint from a gentleman annoyed that menstruating women felt the need to waste money on sanitary products. Why didn’t they just learn to ‘hold it,’ he suggested, the way men kept themselves from urinating?“
8
Again: If men could get pregnant, abortion would be a sacrament performed on the altar of every church, synagogue and mosque on earth. Isn't it time to abort superstition? Christ said nothing about abortion. The anti-abortion movement is nothing more than a weapon to subject women to inferior status. My paternal grandmother, Smith '09 and a suffragist, would have set her dogs on this batch of misogynists.
18
While so many states are now moving in for the kill, where are the men? You would think men would be angered at the state for intruding into private matters in their marriages or relationships.
I don’t just support a women’s right to choose out of the goodness of my heart. I don’t want sanctimonious politicians controlling my family’s autonomy. Too many otherwise well intentioned men seem content to ignore this battle.
17
There is no heart at 6 weeks, so no "heartbeat," just pulsating cells. The media should watch how it's reporting this fiasco. And why this argument for a "heartbeat" line when those advocating it have always argued for life at conception? Can we please have some consistency? At least viability is a clear and consistent line.
13
The US is the least advanced in the list of advanced countries on this subject, and getting worse on many more. Thanks to the dictates of the Republican Party.
13
Holly Rehder is a sick woman, to not even care about rape and incest survivors. Does she vote against testing rape kits, too?
13
This is wonderful. More babies will be saved from abortion.
2
@KMW - And once they get here, who will save them then? From poverty, malnourishment, bad schools, bad parents, illnesses, a lack of good housing, a lousy environment, underfunded schools, etc.? Certainly not the star of Missouri.
I would have a lot more respect for pro-life people in general if they were actually pro-life: caring about babies not just while they were in utero but after birth, supporting food and nutritional assistance programs, school funding, proper housing, healthcare, and a stronger environment. Until then, I don’t want to hear how thrilled you are for the babies, because you’re not doing anything for the babies, really, except helping them out of the womb and onto the road of lifelong disenfranchisement if you don’t support any of the above programs and policies.
16
No they won't. Those abortions will now just be illegal ones. Like they used to be.
6
Silent prayer vigil, huh?
You repudiated shooting doctors and nurses yet?
4
Anyone can go to a border state for their abortions.
No, not everyone can just cross the border for an abortion. Not everyone has the money or the means. To suggest that they can ignores the reality of the situation and is disingenuous.
7
Former Missouri representative Todd Akin said women who are victims of what he called "legitimate rape" rarely get pregnant. And now Rep. Barry Hovis talks about "consensual rape." Only Neanderthals dismiss the brutal assault of a woman. Missouri has forever shamed itself.
28
@Troutwhisperer
Remember Brandon Ellingson? The kid who drowned while handcuffed on Lake of the Ozarks? Ultimately the cop was charged (with not the whole crime). Cause was gross incompetence. And I may add, a sanctimonious attitude. See a trend?
3
Well Missouri and Alabama are are off my visit list, I can visit dinosaurs elsewhere.
14
@BW
Try the American Museum of Natural History.
7
What will happen when the mistresses of these legislators get pregnant?
20
@RHDIV - They’ll get abortions. These guys will pay for them to go to a state where abortion is legal. These old hypocrites aren’t going to have an unplanned child - or any child, let’s be real - with their mistresses, particularly one that would end up being politically inconvenient, although they could probably afford to support said child. It’s everyone else who will be forced to have children they can’t support for one reason or another. It’s everyone else who will die or be maimed for life trying to abort a pregnancy they cannot, for reasons that are not these fools’ business, sustain.
18
Well, women there should take a lesson from Lysistrata and should simply stop having sex with men there. That would end this war.
12
@SL - I have a feeling the male politicians who enact these laws aren't getting any to begin with unless they pay someone for it.
I hope all those who thought Hillary and trump were equally bad are happy with what they got. Say goodbye to the right to abortion for a generation.
13
@Casey Penk
Bravo. To everyone who voted for a 3rd party candidate instead of Hillary, thus giving us DJT, thanks.
You kept to your "principles" and look at what we got.
Votes matter. Do the right thing in 2020.
1
Boycott all the states that have declared men's war on women's bodies with draconian new abortion bills. Will fetal "persons" be allowed to vote for Trump next year?
11
I’d be curious to know, how many of the folks who oppose abortion and the “killing” of babies, are also gun owners?
12
@Warren H Just because you own a gun doesn't mean you committed the crime of taking someone's life. Abortion is violence; it is killing someone. Having a uterus is not violent. Mass shooting is violence; it's killing someone(s). Owning a gun is not violent. This concept seems very reasonable. I don't understand how you can imply that someone who owns a gun simply wants to murder people. You know that's not true, at all.
1
Local elections matter, people.
Vote!
8
Delighted. The GOP is already in the toilet with female voters, who, by the way, are in the majority. This anti abortion hysteria will serve to push out what few sane women remain. Republicans, you thought you got a shellacking in 2018? Hah! Just wait till 2020.
12
Why is it that nobody seems to recognize that a woman who gets inconveniently pregnant in Missouri etc still has six weeks to terminate pregnancy?
Nobody is taking away a woman's "right" to kill her spawn; rather simply making a tighter time limit (und Roe, that is "viability" which is around 20 to 24 weeks and falling). I suppose if a woman is so clueless about her sexual behavior and unaware of her body that she goes longer than that before realizing what's up, well then she probably aught not get pregnant. Oops. She did. Grow up and raise the child. It will do you good. You wouldn't exist if your mom hadn't gotten pregnant.
1
@Bill. Most women do not realize they are pregnant until they have missed two periods. How about having the man who impregnating the woman be held responsible for the fetus. Including health and education expenses for the lifetime of the forced birth child. It will do him good to grow up and pay for his action.
26
@Bill I didn't realize I was pregnant with my (very much wanted) child until week 8. There were no symptoms. It happens.
But even if you were right and all women who don't realize they're pregnant before week 6 are foolish and irresponsible--why should we be wishing that foolish and irresponsible women would have children? Children aren't punishments for bad character or bad behavior. They're people. Why would you wish a child on a woman you don't think has the character to be a good mother?
