Utah Criminalizes Abortion - and Miscarriage

[kiyakotari]

Information gakked from nagasvoice.

Utah is criminalizing women who get abortions AND SUFFER MISCARRIAGES!

http://bit.ly/CriminalMiscarriage

This is bad. Among the comments at that link, somebody tries to explain it was amended to deal with cases like that of a 17-year-old who paid somebody to beat her until she miscarried. Well, duh--what do you think will happen when you criminalize abortion?

Secondly, down at street level, it doesn't honestly matter what they thought they were doing in the statehouse. What will matter is how it gets interpreted and enforced. If somebody wants to enforce this law against those women who come to a hospital with accidental miscarriages, then they can. It doesn't matter that it wasn't intended that way. Laws get torqued out of all recognition all the time in enforcement, and not by cops or DAs at the bottom, but for higher level prosecutors and mayors and all sorts of people with political axes to grind. Same reasons as these right-wing guys voted for this stuff in the first place.

Maybe Utah citizens could think about electing sane people for a change? As the Amplify site notes:
...Utah is not a state known for its legislative sanity. This, after all, is a state that recently made headlines for proposing to honor gun manufacturers on Martin Luther King Day and for considering the elimination of 12th grade to cut back on education spending.

Well, it just got a whole lot worse.

Utah just became the first state in the U.S. to criminalize miscarriage and punish women for having or seeking an illegal abortion. Utah's "Criminal Miscarriage" law expands the definition of illegal abortion to include miscarriages, removes immunity protections for women who have or seek illegal abortions, and assumes women are "guilty of criminal homicide of an unborn child" if a pregnancy ends after "intentional, knowing, or reckless" behavior.

This law:

* defines legal abortion as a procedure "carried out by a physician or through a substance used under the direction of a physician." Anything else that terminates a pregnancy is now defined as illegal abortion - including miscarriages.

* states that "The killing or attempted killing of a live unborn child in a manner that is not abortion shall be punished as...criminal homicide."

* removes existing immunity from criminal prosecution for women "who seek to have or obtain an abortion" or "upon whom a partial birth abortion is performed."

* applies the legal standard of an "intentional, knowing or reckless act of the [pregnant] woman" as punishable as Criminal Homicide...

But even among states that punish illegal abortions, this "Criminal Miscarriage" law is unique. It doesn't punish individuals who perform illegal procedures; it punishes women.

This is all about PR. The state legislature backed off their proposal to eliminate 12th grade when it was ridiculed in the national press. Dropping a year from high school led to "perception problems" -- because of The Onion! -- but national media has been silent when the state enacts one of the most dangerous abortion laws in U.S. history. That silence ends right now.

It's time for everyone to hear about Utah's "Criminal Miscarriage" law. The media must to cover it. We must to start conversations all across the country about what this means for women and girls in Utah - and what this precedent means if (or, more likely, when) other states follow suit. (A similar case in Iowa should be all the warning we need.)

Comments

[nezumitoo.livejournal.com]

How in the fuck can they say having a miscarriage is an illegal act O_o? Seriously, miscarriages for the most part are chance [I had one myself and believe me, I did not want to lose that baby]

I just... even in 2010 we're still dealing with this crap. Our bodies are our own and I'm at a loss as to why people think they have a right to dictate what we do with them, pregnancy included.

[kiyakotari.livejournal.com]

My mother lost a baby boy between my younger sister and I to miscarriage.

I'm going to go be very angry and take it out on some free weights for the next hour or so.

[nagasvoice.livejournal.com]

Thank you very much for corssposting. And yes, I'm sorry to have caused many people to get very angry, even if it's in a just cause.

[greenjudy.livejournal.com]

Terrible law. Not just because its intent is to control women with fear, but because it's so very sloppy, so exploitable in ways probably even the legislators can't imagine. This veers very close, for many reasons, to prosecuting thought-crime.

[nagasvoice.livejournal.com]

Exactly.

[twigling.livejournal.com]

Welcome to Medieval Times. Stone Age, next stop.

So women in Utah can still get a "legal" abortion from a doctor, just no more playing with coathangers or falling down stairs. But.. miscarriage is something that just happens sometimes... it's not something that an expectant and excited mother hopes for, it's a loss and emotional trauma. This is stupid. Men make these laws.

Next, fertile women who do not treat themselves as pre-pregnant get imprisoned?

Is it still okay to take contraceptives and use condoms, or is that now "criminally preventing fertilisation from taking place"?

[nagasvoice.livejournal.com]

I suspect that, on a practical basis, it's extremely difficult to *find* a Utah clinic where you can even get counseled about your choices in a full disclosure sort of manner.
And re: contraceptives, most places it's business as normal, but in some places the pharmacists have taken to refusing to sell you any of those things, "as a matter of conscience". We had to have a go-round about the legalities of them doing that.

[twigling.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the clarification! I understand that life is sacred and all, but come on... it's not like humans are threatened by extinction thanks to abortion, miscarriage and contraceptives, quite the opposite.

[calalillith.livejournal.com]

I've been making this face all day: o_______0

[nagasvoice.livejournal.com]

Yes. As some other folks have commented, it made me very angry, and made it hard to go to sleep.

[shipwreck-light.livejournal.com]

I keep looking for the emergency cord, but I can't find it. To stop the world and get off, damnit!

Better yet, stop this crazy thing and throw off the rowdy passengers who can't keep their bullshit to themselves.

[nagasvoice.livejournal.com]

Sadly, they don't even recognize when it's excrement they're smearing everywhere.

[shipwreck-light.livejournal.com]

Maybe if we stuff some up their noses? Or could it be their senses of smell have been irrevocably corrupted by dumb?

Maybe this calls for science?

[twigling.livejournal.com]

Science? I think these people already subscribe to intelligent design and cannot be persuaded for lack of evidence, sadly:(

[kiyakotari.livejournal.com]

I think even intelligent design might be a little bit too progressive for them. >:(

[shipwreck-light.livejournal.com]

Oh gosh, I meant for US to have fun, not for them to do anything but have pointy/horrible things shoved up their noses XD. I mean, they have to be good for something besides stupiding up the world. Maybe I'm just too optimistic about their capabilities? Even though they are so predictable: the answer is always "godidit", talk about an epic control!

Also, I'm mean and have access to many exotic smelly things which I wish to use. Dead quail, anyone?