Utah Has Now Made Miscarriage A Criminal Offense
I've mentioned before that I had a miscarriage several years ago. Emotionally, the scars lasted for years and years. My poor sister, pregnant again after two recent miscarriages, is holding her breath, hoping that this pregnancy goes all the way to term. For someone hoping for a child, a miscarriage can be a devastating thing.
And now in Utah, un-fricking-believably, it can now be a criminal thing too.
Utah is not a state known for its legislative sanity. This, after all, is a state that recently made headlines for proposing to honor gun manufacturers on Martin Luther King Day and for considering the elimination of 12th grade to cut back on education spending.
Well, it just got a whole lot worse.
Utah just became the first state in the U.S. to criminalize miscarriage and punish women for having or seeking an illegal abortion. Utah's "Criminal Miscarriage" law:
- expands the definition of illegal abortion to include miscarriages
- removes immunity protections for women who have or seek illegal abortions
- treats women as presumptive criminals and leaves them open to criminal prosecution
But even among states that punish illegal abortions, this "Criminal Miscarriage" law is unique. It not only punishes individuals who perform illegal procedures; it punishes women.
This legislation was prompted by the case of a 7 month pregnant 17 year old girl who paid a man $150 to beat her until it caused a miscarriage, but make no mistake, this is all about making it impossible to have an abortion, and controlling women through their reproductive options. But don't write off that prosecuting women for miscarriages is some fantastical dystopian ravings of an ultra-liberal, think again:
So, after making it near impossible and mostly illegal for undocumented (and even documented) women to buy their own health insurance that covers abortions, after making it impossible to get free or reduced cost health insurance that covers abortions–the state of Utah feels it’s important to then criminalize women who don’t have “legal” abortions.
But…what is a “legal” abortion? Is getting advice on what herbs to take from a midwife “legal?” Is taking various medications that many Latinas can get from Mexico and other Latin American countries “legal?” Is a coat hanger “legal?”
Because there seems to be no definition of what equates “legal” written into this legislation, that means any woman anywhere who for whatever reason miscarries–will be subject to criminal charges. And lest you think that prosecutors have ever shown restraint when it comes to pressing criminal charges against women who are making their own *often times very LEGAL* choices about their bodies, please, surf around the National Advocates for Pregnant Women website for a while. This organization of lawyers that defend pregnant women from criminal prosecution, has worked to defend women who have done such things as being pregnant and addicted to various drugs to refusing c-sections to being “uppity” in the birthing room.
Unbelievable. The legislation is written so loosely that any district attorney could prosecute any woman for "reckless behavior" that results in losing a pregnancy. Drinking too much, maybe. How about not wearing a seatbelt? Or not taking pre-natal vitamins/getting pre-natal care? Where does it end? I gotta ask: when will we ever stop treating everyone else except rich, white men as second class citizens?
From a state that has whorrin hatch as a senator?
republicanism/conservatism is a mental illness, it has almost totally destroied our economy, our morals, and the sprituality of America!
In it's current incarnation it is a spiritual disease. Leprosy of the soul.
conservatives are the mental illness, they control
the republiCON party
It really is time to end the tax exemption for religions.
I've read through all the comments and it seems like people have reacted without researching. A simple read through of the bill shows that it only covers miscarriages caused by an "intentional, knowing, or reckless" act of the mother. (Line 77). Unintentional or accidental miscarriages are not criminalized by this bill.
It's fine to disagree with this bill, but do so based on an informed decision, not a knee-jerk reaction to a straw man argument.
"Intentional, knowing, reckless" is open to so much interpretation that it is tantamount to making miscarriage illegal. Everything from "you should have known better than to go jogging" to "it was reckless when you went out in the snow to go to work, you knew you could slip and fall". It is naive to assume that those interpretations would be limited to only women who did things specifically to cause a miscarriage. Intentional, knowing, and reckless could be applied to any risk taken.
And consider this -- any time a woman miscarried, her behavior would come under scrutiny. Instead of being comforted, she'd be interrogated.
mormons are such fine people.... oh wait, didnt they slaughter hundreds of people in the 1800'? one word, glenn beck, mormon and recovering[?] junkie.....
their penchant for kidnapping women for the harems of their poohbas in the 1800s...