12
Hi clueless, many women don't know that they are pregnant by 6 weeks. You should educate yourself on how a woman's body actually works. At 6 weeks the embryo is approximately the size of a pomegranate seed and it is not a person with a heart beat. Neither you nor anyone else has a right or say in what a woman does with their own body., least of all a man. If you want to save children's lives go and protest IQ45 putting them in cages.
14
Just a few of the events that were supposed to take place in St. Louis in 2020:
NHL All Star Game
Olympics gymnastics trials
NCAA men’s basketball March Madness early rounds
Start writing now.
18
Thanks, good start. what we need is for pro choice groups to prepare lists. Events to demand be moved, or boycotted if refused. Homie companies to be boycotted- looking at you Kansas based hallmark.create a pledge that dem president candidates are with us. In this war on women, we should be fighting with dollars.
6
Time for sane people to avoid travelling to Missouri and Alabama and to boycott any businesses based there.
13
It is a despicable move. Republicans belong to the stone age, where they will be comfortable in their archaic, medieval, patronizing and neanderthal activities. Even when they know none of this is enforceable because of Roe, they still go around wasting everyone's time, energy and emotions.
Oh, and elections have consequences. Please go out and vote next time.
- A disgusted Missourian.
14
Saudi Arabia: “An abortion is only legal if the abortion will save the woman's life or if the pregnancy gravely endangers the woman's physical or mental health. The fetus must be less than four months old.” Saudi Arabia has one of the worst women’s rights records in the world. Practices gender Apartheid.
Iran: “Abortion is currently legal in cases where the mother's life is in danger, and also in cases of fetal abnormalities that makes it not viable after birth (such as anencephaly) or produce difficulties for mother to take care of it after birth, such as major thalassemia or bilateral polycystic kidney disease....Legal abortion is allowed only before 19th week of pregnancy.”
“Nowadays, most Islamic legal schools of thought hold that the ensoulment of a fetus takes place four months after conception, which has extended the discussion of abortion in many nations and communities that base their judicial codes off of Islamic law; in Iran, a consensus has recently developed that abortion is legitimate if it is before this four-month mark.”
So Congratulations! Missouri (8 weeks), Ohio/Mississippi/Kentucky/Georgia (6 weeks) and, of course, Alabama (0 weeks) and up to 99 years prison for abortion doctor/provider - you now have more draconian laws on abortion than Saudi Arabia and Iran. It’s not easy to be less liberal than Saudi Arabia’s and Iran’s versions of Sharia Law, but you did it! Hope that all you Trump supporters and Republicans are proud.
26
@MC
Your post brings everything into a cold reality.
Women better be careful about what they support.
7
@MC If men could get pregnant, abortion would be a sacrament performed on the altar of every church, synagogue and mosque on earth.
3
So in other words, Missouri and Alabama are borrowing from the Taliban playbook.
2
The truth about this kind of legislation? There won't be fewer abortions, but there will be more dead women and teenage girls.
I'm a ative and current resident of Missouri, and this is just one of the reasons I can't wait to leave.
17
As a man, if anyone laid a political claim to cells inside my body, I would be fine with destroying everything around them to get rid of them.
9
I'm all for financially boycotting these states.Does anyone know of a website that lists what these states export to the other states.Obviously tourism.But what else,besides ignorance and disdain for women.I will never visit any of these states!
12
Start with hallmark cards.
3
I wonder what the mother's who support this bill, and the one in Alabama - which do not make exceptions for rape and incest - would do if their 14 year old daughter became pregnant by the girl's father. Insist that their 9th grade daughter carry the child to term? And then what? Put it up for adoption? Suppose the girl said she didn't want to have the baby. And ran away to get one in another state. Kick the girl out of the house?
I also wonder how many of these mother's have had abortions themselves. Abortions that didn't saddle them with a child they were unable or unprepared to care for.
13
@Eric
The lack of exception for rape and incest is cruel. And twisted. I mean, they all support the death penalty for all sorts of crimes. I guess because the embryo is "innocent" that makes it different.
2
@Bill, The who le bill is cruel. The lack of exception for rape and incest is sadistic.
1
I’ve never been a fan of abortion as it’s been practiced for most of the last 45 years. But, by the same token I’ve been appalled at the “religious rights” total unwillingness to take care of the children once they are born.
7
No one is a "fan" of abortion. No one is pro- abortion. No one. It is an excruciating and difficult decision. Better access to birth control obviously helps, but unwanted or accidental pregnancies still happen.
5
Last year, Ireland made abortion legal for the first time.
Yesterday I heard an NPR clip about the rebellion against Sharia law in Sudan, led by women seeking to do away with oppression against them.
Today, two American states outlawed abortion.
Time for a new national anthem, as we are no longer the land of the free.
19
That’s ok, it won’t hold up on court. None of these new bills can even touch Roe because they break the law of privacy the state cannot intrude upon constitutionally.
3
@Jude I hope to god you are correct. They are surely unconstitutional. But america is not the same place it was in the 1970's, when even Nixon was a social moderate.
7
@zula
Look at what brought down the Comstock laws. That's exactly the point: it is a Bill of Rights issue at heart. A woman at 8 weeks is not "showing." Well actually some are but not in a way that is "definitive." All the way to 3 months, it is a private matter.
Laws should be designed to enhance and protect social interactions, and should not be used to control how an individual treats herself. Imagine if the state decided that all men at a certain height should weigh between x and y pounds, that their choice of exercise and nutrition would be dictated by government. We wouldn't tolerate it.
If we want to reduce the number of abortions we should look at what the concerns are that cause this difficult decision to be made. Nutrition and health care, financial support, childcare, pre and after school programs, should all be enhanced. Even then, if a woman decides she does not want to grow a fetus, it is her choice and hers alone hopefully with the help of medical professionals.
These laws that are hastilly being put into effect in these few states will not stop abortions, they will merely inconvenience the women who can afford to travel, leaving the poor to be enslaved by these mean spirited and illegal laws. Back alley abortions will rise and with them deaths and tragedy. Furthermore, I expect these states to have a harder time attracting doctors in the future.
