via Proud Atheist

The post God Doesn’t Kill Just Because He Didn’t Like How Things Turned Out…Oh wait a minute… appeared first on Birth Pangs.

Yet harsh anti abortion laws in the USA have already resulted in deaths. Now not content to harass women who don’t want to be pregnant the crotch police are going after women who do want children and finding ways to criminalize them as well.

A woman in Utah gave birth to twins. When one was stillborn, she was arrested and charged with criminal homicide based on the claim that her decision to delay cesarean surgery was the cause of the stillbirth.

After a hearing that lasted less than a day, a court issued an order requiring a critically-ill pregnant woman in Washington, D.C. to undergo cesarean surgery over her objections. Neither she nor her baby survived.

A judge in Ohio kept a woman imprisoned to prevent her from having an abortion.

A woman in Oregon who did not comply with a doctor’s recommendation to have additional testing for gestational diabetes was subjected to involuntary civil commitment. During her detention, the additional testing was never performed.

A Louisiana woman was charged with murder and spent approximately a year in jail before her counsel was able to show that what was deemed a murder of a fetus or newborn was actually a miscarriage that resulted from medication given to her by a health care provider.

In Texas, a pregnant woman who sometimes smoked marijuana to ease nausea and boost her appetite gave birth to healthy twins. She was arrested for delivery of a controlled substance to a minor.

A doctor in Wisconsin had concerns about a woman’s plans to have her birth attended by a midwife. As a result, a civil court order of protective custody for the woman’s fetus was obtained. The order authorized the sheriff’s department to take the woman into custody, transport her to a hospital, and subject her to involuntary testing and medical treatment.

This reeks of treating women as if they are mere breeding stock. The pearl clutching screeches of ‘won’t somebody think about the children’ are nothing more than noise preceding bullshit. These are the same people that clutch their guns and demand to be unaccountable for them. No matter how many children are killed, injured and psychologically harmed. The same people who look at elementary students being handcuffed and Tarazed for such crimes as paper plane flying and writing their name on a desk and think it is a good thing. They are also many of the same people who would see no problem with a lessening of child labour laws.

This has nothing to do with fetuses or children. This is as ever a direct attack upon women’s autonomy.

Full article here

The post Women as Breeding Stock appeared first on Birth Pangs.

She died two hours later of a ruptured ectopic pregnancy.

Jamie Lynn Russell is dead but the war on women and war on drugs continues unharmed, unabated and unthinkingly.

Source

The post Woman dies after hospital has her arrested for ‘noncompliance’ appeared first on Birth Pangs.

The post Cause Nothing Says “I’m a Fetus Fetishist” Like A Snow Globe appeared first on Birth Pangs.

The comic strips feature a woman who goes to an abortion clinic and is confronted by several people who suggest she should be ashamed. Among them is a doctor who reads a script on behalf of Texas Gov. Rick Perry welcoming her to a “compulsory transvaginal exam,” and a middle-aged legislator who calls her a “slut.”

One panel equates the invasive procedure to rape and describes the device used to perform it as a “10-inch shaming wand.”

Story here

http://www.doonesbury.com/

The post Doonesbury Tackles Abortion appeared first on Birth Pangs.

On Thursday, the Senate took up an amendment proposed by Sen. Roy Blunt (R-Mo.) that would allow employers to deny women birth-control coverage if the employer found contraception morally objectionable.

About 100 miles south of Washington on that same day, Virginia legislators passed a measure requiring a woman to be offered an ultrasound image of her fetus before aborting it. The legislation, which opponents say could also require some women who have miscarriages to be offered ultrasonic images of their dead fetuses, is the successor of a bill that would have required women to undergo an invasive “transvaginal ultrasound.”

Still on Thursday, the industrious Virginia House of Delegates also approved legislation bestowing rights on people, including a father, to bring a lawsuit over the death of the fetus.

