Proving there is no such thing as settled law when it comes to women’s bodies, just before midnight last Wednesday, a mostly-conservative Supreme Court refused to block one of the country’s most restrictive abortion bans, this one in Texas.
Here’s more on that Texas nonsense. As for this being one of those “heartbeat bills,” well, that’s crap. In The Guardian, Dr. Ted Anderson, president of the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, which represents 58,000 U.S. physicians, said:
“Arbitrary gestational age bans on abortion at six weeks that use the term ‘heartbeat’ to define the gestational development being targeted do not reflect medical accuracy or clinical understanding.
“Pregnancy and fetal development are a continuum. What is interpreted as a heartbeat in these bills is actually electrically induced flickering of a portion of the fetal tissue that will become the heart as the embryo develops.”
But then, reality and science have never been a big part of the anti-abortion discussion.
The Court’s lack of action was based on procedural hoo-hah, but the hypocrisy of this late-night punt is stunning, and expected. It was obvious from the previous administration’s Supreme Court nominations and from an anti-woman movement that has been years in the making that this hard-fought battle for women’s agency wasn’t nearly over.
(For what it’s worth, the vote to punt was 5-4, with Chief Justice John Roberts, again, siding with the more progressive wing of the Court.)
The Women’s March is planning events around the country on Oct. 2, two days before the Supreme Court convenes on their traditional opening day, the first Monday in October.
So we march. I march for my granddaughters’ right to control their bodies, and their futures. I march for women I haven’t met who for whatever reason elect to wait to give birth — or for women who decide to never give birth. Their decisions are not my business, nor are they the business of legislators in Texas or elsewhere.
So ladies? Swords all the hell the way up. Watch this space for details about marches in your area.
There are antivaxxers marching on a Texas hospital at full capacity with COVID patients chanting “Our Bodies - Our Choice” and “My Body - My Choice.
I shit you not.
I was all set to hear of Lysistrata when I read the headline.