8
@Joe Barnett
Remember that biological success and misery are not mutually exclusive. In fact being poor and miserable may be the best way to pass on your genes. The meek shall inherit the earth. Even Christian doctrine recognizes the irony that wealth leads to decadence and loss of biological success.
Lawmakers are not wasting any time passing these pro life bills in many of the states. They are doing it one right after the other. They are not wasting any time and are on a roll. Who would have thought this would have occurred a few years ago. The difference has been in the support they have seen from President Trump and the courts. They have been encouraged by the passing of bills from other states and have decided the moment is right to place limits and bans on abortion. Many of us who are pro life never thought we would see this day. Anything is possible to those who believe.
1
@KMW If youi really believe that, you must not ever have read the four Gospels. Christ said nothing about abortion.
5
It is an imprecise science to identify how many weeks a fetus is. Women's periods are irregular and ultrasound usually indicate dates as 2 weeks either way. Apart from an autopsy, it is not possible to really know how far a pregnancy has progressed.
13
It is not that unusual for a woman to not know she is pregnant for 10-12 weeks.
2
All of these attacks on fundamental freedoms like women's reproductive rights, whether motivated by religion, political gain or misogyny, is being accelerated by misinformation and ignorance. It is a major attack on women and men too, although many probably don't know it yet.
9
Regarding So-called “heartbeat” bills being passed: There is a pulsing of cells at about six weeks. This is not a heart, which develops much later. I wonder if lawsuits will appear on this basis of how the female reproductive systems work.
4
@Maggie C. The people who conceive these hateful laws are too clearly disgusted by female reproductive organs to learn how they work.
7
This appears as a larger GOP-driven strategy to create a culture war – an us vs. them situation, which can be milked for political gain.
The only people who have much to lose is Americans, who are slaves to this sort of evil, belief-driven notion, which only creates more social problems than it allegedly solves.
Furthermore, I see this is a further blurring of the separation between religion and state which can only wreck more havoc within American Government, leading to an even greater cultural divide which greatly lessens the social tolerance of differing opinions. I expect more intolerance and violence, complete with guns.
If the a majority of Americans do not put an end to this evil brand of politics, much can and will be lost.
4
Why do we have old men deciding the faith of women? Abortion is a very personal and should be a private issue between a woman and her doctor. What does these individuals know about the struggle?
27
Another unconstitutional law. Pursuant to the trimester analysis in Roe, VIABILITY is the point at which the State has a voice.
3
Listening to male Republican politicians like Clyde Chambliss of Alabama or John Becker of Ohio “mansplaining” the functioning of women’s reproductive organs can only be described as utterly surreal. Too bad that former GOP congressman Todd Akin of Missouri was not around to add his vote to Missouri’s new so called “heartbeat law” and remind us once again that women don’t get pregnant after rape because “the female body has ways to shut the whole thing down.”
The willful ignorance/malevolence of Republican men regarding women’s health and well-being could hardly be underestimated.
13
So, do we hear of any laws to make the men responsible for the baby they helped make? After all, women do not get pregnant by themselves. What is that I hear? Oh, yes, the sound of crickets.
17
What happened to Missouri? Not long ago it was a purple state like Wisconsin and Michigan. Now, it’s just an extension of the South.
6
@Mssr. Pleure — it always was a Southern state.
2
The states that no one wants to live now also include Missouri! These states cannot pass such draconian laws without the help of the rich people, who control the politicians. All other liberal states should impose crippling sanctions on businesses that are owned by people from these states!
8
It perplexes me why this issue is so conflagrated when if a woman wants to abort, she can obtain 2 simple pills from many providers, in most states. She can then endure the terrible process in the comfort of her own home, far from probing politicians and men - who will never know the immense pain the decision to abort brings every woman. In 30 years of women's health nursing, I've cared for thousands of patients and not one ever said she used abortion as birth control. Every single one expressed pain and sadness about her situation. Old white curmudgeons, the situation is not your business.
19
@NYSF But pharmacists are allowed to dispense these medications at their own discretion in some states, are they not? Hobby Lobby.
1
Another story as well in Ohio about a university doctor abusing young female athletes. So no help for girls, betrayal at every turn for young women. No help for children. But cry cry cry over a fetus you hate once it is born. Fist bumps in Alabama. This is grotesque.
I’m glad my daughter moved to Australia.
16
The same legislators that pass these restrictive abortion laws while arguing for the sanctity of life are happy to permit capital punishment. How dare they waste taxpayer dollars purposely passing unconstitutional laws solely to work towards having Roe v Wade overturned.
6
Abortions have taken place throughout humanity. Roe v. Wade did not presage an “abortathon”: U.S. census data shows that live births from 1965 through 1980 went UP following 1973. (www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/nvsr/nvsr50/nvsr50_05.pdf)
I believe that this is consistent with other developed countries' experience. Working on a diaper account at Procter & Gamble (known for its obsession with market data) in the 1980s, I noted that the incidence of abortion was higher in the (then West) Germany of higher restrictions (counseling appointments required, permission of the local clergyman) than it was in the neighboring (and not culturally dissimilar) Netherlands with fewer restrictions.
One theory is that the vilified "abortion clinics" are the first stop for women seeking contraceptives. Obviously these women would rather prevent, and not terminate, an unwanted pregnancy.
The consequence of shutting down "abortion clinics" is that women are denied the most convenient access to contraceptives. So, shut down the clinics, and watch the number of unwanted pregnancies, and terminations thereof, climb to their pre-Roe level.
But then, facts are silly things, right?
13
@Padonna
Contraceptives are conveniently available in every grocery store, big box store and drug store. At extremely low prices, if not free.
@Dr. John
That was just my theory. Goodness only knows the reason why. As Karl Marx might have said, "Gee, it was just an idea."
But in any case, U.S. census data shows that live births from 1965 through 1980 did go UP following 1973. Perhaps you can tell us why.
But then, facts are silly things, right?
Yes, contraception is widely available for men. Women need to get a Prescription from a Dr.
...can’t get that at a big box store.
10
What shocks me more than anything is that politicians would decide women who are raped must bring the fetus to term. Pro-choice supporters should be focusing on this issue. We need to hear from women who were raped. We need graphic stories that get media attention. When more women (and men) recognize how horrific this bill is, they will never vote for a Republican again. When Republicans have less power in Congress, these bills stand no chance of passing.