Author Sir Arthur Conan Doyle wrote of this horrid group of scum named "The Avenging Angels" in his first Holmes novel "A Study In Scarlet".
These Morans looted and killed men and children to kidnap the women and wives of other towns to fill their beds.
"Let's talk dirty to the animals"
1857 Mountain Meadows Massacre.
Horrible story.
I pledge allegiance to the Constitution of the United States of America, and to the republic which it established, one nation from many peoples, promising liberty and justice for all
think every fetus should have a chance to grow up and vote Republican.
... you'd not only be baptized, you'd be registered to vote Republican, and then daddy and mommy could vote for you until your majority.
criminalize abortion when the supreme court has ruled that it is every woman's right to obtain one? Seems to me any such laws are null and void from the very start and have no legal force or legitimacy.There can be no such thing as "illegal" abortion.
They want to again place abortion on trial this is just the latest in a long line of state laws that violate Roe v. wade. But even within this mind frame this is extreme I’ve never ever heard of something like this. This shouldn’t make it past a district court it's clearly a bs law.
yes, i agree
But for the "holier than thou" crowd, that's a plus. These laws simply don't work if actually applied.
But they don't want a law that works. They just want to be able to point at someone and yell "Baby Killer!". I think it kinda gets 'em off.
Corruption favors the wealthy.
Yeah, this is the part of the article that confuses me too. Didn't the Supreme Court uphold a woman's right to choose? So what constitutes an illegal abortion if abortions have already been ruled legal? Seems like the wingnuts in Utah are making up things again.
http://le.utah.gov/~2010/bills/hbillenr/hb001
I doubt if their intentions are any good. Their intentions are like an army tank coming down a sidewalk. I think it's interesting to try to figure out exactly why they feel so threatened by women. Why are they always trying to get back to where they came from? That's not my original thought, but I forgot where I read it.
for some reason. Here is one that works for me.
http://le.utah.gov/~2010/bills/hbillint/hb001...
That's the link I followed to get there. Don't know why mine didn't work.
Mine's incomplete. Sorry. The others work.
I clicked the wrong button and then couldn't figure out how to delete it, but it lets me edit it. :-) So, just ignore this comment.
Your link was fine. I failed to copy the entire address. Thanks for the link, as it gave much to think about. Those kind of people will just keep chipping away until they get their way.
When will we ever stop treating everyone else except rich, white men as second class citizens?
When America stops listening to thugs like Glenn Beck and Lou Dobbs, and stops electing millionaires to office.
It'd be a start, at least.
It will be a glorious day when we have people in political office who aren't filthy rich and/or aren't in somebody's back pocket.
NOBODY 2012
"Where does it end? I gotta ask: when will we ever stop treating everyone else except rich, white men as second class citizens?"
When you restrict your subordination to doing what's right instead of "the rule of law". Face it, "law(s)" = the whims of a politician.
outlaw farting. I'll be in trouble.
Oh - nevermind; I have no reason to go to a state run by insane religious zealots who are frightened of women.
This seems the next logical advancement in the struggle for reproductive rights for women. In the past, the lawmakers have been reluctant to prosecute the woman for seeking a legal termination for her unwanted pregnancy. Now they seem to embrace the idea.
I pity the woman who becomes the first person to be made an example of in this way. It seems like a form of legalized terrorism to me... Prosecute a few women for this offense and then others will be too scared to seek out a safe and legal termination. But make no mistake, women will continue to have abortions. Throughout history, this has never changed. But what changed in the 70's, was access to safe and legal procedures for all women in this country.
I don't understand what it is about pregnancy that people think is any of anyone else's business but the people involved. What is it about lawmakers that make them believe that a woman cannot know what is in her own best interest? Why don't lawmakers do more to achieve prevention of pregnancies with better sexual education (and by this I don't mean fear-based messages about sex or abstinence education) and better access to birth control? This would do more towards reducing the number of abortions than any other law determined to prosecute and persecute women.
Only when the last tree has died
and the last river has been poisoned and the last fish has been caught
will we realize we cannot eat money.
