One branch of North Dakota’s legislature just passed a bill that would not only outlaw abortion, but define life as beginning at conception. According to RH Reality Check, legal experts generally believe that defining a fertilized egg as a human being would impact access to both emergency and regular hormonal contraception—both of which can cause fertilized eggs to fail to implant in the uterus. It would also affect in vitro fertilization. And, of course, it would have the effect of outlawing abortion.

Other anti-choice bills under consideration in North Dakota would require the state’s only abortion clinic to post signs outside its door informing patients that no one can force a woman to have an abortion; and a requirement that abortion providers read a statement to women saying that the procedure “will terminate the life of a whole, separate, unique, living human being.”

117 replies on “What’s the Matter With North Dakota?”

  2. @99: If you truly believed abortion to be murder and an absolute wrong, then you wouldn’t allow exceptions in the case of rape. The fact that you would allow this (while dismissing these instances as trivial) combined with your eagerness to call women who have abortions “sluts” illustrates perfectly what your true motivations are: Your views and word choices are not consistent with a great reverence for life or any sort of human compassion whatsoever, but perfectly consistent with a desire to judge others from a position of imagined moral superiority. You honestly don’t give a shit about the lives of others, but you enjoy being able to call women sluts and feel good about it.

    I’ve seen your type standing outside clinics yelling “slut!” and “whore!” and smugly patting yourselves on the back for your righteousness. You’re not fooling anybody that you do this out of love.

  3. Most women don’t go to the doctor without a long, hard think about the decision they are making. Trust me, my friend had one and she waivered back and forth until about a week before she made the appointment. Ultimately, women are going to have abortions, whether or not they are legal is a matter for the rest of us. We need to make sure they are kept legal and safe. If you read “Vaginas: An Owner’s Manual”, the gyno in there talks about the time when abortions were outlawed. A lot more women suffered devastating infections, sterility, and even death because they took care of an unwanted pregnancy on their own. Keep abortions legal and safe. Just like abstinence-only education doesn’t work because kids are going to have sex anyway, criminalizing abortion will only kill or maim more women and cause crime rates to increase. If you read and believe “Freakonomics”, you will see that unwanted children potentially grow up to become criminals. Crime rates rise and we all pay the price in terms of higher taxes and such to raise the little bastards. It’s not fair. Just pay the $400 for the procedure and move on with your life!

  4. Hell, even my mother (also) found herself in a similar situation. She found out her husband was cheating on her literally weeks before she found out she was pregnant with me. In her situation, I would have kicked him to the curb and aborted. She was taking care of him and for him to fuck her over like that and then have to take care of 2 kids on her own (when she finally wised up and left him) is not the kind of life I’m sure she had envisioned for herself. I like my life, too, but my childhood (like others) was less than ideal. Some people need to know they have that option. It’s a contingency plan.

    My friend got pregnant using the pill. I’m sure she didn’t expect it to happen (again), but it did. Now she’s got it taken care of, and to my knowledge has no regrets. It was the better decision for her (adoption was not an option as she was not unselfish enough). It’s a personal decision and needs to be left up to the person who is pregnant – not some fat old white dude in the legislature.

  5. 102
    I do not believe abortion to be murder and an absolute wrong.
    I recognize abortion to be the taking of a human life.

    If done so without justification it would constitute murder but there are times when it would be an ethical choice.

    If a pregnancy truly threatened the life of the mother and the choice was that one of the two involved people; the child or mother; was going to lose their life the decision to take the chiild to save the mother would be an ethical one.
    If the pregnancy was truly noty the result of the woman’s choice; rape, for example; forcing her to complete the pregnancy would seem to heap one injustice on another. (However many women in that position have chosen to let the child live and adopt it out. And if the abortion does take place the rapist, if caught and when charged, should also be charged with a crime that reflects the fact that an innocent human life was taken because of his actions.)

    I do not consider pregnancy resulting from rape to be trivial; however the number of abortions that result from rape is trivially small compared to abortions of convenience and when pro-abortionists bring up rape they are dodging the question.

  7. Again, women are going to have abortions, legal or not. How about we keep them safe and legal so we aren’t having to pay for the care (or incarceration) of the woman having one through taxpayer money? I don’t want to pay to prosecute women just because they didn’t want to continue their pregnancies. And whose to say the woman wouldn’t kill or dump the baby once it’s born? That’s wrong, not abortion.

