A Ban on Abortion is a Ban on Women's Rights
Georgia Republican Governor Brian Kemp signed a bill into legislation on Tuesday, banning abortion and furthermore, punishing women up to life in prison.
That's right, the state of Georgia just criminalized abortion.
Women who now end their pregnancies could receive life in prison; any pregnancy that reaches six weeks must therefore be carried out to full term. The law also forbids doctors from terminating any pregnancy once they can identify "embryonic or fetal cardiac activity" which is usually at the six week mark. The law claims that unborn children are to be recognized with full legal rights, even though they cannot exist outside the womb.
Six weeks is the equivalent to being two weeks late on your period, which happens more often than not. Representative Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez states "Most of the men writing these bills don't know the first thing about a woman's body outside of the things they want from it."
I couldn't agree more.
The law & science surrounding the issue of abortion and life is so overwhelming that it baffles me to imagine that there are still people in the world who think otherwise.
The law ignores fundamental basics of biology; if you have been sexually assaulted, taken a morning-after pill, or have an irregular cycle, it is possible to have a delay in your menstrual cycle. The current constitutional standard under the Supreme Court's Roe v. Wade decision is that abortion is legal up until the point where the fetus could survive outside a woman's womb - which is usually at 24 weeks. According to the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, an embryo is not considered a fetus until eight weeks after fertilization, which is about 10 weeks into a pregnancy.
This is not just a law to end abortion, it's a backdoor ban.
This law wants to shut women down and take our voices away. This law gives control of our bodies over to the authorities as if we were property. This is not just about pro-life or pro-choice anymore, it's about the traditional, lost-in-time (even fellow women) class punishing women for their reproductive biology and their choice to enjoy their sexual freedoms like men do.
Contraceptive care and programs such as Planned Parenthood have been put into place to prevent unwanted pregnancies and help women who know they are not ready to bear children. But these programs and the concept of contraceptives have been demonized in a way that leaves women damned if they do, and damned if they don't.
Many women (and their partners) are not financially ready or emotionally prepared to take care of a child, so why would you force a child to be brought on this earth if he/she is not going to be given a proper upbringing?
I should be allowed to have sex with my partner without having to consider that I will be punished if an unwanted pregnancy arises. JUST LIKE MEN. I should be allowed to enjoy sex.
We are not baby factories; we are more than our reproductive capabilities.