10
@Tom
I'm pro choice. However, this bill is morally consistent from the anti choice perspective. If abortion is the murder of innocent life, the fetus resulting from rape is just as innocent as the fetus resulting from consensual sex. Why should a rape fetus be allowed to be killed?
Maybe this will motivate Democrats and progressives to vote instead of staying home pouting because their candidate didn't win the nomination. Maybe the Democrats will campaign for the court as relentlessly as republicans do. They should bring women's horror stories o back alley abortion complete with graphic pictures of women dying from self-induced abortions and illegal ones. Frame this as a women's health issue, not a reproductive Rights issue. That's abstract and cerebral. Appeal to emotions just as the republicans do.
6
If you are convinced that abortion is murder, it’s no less murder if the fetus is the product of rape or incest. So for those who believe that rape or incest is an exception, they should wonder why. And of course the truth is - because it’s such a grey area that they have no business legislating abortion.
1
@ST At what point does the fetus become viable outside the uterus? Only then can we talk about taking life.
1
I wonder if at some point women will be mandated to reproduce or face consequences.
15
The U.S. birthrate is at an hostorically low level. Makes me wonder if that's playing a role. Of course, a decent immigration policy could address that.
1
Or if the woman miscarries: will she be prosecuted for reckless endangerment? Involuntary manslaughter?
1
This is what happens in any state which has super majority for any party. Democrats or Republicans. They become full on extremists.
In Missouri, we have a bunch of GOP hard core ideologues competing with each other to see how far back in time they can move the state. Inane, ill thought out, posturing policies are offered and passed without any opposition or discussion.
We are banning abortions, removing requirements for helmets on motorcycles, canceling car safety checks, putting "God" into every nook and cranny of public life, and generally acting like a caricature of out of control evangelical populists.
This has nothing to do with conservatism or even anything to do with what GOP was about just 5 years ago. The damage will take years to undo. Missouri is chasing Alabama in every sense. Or, I should say, Talibama.
14
@Vizitei
Tell us what nook and cranny of public life God is being inserted by politicians.
@Vizitei Abort superstition! A world that knows something about nuclear particles should long since have outgrown a medieval superstition. Even in colonial days, midwives knew how to induce abortion with herbal concoctions, but then male doctors took over...
3
@Dr. John come to Missouri and find out. Start with our schools.
1
absurd. it will not turn out well.
3
Seat and watch the collapse of this state. The young and progressive people are going to leave in droves leaving behind sclerotic old males and old church ladies to fend for themselves. We the majority of Americans will be happy to help resettle those wiling to vacate a state that imposes its ill conceived bigotry and assault on women. We should starve their businesses and cut all travel and tourism to their state. Let the world know that they reverted to the Dark Ages. What they have done is unconstitutional to begging with.
18
@JG Well good riddance then. The fishing will be much better when you leave.
Talk about an extreme minority of voices imposing their will on the population at large. How did these politicians become so corrupted?
7
In a recent election we had here in LA we were asked to vote on if porn industry workers should be required to wear condoms. I felt uneasy being asked to make a decision for something like that that was none of my business. The past couple of days’ abortion news have brought that same feeling back.
5
Why I will never set foot in any of those states. Anti-minority, anti-woman.
15
Hurry hurry hurry. Vote Trump/Pence in 2020 and turn *your* home state into Gilead!
6
@wildwest Ghoulead is more like it.
3
These new restrictions on abortion are good news. For it is a great evil when a woman kills her unborn child through an abortion.
1
@D: Says who? It’s a choice of necessity, neither evil nor good. Women should decide that in private consultation with their doctors, without someone else’s religious beliefs and/or the government interfering.
4
@D It's not a child. No matter how much how repeat your belief, it's not true.
4
Is it also a great evil when the man who impregnated her asks her to get an abortion?
4
More misery for Missouri.
6
If you feel strongly, then consider making a real difference. Move to Missouri (or other state which you think is moving in the wrong direction). Become a resident: vote, teach, and campaign there. It can happen; e.g., Virginia and Colorado (and even "bathroom bill" North Carolina).
If you believe that life is sacred, from its earliest moments of conception, then you have to except the notion that women must carry a child to birth, regardless of how the pregnancy occurred. If conception is sacred, then there can not be any contraception. Women, because of the very nature of the relationship between the sexes, must become, again, the weaker sex. Perhaps the next step is: the sexual act is only be for procreation, to do otherwise will be a criminal offense. It’s all so very logical.
They say the sanctity of life is the primary motivation. But If that’s really true, they have a lot more work to do. If life is sacred, then true justice must prevail. If life is sacred, we must first put an end to all wars, we must respect and support each and everyone of us equally - true criminal justice reform, true respect and care for the environment, voting rights equal for all… Let’s implement these first, and then move to such Draconian interpretations of the conception.
2
Oh, yeah.
No longer will we celebrate those painful days of birth, your mother screaming on her back in labor.
No. Now we must celebrate Conception Day, your mother screaming on her back in delight.
No more talk about how you as a baby were crowning for an hour before finally coming out after a day of pushing.
We need to be regaled about Dad's 5 minutes of pushing and how Mom had to finish on her own, later, after she'd secreted out of the sacred Conception chamber.
1
@DMO: Nah, guns will always be more sacred than life for the forced birth zealots.
3
This is the kind of thing that happens when you stay home on Election Day because Bernie isn’t the nominee or your decide to vote for a 3rd party candidate that doesn’t have a snowball’s chance of winning. Please, in 2020 vote for whomever is the Democratic nominee. Ginsburg will not live forever and if it’s 4 more years of Trump, Roe will be overturned by the next zealot the Federalist society puts up for nomination.
26
You are one hundred percent right. But don’t let the effete former commander in chief off the hook. Mitch played hardball while Obama shot hoops in the driveway with his brother in law and worked on another autobiography.
The abortion bills that are passed in largely Republican run states are going only going to become more and more outlandish. These bills are really bait. The Republicans want the Democrats to challenge these bills so they can go directly at Roe vs Wade and over turn it.
