Wednesday, February 22, 2006

It's a bad time to be in South Dakota (if you're a woman who claims control over her uterus, that is).

Jill of Feministe wrote a great piece on the South Dakota bill that's going through right now, attempting to make abortion in *all* cases except where the woman's life is in immediate danger. Yep, that means no exceptions for other serious health risks, rape, incest, extreme birth defects that mean the infant will likely die during/immediately after pregnancy, etc.

I'm just gonna say: If you're a woman in South Dakota, and you don't want to have a child, you might want to think about moving. Because even refusing to have sex doesn't matter -- if someone rapes you, the possible contents of your uterus are under state protection for the next 9 months.

2 comments:

Nita said...

Actually the aim of this bill is to test roe v. wade, which as someone who is pro-life, i'm not in favor of right now. This could seriously re-affirm roe rather than slapping it down. Beyond that, the issue with the woman's health being placed in a bill is that it allows for mental health as well which is difficult.

Becky said...

Although that seems to be the goal, the bill itself is a mess. And if it's actually supposed to go into effect at some date, it's still going to be a mess. I don't know how this works, but wouldn't it be immediately in effect if passed? And then we'll wait 2 years to see what the Supreme Court has to say, while in the meantime, there's no provisions for if the fetus dies in utero, or if the woman was raped, or if the "woman" is a 12 year old incest victim... I just don't think this bill is very well thought out as a document, and I agree that it doesn't even seem like the best way to go about pro-life project.