"I don't understand what it is about pregnancy that people think is any of anyone else's business but the people involved."
Indeed, Roe v. Wade was decided on the basis of privacy rights. Pregnancy is no other's business. I think it is privacy that sticks in the craw of the authoritarian types who are constantly trying todeny women their rights. A lot of these religious types wholly subscribe to the biblical notion of a man's dominion over women., or vice versa, the proper role of women as one of subservience to men. They can't abide anything that would upset that twisted kind of social arrangement. On a larger scale, I think the right wing is basically anti-democratic and would prefer a totalitarian state, regardless their rhetoric to the otherwise. Any significant or meaningful example of a functioning right to privacy is antithetical to the establishment of totalitarianism, in any degree. That's why I've always seen the overturn of Roe v. wade as a must-achieve objective for these guys. It's an obstacle to their idea of what kind of nation this country will be.
... the whole illegal wiretapping thing brought to us by BushCo severely impacts/erodes the definition of privacy.
And it's been demonstrated that when draconian/elaborate security measures don't work against the intended threat (stopping terrorism), they get re-tasked to other objectives (stopping gangs, stopping illegal immigrants, etc.)
Who knew that the movie "The Hills Have Eyes" was actually filmed in Utah and not in Nevada? If the Democrats had any sense, they would establish the Nuclear Waste Repository in Utah, since Nevada's Yucca Mountain is out of the running. The only regret that I might entertain regarding that suggestion is the scenario from "A Canticle For Liebowitz" where this particular religious order might actually survive for tens of thousands of years, instead of them being put down like the mad dogs that they actually are. These maroons were chased out of New York State many years ago -- any chance of driving them completely out of the USA?
(My sincere apologies to mad dogs everywhere for casting them in the same craziness as LDS !)
"Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable."
-- John F. Kennedy
We need to call for an international boycott of all things Utah! N.O.W. etc. should call for this!
Utah is known internationally in the computer industry. The Provo area is the nation's third-largest producer of computers and related equipment. Find out specifically a major computer product that is made there and stop buying it.
The Sundance film festival held in Park City every January/February??? How about a change in venue Robert Redford?
Stop going to Utah for any vacations. Start a campaign to write to the head of their tourism industry and let them have it.
This is what we need to do with states that pass stupid, punitive laws that are flat out discriminatory.
As the old saying goes Nicole, "If a man were the one who carried the baby abortion would be a rite of passage."
Any state as blatantly backward in their thinking, educational systems (especially sex education/family planning for young women) needs to be publicly SHUNNED.
We need to make them feel it where it will hurt. $$$$$$$$
(BTW Nicole....as to the whole "uppity" women in the birthing room situation. I never had to worry about that. I was an "uppity" woman in the comfort of my own home when I delivered 3 of my 4 sons. And I did get a little bit uppity during the whole transition thang....Ha!!!!)
"The US has an army of 90,000 soldiers in Afghanistan and is spending $100bn a year, but has still been unable to defeat 20,000-25,000 Taliban who receive no pay at all." - Patrick Cockburn
... Kansas.
continue to have as many white babies as possible have anything to do with the "white majority" maintaining its "majority" status over the next, what?, thirty years or so----and absolutely nothing to do with whether one is Republican or Democrat???
dandy
just recently there was a kerfluffle about a billboard in a Atlanta, GA just recently targeting women of color.
http://blogs.ajc.com/political-insider-jim-ga...
Only when the last tree has died
and the last river has been poisoned and the last fish has been caught
will we realize we cannot eat money.
that is one of the biggest concerns of "The Family" and the rest of the christian right. They are afraid of the Muslim population--along with brown and black people. That is why we are killing them "over there" in two wars, and why this new attack on women. That is why they don't want women to work, blame them for every social problem--that is why the quiverfull movement is gaining, that is why they home school. All of this plays into the desire to keep things as they were in 1950. Biblical law, Dominionism, Revisionism and christian nationalism are behind a lot that is going on in this country right now.
Joseph Mengele would be proud. But should they include the black ones?
