Gilead Is Real: The War On Abortion And Women's Rights 2

[47of74]

Being a safe haven is hard

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Steps from an interstate and minutes from an airport sits a nondescript building with a tenant never more in demand.

Whole Woman's Health is one of the nation's largest independent abortion providers, and the location of its Minnesota clinic is no accident.

"Some patients may fly, some may prefer to drive. So being near the highways that we are and the airport in Bloomington gives patients the most options available," said Sharon Lau, Midwest advocacy director for Whole Woman's Health Alliance.

Lau says the clinic is bracing for an influx of patients from states with more restrictive abortion laws than Minnesota after the Supreme Court overturned Roe V. Wade and enabled states to determine abortion access.

 

[Manda]

 

On 6/29/2022 at 11:22 AM, nelliebelle1197 said:

I find this especially rich from you towards someone like @nausicaa since 75 percent of your interactions on FJ are using the fuck off reaction rather than using your words or contributing in any substantive way. Giving people the finger for actually expressing option with an emoji is not exactly helpful and it is pretty much what you do.

 

 

On 6/30/2022 at 9:07 AM, SilverBeach said:

What you say here was a pet peeve of mine about FJ, those who would pretty much only drive-by downvote or fuck-you, with no meaningful contribution to advance the discussion. Those practices were defended, ie. no one has to explain their reaction, etc. I'm glad you see how useless this is.

At least be accurate.  32 F/Us to 668 hearts is not 75% and that doesn't include all of the other votes.  

Not guilty of the "pretty much only drive-by downvote."  

SMH at some people.  

[molecule]

12 hours ago, 47of74 said:

Some of the larger law firms are pledging to cover costs if their employees or employee dependents need an abortion

I've been seeing news about a variety of companies doing this. I'm pondering a couple thoughts. 

1. This is nice for women who work for these companies, but it does nothing to help the server at Denny's or Golden Corral, the woman who's working two parttime jobs while going to school to make a better life for her theee-year-old, or the woman who quit her job to care for an ailing parent. And what about lost wages for someone who doesn't get paid time off? Sure, her abortion and travel will be paid for, but three days of lost wages may mean the difference between having lights or being able to eat next month. 

2. Is anyone actually going to be comfortable telling their employer they're getting an abortion? I wouldn't want my name on a list in my HR department if I lived in a state that had an extreme anti-abortion law.

A relative recently made a medical decision (related to changing birth control) because she didn't want to appear to have a missed period in her period tracking app. Her decision caused only temporary discomfort, but it makes me wonder how many women will encounter genuine medical problems because of fear of appearing to skip a period.

[Smash!]

Interesting perspective why fundamentalist women vote anti-choice 

For those who don’t have reddit: Her account is tialevingswriter

Edited July 3, 2022 by Smash!

[WiseGirl]

 

[dramallama]

So glad the pregnant 10-year-old rape victims won't have to look at a rainbow while getting shot at in their classrooms, god bless 'Murica.

[Audrey2]

This makes me livid! If I remember correctly, young girls who give birth are more likely to have a fistula. I remember reading about girls in Africa who give birth, develop a fistula, and leak urine/feces after. The girls could even become infertile as a result. 

I do say girls because, although they are biologic women, they are late elementary/middle school age.

[dramallama]

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Women on Waves receives applications from the US for abortion ship

I was just telling my husband a few days ago that I hoped someone would follow the example of Women on Waves and put an abortion ship (or a fleet of them....) in international waters off the coasts of US states with bans.  The Gulf of Mexico seems like a prime location.

[BensAllergies]

I’m reminded of the Duggar dream I had several years ago. I found it so disturbing that I never shared it but now that it’s more of a reality I see it as foreshadowing.

In my dream, Jessa Duggar was in an ultrasound room stroking the hair of a 12yo who was crying. The girl had just found out that she was pregnant due to incest/rape. Jessa was trying to comfort her but was also shilling the talking points such as “it’s God’s will” and “you’ve just got to have the baby.”

I’m more than horrified that this is now state sanctioned in multiple states, including Texas which has the highest population for a red state and the site where the FLDS built that compound.

[47of74]

On 7/2/2022 at 10:37 PM, molecule said:

I've been seeing news about a variety of companies doing this. I'm pondering a couple thoughts. 

