Did you know many European countries have stricter abortion laws than the U.S.?
I didn’t know it, though I didn’t know much about abortion law to begin with admittedly. Many U.S. states allow abortion until “fetal viability”, which is usually around 24 weeks. Sweden bans it after 18 weeks, stricter than a proposed 20-week policy in North Carolina. Spain and France allow it up until 14 weeks. Ireland allows it only up until 12 weeks. The UK would be an exception in Western Europe that allows it until 24 weeks, as many U.S. states do.
European countries are often presented as being less restrictive and more liberal than the U.S. and it’s true that outright bans are uncommon in Europe, but I had no idea that the window for legal abortion in many “progressive” European countries is smaller than in many U.S. states.
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This is a false comparison. Europeans have easy access to abortion with no questions or waiting period, and healthcare, unlike the US, is free.
As @zenvelo said, those time limits only define the “no questions asked” period. One can still get an abortion after that in most European countries if there is a reason for it (e.g., life or health of the pregnant person). Also, the general trend in Europe has been to expand access to abortion and extend those time limits, whereas the trend in the US has been to restrict access to abortion, create time limits where there weren’t any before, and to shorten time limits that existed previously. The direction of these trends seems important when assessing the laws.
@zenvelo and @Irukandji In America over 90% of abortions happen before 15 weeks. Plenty of liberals were freaking out about restricting abortion on demand to 15 weeks. I myself don’t want the restriction set at 15, I prefer 20, with exceptions later, but I definitely was not freaking out.
Back in April DeSantis (my governor) changed Florida law to abortion for any reason before 15 weeks, and abortion after 15 weeks to save the life of the mother or severe problems with the fetus. I really hope liberals don’t attack him for the change, which basically is no change in how abortion was being practiced already! I hope they don’t call attention to him and inspire him to go further. By the way the statistic I see in Florida is 94% of abortions in Florida happen in the first 12 weeks.
I just want to say that I would prefer no government or laws on this topic. Leave it up to women and their doctors. Women choose earlier abortions in their own when abortion is readily available, they don’t need to be restricted.
What is stricter than prosecuting women who seek out-of-state healthcare?
Not relevant. In the US we have to live by US laws.
What you have to remember is European countries don’t make women and clinics jump through random hoops. My personal favourite is the state that insist teenagers must be anaesthetised… up until week 8 or so an abortion ca§n involve nothing more than a couple of tablets except if your in the US where you’ll be anaesthetised and have the tablet placed in your stomach surgically. For no other reason than to be awkward.
@kruger_d wont be long before women will be required to to a pregnancy test to cross state borders…
@JLeslie “In America over 90% of abortions happen before 15 weeks.”
In what universe do you think we don’t already know this? Besides, it’s not the point at all.
“Plenty of liberals were freaking out about restricting abortion on demand to 15 weeks.”
Yes, because it was an obvious challenge to the existing laws regarding abortion. The 15 week bans were attempts to chip away at, or lead to the overturning of, Roe v. Wade. And as I’m sure you’ve noticed, it worked. So it seems like the concern was warranted.
This is much different from a time limit in, for example, Ireland where an abortion used to be very difficult to get. If you paid attention at all to what I actually said, it was about the different directions that these laws are going in (expanding rights in Europe vs. contracting rights in the US).
Also, I really hope you are not hopelessly naive enough to believe that this ends with 15 week bans, especially since some states have already gone further than that.
“I myself don’t want the restriction set at 15, I prefer 20, with exceptions later, but I definitely was not freaking out.”
I’m not sure why you seem so proud of this considering all it shows is that you were blind to the actual purpose of the change. And it’s not like the recent Supreme Court ruling just changed the legal line where a ban can take place to 15 weeks. Now that it’s up to the states, the exceptions that you say you want are also in danger depending on what state you live in.
^^No shit. I have voted for pro-choice politicians my entire voting life. I am STUNNED anyone is surprised this has happened. When I was in college in the 1980’s a Republican friend of mine was commenting on my being a Democrat because I’m pro-choice, among other things, and she said to me, “abortion is legal and it won’t change.” My comment to her was, “the pro-lifers are blowing up abortion clinics and are relentless in their mission. If it will never change why do you think they keep trying to change it?”
In the years since, the pro-life movement has been constant and consistent at chipping away at abortion rights and it has worried me for as long as I have understood what pregnancy and abortion is.
When I moved to the South I asked my OBGYN if she would make me a priority over a fetus. See, I had 5 failed pregnancies, and in TN the hospitals closest to me were Baptist and St. Francis, and I didn’t really trust doctors either let around hospitals in the Bible Belt so I felt my life could be at risk.
You are speaking to the choir in your lecture to me. I lecture people constantly. I knew Democrats who are pro-choice who voted in favor of requiring parent notification. It is beyond me how they don’t understand the problem with that.
The Supreme Court now reversed Roe. People need to get out and VOTE. Young women better get their act together and vote. Their health is directly in danger let alone autonomy over their bodies.