"Someday somebody related to some of these sufferers, these victims, these collaterally damaged souls, may try to kill you. And I have to tell you, I think you’ll have it coming." - Christopher Cooper
he, she, it is responsible for most misscarriages.
Also mscarriages.
a "home remedy" for unwanted pregnancy that has been a stalwart of my family (Mother's side) for generations. It nearly did me in, but for the saving grace of a nosy neighbor and an Air Force hospital incubator.
It's amazing what some women will do to conceal that gestational calender, what with a husband away on TDY. That whole "immaculate conception" story just doesn't hold up to scientific scrutiny like it used to, don't you know.
-
;-)
"Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable."
-- John F. Kennedy
God is responsible for the deaths of billions and billions of people. I wish we could catch Him.
He's a slippery fellow.
NOBODY 2012
My very first thought after reading the post: "The Handmaid's Tale"
Say what you mean. Mean what you say. But don't say it mean.
Why don't they just change the name of their state from "Utah" to "Gilead"?
Never trust anyone who insists that patriotism requires you to blindfold yourself with the flag.
"Rain Without Thunder"
That film was even more on point. Yet it disappeared without a trace because the critics thought it was "shrill". Yeah, so unlikely that women could get jailed for "fetal murder". Such a fantasy.
There's always free cheddar in the mousetrap, baby. - Tom Waits
How old is this movie? Is it on DVD?
NOBODY 2012
Thanks for the tip.
What's next? Flogging? Stoning?
... what a show! The Inquisition, here we go! La-la-la-la.
What wrong with an inquisition if you have nothing to hide? Its patriotic to submit to inquisitions.
to move into Utah and just start auditing everyone!!!
When will there be an end to these cultist whack jobs?
"Egotism is the anesthetic that dulls the pain of Stupidity" - Frank Leahy
Have one religious group attempt to "cure" another religious group!
I'll bet that will go over well. We could even end with the next set of the Crusades in Utah.. Sounds like an interesting movie idea! :)
Only when the last tree has died
and the last river has been poisoned and the last fish has been caught
will we realize we cannot eat money.
... called 'Examination Day,' where a young man and his parents are nervous because he's facing a series of state-mandated tests.
The surprise ending is that the young man is sentenced to death because his IQ exceeds the state's limit.
If the White Christian nutjobs get their way, it won't just be abortion on their To-Do-Away-With list.
And my mother suffered three third-trimester stillbirths due to Rh negative incompatability. I don't remember the details, but I know she was questioned by a police detective at the local Catholic hospital.
I think this was pretty common in the 50s and 60s.
A former award-winning journalist and lifelong class warrior, keeping a jaundiced eye on the Washington elite.
Bit by bit.
Only when the last tree has died
and the last river has been poisoned and the last fish has been caught
will we realize we cannot eat money.
State owned Utah-rus
Blacks, Latinos, Gays, Women. Running out of groups to hate.
gets arrested in Utah after having a legal abortion, only to be charged for an illegal miscarriage?
Just watch. Republicans are going to conflate the two intentionally.
Wait until a woman who's had a completely accidental miscarriage is blamed for it and literally treated like a criminal simply because she's human and didn't do everything absolutely perfectly...especially if she's poor.
This legislation is not merely unjust -- it is profoundly, insanely misogynistic and any woman of child-bearing age who would actually want to continue living in Utah after this either despises her own gender or is quite simply not in her right mind.
Never trust anyone who insists that patriotism requires you to blindfold yourself with the flag.
But also that they will use this to bypass Roe vs Wade. I think that was the intention all along. The definition of "illegal miscarriage" is I think intentionally vague.
The emotional pain of miscarrying a child is bad enough -- but then to have people who should be supporting you turn on you and not only blame you for the child's death but accuse you of committing a crime, and all because you may have in a moment of absent-mindedness exercised poor judgment????
I wouldn't wish such a fate on my worst enemy.
Never trust anyone who insists that patriotism requires you to blindfold yourself with the flag.
DaveZ is not missing the point at all. It's EXACTLY the point. Every legal decision on this subject chips away at Roe vs. Wade. It doesn't matter a fig to the stupid Republicans that women innocent of even considering an abortion get thrown under the proverbial bus. It's all about getting rid of that pernicious 1973 decision (probably made by a bunch longhaired commie hippies) that actually gave women rights over their own bodies.
