Kiss your bodily rights goodbye: SCOTUS edition April 19, 2007
Posted by Evil Bender in Morality, News and politics, constiutional issues, reproductive rights, wingnuts.trackback
Feministing has a roundup of responses to yesterday’s SCOTUS decision in favor of the government’s “right” to tell women and their doctors which medical procedures they can undertake. What it comes down to, for me, is that SCOTUS, for the first time since Row, has upheld a law that makes no exception for the health of the mother. How can ruling out a medical procedure that medical professionals say is often the best choice and doing so without exception for the health of the mother not be a violation of a woman’s right to choose?
If anti-choice folks really cared about peoples’ health instead of about controlling others’ bodies, then surely they would oppose any band without health exceptions. Never mind that other late-term abortions are still legal, but dangerous or even completely impossible in some cases. Never mind that women who have late-term abortions generally do so because of medical reasons or because they have been unable to obtain one (or pressured not to obtain one) earlier. Never mind that no one, all things being equal, would rather have a late-term abortion: according to the anti-choice crowd, this is all about women killing babies, not about human beings making difficult decisions about their own bodies.
I will say it again: anti-choicers are working hard to prevent women from making choices about their bodies. And men, don’t think you’re in the clear. The far right ascribes better judgment to you, but the best judgment is always attributed to The Man.
Don’t believe me? Then why is the Federal Government tracking what medication you take?
Our bodies are our own. End of story. The State has no right to make medical decisions for us. We have the right to choose how we live, to choose our medication, our doctors, which procedures we will use. When the time comes, we have the right to choose when it is time to go.
Our bodies, ourselves. That is all.
[...] wingnuts, reproductive rights, Morality, Religion. trackback Given the increasing violence (political through SCOTUS and many states and physical through attacks on abortion clinics) against our attempts at reproductive justice* I [...]
[...] I support reproductive freedom because I love the women in my life, and because I’m sick to death of those who would demean, degrade and dehumanize them. I work to be conscious of the privilege that’s afforded me as a man, and the very least I can do is speak up when I see assaults on the rights of women. When they take away a woman’s bodily autonomy, they are doing their very best to make her less than human. That devastates women, devastates us all. [...]