This is a much bigger issue...one over an individual's right to control his/her body. If the court does not decide on the path to the ultimate individual right, them all of us have lost the right of self determination. What a contradiction to the expoused philosophy of the GOP.
2
If you are a fan of the Outlander series on Stars, you will recall the witch trial of Claire and Geillis Duncan. It's amazing to see that the level of scientific thinking in significant parts of our country has not advanced beyond this 1750's logic.
15
Has anyone proposed that women at child-bearing age, who suffer from miscarriage (knowingly or unknowingly) may be called for criminal offense as well?
11
@y No such proposal has been made because pro-lifers can make distinctions where there are differences. A miscarriage is not the result of a woman's choice to kill her baby, but rather something that she unwillingly suffers. A miscarriage is tragic, but not immoral. Abortion is both tragic and gravely immoral.
Viagra is against God’s will (aka “morality” in the sense you’re using it.) Curing leukemia is against God’s will. Failing to go to church is against God’s will. Having intercourse for any reason other than procreations against God’s will. Etc, etc, etc.
4
Who decides when it’s a “miscarriage”?Legislators in the exam room in the ER??
7
When do they plan to pass a bill criminalizing when the police shoot and kill unarmed citizens?
33
Do few/most/all women necessarily know they are pregnant by week 8?
16
Many women do NOT know they are pregnant by 8 weeks.
3
It is not unusual to NOT know you are pregnant at10-12 weeks, especially if you have irregular periods.
2
Another stunning example of when people believe in absurdities, they will continue to commit atrocities. As Sinclair Lewis said, when fascism comes to America, it will be wrapped in an American flag, and carrying a cross.
51
A woman should be able to make decisions concerning her life and her body. The State has no business interfering.
24
People have all kinds of beliefs, some religious and some not religious, about when life begins.
In the Roe case the SC was asked to decide when a fetus becomes a person and is entitled to all the rights and responsibilities of US citizenship and when US laws apply to that person.
The US legal system has no concern for non-citizens.
If a French citizen came to the SC and said I do not have freedom of speech in Paris, the SC would tell the person that it has no jurisdiction over the matter.
In Roe the SC made the decision that a non viable fetus is part of a woman’s body and not a US citizen and that a viable fetus is a person protected by all the laws of the US.
People can have all kinds of ideas about when life begins, but the SC had to decide when a fetus became a citizen and they made a wise decision and the only legally acceptable decision possible.
7
I can't wait to see the economic backlash because of all these laws. The GOP sure do feel emboldened right now. Just wait.
19
@Character Count
Exactly! The era of insanity will hopefully come to an end during the next election. Otherwise, there will be no more Democracy!
5
Let's remember that the assault is coming at the state level. Democrats simply haven't paid attention to local politics, and the legislatures and state houses are heavily occupied by ideological zealots. 2020 isn't just about the White House or Congress or the Senate. If we don't stop this trend, and it may already be too late, it will accelerate thanks to the consequences of elections and the control of the Supreme Court. Run, make your case, get elected.
22
@jet45 Keep in mind that the GOP has been undermining democracy in many states since the end of the Civil War. It's hard for Democrats to win elections when Democratic-leaning voters are systematically removed from voting registration lists, when those who manage to remain registered face any number of obstacles to casting a vote, and when election results are rigged (simple to do with voting machines that leave no paper trail for audit/review).
2
I see a whole bunch of states taking themselves out of the running for business relocations/startups, conferences, tourist dollars (including any of mine) and just about any endeavor that will require an educated work force. I also wonder how many doctors will be giving these states a big nope when they are deciding where they want to practice medicine. I know on my next relocation I won't even consider a state that is solidly blue.
20
@Frank Anthony Well, New York and California will welcome the extra business. The rest of the country will be at ease. My internist, FYI, is only 38. And he is thrilled about this.
1
@Frank Anthony Because they tend to be wealthy, a great many doctors are GOP supporters, and as such it's party first. They'll still have plenty of doctors, but the quality of care might decline.
1
@Frank Anthony Solidly blue would increase & grow your business, but that's your regressive, konservative choice.
1
Just before election day, 2016, Harry Belafonte wrote an impassioned piece for this paper laying out what would happen if Trump were elected president. He mentioned our civil rights and women's rights progress over the past 50 years and how a Trump administration would undo the hard work Americans have done to ensure a more egalitarian society. And here we are now, in the midst of just that, thanks to extreme right-wing zealots who are drunk with power and think nothing of putting women back into subservience. Fie on them. Mr. Belafonte, you were right on the money. So sad.
42
The US is really more akin to the EU. The states have significant power wherein the Federal government has limited power. I'm ok with this provided that the federal income tax is adjusted accordingly and that each state stand on its own merit, whereby their is a per capita citizen fee, which is the exact same, eg, for Alabama as it is for Massachusetts. The Federal government can then retrench to national defense, monetary / treasury and other "national" functions and the states can go it alone fiscally. All the huffing & puffing about states rights must be directly correlated to the receipts. Then we will see the real harsh reality of states rights.
8
I live in Missouri and my GOP state rep happily voted for this abomination of a bill. He campaigned in my neighborhood a couple years ago, touting his credentials as a "pro-life, small government conservative," and I asked what exactly is "small government" about him trying to control what I do with my own body?
Of course he had no good answer. But he did remind me how hard he had worked to protect my "freedom" when it came to guns. And thank goodness! I mean, who really cares about having control over my own uterus when I can exercise TRUE freedom and buy as many assault rifles as I want!
Thank you, state rep, for showing me the light. I will need it as we descend back into the dark ages.
124
@shstl Do you remember the Lincoln Douglas debates, before the Civil War? Douglas was in favor of each state deciding if slavery should be allowed. Lincoln however felt that there were some issues that transcended the popular vote. For instance for Lincoln, slavery cannot be justified. For those who are pro life, they walk in the steps of Lincoln. It's not a matter of popular belief, or what the voters want, it's a matter of what is right and what is wrong. Call it natural law, because that's what Lincoln did.
Republicans write laws to suppress women. Take away basic subsidies that do not support the law they create. The unborn is protected. When born, it becomes your responsibility without your right to choose. Republicans want to close planned Parenthood, basic healthcare for women who cannot afford the costs. Insanity rules on the right.
