Dr. George Tiller, an abortion provider in Kansas, has been ordered to surrender his patient records to a Kansas grand jury.
Tiller is one of the few doctors in the US who performs late-term abortions. His clinic is often the last resort for women in desperate and tragic situations - incest survivors, substance abusers, mentally ill women, rape survivors who were too traumatized to cope with the resulting pregnancy any earlier.
The procedure he performs is now illegal, and he is being prosecuted.
The judge in the case has ordered names and addresses removed from the patient files, but women fear their identities can be deduced from details about their families and medical histories. The radical antiabortion group Operation Rescue has photographed pregnant women entering Tiller's clinic, and has posted the photos online.
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In my personal experience, I know of one woman and one girl who had late-term abortions.
I had a close friend who very much wanted to have a baby. She had a hard time getting pregnant, then lost a pregnancy early on. After healing from that trauma, she and her partner tried again, and were able to conceive. In her fifth month, tests revealed that their baby would be born without a brain. It would either die in utero or immediately after birth.
It was devastating. They were crushed. My friend aborted the fetus. And we were all so grateful that she was able to. If she had been forced to carry that pregnancy to term and undergo a delivery, I think she would have gone insane. I'm not exaggerating. I think she would have been at risk for suicide.
Was my friend a criminal?
The only other person I've ever heard of having a late-term procedure was a girl helped by the Haven Coalition. She was ten years old.
The girl's aunt noticed the pregnancy when it started to show. The aunt contacted Child Protection Services, who quickly ascertained that the girl had been impregnated by her own father. The girl was removed from her home and placed in her aunt's custody. The aunt was now trying to obtain an abortion for her niece. They had no money, and no abortion provider in their home state was experienced in late-term abortions.
This was before my time in Haven, but my colleagues told me that they got the aunt and the girl safely to Kansas for her procedure. That's all I know.
Was this ten-year-old girl a criminal? Was her aunt?
If they are criminals, don't they have to be punished? Should they go to prison? For how long? When you examine the issue a little more closely, the scare tactics of the fetus-lovers break down pretty easily.
Last summer, I posted this question: How Much Time Should She Do? Even they don't know.
16 comments:
Huh. Must of missed this first time 'round.
I'm surprised the journalists in the video found that many folks who don't understand what they're fighting against.
Even me, a staunch pro-choice advocate can see the problem with the question being posed. Each of them said the women shouldn't be punished -- they should have caught on that what they are looking to have done is make the *providing* of abortions illegal. In other words have a Doctor punished if she or he completes the procedure.
It is surprising they could go years without figuring that out.
I also wonder if they recognize the consequence of that action, which is to drive abortion underground and risk lives not only of fetuses but of mothers as well.
If they honestly *do* think *having* an abortion should be illegal, they should be willing to back it up. There are a lot of laws on the books which are there to provide moral suasion and not intended to be enforced (which either the protesters don’t realize or they do realize and have been edited out) that carry a slap on the wrist – one year in jail and a $500 fine or something.
Anyway, you’d think they would have thought it through.
I also wonder if they recognize the consequence of that action, which is to drive abortion underground and risk lives not only of fetuses but of mothers as well.
Well, they're told it all the time.
That movement disputes that there are, or ever have been, many illegal abortions. They claim anti-abortion laws actually do prevent abortions, and that the spectre of the back-alley abortion is either fabricated or hugely exaggerated by the women's movement.
I think movement leaders must know that this isn't so, but that's their line.
Anyway, you’d think they would have thought it through.
Indeed. It does point to the unthinking, knee-jerk-ness of many in that movement.
If they honestly *do* think *having* an abortion should be illegal, they should be willing to back it up.
Most of these people claim abortion is murder, then turn around and say that it's okay in certain cases (rape, incest). So, apparently, these people believe that some murder is okay.
Most of these people claim abortion is murder, then turn around and say that it's okay in certain cases (rape, incest). So, apparently, these people believe that some murder is okay.
Which goes to my central point, which is that the majority of anti-choicers aren't concerned about abortion at all. They only want to control women's lives, especially women's sexuality - and to punish women for having any.
It seems to me if you think abortion is actually a murder of a human being, then you have to be against all abortion for any reason.
Hey Allan...
Neat new icon!
I think that may be a case of semantics --
It's not unfathomable that some may think that abortion is murder under certain/most circumstances, similar to the fact that killing a person is murder under certain/most cirumstances.
Their choice of the word "murder" is intentionally inflammatory, of course, but is also driven by the fact that there's not really a commonly used word to indicate what they mean in English. "Abortion in most circumstances is an amoral killing act" just doesn't make for a good chant.
... though it would be priceless to hear it attempted.
Scott, I agree, for some people, "murder" is likely a shorthand.
This points to the central flaw with the anti-choice movement.
If this "murder" is immoral in certain circumstances, but not in others, who decides which circumstances warrant the act and which don't? Women would be (are) forced to submit their life circumstances to another group of people to render judgment on their choice.