On Wednesday, conservative radio host Rush Limbaugh, a powerful influence among Republican lawmakers, described as a “slut” the law-school student invited by House Democrats to testify in support of birth control. “It makes her a prostitute,” Limbaugh said of the woman, blocked last month by House Republicans from testifying on what became an all-male panel. “She wants to be paid to have sex.”

On Tuesday, Oklahomans held a protest at the state capitol to oppose a bill, passed by the state Senate and now being taken up by the House, that would bestow “personhood” on fetuses – one of many such efforts across the nation. Democrat Judy McIntyre, one of just four women in the 48-member state Senate, was so upset that, according to the Oklahoman newspaper, she held a protest sign proclaiming: “If I wanted the government in my womb, I’d [expletive] a senator.”

full story

The post GOP Practising Vagina Politics appeared first on Birth Pangs.

Women are fighting back. They drew a line in the sand in Mississippi, where voters defeated a fetal personhood amendment. In Virginia, women organized to block a harmful ultrasound bill. Women everywhere are mobilizing to tell their lawmakers: “our health is NOT up for debate!”

The “Hurdles” video depicts these new state restrictions with 92 hurdles, each printed with a law or regulation targeting women’s reproductive health care.

The post My Health Is NOT Up For Debate appeared first on Birth Pangs.

Senator Janet Howell has formed a brilliant protest manoeuvre

Howell expressed her disdain for the latest legislation on Monday, and said the amendment was just a matter of fairness between genders. Her amendment states before a man is treated for erectile dysfunction they must undergo a cardiac stress test and a digital rectal exam.

BirthPangs salutes you Senator Howell.

*source

The post Virginia State Senator Janet Howell Has A Brilliant Plan appeared first on Birth Pangs.

Saturday, November 19 · 12:00pm – 4:00pm
Location: Peace Fountain by Province House on Grafton Street

PRRO – Prince Edward Island Reproductive Rights Organization – is organizing a reproductive rights rally to inform residents of Prince Edward Island what reproductive rights women are entitled to as decreed by the Canadian Government in 1988, but are being denied in Prince Edward Island.

Come out and have some coffee or tea, enjoy some busking, listen to informative speakers, learn something new and support a great cause.

Speaker List to follow.

There will also be a drop-off box for a Women’s ‘Zine. Please feel free to drop off any creative/ informative pieces you would like to contribute.

For more information about PRRO please visit PRRO’s facebook group at :

http://www.facebook.com/groups/155653531197617/

“Forcing a woman, by threat of criminal sanction, to carry a fetus to term unless she meets certain criteria unrelated to her own priorities and aspirations, is a profound interference with a woman’s body and thus a violation of her security of the person.”

- Chief Justice Brian Dickson

The post Prince Edward Island Reproductive Rights Organization Rally appeared first on Birth Pangs.

http://www.arcc-cdac.ca/press/ARCC-CDAC-release-nov3-11-english.pdf

For immediate release
November 3, 2011

Abortion: There’s Nothing to Debate.
Except how to eliminate remaining barriers to abortion care

NATIONAL – Despite repeated calls by Canada’s anti-abortion movement to
“reopen the abortion debate,” a national pro-choice group says that’s not
going to happen-at least not in the way that anti-abortionists want.

“The phrase ‘reopen the debate’ is simply code for
re-criminalizing abortion,” said Joyce Arthur, Executive Director of the
Abortion Rights Coalition of Canada (ARCC). “The anti-abortion movement
wants to take us back to the 1960′s when abortion was completely banned, and
women were injured or killed from unsafe illegal abortions.”