52
I keep saying the same thing: men make women pregnant and a vast number of them don't care. It's not their responsibility because they are not the ones who get pregnant. And on the other side of the coin what about men who demand women get an abortion because a child is inconvenient for them and may ruin their marriage or interfere with their stature. Wasn't there that guy in congress who forced his girlfriend to have an abortion because it might interfere with his re-election?
38
Men do it all time. Republicans who have unwanted pregnancies have abortions but keep it quiet.
5
As quickly as many are willing to prosecute women for abortion procedures, it's interesting that NOTHING is done to the men who have given their 'seed' for the pregnancy. Are women to be the ONLY ones blamed??
42
@betty sher
Yes.
The anti-choice movement has always been about controlling women.
11
Men should be forced to pay for child and if they do not throw them in jail. Woman are equal to men.
If Republicans really really cared about the child , they would not want to the child to suffer. Most Republican men really don’t care about abortions, it just gets votes period.
5
Add Missouri to the list of states, and hopefully others, will be boycotting in every way possible.
31
@alank -- Missouri, aka "Misery".
These laws seem to be driven by ideology and are not based on any empirical evidence that abortions performed by doctors are a threat to public safety or otherwise adversely affect the public welfare. Thus, I believe that one of the legal theories for challenging the law should be that it deprives the doctor of equal protection under the 14th Amendment because it criminalizes performing a medically sound and approved procedure that would not otherwise cause the doctor to lose his or her state-issued medical license.
Sadly, given the current political climate, if the legal argument is based solely on women's rights, we will not get anywhere. I think that this has to be about putting the doctor's rights before women's rights if we are going to make any headway on the latter. In other words, the doctors will be the white knights.
20
@Michael, it’s an interesting idea. Any attorneys out there who would like to respond to this?
1
I have seen and heard multiple interviews with the overwhelmingly white and male lawmakers who passed this garbage and the common thread was that NONE of them had a real grasp on how pregnancy works. Their answers about it have ranged from a woman just knows to women constantly take pregnancy tests to bizarre magical explanations. None of them understood even the basic fact that a woman with a *normal* cycle of 4 weeks would likely not be too bothered by being 2 weeks overdue for your period.
Many factors go into when a woman’s period starts and many of them have nothing to do with being pregnant. Doctors were not consulted on a majority of these new laws. We need to get rid of these lawmakers that are trapped in the amber of the 1950s.
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@Michael
Regardless of whether I agree or not, thanks for a comment that makes me think (instead of the entrenched vitriol).
Back in the bad old days, New York State was more progressive than Canada. We were the socially conservative country. Now up here, we haven't had any abortion law at all for 30 years. The sky hasn't fallen. It's considered a medical procedure, decided on between the woman and doctor. I would never think to tell some random woman what to do. I've known women who primarily had abortions for stuff like Downs or major fetal abnormalities but I guess that would not be allowed now either. Wow, just wow.
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All I can say is that this is outrageous and the only way to stop this tide of anti-abortion legislation is to vote out the legislators responsible. Women (and men) must become single issue voters for reproductive rights the way anti-abortion supporters are for these horrible attempts at interfering in women’s ability to make their own decisions.
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Someone needs to point out to Parsons that there have always been abortions and there always will be. Making them illegal doesn't stop them.
While they're at it, they should point out to him that the number of abortions has been decreasing in recent years and part of the reason is that the ACA made health care and contraception more affordable and easy to obtain.
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@DR. You’re absolutely right, although if they overturn Roe v Wade, their next target will be making sure that company health insurance is not required to pay for contraception.
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Gonna be hard to attract educated women to study, work and live in these states. Gonna be hard to attract men married to women and/or with daughters to these states.
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Probably not.
Educated women can always pay for medical tourism. It would take one day of PTO and. $500 out of pocket payment to run across state lines and have the procedure.
And I dont think most fathers are thinking about their little princess having an abortion when considering a transfer or relocation.
This will ultimately hurt the poor and overburden the foster care system as these things always do.
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@Julie Some states are making it a crime to go to Canada, Germany or my country Italy (Florence to be precise) or other places for an abortion. So, if a woman needs that procedure they’ll first need to move their residency permanently to another state.
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@donow, good point.....going to also be hard to attract capital for growth industries, but as long as the wealth is taken from Massachusetts and Manhattan and redistributed to poor states, then it won't have real consequence.
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Living in St. Louis for nearly two decades now has shown me how truly out of touch and incompetent the Missouri legislature is on the whole. There are some voices of reason in there, but they are almost always drowned out by the voices of ignorance, hypocrisy, and outright hatred. After a while you come to expect nothing good from the Republican legislation in this state, as a means of protecting yourself from disappointment.
But this is truly the worst thing they have done in my time here, the most blatant middle finger they have raised to everyone who does not agree with their severe and uncompromising religious convictions.
I can just imagine how tickled with glee the people who support this are, how much pleasure they are getting in the knowledge of how much pain and hardship this will cause their political enemies. Many probably have the unshakable belief that they are actually doing something good for women in this state, that they are saving them from eternal damnation.
Once again, Republicans have brought shame upon this state.
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National boycott on business headquartered in anti-abortion law passing states. AND flip and hold the Senate.
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@Mike B, Flipping the senate is the key, to do that, the top of the ticket must be able to flip, for example, Arizona which is in the balance, or run very strong there, only Biden is positioned to do that. Dems better get serious about winning and subjugate some of the other important issues to winning.
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Biden will never win the general; besides, he’ll make Trump look good when he continues to smell women’s hair until the next election.
Any woman, regardless of her color, still voting for GOP after anti abortion laws, should be sentenced to live in the states where these unconstitutional, inhuman and misogynistic laws are passed. We, the women, deserve better than Gilead.
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Come to Maine! We elected our first female govenor and our state has done a 180 since the days of Paul LePage. Among other things, Maine is very close to passing a bill that will require MaineCare and private health insurers to cover abortion services. There is life after poor leadership.
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Yes and Maine passed “ rank choice voting” because LePage never won by a majority vote. Biggest mistake I made was to vote for Susan Collins. Everyone I know says the same thing.