Once rape is in the picture, since many people are disinclined to believe that women are raped as often as they are, you have potential for a double whammy of judgment.
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There's a saying in the reproductive rights movement that most people support abortion rights under three circumstances: rape, incest and me.
Everyone wants to have safe and legal abortion available when they need it. However, abortion is so stigmatized that most people will not admit publicly that they would ever consider having one.
An alarming number of people on those picket lines have had abortions or paid for their wives', daughters' or girlfriends' abortions.
"Abortion in most circumstances is an amoral killing act" just doesn't make for a good chant.
... though it would be priceless to hear it attempted.
Hey, it couldn't be any worse than some of the chants I've heard from our side. Sometimes they are downright embarrassing! :)
I think there should be a chanting school, that's something that would bring both sides together... but I digress.
An alarming number of people on those picket lines have had abortions or paid for their wives', daughters' or girlfriends' abortions.
That may sound hyprocritical, but I don't know if I'd call it that. They may be driven to feel that way out of remorse for a previous decision and genuinely think they know what's best for everyone else. "Learn from my mistakes!". It would be nice for them to admit it though, instead of coming of as a bunch of sanctimonious muddleheads.
I understand why they wouldn't admit it though, for years whenever anyone in the States changes their viewpoint on something they're a "flip-flopper" and therefore the worst scum on earth (unless they're born again Christians in which case they're held in the highest esteem). There's no room for people changing their viewpoint or becoming enlightened lest they be called a hypocrite.
You see it happening more and more up here to (thanks Harper government). Anyway, I digress again...
I sympathise with the people who chose to have abortions and regret it. I too have made many choices I regret, and this would probably be much worse. That being said I never think it's a good idea for people with a highly-charged emotional stake in an issue to be dictating public policy. That leads to draconian laws that see any victim of any crime as a survior/hero, and any perpetrator as a wholly evil person worthy of destruction. Life's never that simple.
But I digress...
I see anti-choicers who have had safe and legal abortions as the lowest of the low. Human scum.
If they regret a choice, so be it. That's theirs to live with. But how dare they try to take away a right which they have already accessed from someone else!!!!
For me, the word hypocritical doesn't begin to touch this. It needs something far stronger. It's perverse. It's obscene.
If a woman who terminates a pregnancy one day regrets it, that's her life. Still her life to live and no one else's. Still her body, and no one else's.
How fucking dare they. It enrages me.
And Scott, I know you are pro-choice, and not out on those picket lines. :)
By the way, we should not assume that the anti-choicers who have had abortions regret it one bit. There was a man on the picket lines in suburban New York who, it turned out, had planned and paid for three different abortions - two daughters and a girlfriend (he was married) and continued to be in the movement the whole time. It wasn't like he did that as a young person then later joined the anti movement. He did it while he was a movement leader.
It would be nice for them to admit it though, instead of coming of as a bunch of sanctimonious muddleheads.
Some do. It's not uncommon to hear women protestors say that they had abortions, now regret it and want to prevent other women from making the same mistake.
I had a letter in the Globe and Mail responding to just that. I can't find the letter in this blog but here's what I posted before I wrote it.
Grrrrrr. That's pretty much all I can say!!!
But how dare they try to take away a right which they have already accessed from someone else!
They shouldn't. And that's precisely why we're lucky that, in general, we elect people who have the chance to listen to all sides of the debate and come to a reasonable conclusion. We hope.
Not to say that passion isn't important in a debate -- passionate people are the ones that drive both sides of a debate. Hopefully our elected officials will do the right thing.
While I disagree with folks who would have an abortion then want to take that right away from others, I try to understand their position. They think they're helping. They're wrong.
[A man] had planned and paid for three different abortions - two daughters and a girlfriend (he was married) and continued to be in the movement the whole time.
OK... he's a hypocrite. No problem calling that one.
(I tend to give the benefit of the doubt - when people run red lights or pass improperly or whathaveyou on the road, I like to think they're rushing to hospital. Makes me feel better.)
OK... he's a hypocrite. No problem calling that one.
Whew.
(I tend to give the benefit of the doubt - when people run red lights or pass improperly or whathaveyou on the road, I like to think they're rushing to hospital. Makes me feel better.)
It speaks well of you. You're willing to think the best of people until shown otherwise. I would even venture to say that's very Canadian of you.
I do that on a personal level. I remind myself and others that we don't know that person's circumstances and we shouldn't judge.
It's the ones who appoint themselves judges of other people that drive me nuts! (As you can see.)
[A man] had planned and paid for three different abortions - two daughters and a girlfriend (he was married) and continued to be in the movement the whole time.
By the way, we learned about this when his girlfriend - who he dumped - came forward. When his family found out about his affair, his older daughter spoke up... then the other daughter did.
Of course he denied it all, but his wife confirmed evidence of the affair. A nurse at the clinic also corroborated that she knew him from both inside and outside the clinic. She couldn't confirm anything else, of course, because of patient confidentiality. But he wasn't a patient, and she said he had been in the clinic with patients more than once.
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