Women seeking abortions in Arkansas now need permission from men (including the rapists)

[niyad]

Women seeking abortions in Arkansas now need permission from men

Pro-choice campaigners are fighting the law, which comes into force at the end of the month
US

Planned Parenthood supporters hold signs at a protest in downtown Denver Reuters

A new law passed in Arkansas means women must obtain permission from the man who impregnated them before they can have an abortion. Even in the case of rape, women wishing to terminate a pregnancy would have to seek the opinion of their attacker or abusive partner – who would be able to refuse and potentially block the procedure. The bill, which was signed into law in March and is set to come into force at the end of July, includes aborted foetuses in a rule stating family members must agree on what to do with the remains of their dead relatives. Parents of girls under 18 will also be able to decide whether their daughter can have an abortion.

Pro-choice campaigners are fighting the law, which they say is designed to make it more difficult for women to access abortion, under the guise of legal requirements regarding the disposal of embryonic tissue. A spokesperson for the NARAL advocacy group told the Huffington Post the "plain intention and unavoidable outcome" of the new law is "to make it harder for a woman to access basic health care by placing more barriers between a woman and her doctor”.



Guests at a speech by former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee billed as a 'frank discussion on defending the sanctity of life from conception to natural death' (Getty Images)

A legal challenge against the bill launched by civil and reproductive rights organisations will be heard on Thursday. "Every day, women in Arkansas and across the United States struggle to get the care they need as lawmakers impose new ways to shut down clinics and make abortion unavailable," said the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) in a blog post announcing its legal challenge. "Arkansas women cannot afford to lose further access. They cannot afford to travel hundreds of miles to get to the nearest clinic. And they should not have to endure invasions of privacy and violations of their autonomy."

ACLU is among the groups aiming to freeze this bill and a number of other new abortion laws until a decision is made on their lawsuit. This includes one signed by governor Asa Hutchinson in January prohibiting the most common abortion procedure used in the second trimester of a pregnancy.The method known as dilation and evacuation is the safest method of ending a pregnancy, say pro-choice campaigners, but has been called “barbaric” by those who support the law.

http://www.independent.co.uk/News/world/americas/women-arkansas-abortion-men-permission-male-us-pro-choice-life-planned-parenthood-termination-a7834861.html

[spanone]

1. K&R...

[CrispyQ]

2. Forced slavery.

Is there a test that can determine paternity in the womb?

I don't know why the pro-choice movement doesn't have an ad campaign presenting the issue in this light:

=====
2010
Forced Labor, Revisited: The Thirteenth
Amendment and Abortion
Andrew Koppelman
Northwestern University School of Law, [e-mail]

http://scholarlycommons.law.northwestern.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1031&context=facultyworkingpapers

snip...

My claim is that the amendment is violated by laws that prohibit abortion. When
women are compelled to carry and bear children, they are subjected to "involuntary
servitude" in violation of the amendment. Abortion prohibitions violate the
Amendment's guarantee of personal liberty, because forced pregnancy and childbirth, by
compelling the woman to serve the fetus, creates "that control by which the personal
service of one man [sic] is disposed of or coerced for another's benefit which is the
essence of involuntary servitude."6

Such laws violate the amendment's guarantee of
equality, because forcing women to be mothers makes them into a servant caste, a group
which, by virtue of a status of birth, is held subject to a special duty to serve others and
not themselves.

This argument makes available two responses to the standard defense of such
prohibitions, the claim that the fetus is a person. The first is that even if this is so, its
right to the continued aid of the woman does not follow. As Judith Jarvis Thomson
observes, "having a right to life does not guarantee having either a right to be given the
use of or a right to be allowed continued use of another person's body -- even if one needs it for life itself."7

Giving fetuses a legal right to the continued use of their mothers'
bodies would be precisely what the Thirteenth Amendment forbids. The second response
is that since abortion prohibitions infringe on the fundamental right to be free of
involuntary servitude, the burden is on the state to show that the violation of this right is
justified. Since the thesis that the fetus is, or should at least be considered, a person
seems impossible to prove (or to refute), this is a burden that the state cannot carry. If we
are not certain that the fetus is a person, then the mere possibility that it might be is not
enough to justify violating women's Thirteenth Amendment rights by forcing them to be
mothers.
=====

[niyad]

3. please post this as its own OP for needed visibility, and so we can rec it.

some of us call the anti-choicers woman-hating gestational slavers already. but that article makes excellent points.