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@Julie Head Thanks for this good news, every thing else is depressing.
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@Julie Head How about voting out Susan Collins?
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The GOP follows the lead of their misogynistic leader Trump and continue a war on women until they are satisfied with their version of a Handmaid's Tale comes to life.
The only way to stop the scourge is to vote these individuals who cater to the evangelicals, who themselves are hypocrites.
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Will not be watching season 3 of The Handmaid’s Tale. Not when we’re living it.
The last fifty years of fighting marching voting campaigning and we are rapidly sliding back behind square one.
When will women be persons under the law?
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@Chickpea. When we start going on a rampage as men do.
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Ironic that these are caused the "heartbeat" bills as it's very clear from the cruel, draconian policies (no exceptions for rape or incest or a non-viable child after birth?) that the writers of these bills have no heart.
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@Ivy They are sadists and should be in jail. That is what the French did to the Marquis de Sade, at the time of the french revolution.
I have an idea. In the Greek play “Lysistrata,” the women refused to have sex until the warring men made peace. How about the women in these states do the same thing. That may cause the men to reconsider their votes.
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As the Governor of Alabama admitted, these so called laws won’t hold up as long as Rowe v Wade is still the federal law. That gives at least some time. There is still a chance that Roberts won’t vote to overturn it when the time comes. We just need Ginsburg to hang on. Maybe it’s better that this challenge happens now before we lose her.
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I have always said, once the pro-life supporters start adopting and financially supporting the babies who are born in to this world unwanted, or to drug addicted mothers, or in to poverty and abuse (emotional, sexual, physical) - I will support their stance.
But pro-lifers simply wish to appear Christian in their actions. To vote against abortion (even for rape and incest) makes them feel superior and righteous.
But in truth, pro-lifers are allowing unwanted children to live horrible lives, by not stepping up to the plate and caring for those children they have demanded be born. That is not being Christian, that is being arrogant, selfish and cruel.
To Gov Mike Parson who has voted for and demanded this bill be passed - how many unwanted babies, sir will you personally accept responsibility for? As a Christian who is declaring all lives matter - surely you will fulfill God's word by personally housing, caring for and loving the innocent children that will be born because of your actions.
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If they are really pro life , they wouldn’t have justified taking kids from parents at border. They gave themselves away when they approved.
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@Sue It has never been about "life." Look at correlation between pro death penalty and pro life.
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It's no coincidence that the same states banning abortion are the ones with the highest infant mortality and poverty rates.
In these states a fetus is precious until it's born. Then — you're on your own, kiddo.
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Conservative Republicans sure love fetuses, but they hate people -- particularly women.
They are NOT "pro-life"; they are pro-fetus. They hate the living, as demonstrated by the fact that they hate everything needed to sustain and flourish life after birth, like healthcare, financial assistance, housing assistance, education and the like for living people who need these vital public services for the babies to children to adolescents to adults that they insist be brought into this world, often to women who lack these resources on their own.
All this makes these laws not compassionate, but decidedly cruel.
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Don’t forget hate for natural resources that sustain life.
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@JB Actually you mischaracterize the right. It isn't about eliminating support. It is about getting Public Money out of that role. Ever heard the term "moral hazard?" That's what's up with "public housing," etc etc. People are naturally lazy. Welfare will always spiral out of control if allowed to expand to it's "logical" dimensions.
@Bill I'm not advocating for public housing, and I actually think you do need to make all public assistance uncomfortable due in part to lazy inclinations. That said, if states like MO are going to insist on the woman giving birth to a baby that she didn't want to bring into this world due to lack of resources, then you better be prepared to support that human life beyond birth, which means publicly funded healthcare, education, social services, etc. You can't just be "pro-life" before the kid is born -- which is why I argue that they aren't "pro-life" but "pro-fetus".
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As I have said before, I'd bet trust funds that if those antiabortion male politicians got their girlfriends pregnant they be singing a different tune. Especially the married ones.
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@Silence Dogood, as a women's healthcare provider who has questioned thousands of women about her birth, abortion, and miscarriage history, I can tell you in full confidence that the majority of women I met who had abortions (admitted them, anyway) were college-educated, higher-demographic white women. The daughters and lovers of rich white men.
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@Silence Dogood Bingo. Check out Scott DesJarlais of Tennessee, a Republican pro-life doctor who slept with patients and recorded himself (??) telling the woman he was having an affair with (he was married at the time) to have an abortion. He was re-elected even though this information came out before the election. I have a Christian friend who is a wonderful person, but we don't talk politics except this once, when I said something critical of DesJarlais and she said, "Perhaps he has repented and God has forgiven him."
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-5229243/Congressman-Scott-DesJarlais-says-God-forgives-him.html
And here he is proudly voting for an abortion ban:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2015/05/16/congressman-who-advised-ex-wife-to-seek-abortion-votes-for-late-term-abortion-ban/?utm_term=.34d27291f247
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@Hdb One of our biggest problems these days is that Trump has normalized lying. You cannot embarrass him or people like him. Catch them red handed with video tape evidence and they'd still claim they were innocent.
I've read that prisons are full of people with this same kind of mentality.
Things are getting out of hand ... It's time to regulate and tax religions ... those who profess religious beliefs must state, adhere, and be held accountable to those beliefs ... standards must be set ... punishments must be meted out to those who are religious hypocrites or use false piety for political and economic gain ...
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The fact that they "won" a ban on abortion will be cold comfort as men stand by and watch wives or daughters die a completely preventable death. America has turned pregnancy into a crime punishable by death.
21
Another win for the big government types who think bureaucrats should monitor and control every aspect of our lives. Hopefully the previous court decisions which showed this sort of thing is unconstitutional will hold up.
11
@Bill Kowalski
No, this is a "win" for the "small-government" hypocrites who want the government out of their lives, but not out of pregnant women's lives.
A lifelong government worker (CPS), I often encountered anti-government types. I would often ask them, who do you call when your house is being broken into? "Uh...the police." They are government workers (county and municipality).
These folks believe it is more important to protect an 8-week-old fetus than a 13 y.o. impregnated by her abusive step-father., or any female whose life and health are threatened by the pregnancy.