  8. 106 – If it’s the difference between having the kid be aborted and having the kid born just to grow up and hurt someone else, I’d say abort every fucking time.

  9. @Raindrop: Parental notification is total, complete BS. The reason against it, as has been stated MANY, MANY times is that many girls are the subject of abuse from their family members: brothers, uncles, fathers, etc. Not only that, but some are dealing with physical abuse as well, so their safety would be in question if their parents found out. And PP and other clinics that provide the services have MASSIVE AMOUNTS OF FREE COUNSELING. If your friend is still haunted by a choice she made 20 years ago, she needs to seem serious therapy. Which she can get at…..wait for it….planned parenthood! They have grout thetapy sessions for people who need to deal with the loss of an abortion. So for fuckssake, don’t take away rights to young girls because you know *1* girl who is all sad about it. Also raindrop, I dont want you to go away, I just want you to be informed.

    @Right wing douchebags (you know who you are!): Women who have abortions are not *sluts*. They are women who have made a diffult decision to choose between motherhood or not. They are women who are raped, women who have birth control failures, older women who get pregnant during menopause, get pregnant while on chemo due to cancer, etc.
    And a fetus is not some person or human. It is a collection of cells multiplying.

    Who are the women getting these abortions? They are your friends, aunts, cousins, sisters, wife, etc. And they aren’t all willy-nilly just hopping to the clinic for the ‘ol cut and suck. They make the hard choice knowing it is just right for them. And it’s none of your fucking business. So go cling to your bible, and when your daughter gets raped at 12 years old by her brother, go ahead and make her keep it, you fuckwads.

  10. Also, babies aren’t just *incovenient*. It’s not like, oh the elevator is broken, how inconvenient! I have to have a baby, how *inconvenient*.

    Children are life changing, expensive, and require time and attention. If you have the choice between being thrown out in the streets and trying to have a baby homeless (which some people do) or having a procedure to stop the multiplying cells in your body that would become a person in 9 months, what are you going to choose.

    Or you have a scholarship to college and your birth control fails. Simple procedure, or be horribly poor with no way to provide?

    But once again, there are THOUSANDS OF REASONS why women choose this. And I am guess pretty much all the douchebags who are on this thread are MEN. So hey, FUCK OFF. This doesn’t involve you.

    I bet if men were taken out of the equation of abortion, because it does not effect them physically, the support would be 80 – 20 (cause at least 20 of women are religious assholes who want to force their beliefs on others)

    So hey, if you are a man in this thread…..STFU.

  11. Actually … Orginal Monique. I think more men are allies than you think.

    Men, when they don’t want children, are ESPECILLY fucked by this. How many men are forced into paying child support for children they never wanted? How many men are coherrced into having a child because they thought she was on the pill (I know …. dumb ass men … but still. You would like to think you are trusting someone you are being intimate with).

    And forcing men to become fathers, when they don’t want to be, creates god aweful fathers. You have fathers who struggle to love only out of guilt, and look at their offspring as a financial burden. And the most twisted thing about it .. .THEY NEVER HAD A CHOICE! It’s the women’s choice! The one’s they often come to regret when they realize they have to do it alone. If anything, I would say if the father is aware of the child, he should have veto power. Maybe that would create more quality families.

    And btw … there are little to NONE as far as state resources for single noncustodial fathers who are struggling or deadbeats etc. etc. They don’t get gov. education, or much of anything to improve their lot in life. They pretty much have to get the most mindless highest paying job they can hold on to, and start paying out the ass.

    And no, creating mysogenistic embittered overworked men doesn’t help the feminism movement either.

  12. O@110: take a deep breath. I think you want your pro-choice brothers to keep fighting the good fight, yes? Because guys vote and your pro-choice brothers can help influence guys who would otherwise vote anti-choice, right?

  15. and btw

    Sorry ladies … you heard @113 SADDLEBACKING IT IS!

    All right, let’s get this over with, I’ll be back from the shop, get some schmancy lube … and we’ll have a real intimate night.

    You got the rubber sheets and left the plastic on the mattresses right?

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