Meanwhile, I hope the national media doesn’t give DeSantis attention if he isn’t doing anything to make abortion law even stricter here. Let’s see what happens. They gave him lots of attention during covid and it only helped him, and it killed more Floridians in my opinion.
This is a weird about face. First, you act like @zenvelo and I are idiots who don’t know what we’re talking about while completely misunderstanding what we said. Then you act like the 15 week bans aren’t something to freak out about but respond “no shit” after I pointed out that they were worth freaking out about. I’d be surprised if this sort of context-free response wasn’t standard operating procedure for you.
The 15 week ban is not worth freaking out about in the climate we have today as long as there are exceptions after the 15 weeks. That is basically how abortions are done in practice. The law was just putting into law what is done. Like I said above, I prefer no law prohibiting abortions at all.
6 weeks is worth freaking out about.
No abortions at all is worth freaking out about.
Giving DeSantis attention will only encourage him to do more restrictions. Hopefully, he loses in November, but it will be tough.
I don’t disagree about DeSantis, which is why you might have noticed that I didn’t say anything at all about him. But freakouts don’t have to be directed at him or even public in any way. And freaking out about a 15 week ban is happening precisely because we cannot guarantee that exceptions will be part of them.
Of the 13 states that had trigger laws (meaning abortion is already banned in them), only five had exceptions for rape or incest. Doug Mastriano, who has a decent shot of becoming the next governor of Pennsylvania, doesn’t want any exceptions whatsoever (including for the life or health of the mother).
You keep acting like these freakouts are occurring in some vacuum where the law is guaranteed to stay within parameters that you are personally comfortable with (and then turning around and pretending otherwise when called on it). But that’s not what people are worried about. They are worried about 15 week bans because they know that they are a harbinger of further restrictions.
If a six week ban is worth freaking out about, then so is anything that weakens abortion protections to the point where a six week ban is possible. The 15 week ban that led to Roe being overturned made six week bans possible, and every sensible person knew that overturning Roe was the point of it. Therefore, the 15 week ban was worth freaking out about. The people who freaked out about it were right.
@Irukandji I agree with you insofar that each chipping away at current law is concerning. I mentioned requiring informing parents, which came up a lot about 20–25 years ago. Then there is the late-term abortion issue that pro-life pounded at for years and still talks about. Now, we are talking about reducing the at will availability of abortions to 15 weeks, which also is another example placing more restrictions, but it is not extreme when you consider half of our states just made it illegal period.
If we use viability, viability continues to get shortened to begin with, with advancing medical technology.
DeSantis might go further now, he will feel pressure to do it. If he feels it will get him more votes he probably will do something more. We’ll see. I hope not.
As a side note, Florida has a lot of abortion clinics and people come to Florida to get abortions. I think it’s something like 50 locations, and that’s not including abortions that probably happen at hospitals. I know in NY some hospitals do abortions similar to clinics.
I found this map from 2017 of the US and how many abortions clinics are in each state, just scroll down a little on the page. Here is the link Florida had 71! It might be a little lower now, but still going to be high. How is DeSantis going to juggle this I wonder. The abortions probably bring money to Florida too. I know a woman who came from Dom Rep to get her abortion, her baby had a genetic defect, because she could not get it in her country. That probably happens a lot. I am guessing Florida is a haven for women in Deep South states, that will even be more true now.
On the news (NYC news) they said NY state will be a travel destination for women seeking abortions.
@jca2 I remember when a friend of mine wanted/needed a mid-term abortion, because the baby would not be able to survive, and her doctor told her there were only two doctors in NYC who perform it. I told her two is probably good, I bet there are areas of the country without a doctor for hundreds of miles. That was a miracle baby too, they were very excited to be pregnant. Her first child was from IVF. She had had a lot of trouble getting pregnant, and then she gets pregnant naturally and the fetus wasn’t ok. She did eventually have twins after that.
Yes. Poland has a near-total ban on abortion. It has been a problem for Ukranian refugees raped by Russian soldiers.
I don’t think most Americans think of Eastern European countries when comparing freedoms, rights, or governments. Maybe more now than in the past, but at least for myself, I would be thinking of Northern, Western, and Southern Europe.
Poland has a large Catholic influence, and the current central government is very far to the right. I am surprised they have an exception for rape, that’s good. I never understood the rape exception if someone believes life begins at conception and that the life is equal to any other human life.
Allowed if you can prove that you’ve been raped.
@jellyjellyjelly Oh, yeah, forget it. We know how difficult it is for a woman to be believed.
@JLeslie I don’t want to Google it but are you sure all those 50 clinics are abortion clinics? When I had the place in Dunedin there were several pregnancy counseling agencies advertising but they were all about adoption counseling, not abortion.
@janbb: I just googled and I found a site called abortion preborn rescue which says they ahve 57 abortion clinics. I didn’t click on it because I’d be receiving all kinds of right wing stuff if I did. It said “come to preach the gospel and rescue the unborn.” Oh boy. So I guess the answer is 57 at present in Florida.
@jca2 I would want confirmation of that from a reputable source. It may be true of course but I would need confirmation.
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