"But the fetus is innocent." Isn't a 13 y.o. who was sexually abused?
Holding the House needs to be a recurring strategy. I am not confident about Senate and Presidency because of electoral college and disunity on the left.
But you need to keep the House at all costs. Otherwise these guys will push through a law that is a nationwide ban. If this law was challenged, well, that won’t end well either with a stacked court.
The states are a lost cause for 50 years.
That 2016 election was something else.
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@Practical Thoughts
I can not find the space to forgive non-Hillary voters.
1
Looks like I will be canceling my trip to St Louis this summer and will be spending my dollars in states that aren't having a war on women. Boycotting Missouri, Alabama, Georgia.
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Liberals and moderates in Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, Iowa, North Carolina and MAYBE Arizona have to step up big time if this country is going anywhere positive.
Boycotts are cool. Marches are good for rallying attention. But voting is the only thing that drives tangible change.
The South, Kentucky, WVA, Ohio and the prairie states are right wing strongholds and lost causes for at least 50 years. You have a Civil Rights era type generations fight in those states. They are going to go their own way without concern for the consequences.
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@Practical Thoughts You are right, EVERYONE needs to vote, take someone to the polls, get friends motivated, and reach out to potential candidates and encourage them to run which I have done and will continue to do. It's our democracy that is now at stake in this election.
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Yup. Going to be doing that where I live. Also, for states with voter ID, helping older people get personal identification cards is big too.
9
It’s a war on women, plain and simple. Fight back: VOTE!
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Tragic for those who need abortions. Next it will be birth control. These people need to mind their own business. How about putting that energy into saving the planet from over-population and climate change?
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Seems like American politics is at a feverish pace. All for nothing:
1) Lower courts will over-rule Missouri, Alabama, and so forth.
2) Superior Court will send back, not wanting to raise tempers during a Presidential election year.
3) And if Roe becomes overturned (doubtful): Then what will our society become? What regulations will prosecute abortion providers, and how medical emergencies for terminating pregnancies will be decided, based on what criteria, what documentation, with what oversight? Why not prosecute the aborting pregnant mothers and their supporting family members on the grounds of abetting "murder," rather than jailing only the abortion providers?
Finally, are we surrendering our health privacy?
10
Add Missouri to the unfortunate growing lists of states that should be boycotted. States should be boycotted economically. Take conventions and vacations elsewhere and support those states that have not and will not pass these draconian laws. If these states feel that women should suffer consequences from an unwanted pregnancy, then it is our duty to make sure that they suffer too. The message is your actions also have consequences.
40
We have 2 separate states in the US, not unlike the union and confederacy. The Midwest/south and the coasts. Sadly, we are as far apart as we have ever been. I see a lot of criticism of one or the other but that helps nothing. What can possibly unite us?
13
Criminalizing non-consensual impregnation and using asset forfeiture laws to force men to fully fund 18 years of child rearing seems like a better deterrent to unwanted pregnancies than criminalizing abortion.
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@Megan I agree.
Put the onus back on the men who contribute nothing but trouble and blame everyone else but themselves.
2
And making it VERY clear to boys what they are in for if they break these laws.
@Megan
Good idea.
As the mother of a high school junior I promise that No child of mine will apply to a university in a state that doesn’t respect a woman’s right to choose.
You can’t call yourself pro life and cut access to healthcare and limit options for family planning.
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Well you can, but it means nothing.
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@Deirdre They're NOT pro life: they're anti abortion. Many if not most of them are pro capital punishment (especially for "the other"). Hypocrites all.
1
I moved to exurban Saint Louis in 2011 from upstate NY near Albany where I lived for most of the previous 30 years having moved there from LI for college.
I am glad I moved there solely because of the cost of living being so low that I might actually be able to afford retirement one day - an impossibility had I stayed in NY.
Yet, the price I have paid is to move back in time - to a time "when Jesus wrote the Constitution".... to an state that is becoming so red, it soon will be "infra-red". It is very disheartening to the point that I feel that I need to keep my mouth shut to survive. This sort of legislation is not helping my mental state, let alone the state where I live.
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There is a reason these places have lower costs of living.
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@VJR
Rush Limbauqh, the James and Younger Brothers are from Missouri.
There are no saints in either St. Louis or St. Joseph Missouri. St. Louis is much more dangerous on a per capita gun homicide basis than Chicago.
Is there any hope in and for Kansas City, Missouri?
St. Louis has a great zoo. Along with proximity to Cahokia.
2
@Blackmamba - Native and current resident here. You're right on all points - but the "dangerous" part of the equation is a bit skewed. The City of St. Louis is actually quite small, compared to the large metropolitan area that surrounds it. But that's St. Louis County, and most of it is very, very safe. (Almost Normal Rockwell in places.) But the homicide rate - which is indeed high in the "City" - gets mistakenly attributed to the entire metropolitan area.
In any event, Missouri has very little to recommend it, other than cost of living, a great symphony orchestra and a great baseball team.
1
So it's a war on women.
Remember that old saying--"Scratch a woman, find a rage?"
You ain't seen nothin' yet.
By the way, I was wavering on who to support in 2020.I just made a contribution to Elizabeth Warren's campaign. It's clearer to me than it's ever been that we need a woman to run this country. Preferably many women.
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@AH
Not just any woman. The governor of Alabama who signed the bill is a woman.
2
And with the stroke of a pen, women and the men who care about them are relegated back to the dark ages…
1
I wish the anti-abortion folks would get their morals straight. In Alabama the fetus is a person at conception. In other states now, the fetus is a person when there is a fetal heartbeat. I'm so confused.
10
Thank you for your chart of the states that have past laws that restrict women’s freedom to make decisions regarding their own bodies.
It is a perfect guide for me to make sure that I don’t accidentally do anything that would financially support these states or any of their industries or products. Of course I realize that I may not have choices sometimes but I will always look for alternatives if available. I will also cancel any trips to these states and make sure not to plan any either. I’m following what my morals dictate. You know, just my religious convictions.
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The unraveling of progress in the US continues at an astronomic speed
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@Nabil I'm not so sure about astronomical speed, but it certainly has had the relentlessness of a tsunami since January 20th, 1981.
14