1. This is nice for women who work for these companies, but it does nothing to help the server at Denny's or Golden Corral, the woman who's working two parttime jobs while going to school to make a better life for her theee-year-old, or the woman who quit her job to care for an ailing parent. And what about lost wages for someone who doesn't get paid time off? Sure, her abortion and travel will be paid for, but three days of lost wages may mean the difference between having lights or being able to eat next month. 

2. Is anyone actually going to be comfortable telling their employer they're getting an abortion? I wouldn't want my name on a list in my HR department if I lived in a state that had an extreme anti-abortion law.

A relative recently made a medical decision (related to changing birth control) because she didn't want to appear to have a missed period in her period tracking app. Her decision caused only temporary discomfort, but it makes me wonder how many women will encounter genuine medical problems because of fear of appearing to skip a period.

Good points.  Especially the one about the women who don't have access to health insurance and being uncomfortable telling employers about having their name on an HR list.  I could see some of the reich winger shitweasels like Gov. Abattoir, Reynolds, Paxton, DeathSatan, and so on trying to get their hands on records from companies - even those in more progressive states - to see who's had an abortion so they can harass the companies and the women.  I hope these companies take steps to protect the identities of their employees who need to make use of it and are willing to fight hard against reich wing states like Iowa, Texas, Ohio, and Florida if they try to pull any shit.

Upshot to some companies paying for abortion care is that it pisses the reich to lifers off.  The Dubuque paper had someone whining about it the other day along with the fact that women were able to work outside the home and have careers.  Hell of it was it wasn't some sexually frustrated old man or incel but it was a woman who I think is a leader in the Dubuque reich to life movement.

[nelliebelle1197]

For anyone who has an audible subscription, The Janes - a book about abortion rebels from the pre Roe era- is on for free!

[Jackie3]

On 6/29/2022 at 11:22 AM, nelliebelle1197 said:

I find this especially rich from you towards someone like @nausicaa since 75 percent of your interactions on FJ are using the fuck off reaction rather than using your words or contributing in any substantive way. Giving people the finger for actually expressing option with an emoji is not exactly helpful and it is pretty much what you do.

 

 

 

To me, the FU emoji is just saying, "You made me think" or "You got under my skin." That's really not a bad thing. It's a sign that you've made a persuasive point.

19 hours ago, nelliebelle1197 said:

For anyone who has an audible subscription, The Janes - a book about abortion rebels from the pre Roe era- is on for free!

Thank you, I'll check it out. How great that it's free!

[meep]

https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-features/roe-supreme-court-justices-1378046/

"

At an evangelical victory party in front of the Supreme Court to celebrate the downfall of Roe v. Wade last week, a prominent Capitol Hill religious leader was caught on a hot mic making a bombshell claim: that she prays with sitting justices inside the high court. “We’re the only people who do that,” Peggy Nienaber said.

This disclosure was a serious matter on its own terms, but it also suggested a major conflict of interest. Nienaber’s ministry’s umbrella organization, Liberty Counsel, frequently brings lawsuits before the Supreme Court. In fact, the conservative majority in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health, which ended nearly 50 years of federal abortion rights, cited an amicus brief authored by Liberty Counsel in its ruling."

HOW IS THIS OKAY?!?!

[Destiny]

Sigh. The system is so broken. It’s so very not okay.

[Bethella]

Some hopeful news out of Michigan. Bridge MI is reporting that the reproductive freedom amendment had gathered 800,000 signatures (about 10% of registered voters in the state)! They still have to be verified but its nearly twice the required number and supposedly the highest number of signatures ever gathered for a Michigan ballot petition. https://www.bridgemi.com/michigan-government/michigan-abortion-rights-ballot-measure-has-800k-signatures-organizer-says

[GreyhoundFan]

From actor John Turturro: "My grandmother’s botched abortion transformed three generations"

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When the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, my first thought was of my grandmother and the botched illegal abortion that transformed three generations of my family. My mother, Katherine, the fourth of six children, was born in Brooklyn to immigrants from Sicily. Her mother, Rosa, took care of the family and worked as a seamstress from home; her father, Giovanni, earned his living as a shoemaker. They struggled as many poor families did, then and now, to feed and clothe their children. Then Rosa became pregnant with child number seven.