ALL of these steps are about RvW. Don't even think they're not. It's been one long march to shoving women back into the breeding box. And we're definitely going to get there, pretty damn soon.
There's always free cheddar in the mousetrap, baby. - Tom Waits
it is without question the statute is unconstitutional. But what I want to know is . . . WHY would a woman or gay EVER vote Republican? I mean I get not voting Dem. But on what planet do they think it is in their interest to vote GOP?
Why?? I think the women who vote that way feel that the Republicans are the more "morally fit" party.
Truly low information voters...
Every week the church tells them who to vote for.
Why would a woman embrace LDS polygamy after this?
I voted GOP county commissioner as "affirmative action", because one of his relatives was a Medal of Honor veteran and I thought the Rethug would have our best interests at heart. He has just reneged on a campaign promise and refused to repeal a discriminatory bill he swore to take down, before election.
do women, minorities and homosexuals vote for a party that HATES them and bases campaign promises and policies against them?
NOBODY 2012
Why didn't the silly bitch just purchase an herbal abortive?
They're not 100%, but a cash transaction, perhaps through a catalogue or bought in another state, and she'd be free and clear.
Diabolus est Deus Inversus
More "dystopian ravings" from a fanatical liberal? Didn't you go to the linked Latina at Vivirlatino.com? The whole purpose of the law is to target the undocumented unwed mother taking herbs. This girl who paid to have herself beaten is just an excuse to get at the very remedy you propose.
“Why would anyone with a functioning brain believe this guy?”
Some guy with an eating disorder
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~~~~ [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abortifacient]
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~~~~ [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nutmeg]
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"Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable."
-- John F. Kennedy
I am SO done with you.
There's always free cheddar in the mousetrap, baby. - Tom Waits
Paying some one to beat you?
I'm curious, if a husband punches his pregnant wife in the stomach and she miscarriages, which one will the Utah police arrest?
Diabolus est Deus Inversus
of course.
That baby was wanted and planned. We had names picked out. It was emotionally devastating to me and my husband.
About a month before, I had gone to my family practice doctor for something, and told him about how many hours I was working, and how tired I was. He told me to decrease my hours at work at the stressful job "because this pregnancy could be in trouble." My bosses wouldn't hear of it. "You are on salary--you work as many hours as we tell you to."
In this case, was the miscarriage just one of those accidents that happens in many pregnancies? Was it my "fault" for not following orders? Was it the boss's "fault" for not allowing me to follow doctor's orders?
...which is why I said what I did in an earlier post. It's bad enough for a woman to suffer a miscarriage -- but blaming the mother for the death of the child and charging her with criminal conduct because she may have exercised less-than-perfect judgment (or may be unable to afford regular pre-natal checkups) is positively inhuman since it only blames the victim and adds insult to injury.
Never trust anyone who insists that patriotism requires you to blindfold yourself with the flag.
The Utah Taliban , you got it Lurk .
Insanity , it is what it is , there is no understanding it .
but Sen Jim Bunning is holding up extending UI benefits. One of his more compassionate remarks was "tough shit".
His website takes out of state comments. As always, be as repectful as you can, deserving or not.
http://bunning.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?Fu...
Thanks to those who email him.
First, I would like to note that I am against this bill in its entirety. That said, I don't know if it's something they just changed or not, but that's misrepresenting what it says as of now. The language states that it is only miscarriages that are induced by a physician, not natural. Additionally, there was language in the bill, while still technically true to the same definitions, could be confusing and cause people to misinterpret it meaning. That language was crossed out of the final draft of the bill.
Here's the actual bill: http://le.utah.gov/~2010/bills/hbillenr/hb001...
Again, I am still against this bill and am not defending it in the slightest. I just also like to make sure that we are factual and know what we are talking about. Otherwise, we can discredit ourselves before a debate even begins.
Somebody please let me know if it's I who misunderstood something, myself. Thanks. :-)
From the article:
When will government of the people, by the politicians, for the corporations perish from this Earth?
