Abortion: Legislative Ovary-Action

(Image via The Cut)

(Image via The Cut)

Jessica Shepard, Resources Editor

If you haven’t heard whispers of the word “abortion” within the past few weeks, it’s probably because you haven’t glanced at a single’ source of media — it’s the topic on everyone’s mind, and for good reason. Recently, many states have passed or tried to pass more restrictive abortion laws. These laws are full bans or what critics call “backdoor-bans” on the matter entirely — meaning abortion is becoming a near impossible feat. But what does this all mean? For those with a uterus, it could mean everything.

 

Abortion in the Hands of the State

 

The bill that jumpstarted attention to this new abortion outrage was the nicknamed “Heartbeat Bill” in Georgia. This bill sought to recognize unborn fetuses with a detectable heartbeat as “natural persons who qualify for … state population based determinations,” giving them full recognized rights as citizens of the State of Georgia, and, as such, are protected under the State. Abortion would now then be considered a “murder” of a recognized human life under UDDA classifications. The reason why so many people have jumped to label this as a “backdoor ban” is that a detectable heartbeat can be found in a fetus at 6 weeks of pregnancy — a time when someone might not even realize they’re pregnant. For those without a uterus and/or who are unfamiliar with the workings of menstruation, this would resemble a period that was around 2 weeks late. Menstruation cycles are different for everyone who has them and are increasingly more irregular the younger you are. They can skip between how long they last, how far apart they are in succession, as well as the symptoms that go along with them. A standard 28-day cycle is not one that fits with every uterus, as can be expected with bodies — they don’t fit into typical molds of what they should or shouldn’t do. Critics have rushed to label this bill a “backdoor ban” because, without outright banning abortion, the window to receive one is now extremely slim, if not non-existent. The window slims even more when you take into account that the earliest a pregnancy can be officially confirmed by a medical professional is roughly 10 days after a missed period, landing someone in the middle of the 5th week of pregnancy.

Not only that, the exemptions to this law have decreased. Under the previous bill in Georgia, which allowed abortion until up to 20 weeks of pregnancy, certain exemptions were allowed for people to have abortions if it was a serious physical or emotional risk to if they were to carry to term. While physical exemptions are still in place, the bill claims, “No such condition shall be deemed to exist if it is based on a diagnosis or claim of a mental or emotional condition of the pregnant woman or that the pregnant woman will purposefully engage in conduct which she intends to result in her death or in substantial and irreversible physical impairment of a major bodily function.” Serious emotional harm or threats of suicide and/or self-harm are not considered “viable” reasons for abortion by the State, so now the only way a pregnant person could obtain an abortion is if they were to be aware of their pregnancy before 6 weeks and choose to abort within a near 4-day window, or face a serious medical emergency that would jeopardize their life if they were to carry a pregnancy to term. Adding it up, the possibility of abortion is thrown out the window.

The plot thickens when we consider what abortion is now classified as when unborn fetuses are recognized as citizens of the State: murder. The Georgia bill continuously uses the words “abortion” and “homicide” interchangeably and confirms those who choose to terminate a pregnancy, those who aid in performing an abortion, and even those who experience a miscarriage can be subject to criminal charges. To recap, this means not only are the windows for abortion now incredibly thin, but there’s also severe criminal punishment for those who are involved with them in any way — even one as indirect as a miscarriage.

So why does this matter? Why such outrage among the masses? Well, for starters, it toes the line of unconstitutional.

 

Roe v. Wade and the Fight for Bodily Autonomy

The term Roe v. Wade might be one you’ve heard quite a bit in the last few weeks. This term refers to the landmark Supreme Court decision in the case of “Jane Roe”, a woman who wanted to end her pregnancy amidst Texas law prohibiting abortion unless the pregnancy was a danger to the pregnant person’s health and safety. The court ruled that the right to privacy “is broad enough to encompass a woman’s decision whether or not to terminate her pregnancy”, as defined by the Fourteenth Amendment’s protection of personal liberty from state action — thus, bodily autonomy. This decision granted the right to abortion nationwide: something these bills are hoping to challenge. Imposing borderline unconstitutional abortion bills was exactly the intent for Georgia and the states now following in the footsteps. The Supreme Court has been flipped, meaning there is now a majority Republican seating that can overturn the Roe v. Wade decision if it were to be brought back to their review, officially outlawing abortion nationwide. But here’s the thing: when abortion was criminalized in the 19th century, pregnant persons still found ways to terminate their pregnancies, just without the help, guidance, and care of medical professionals who were qualified enough to aid them. They went about the difficult procedures themselves: hospitals even had entire wards dedicated to treating patients in the aftermath of self-induced abortions, many suffering from sepsis and other serious infections. Criminalizing abortion never stopped abortion — it just meant making a choice about your own reproductive health and rights made you a criminal.

This all comes down to bodily autonomy, which is your control over your own body: you get to decide whom or what can, in a sense, use it, for what reasons, and for x amount of time. Bodily autonomy is what grants you overall consent for everything and anything that happens to your body; this can include anything from sex to donating organs. It’s why we must check a box on our driver’s license if we want to be an organ donor in the event of an accident — legally, someone without this consent cannot have their organs harvested to be donated, even if it may save many lives. Criminalizing abortion jeopardizes this right to bodily autonomy, possibly giving more rights to a corpse than we do to those with a uterus.

Historically speaking, it’s not an exaggerated myth that women have only had fleeting encounters with this idea. Regardless of personal desire, it is known that women’s physical and cultural role throughout history has been to produce and raise children — sometimes at the sacrifice of their own education and advancement. Bodily autonomy being violated is something unproportionately experienced by women — either by not getting to choose if, when, or how they have children, or by more extreme cases like rape, molestation, or forced sterilization. This elaborate history of misogyny is why it’s easy to spot a need for control over women’s bodily autonomy in these abortion bans, because the answer to reduce abortion rates lie in a place legislatures are failing to look: full reproductive healthcare.

 

Reproductive Healthcare

 

There’s a very simple and scientifically supported way to decrease abortion rates, and it is to provide people with easy and affordable access to reproductive health services. These can include contraceptives like oral birth control, IUDs, and condoms, or full sex education, or affordable public healthcare — preferably all of those things and more. The overall reproductive health as well as the economic, social, and political advancement of people improves when access to these services are available, not to mention legal access to abortion itself. With this thought in mind, it comes as no surprise that the places that do not provide these services lead the world with some of the worst stats for the reproductive health of their community — the birthplace of the new “Heartbeat Bill” not excluded. Georgia is dead last in the United States in terms of maternal mortality, with a whopping 46.2 deaths per 100,000 births, which is double the national average. So, the state now looking to limit access to abortion is also one that will damn its future pregnant persons to a grim survival statistic due to the lack of maternal healthcare they provide, which arguably seems counterintuitive to its focus on the preservation, protection, and care for human life as addressed in this bill. No amount of opposing belief can change the tide of scientific statistic regarding the reproductive health of a community: access to safe and legal abortion, birth contraceptives, and sex education help more than they harm.

 

No matter your stance on abortion, and no matter your belief on when and where life begins, one thing remains clear: the law just passed in Georgia and all those that will follow it are not steps forward for anyone, least of all those with a uterus. If not threats to the fundamental human rights of those around you, they are threats to the health of all those around you.