Yeah, I know the religious wingnuts have been up in arms about this before, but for a long time, I hadn’t heard anything about it. But I’ve heard multiple mentions today, so I’m kinda wondering what’s triggered them this time.
I figure there’s some perfectly reasonable legislation at the state level somewhere that they’re twisting into a pretzel to show that whatever evil the Republicans are doing, it pales next to this liberal plot to kill newborn babies.
But since wingnuts apparently feel greater freedom to rant if they’re not weighed down by links to whatever the hell it is they’re talking about, I’m in the dark here. Anyone here able to clue me in?
New York just legalized 40 week abortions and there’s a movement in the Virginia House of Delegates sponsored by the governor to do so there as well. Since most people find 40 week abortions to be distasteful, it’s being likened to infanticide. I guess its your own opinion as to whether you feel that is the case or not. There are multiple threads about New York’s law if you wish to discuss it.
I don’t believe this is an accurate description of those laws. IIRC, late-term abortions were already legal under certain circumstances, and these new laws alter those circumstances.
It should be noted that the Governor of Virginia when asked about it on a radio show made a very bumbling answer that could be construed as advocating what might be called ‘exposure deaths.’ I don’t think that was his intention and I think he was meaning for babies that were unlikely to survive, but it ended up sounding very strange and added fuel to the fire and abortion is the one debate that could do with a bit less fuel instead of more. His quote is below.
You are correct. They make them easier to get. They basically end requirements for other physicians to be consulted regarding late term abortions and allow them to be performed in non-surgical settings (in Virginia) or by non-physicians(in New York.) They also make the provisions for providing them move from ‘life of mother’ in New York and ‘life or serious and irrevocable impairment of maternal health’ to simply ‘life or health of mother.’
So if someone from the right “rants” about things they’re not up to speed on they’re wingnuts. But when you rant about something that you’re admittedly “in the dark” about you’re a smart, thoughtful guy?
I’m pro-choice and agnostic myself. However, I’m a bit uncomfortable with New York’s and Virginia’s (attempt at a) new abortion law.
I’m not at all uncomfortable. I trust individual women and medical professionals far more than the government when it comes to the health decisions of any particular individual woman. Anything that reduces government interference in the health decisions women and their doctors make about their own bodies and health is good with me.
I agree with your sentiments re: trusting women and medical professionals more than the government.
However, the issue at hand is that when dealing with a pregnant woman, there are more parties involved than just the woman and the medical professionals. There is the father (potentially), and of course the unborn child.
I trust women and their doctors far more than the government when it comes to the unborn child/baby/fetus/zygote. As for the father, he should (and does, thankfully, according to the law) have full and sole control of decisions made regarding his own body, at all times, no matter the age or size of any other life inside it.
I’m not saying I’m a smart, thoughtful guy. My words will stand or fall on their own.
They certainly seem to have considered themselves “up to speed,” making statements about this legislation with great certainty.
My point is that I’m “in the dark” because that’s where Erickson and Bongino left me. All I had was their descriptions about alleged legislation. They didn’t even bother to say which states had taken up this legislation.
I did what I’m criticizing them for failing to do: they criticized legislation without providing links to the legislation. I criticized them, but I provided links to them. You can see the difference, I hope.
Erickson and Bongino are commentators who make frequent TV appearances. These aren’t random wingnuts, but people whose words get heard and read by a lot of people. So I feel comfortable in holding them to the same standard we expect of each other here: to substantiate what we say.
It’s more that they’re wingnuts for spinning wild hyperbole, fooling themselves into thinking their hyperbole is literally true, and then protesting against the fiction. Because seriously, any sane and rational person would not announce that democrats in general are now in favor of infanticide. That’s insane.
That’s an interesting use of the term “misstep”. Either she was lying (about her own bill), or she made a mistake in being truthful about what her bill allowed.
I can see it’s being considered a misstep in the first case. But that is easily remedied by pointing to the provision in the bill that would prevent this from happening. But the second case? I am struggling to find a worthwhile motive behind “I should have lied because now people know what the bill will do”.
I would be interested to know, specifically, what those medical reasons are. Is it **always **the case that the fetus is non-viable, or that delivery presents a serious risk to the physical well-being of the mother? If so, that’s great, and it should be spelled out in the language of the bill.
I tried to find numbers on abortions performed after 30 weeks but came up with just a single article about a woman who had a non-viable fetus and had to have one done at 32 weeks. What I’m saying is that you’re asking for a cite that might not be available – everything I saw just had 21 weeks and beyond.
So, if you can find a cite, I’m definitely interested. My impression is that it’s so vanishingly rare, so hard to find a doctor to do it, so dangerous, and so expensive that it’s not really something you have to legislate against. But, I don’t have a cite to that effect.
Correct. There is/was a GQ thread about this same subject, and the data on third-trimester abortions is pretty sparse, and (on both sides) spun almost beyond recognition. And the cut off date varies from 16 weeks to 21 weeks to 24 weeks to 27 weeks for the data.
Third trimester abortions can be restricted by the states per Roe v. Wade, but some restrictions have been struck down by the Supreme Court.
AFAICT, and it isn’t very far, third trimester abortions are not common, but they are not unheard of either, and also AFAICT not exclusively done on non-viable fetuses or mothers where delivery would present a significant danger to the mother.
Wasn’t Tiller, the abortion doctor who got shot, somebody who did late- or later-term abortions? Wiki says Yes.
Yes, I get that. But some parents are willing to harm their offspring, either with or without the assistance/cooperation of medical professionals, even to the point of the death of the offspring. If government serves a purpose at all, surely it should be to protect those who can’t protect themselves.
But we’re not talking about the father’s body, or the mother’s for that matter. There is a third party involved, the offspring of the mother and the father. You don’t believe that the father should have any input regarding the offspring’s fate?
I think you’re engaging in a bait and switch here. The question for the governor or state senator or whatever was about infanticide, which implies very, very late abortions (30+ weeks, in my mind). Now, you’re switching to third trimester abortions and saying they are not unheard of – I agree, but very, very late abortions are unheard of, or nearly so.
The “wingnuts” mentioned by the OP are talking about the law allowing abortions up to the last minute – that’s what the question to the governor was about. The fact is that this law doesn’t specifically disallow that, but other laws on the books, plus medical ethics and practices, do disallow infanticide as predicted by the “wingnuts”. Medical laws don’t disallow lots of things – open heart surgery when you’re knee is bleeding, for example. That doesn’t mean it won’t happen. (Or, if it does, that doctor is going to jail)
So, unless you want to retract something there, I’m not really interested in engaging with that kind of bait and switch.
If I understand right, the Virginia governor is referring to babies who would need some kind of life support, and he’s suggesting denying them life support (if the parents don’t want it,) which would make it something like passive euthanasia vs. active euthanasia.
You can look at TABLE 8. Reported abortions, by known weeks of gestation and year — selected reporting areas,* United States, 2005–2014 which gives a value of 1.3% of abortions are tied to gestational age >=21 weeks. By inference abortions after 30 weeks, let alone 40, would be even smaller.