She was 40. She had a baby, a 4-year-old, a 6-year-old, a 7-year-old, an 11-year-old and a 13-year-old. I imagine the method of birth control was rudimentary. Rosa’s older sister Margarita was distraught that Rosa would have another mouth to feed. Margarita persuaded her sister not to bear another child.

Margarita promised to make her a special drink, a combination of certain powerful plants (most likely pennyroyal, tansy or savin, among other ingredients that were used at the time). That concoction would “take care of it.” Rosa acquiesced to her older sister. My mother was 6 years old at the time.

My grandmother became feverish — most likely from an infection that turned into septic shock that evening — on fire from the poison, burning inside. Pennyroyal, I know now, can be toxic to the liver. My mom watched her mother stand up on her bed, pulling at her hair and asking God, “Why?”

Rosa Inzerillo was taken to Kings County Hospital in Brooklyn on April 18, 1927. She died on April 25 at about 7 a.m. The doctor was unable to state definitively the cause of death; the last diagnosis during her last illness was manic depressive psychosis. Contributory: exhaustion.

One late night at the kitchen table, my mother told me this story, slowly and quietly, haunted by the images of her mother’s death. For years, she had hinted that something tragic had happened but she had never put it fully into words until then. She remembered her Aunt Margarita whispering to her mother, coaxing her, while she played with her doll.

My grandfather worked at the Hanan Shoe Factory in Brooklyn for $35 a week. After my grandmother’s death, the Brooklyn Department of Welfare sent all the children to City Hospital. None of the immediate relatives was able to take in any of the children; after every family name — maternal uncle, aunt, grandmother — the official report says, simply: “Cannot assist.”

On June 2, 1927, my mother was taken away screaming and admitted to St. Joseph’s Female Orphan Asylum in Brooklyn. The reason for admission: destitution. She remembered being locked in a clothes closet because she could not stop crying and asking for her mother. Her younger brother Fred went to the boys’ section of St. Joseph’s Asylum. Her two older brothers, Anthony and Nicholas, were sent to St. John’s Home — one of them soon ran away, only to be returned. Her older sister, Margaret, went to live at St. Germaine’s Home in Peekskill, N.Y. Her baby brother, Carmello, remained at home with my grandfather and died when he was 4.

As a result of this botched illegal abortion, my mother lost not only her mother but also her home, her family, her native Sicilian language (which she was forbidden to speak by the Irish nuns who ran the orphanage), her sense of safety and security, and her childhood. She felt, throughout her life, that her father had abandoned her and her siblings. When he came to visit on Sundays, she forbade him to speak to her in Sicilian. When she did not follow the rules, she was beaten by the nuns who were supposed to care for her. After five years in the orphanage, she was discharged on her birthday along with her younger brother Fred, when her father married Lena Salvato, a widow with nine children. My mother held a distinct memory of all the cars on the street outside the orphanage and the fear of crossing as she left it. Four years later, her stepmother died of a brain abscess.

The family was split up all over again. My grandfather moved to a furnished room. My mother, now 15, was left with her six stepsiblings. Her older brothers had hardened from the loss. Her brother Nicholas broke into a gas station and stole a radio and a bit of cash — the value of the goods was $16.63. He was sentenced to five to 10 years for petty larceny and sent to Sing Sing prison.

My mother, meanwhile, was forced to quit high school. She had hoped to study dress design. The wound of Rosa’s wrenching death never left her or her siblings. Her brothers were in and out of trouble, leaving broken families in their wake. My mother made sure that didn’t happen to us. She never became the dress designer that she wanted to be, but she never stopped drawing, working as a seamstress and then making wedding dresses at home. She fought fiercely to protect her three children with unconditional love and gave us the gift of security that she never had. I am sure her story is not unusual.

She gave me the gift of this story, perhaps knowing that I would dig into what happened. When I was a little boy, I always eavesdropped on the women, huddled together whispering, juggling, speaking their secret language. They held us together.

My mother never stopped yearning for her mother, but she kept it private; only rarely did I hear her cry out for her. Who would my mother or the rest of her siblings have been had abortion been legal and Rosa allowed to parent her six children, rather than dying to keep them fed?

 

[GreyhoundFan]

Trumpkin wants Virginia to be Gilead:

 

[GreyhoundFan]

"How will illegal abortions be prosecuted? 1968 NYPD manual offers hints."