Not soon enough!
Human behaivior, the existing and proposed laws of Utah, their enforcement, the reaction to them, and this post itself demonstrate the lunacy in which this nation finds itself embroiled when mixed together.
1) 17 year old 7 month pregnant girl. Stupid enough.
2) Boyfriend threatens to leave her if she has baby. Worse.
3) Girl solicits scuzz bag to kick her to induce miscarriage. Pathetic.
4) Girl and scuzz bag both prosecuted and plead guilty under current law.
5) Judge changes charge against scuzz bag from attemtped murder to attemtped
illegal abortion. Prosecutor pissed, Judge probably a whack job.
6) Another Judge sentences girl to custody. Later drops charge after lawyer
"persuades" him what she plead guilty to was not a crime. WTF???
7) Outraged legislators (woman included) introduce new law, badly drafted
to remedy non criminal act that was, in fact prosecuted successfully.
8) Legitimate questions about flawed draft raised, hypothetical examples
of abuse by prosecutors noted.
9) Because of topic, all manner of sinister inplications and motives are
asserted on blogs by groups with vested interest in topic.
10)Blogs begin to link to each other. Tangential side hypotheticals and
motives are added.
11)Commenters react with prejudices about places and religions.
12)Boycott of state proposed.
I know I for one, will never watch that HBO program about polygamy or go to Arches National Park ever again.
“Why would anyone with a functioning brain believe this guy?”
Some guy with an eating disorder
"when will we ever stop treating everyone else except rich, white men as second class citizens?
NEVER!!!
This is what the citizens of the U.S.A. can expect if the American Taliban get their way. Utah is an illegal theocracy. If a prospective politician isn't a member of the Mormon Church he won't get very far up the ladder. The church controls everything that goes on in the Utah legislature and they would like nothing better than to control what goes on in the rest of the country, the Constitution be damned.
once used to make ephedrine (used in methamphetamine manufacturing) that grows wild all over Utah?
"Parachutes are allowed in checked or carry-on baggage, but may not be worn in flight."
---Southwest Airlines
Go ahead and punish the mormon women. They have such low, self-esteem anyway, this law is only fitting of their "place in life".
Don't be naive, the mormon women voted for it too! Bust 'em all.
Joseph Smith is only a cultist.
We're fast coming up on the national situation described in the 1992 film Rain Without Thunder. This was a really excellent film, a pseudo-documentary set in 2045 about a young woman jailed for "fetal murder", starring Jeff Daniels and Betty Buckley. I found it pretty devastating when I first saw it.
The critics thought otherwise. The vast majority thought it was "shrill" or "a fantasy" or "a screed". They sneered that it was just some feminist scare piece, that it could never happen, that Roe vs. Wade would never be taken down. I wonder what those critics would think now?
The film got one release on VHS and then disappeared. I think it should be revived, at the very least for DVD, because it was not only well-made, but really SCARILY prescient in every aspect. Hell, it looks like we're not only going to get where it predicted, we're going to OUTRUN it. I predict we'll be there by 2020, if not sooner.
Look it up. Seriously, it's amazing.
There's always free cheddar in the mousetrap, baby. - Tom Waits
why Utah pisses me off. For god sake, they should just make a law in Utah that says "Women Have Zero Rights" and get it over with. These people, both the politicians and the
mormonsmorons that support them, are bat-shit crazy. They, like too many other states, are still living in the 17th century.NOBODY 2012
And there is always the eggs and pork modern method. That does take too long, though. DeMedici's method is much more efficient.
"I gotta ask: when will we ever stop treating everyone else except STRAIGHT rich, white men as second class citizens.
There, fixed it for ya Nicole.
Ah, Utah.
The land of Mor(m)onism, Cre(a)ti(o)nism and the (funda)mental(ists).
Hello Shariah Law!
blog to watch for possible comment:
http://www.feministmormonhousewives.org/
This is horrible, treating women who have unintentional miscarriages like they are criminals. Or women who use home remedies to have legal abortions, for that matter.
We really are going back to the Middle Ages...
