Oh Kansas, we're so disappointed.
Ready for this?
According to a report from the ACLU, as a part of a sweeping anti-abortion bill, Kansas is ready to pass legislation that will ALLOW DOCTORS TO HIDE the results of your cvs, amnio, ultrasound or other tests regarding your pregnancy IF THAT DOCTOR DOESN’T BELIEVE IN ABORTION.
Writes Jennifer Dalven:
Buried in a sweeping anti-abortion bill is a provision that would immunize a doctor who discovers that a baby will be born with a devastating condition and deliberately withholds that information from his patient. That’s right. If the bill passes, a doctor who opposes abortion could decide to lie about the results of your blood tests, your ultrasound, your cvs or your amnio. Lie to you so that you won’t have information that might lead you to decide to end your pregnancy or that might lead you to learn more about your child’s condition so that you are prepared to be the best parent you can be to your child.
Apparently Oklahoma and Arizona aren’t far behind.
In the words of Sir Paul McCartney, “You gotta help me understand.”
In the past few months, between this, and this and this, and, oh yeah, remember this, I think I’m starting to understand. Let’s break it down.
A. Some politicians believe that they know better than YOU about your body.
B. Women’s health rights are not really a concern unless we’re following the “rules.”
C. The “rules” don’t include terminating pregnancies–for any reason.
D. You’re going straight to hell. (That was just my little addition.)
They’re never going to overturn Roe v. Wade. Never going to happen. Getting a supreme court to overturn such a ruling would send us back to the 19th century. What can happen, and what is happening all around the country, is the systematic attack on women’s health care so that it will be more difficult to get abortions. They’ll do it by cutting budgets for women’s clinics that offer abortions (see this depressing NYT article on more about that) and they’ll do it with hidden measures like Kansas’s plan to give permission for doctors to hide information.
Women need to have the right do what they want with their bodies–this should not be up to politicians. So why is it?
Let’s keep talking. Let’s make this issue a big one. Get out of my vagina, Kansas.
brooke
March 19, 2012
As a Canadian I am following these discussions with absolute shock, awe and horror. I won’t generalize and say that we as a nation consider ourselves necessarily better off than our US peers, but in terms of such a valuable human right as the freedom of choice and ease of access to competent medical practitioners I am genuinely rendered speechless by these proceedings. It really drives home for me the things we so easily take for granted (however since when is the right to make decisions about my own body something that shouldn’t be taken for granted? It’s mine. It belongs to me, and nobody else)
Hayley Krischer
March 19, 2012
Brooke, thank you for commenting from the Canadian perspective. As AN AMERICAN I’m rendered speechless! Unfortunately, we have a lot of religious zealots in this country that never really understood that we don’t want or need ALL OF THEM to make decisions for us. Been going on for a long time unfortunately.