# Utah law to criminalize miscarriages **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [February 24, 2010, 7:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/utah-law-to-criminalize-miscarriages/530298 "2010-02-24T19:39:20Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 9\ **Page:** 7
**Author:** ![kaylasdad99](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kaylasdad99/32/3398_2.png) [@kaylasdad99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kaylasdad99)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2010, 5:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/utah-law-to-criminalize-miscarriages/530298/121 "2010-02-27T05:09:06Z")
> [@vandal](#): > > Wow, if I was a woman living in Utah, I’d be scared shitless of getting pregnant. Well, the official Utah answer to that is (apparently) “If you don’t want to get pregnant, don’t be having sex like a dirty whore.” ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2010, 12:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/utah-law-to-criminalize-miscarriages/530298/122 "2010-02-27T12:50:32Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > One important difference is, in this case one side IS driven by malice. This is like looking at a segregation-era law passed enforcing “separate but equal”, and assuming it will be enforced in a way prejudiced against blacks - of course it will. That’s the point. > > If heath care reform was being pushed by old-style eugenicists, then fearing that they would set up “death panels” and kill grandma would be a perfectly reasonable fear; it’s not like such people didn’t have a history of such behavior, and it fits their ideology. Motivation matters, as does the history of behavior of a movement. A movement that has consistently worked to harm women, whose ideology is anti-woman can be safely assumed to intend to use a law like this in as anti-woman a way as possible. Assuming they will be even-handed and reasonable is foolish. Saving this post to quote when gun control advocates seek to pass laws limiting Second Amendment rights. Now I can say,“This will take away all guns and criminalize possession of bullet fragments!” with perfect safety. ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2010, 12:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/utah-law-to-criminalize-miscarriages/530298/123 "2010-02-27T12:59:28Z")
> [@tumbleddown](#): > > Because at the end of the day, here’s where the law breaks down. If I want to have someone to beat me, legally, I can. Practitioners of BDSM do it every day. I could have a very skilled person lash me with a bullwhip until I’m a bleeding heap on the floor if I wanted to. > . > . > . > If it’s legal for me to be savagely beaten when I’m not pregnant, and it would be legal for me to get an abortion at the point of pregnancy where I am, then clearly the point of telling me that I can’t be beaten to end my pregnancy, if that’s the stupid path I choose, is **not** to protect **me**. The wrongness, it burns, stop talking, your wrongness of words is fire in my brain. While it’s true that there are levels if assault to which you can consent, there are also levels of assault that you cannot consent to… if it were otherwise, assisted suicide would be essentially legal. There is a tension, in other words, between your ability to consent and society’s interest in protecting people from harm. It’s not a bright-line standard, but your post above suggests that a person may consent to his own savage beating without a hint of legal liability for the beater, and that is simply untrue. So it’s clear that… hey, wait a second. An argument based on an untrue statement… in support of a claim by the Left. Sorry, my mistake. Everything’s fine here. It’s only the Right that’s not allowed this tactic. Carry on. ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2010, 1:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/utah-law-to-criminalize-miscarriages/530298/124 "2010-02-27T13:01:24Z")
> [@jsgoddess](#): > > People want you to prove things because you border on hysteria, treat true crime novels as scientific studies, and have worse cites than Jack Chick. I’m pretty sure you’re pro-choice… so thank you for saying this. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2010, 1:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/utah-law-to-criminalize-miscarriages/530298/125 "2010-02-27T13:09:15Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > Saving this post to quote when gun control advocates seek to pass laws limiting Second Amendment rights. Now I can say,“This will take away all guns and criminalize possession of bullet fragments!” with perfect safety. Another false equivalence; gun control advocates are not primarily motivated by malice. Nor is forbidding people private ownership of guns a physical violation. Nor do they assassinate people who disagree with them. And so on; the two groups aren’t at all alike, in behavior or in motivation. Again; the anti-abortion movement is much more akin to anti-semitism or racism than it is to something like gun control. And I find it amusing that so many people want to pretend that it’s loony to think that movement built on hate will behave the way that it always has been. Yes, I’m so _very_ unreasonable to expect that they’ll harass and abuse women the way that they alway do when they can. :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![tumbleddown](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/e9bcb4/32.png) [@tumbleddown](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tumbleddown)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2010, 8:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/utah-law-to-criminalize-miscarriages/530298/126 "2010-02-27T20:57:45Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > There is a tension, in other words, between your ability to consent and society’s interest in protecting people from harm. It’s not a bright-line standard, but your post above suggests that a person may consent to his own savage beating without a hint of legal liability for the beater, and that is simply untrue. Ah, but in this case, the legal liability of the _beater_ isn’t at issue. In fact this law wasn’t amended to be sure that someone enlisted to beat a pregnant woman until she miscarries could be prosecuted, but specifically so that the woman herself could be prosecuted. This is not about protecting women. The fact that a woman can consent to be beaten when not pregnant but now cannot if she is pregnant if she knows there’s a risk of miscarriage or because she wants to miscarry says that the fetus is the one being protected by this law. And the fact that there is no distinction being made regarding gestational age means that pre-viability fetuses are being given protections which, per Roe v. Wade, they are not entitled to, by federal law. ---
**Author:** ![SteveG1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/bb73d2/32.png) [@SteveG1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SteveG1)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2010, 9:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/utah-law-to-criminalize-miscarriages/530298/127 "2010-02-27T21:50:31Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > Even assuming that God actually existed, so what? This isn’t supposed to be a theocracy. I almost missed this (actually I did miss it on the first “go round”), but it’s absolutely true. The USA is not a theocracy. The USA (and I say this with tongue in cheek) is supposed to be a paragon of the Rule Of Law and the Triumph Of Logic (or something). ---
**Author:** ![Candyman74](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ad7895/32.png) [@Candyman74](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Candyman74)\ **Post date:** [February 28, 2010, 12:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/utah-law-to-criminalize-miscarriages/530298/128 "2010-02-28T00:05:20Z")
> [@Enderw24](#): > > I’ve had to take the internet’s word on what “reckless” means because that’s all I have access to. I’ve attempted to look into Utah Codes for a day now and failed. They’ve put their statutes on this buggy piece of Java crap and my browser fails every time I try searching through the thing. > > And thanks for assuming I’ve passed any moral judgement. Go back and read the OP without your blinders on. I found some articles, summarized them, and asked for others’ opinions on them. It’s about as objective as I could make it. I was referring to the article writers, not you. But, OK, at your request, I’ll re-read the OP without my “blinders” on. The thread title does not read “Is Utah law ciminializing miscarriages?” it reads “Utah law to criminalize miscarriages” which is a very misleading interpretation of the situation when the additional “…miscarriages which are caused by criminal recklessness” is missed off the end, where “criminal recklessness” means something specific. You weren’t asking a question, you made a statement. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Second\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/bbe5ce/32.png) [@The\_Second\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Second_Stone)\ **Post date:** [February 28, 2010, 3:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/utah-law-to-criminalize-miscarriages/530298/129 "2010-02-28T03:56:04Z")
> [@SteveG1](#): > > I almost missed this (actually I did miss it on the first “go round”), but it’s absolutely true. The USA is not a theocracy. The USA (and I say this with tongue in cheek) is supposed to be a paragon of the Rule Of Law and the Triumph Of Logic (or something). Half-way, but no cigar. Our constitution provides that there shall be no religious test for public office and no establishment of religion or interference with the free exercise of religion. In short, religion in this county (or presumably the absence of religion) is supposed to be outside the realm of government. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/utah-law-to-criminalize-miscarriages/530298.md?page=6)