Push for ‘Personhood’ Amendment Represents New Tack in Abortion fight

[n2doc]

By ERIK ECKHOLM
Published: October 25, 2011

A constitutional amendment facing voters in Mississippi on Nov. 8, and similar initiatives brewing in half a dozen other states including Florida and Ohio, would declare a fertilized human egg to be a legal person, effectively branding abortion and some forms of birth control as murder.

With this far-reaching anti-abortion strategy, the proponents of what they call personhood amendments hope to reshape the national debate.

“I view it as transformative,” said Brad Prewitt, a lawyer and executive director of the Yes on 26 campaign, which is named for the Mississippi proposition. “Personhood is bigger than just shutting abortion clinics; it’s an opportunity for people to say that we’re made in the image of God.”

Many doctors and women’s health advocates say the proposals would cause a dangerous intrusion of criminal law into medical care, jeopardizing women’s rights and even their lives.

The amendment in Mississippi would ban virtually all abortions, including those resulting from rape or incest. It would bar some birth control methods, including IUDs and “morning-after pills” that prevent fertilized eggs from implanting in the uterus. It would also outlaw the destruction of embryos created in laboratories.

more

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/26/us/politics/personhood-amendments-would-ban-nearly-all-abortions.html

[CrispyQ]

1. They've tried this in Colorado a few times.

Fucking control freak assholes who think a clump of cells has more rights than a living, breathing human being.

I can't say how much I hate, yes, hate, these people.

[fizzgig]

6. and they're trying again

they make me ill

[MADem]

2. Oh, please. When that egg can live in a temperate environment for a couple of hours without

any nutritional support or assistance, I'll buy the argument. Until then, the egg is a parasite unless the HOST says otherwise. It's no one's business other than the concern of the one hosting or owning (if frozen) the egg.

What a load of shit. How many of these assholes voting on this measure even have a womb from which to draw a point of reference?

[Tikki]

3. This is what this could mean....

The moment you conceive be prepared to go down to
Social Security and get a SS# for your child.

Sneeze sideways and have a miscarriage maybe charged with murder.

If your pregnancy should fail, even in month one, there
must be a proper burial or cremation of this person and the
legalities around a death settled.

How old will this person be at birth; nine months old or 1 day old?

There are many more issues to take into consideration.


Tikki

[dtexdem]

4. And even the Catholic Church opposes it.

It's totally illogical. If it passes in MS (which it likely will), when identical twins are born, which is the person -- since they both started with the same fertilized egg? And in the rare case of a chimera or mosaic human, is the resulting citizen more than one person (since that human will have come from more than one fertilized egg)? And at base, is chemistry all that defines a human person? So brain activity, even having a brain, isn't important?

As to religious arguments over a soul, religions differ widely; and, of course, many people do not believe in souls. Where does the Bible tell "Christians" when a soul is present? In fact, the Catholic Church does not take a position on that question, its opposition to abortion not hinging on "ensoulment." So what conceivable logic, or even illogic, leads to fertilization personhood?

In fact, most fertilized eggs perish -- and are not noticeable for Mississippi to hold a funeral. But besides the issues raised above about threats to women's rights and lives, and to use of contraception, this would further open up tyrannical DAs' ability to charge women with a crime when she has a miscarriage. Yeah, the federal courts MIGHT ultimately strike such a state constitutional down, but think of the mischief in the meantime, and the longer-term mischief this would inspire.

[zbdent]

5. Does that mean, with every positive drugstore pregnancy test

that, through the will of God, spontaneously aborts itself (happens quite often, just ask Kathie Lee Gifford) ... the insurance companies are legally obligated to pay on the life insurance the "mother" had?

Or does this mean that the courts will find the mother guilty of criminal homicide and "reckless endangerment" of a fetus, for not carrying it to term?

Probably infinitely more common than "late-term" or "partial birth" abortions in this country ...