“The debate about legalizing abortion in Canada is long over and done with.
It was a difficult debate that lasted three decades, from the early 1960′s
to 1991,” explained Arthur. “The first result was a flawed abortion law in
1969 that kept abortion as a crime except if approved by a committee of
doctors. Then came the 1988 Morgentaler ruling by our Supreme Court, which
had to throw out the 1969 law because it harmed women’s health and violated
their constitutional rights.” Brian Mulroney’s Conservative government then
tried to pass a new law that would criminalize individual doctors if the
reason for an abortion failed to meet certain criteria. But that law failed
to pass in 1991. Since then, all governments have vowed not to
re-criminalize abortion, including today’s Conservative government in which
61% of Stephen Harper’s caucus is anti-choice.
(http://www.arcc-cdac.ca/action/list-antichoice-mps-may-11.html)

“An overwhelming 92% of Canadians don’t want to make abortion illegal again,
and that’s according to a recent survey commissioned by the right-wing
anti-choice Sun News Network,” said Arthur
(http://abacusdata.ca/wp-content/uploads/2011/05/Abortion-Report-May-11-2011
.pdf). “Besides, abortion can’t be banned in Canada today because it would
infringe on women’s rights to life, liberty, bodily security, and
conscience, under our Charter of Rights and Freedoms.”

“It’s time for a new kind of debate about abortion,” said Julie Lalonde, an
Ottawa-based ARCC spokesperson. “The controversy and stigma around abortion
often silences people, which makes it hard to address access problems.
There’s still so much to be done to ensure that any woman can obtain
abortion care when she needs to, without barriers.” Lalonde cited a list of
problems – some of them decades old – that need to be resolved:

. Prince Edward Island doesn’t have any abortion services at all and
women have to travel off-island.

. New Brunswick enforces an unconstitutional regulation that requires
women to obtain permission from two doctors or else pay out-of-pocket for
their abortion. This is illegal under the Canada Health Act and violates the
1988 Morgentaler decision.

. Only 16% of Canadian hospitals perform abortions, and most of those
are in larger cities.

. Women in rural areas and the north have difficulty accessing services
in their regions. They often experience delays and many must travel to a
major centre.

. There is a serious shortage of abortion providers outside major
cities. More doctors should be trained and supported to work in smaller
communities so they don’t feel isolated or suffer anti-choice harassment.

. Abortion remains on the list of “excluded services” for purposes of
reciprocal billing between provinces, which means that when Canadians (such
as students) first move to a new province, they must pay for abortion
themselves, again a violation of the Canada Health Act.

. Anti-choice doctors are not required (by the Canadian Medical
Association) to refer their patients to another doctor when they need an
abortion. But that is an abuse of authority and a violation of a patient’s
right to medical care and accurate information on all options.

. An estimated 150 anti-abortion counselling agencies (“crisis
pregnancy centres”) operate across Canada. They refuse to refer for abortion
or birth control, and they often misinform and scare women considering an
abortion. These unprofessional centres should be regulated and forced to
disclose their lack of services to women.

“Governments at every level can play an important role in tackling these
issues, along with the medical profession and NGOs that support the legal
and human rights of women,” said Lalonde. “The health needs of Canadian
women should never take a back seat to politics, especially when 70% of
Canadians are pro-choice.”
(http://abacusdata.ca/wp-content/uploads/2011/05/Abortion-Report-May-11-2011
.pdf)

Arthur pointed out that “31% of Canadian women will have at least one
abortion in their lifetime.* These are ordinary women-your partner, your
sister, your daughter, your friend. Good women have abortions, and they have
them for good reasons. Their dignity needs to be respected and their rights
upheld,” said Arthur. “So yes, let’s talk about abortion! Let’s bring it out
of the closet and stop the shame and stigma. And let’s figure out as a
society how to get rid of these remaining barriers to abortion care.”
(*

http://www.contraceptionjournal.org/article/S0010-7824%2811%2900424-0/abstra

ct)

———————————-
Abortion Rights Coalition of Canada
POB 2663, Station Main, Vancouver, BC, V6B 3W3 . info@arcc-cdac.ca .
www.arcc-cdac.ca

The post Abortion: There’s Nothing to Debate appeared first on Birth Pangs.