"The greatest tyranny is censoring information in order to be better able to control people." - Cristina Saralegui
Let all democrats continue to reach out to the GOP in a spirit of bipartisanship, that our nation might go forward. I know! Let's convene a summit in Salt Lake City...
... if President Obama would drop this whole Christian "Be nice to the people who hate you" thing.
In the UNited States, Christian and Conservative are, in my observation, mutually exclusive descriptors.
chant about wanting "their" country back, this is the kind of thing they mean. Somewhere between the half-remembered, simpler time of childhood and the stereotypes presented in "Andy Griffith" and "Leave it to Beaver". I was a kid in the 1950's but I don't remember it as being so great. But we were working class, so we wouldn't count.
Of course, those days were marked by everyone knowing their place. All those non-WASPs (and, of course, the gentler sex)were happier that way.
you....cannot....be serious
why would anybody in their right mind live in Utah???
Who knew?
LETS JUST START ALL OVER AND DO AWAY WITH THIS WHOLE "UNITED STATES" THING AND REFORM THE ENTIRE REPUBLIC! LETS JUST SCRAP WHAT WE HAVE NOW AND START ALL OVER! I VOTE FOR KICKING UTAH OUT OF THE UNION!!
...and Mississippi
...and Kentucky
...and South Carolina
...and Arizona
...and TEXAS!!
NOW THAT'S PROGRESS!!
Who knew?
...and problematic births? LACK OF PRENATAL CARE. And these are the same people trying to prevent more people from being able to afford health insurance and therefore get the care they need. Not to mention their opposition to Planned Parenthood which provides prenatal care at affordable prices.
Will they prosecute pregnant women who can't afford a 3D ultrasound if they end up having a miscarriage? I mean, it was clearly risky not to have one, right? Will they prosecute women who can't afford the best of the best prenatal vitamins?
These people who oppose abortion and health care also oppose sex eduction. Millions of US abortions could be prevented if this out-of-date group stopped keeping words like CONDOM, BIRTH CONTROL PILL and MORNING AFTER PILL from being openly used and discussed. "Just say no!" just isn't working
Although the pro-choice people could use this case as an example of desperation, and illustrative for the need for Pro-Choice laws
Her selfish behavior could easily provide the trotting horse the anti-choice forces need to have life legally mandated as starting in the womb.
Appeals could land it in the supreme court, which under it's present configuration would likely strike down Roe v Wade and make abortions unavailable for anyone.
So I stand by my earliest comment.
Diabolus est Deus Inversus
most of the people who post here did not read the actual bill. Read the following:
64 (b) There shall be no cause of action for criminal homicide for the death of an unborn
65 child caused by an abortion, as defined in Section 76-7-301 .
66 (2) Criminal homicide is aggravated murder, murder, manslaughter, child abuse
67 homicide, homicide by assault, negligent homicide, or automobile homicide.
68 (3) A person is not guilty of criminal homicide of an unborn child if the sole reason
69 for the death of the unborn child is that the person:
70 (a) refused to consent to:
71 (i) medical treatment; or
72 (ii) a cesarean section; or
73 (b) failed to follow medical advice.
74 (4) A woman is not guilty of criminal homicide of her own unborn child if the death of
75 her unborn child:
76 (a) is caused by a criminally negligent act of the woman; and
77 (b) is not caused by an intentional, knowing, or reckless act of the woman.
Someone actually checked their facts before declaring war? I'm impressed.
This online magazine could learn something. I think the people who wrote this article without checking their facts are the "crooks and liars".
You are wrong Gop is a joke
You are wrong Utah is a joke
The downside of the new Utah law is obvious, but has anyone realized that there is an upside? We can use this to prosecute corporations for exposing pregnant women to toxic chemicals that cause miscarriage!
Many miscarriages are caused by corporations' negligence. I see a whole new arena for finally holding corporations accountable for all the deaths and injuries they cause, starting with fetuses! Maybe this is the way to finally get all the white male republicans on board to protect us from corporations' crimes against us.
Women themselves cause very few miscarriages, corporations cause many. Let's challenge the Utah lawmakers to put their money where their mouths are and start prosecuting corporations for causing miscarriages ie. performing illegal abortions.
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