Alabama is Violating women’s rights – Immie Pearson
People like to say that we live In a better, freer healthier world, and in many aspects of life that’s true, but woman’s rights in Alabama and other states in America are going back by decades. Last week Alabama’s 35 seat senate signed a new bill for a near blanket ban on abortion, it passed twenty-five votes to six, that twenty-five all being men, Senate is dominated by men, and none of its four female senators backed the ban. It was then signed by Alabama’s Republican governor, Kay Ivey. The ban if passed bans abortion past six weeks, bare in mind most women don’t know they’re pregnant at this point so it is essentially a near-complete ban or might as well be.
And just to worsen this already heinous law is there will not be exceptions in cases of rape or incest. In my opinion, a woman has a right to abortion no matter what the circumstances, it is no one’s business but her own, she is the one who has to deal with the physical and psychological implications of growing, carrying and birthing a child, it’s her body, her choice. Unfortunately, those twenty-five men have decided for the women of a whole state that they do not deserve autonomy and control of their own bodies. I like many people am outraged by this, and cannot imagine the fear the women in Alabama and all of America are feeling at this time, their human and constitutional rights are being attacked, I thought about trying to be more neutral about this topic but quite honestly that’s going to be impossible.
The reason the ban is past 6 weeks is because of what is known as the ‘heartbeat bill’, these bills state that as a fetal heartbeat can be detected, that baby is a person and has the right to life. The model legislation many states use refers to that fetal cardiac activity as a marker of “an unborn human individual,” defining a moment where alive-ness starts. And while that is technically true, this just demonstrates the ignorance of those who pass these laws. Doctors usually detect this ‘heartbeat at 6 weeks to reassure a mother that the pregnancy will probably advance and be healthy, it is not technically a heartbeat, rather electrical impulses, at 6 weeks there is a very immature cardiovascular system, it cannot really be called a heartbeat if you are wanting to be scientifically accurate, “What’s really happening at that point is that our ultrasound technology has gotten good enough to be able to detect electrical activity in a rudimentary group of cells,” (Horvath), At 24 weeks (6 months) a baby could survive outside the womb. So essentially a group of cells and electrical impulses is receiving more consideration than the living breathing human being who is carrying it who the government and society have a duty to protect.
Under the bill, doctors face 10 years in prison for attempting to terminate a pregnancy and 99 years for carrying out the procedure. A woman who has an abortion would not be held criminally liable, and abortion in cases where the mother’s life is at serious risk are allowed.
The bottom line is this ban will not stop abortion, it will stop safe abortion, according to the Guttmacher institute abortion rates in countries where abortion is legal are similar to those in countries where it’s illegal. In parts of the world where abortion is illegal, botched abortions still cause about 8 to 11 percent of all maternal deaths, or about 30,000 each year. In August of 2018 the Argentine senate rejected a bill that would decriminalise abortion within 14 weeks of pregnancy. A week later it was reported a 34 year old woman had died from septic shock after attempting to terminate her own pregnancy. This fact shows these supposed ‘pro-lifers’ are anything but, they do not care about the lives of the mothers nor do they care about the children they are forcing to be born.
A state that ranks 46th in Healthcare is not pro-life, as soon as those children are born they do not care if they are placed in a neglected in a system that is already stretching at the seams. This law is not about protecting life it’s about control, to deny women reproductive rights is to deny them human rights, wether the bill will be passed remains to be seen, but Alabama is violating human rights with this bill and it can’t be allowed to stand. It is a person’s right to not believe in abortion, how that manifests though is; if you don’t want an abortion don’t get one, not to enforce the beliefs of one group on all women, endangering and violating them.
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