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With abortion bans in place or likely to be enacted soon in at least 20 states, many worried Americans are now wondering: What does the investigation and prosecution of an illegal abortion look like?

An internal document from the country’s largest police force in the pre-Roe v. Wade era provides a pretty good answer.

The New York Police Department first formed an Abortion Squad after an abortion-ring bust in the mid-1950s. It later became the Abortion Unit within the NYPD’s Central Investigation Bureau, and its detectives lent operational support on abortion cases to other units. From 1872 to 1970, it was generally illegal to provide abortions in New York state.

In 1968, the CIB distributed a training bulletin titled “ABORTIONS” to detectives throughout the city as part of a series highlighting investigative best practices and specialized units available within the bureau to aid investigations.

According to the manual, investigations normally began not with an tip from a suspicious acquaintance, but in the emergency room following reports from hospital staff treating victims of botched illegal abortions.

Interrogating women while they were still “confined” in the hospital was “necessary,” the manual stated, to “ascertain the identity” of the abortion practitioner and other “pertinent details” of the operation.

The manual cautioned that a male detective investigating a hospitalized woman for intimate details “invariably results in an embarassment to both parties” and “frequently produces such resentment on the part of the woman that she becomes totally uncooperative.” Instead, police found it “highly desirable to have a trained female detective, rather than a male,” conduct the interrogation because of the “highly personal and delicate character” of the questions involved.

Female detectives did not face the same embarrassment and better understood anatomy, the manual advised, and so they were likelier to effectively “demonstrate to the subject the flaws in a fabricated story.”

The primary target of any investigation was the abortion practitioner. Detectives were more interested in “utilizing” the woman as a witness against the abortionist than in charging her as a defendant (although that prospect remained for uncooperative women).

At this point in the case, there was a tactical fork in the road depending on who was identified as performing the abortion: a non-professional “lone operator” or a licensed physician.

Most lone operators were women who either were or presented themselves as nurses or nurse’s aides. These women usually did not have professional training, operated in “non-sterile, and, in numerous instances, downright filthy” conditions, and were relatively easy to arrest and prosecute, the manual stated.

With a single witness identification, detectives could initiate an arrest of a lone operator without an indictment or warrant, the manual advised.

Meanwhile, the scales of justice weighed differently depending on the accused: Licensed physicians performing illegal abortions (generally men, at a time when women made up 5 percent of doctors nationwide) often received an amount of deference from the district attorney not afforded to their non-professional female counterparts. The training bulletin stated that “cases involving licensed physicians are a different matter.”

District attorneys were “of the opinion that at least six counts are desirable” before a doctor could be arrested. That opinion was based “on the theory” that grand juries showed a “reluctance to indict a doctor” unless the doctor performed abortions as a “regular business.”

To arrest a physician, detectives needed to set up a sting operation. An undercover female officer should schedule an appointment to “elicit from him as much information as possible,” the manual stated. If the conversation was fruitful, detectives could obtain a warrant to wiretap the doctor’s office.

How the Roe v. Wade ruling evolved: A behind-the-scenes visual tour

After that, police would organize a stakeout of the clinic and its patrons. Women “known or suspected” of visiting the doctor’s office for abortions were “tailed, by car and on foot, as necessary,” to covertly establish their identities and residence.

Unlike in cases with female lone operators, where people assisting the abortionist were often offered immunity to testify against the provider, in cases involving doctors the “steerers, chauffeurs, druggists, and the like” were indicted as co-defendants. As a result, the cases could quickly become sprawling investigations of “interstate and highly organized” abortion rings. Only at this point were male officers used in the investigation “if the case so demands.”

After documenting at least six counts of abortion, detectives consulted with the district attorney to convene a grand jury. On the appointed day, the police showed up at the residences of “the previously identified abortees” to serve subpoenas. The women were then “brought to the D.A.’s office, interviewed, and [their testimony] put into the Grand Jury” in order to secure the indictment of a physician.

The final operational support that the CIB Abortion Unit provided was maintaining a “Central Abortion File” detailing all aspects of previous abortion cases, which police viewed as “one of the most important functions” of the unit.