[BadgerMom]

16. Concur

Please make this an OP.

[CrispyQ]

36. I'm not much of an OP type, mostly a responder.

I've posted the article & link in response to lots of women's rights/choice threads. It would be nice if it went 'viral' on DU. The article is out there for you to use & post. Please, reference it! As often as you can! Send it to PP & other pro-women/pro-choice orgs. We need to change the narrative. If we don't believe in slavery, then this is the most base slavery there is - taking a woman's control of her reproductive choice away from her. WOC have suffered this in ways we white women can barely begin to imagine.

[niyad]

37. I can certainly do that. As you said, we must change the narrative. and your last line

is just heartbreakingly true.

[brer cat]

4. Total bulls@#$

by the women haters.

[niyad]

5. but. . .but. . we LOVE ALL lilfe (just not women, apparently)

[brer cat]

8. Yeah, and think of the poor rapists.

They have feelings too.

[Lee-Lee]

6. Every progressive male in the state needs to volunteer to sign off as the father

No questions, not even face to face with the woman but have an underground network that connects men who will sign with women seeking a procedure, so it's as simple as a volunteer taking the paperwork and bringing it back. She needs a signature, a volunteer takes the papers and comes back with one.

It's not like they are going to do any paternity testing.

[niyad]

7. that is a most supportive idea, and thanks.

[ProudLib72]

9. This is a wonderful idea!

I was all sorts of pissed off reading the article, but this idea gives me hope.

[Lee-Lee]

11. They can't prove your not without mandatory paternity tests

And there is no way that compelling DNA samples from the men would ever be found to be Constitutional. Even the most woman hating man on SCOTUS wouldn't set a precedent of mandatory DNA collection outside the criminal justice system.

[hamsterjill]

15. Like minded thinker here!

Circumvent any way we can!

[Bettie]

18. I had the same thought

just find someone who is willing to sign off on it.

[Lee-Lee]

20. It needs to be an anonymous network

A woman's choice should be private and she shouldn't have to confide it in anyone she knows.

[Bettie]

23. Yeah that works better

Who thinks this shit up? WTF is wrong with people?

[lunatica]

19. Banning and outlawing this shit is far more preferable

But I get your intention.

[marybourg]

28. "It's not like they are going to do any paternity testing"

That'll be in next session's law. Anything to delay past the safest period.

This law must be fought on constitutional grounds.

[ProfessorGAC]

32. Great Idea Lee

I know we've locked horns before, but i know a great idea when i see one. Well done!

[Pacifist Patriot]

10. Evil

[CaliforniaPeggy]

12. DISGUSTING, WRONG, EVIL!

[smirkymonkey]

13. This is nothing but pure misogyny!

We are getting closer to the Handmaid's Tale every day.

[NastyRiffraff]

38. Handmaid's Tale

We're not supposed to compare what's happening with the Handmaid's Tale, according to some on DU. Even though it's true. That show emphasized that nothing happened all at once. Offred/June said at the beginning that she should have spoken up when the first signs of theocracy appeared.

[BadgerMom]

14. Kick

This makes me so sad and so angry.

[Solly Mack]

17. K&R

[trueblue2007]

21. what if the pregnancy was as a result of a 1 NIGHT STAND ?????

[IronLionZion]

22. All Lives Matter !1!1!1

Except women's lives. One has to wonder how a state like Arkansas could have produced Bill Clinton.

Oh well, I bet we'll see lots of nonsense like this since they have a majority of conservative justices on the supreme court to side with idiocy.

[niyad]

24. how about the women name the male members of their local council, or their state reps.

I know there would be a lot of problems, but it would sure irritate the hell out of those woman-hating bastards.

[lpbk2713]

25. This is totally effed up.

This makes Arkansas look 100 years behind the times.

[demmiblue]

26. It is amazing how fast the war on women is escalating.

[niyad]

27. yes, it is. and on so many fronts.

[WinkyDink]

29. I'd say I had no idea.

[niyad]

30. the profound hatred for women is no longer even bothering to hide itself.

[WinkyDink]

31. The major difference between these male law-makers and ISIS is clothing. ISIS wants total

coverage; these men would prefer total un-coverage (no matter what they claim).

[niyad]

34. you make a most excellent point

[sheshe2]

33. Fugg this bullshit!

[niyad]

35. there are words, most of which would garner me a visit from the suits.