Since abortions were illegal, providers often took steps to conceal themselves and their practice from scrutiny. The women who received abortions often had only “scraps of information” about the providers, such as a location, telephone number or alias. The registry was an “invaluable” resource to police “since abortionists, greedy for easy money, are more often than not recidivists.”

Much has changed in the 54 years since the distribution of that training bulletin. Electronic surveillance captures far more data than telephone calls, and physical surveillance is easier than ever, thanks to drones. More than one-third of U.S. doctors are women. Database records can be collected, stored and accessed electronically. But with the overturning of Roe and a likely imminent spike in abortion prosecutions, it may feel as if not much has changed at all.

 

[GreyhoundFan]

More under spoiler:

Spoiler

 

 

 

 

And of course, the LA AG is a jerk:

Because it's so easy to just pick up and move.

[GreyhoundFan]

This is disgusting:

 

[Shrubbery]

I hope someone later on refused to ring up that arsehole cashier’s treyfenen bacon or haram meat or pineapple pizza.

That is just so beyond disgusting and I hope against hope that was just an isolated incident that is not at all representative.

[AlmostSavedAtTacoBell]

1 hour ago, GreyhoundFan said:

This is disgusting:

 

Jackasses already emboldened by the Dobbs ruling.  Walgreens' corporate response was that their policy is to allow employees to avoid handling sales they find morally objectionable.  This part of the article really stood out to me:

She thinks about how much more humiliating the experience would have been for a younger, less self-assured customer. She wonders if the clerk would have said anything if her husband had been the one to approach the counter with a box of condoms in his hand.

I did appreciate that she had commented that, although she was the only woman in the store, another customer patted her on the shoulder as she left and that customer contacted her (and her husband) when her husband's tweet became shared.  The other customer identified himself and gave a statement for the article that corroborated her account including the smug look on the clerk's face when he refused to sell her the condoms.  I must have missed that part in the New Testament where Jesus told His followers "I say unto thee, when thouest judgeth others, haveth thoueth a countenance of assholeth smuggary, so that all may knoweth thoueth art true in spirit and heart!"

[Audrey2]

4 hours ago, GreyhoundFan said:

This is disgusting:

 

So I'm going to infer that these arseholes are Catholic, based on their views. I'd love to see them bring beer/ other alcohol to me if I still worked in a grocery store. "Sorry," I'd say, " I can't sell you this. My faith prohibits it ."

(Methodists don't have alcohol at communion and traditionally were against it. I'd mention it just to be a jerk!)

[47of74]

Some developments with the case where an anti-choice fuck stick hit protesters

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On Monday, July 11th, Cedar Rapids Police announced that they finished gathering evidence in regards to the case and have handed it off to the Black Hawk County Attorney for consideration:

“The Cedar Rapids Police Department has completed its work to compile facts and evidence regarding the June 24, 2022 vehicle vs. pedestrian incident at 8th Avenue SE and 2nd Street. The case file and investigative materials have been submitted to the Black Hawk County Attorney’s Office for consideration.”

I'm wondering if that's a typo or if there's something going on that they gave it to the Black Hawk county attorney cause of a conflict of interest or some such.  Cedar Rapids is Linn county.

[AlmostSavedAtTacoBell]

4 hours ago, Audrey2 said:

So I'm going to infer that these arseholes are Catholic, based on their views. I'd love to see them bring beer/ other alcohol to me if I still worked in a grocery store. "Sorry," I'd say, " I can't sell you this. My faith prohibits it ."

(Methodists don't have alcohol at communion and traditionally were against it. I'd mention it just to be a jerk!)

Don’t be too sure. As a cradle Catholic, I said a mighty fuck you to the birth control bullshit before I was even having sex (bad endometriosis so imagine all of the doctors’ surprise when the Taquitos were naturally conceived and with the exception of my Angel baby were all full term and healthy.) I know far more contraceptive using Catholics than those who go with “natural family planning” these days (and while I again note my point is anecdotal, all but one of even the staunchest NFP people I know eventually turned to condoms, finding a “barrier” not Biblically prohibited. The one remaining couple - well, gossip is gossip but the gossip is that she told him to stay out of her bed until she is absolutely unable to conceive again. They have 14 live children and I have been told she has had several miscarriages.) 

My guess is he is either of Jilldo/Deadbeat Dave ilk or just an outright judgmental asshole. But I repeat myself.