Yesterday I put up a post on the issue of abortion, and where the line should be drawn. I don’t think there should be a line at all. A woman’s body is hers, and no one should have the right to tell her what to do with it. Most women, of course, who become pregnant, will act responsibly, but the fact that some may not does not give governments the right to intrude into women’s privacy, and to limit their freedoms. That it’s mainly a Christian issue is made clear by the Health Secretary’s claim that
[t]here’s an incredibly difficult question about the moment we should deem life to start. [see the Guardian here]
Hunt, just new to the health portfolio, since last month’s cabinet shuffle, has kept quiet about this until now, and though he says it has nothing to do with his Christian faith, there is reason to doubt the sincerity of the claim. Speaking to the Times (behind a paywall here) Hunt said
he had reached the conclusion after studying the evidence and denied that his stance was a consequence of his Christian belief.
In the Times interview he said:
It’s just my view about that incredibly difficult question about the moment that we should deem life to start. I don’t think the reason I have that view is for religious reasons.
But his claim about evidence found no backing from health professionals:
Dr Kate Guthrie, a spokeswoman for the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists, questioned the basis for Hunt’s reference to making his decision after looking at evidence. “What evidence is he thinking of? I can’t think of anything.”
Which just shows how dependent Hunt’s views are on his Christian prejudices, and how endangered women’s reproductive freedoms are when faced by the idiocies of Christian meddling.
Of course, the so-called “pro-life” constituency are all cock-a-hoop over the sea change in the cabinet. After Hunt declared himself for a limit of 12 weeks (on some supposed evidence), another cabinet minister, the Home Secretary Theresa May, voiced her support for a lowering of the limit from 24 weeks to 20. The strange thing, to my mind, is that no one in the government seems at all concerned about the rights of women. None of those in favour of a reduction of the time limit has mentioned the women involved, and what implications the proposal would have for them. On the face of it this is astonishing. It’s almost as if the women are invisible, and the only thing that counts with these people is the potential life growing inside them. They seem quite prepared to limit access to abortion, even though it is entirely possible that abnormalities might show up much later, as Cathy Newman mentioned in her own story in the article cited yesterday. Newman’s experience, as she says, allowed her to see both sides of the story, and that’s just the side the politicians are complicit in ignoring, presumably for the sake of living up to their Christian principles. This is a clear example, despite Hunt’s denial, it seems to me, of religious meddling in public policy decisions where it does not belong.
According to the Times report,
the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists [RCOG] called the Health secretary’s intervention “insulting to women.”
As indeed it is. One of the things that would be put beyond reach by a 12 week limit would be testing for Down’s syndrome. And while Cameron did not agree with his new Health secretary, he said that he was entitled to his opinion, though the Prime Minister is in favour of a reduction to 20 weeks. I assume his reasons are also due to his Christian convictions.
This is surprising in a society that is largely post-Christian, and it indicates the depth of Christian influence in a country a majority of which do not even believe in God. According to the National Secular Society only 38% of Britons believe in God. The genuinely puzzling thing about this flurry of anti-choice activity by the Tories is that almost all abortions are early, and when they are late, they are late for good reasons, because the women are then often “in extremely challenging circumstances,” as the spokesperson for the RCOG said. And she went on to say:
The politicisation of women’s health is absolutely shocking. Politicians talk about putting patients at the centre, which is quite right. How is the woman at the centre of her healthcare with something like this?
If everybody had to have abortions by 12 weeks, my worry would be that women would be rushed into making decisions: ‘I have to have an abortion now or I can’t have one.’ That’s an absolute shocker. You will absolutely create mental health problems if you start dragooning women into making decisions before they have to. [my italics]
The important point to notice here, again, is that the anti-choice politicians are not standing on firm evidential ground, and by speaking, as he does of “issues that cut across health and morality,” Jeremy Hunt is, despite himself, expressing a religious view, for the morality in question here is religious morality. Hunt must know — and if he doesn’t, what is he doing in such an exalted position? — that, if the limit for abortion is lowered, then some women will, in desperation, seek the old-style “backstreet” abortion, with all the dangers to women’s health that this will portend. The only reason for forcing women into such a situation is a religious one, and Hunt, who is a Christian, though he does not broadcast the fact (as he says), is simply being disingenuous when he says that his Christianity has no bearing on his position. Since there is no scientific basis for his stand, the only other basis for taking such an extreme stand is religious.
Nero fiddling to the sound of burning Rome
You may wonder at my strong stand on this issue. The truth is that women’s right to abortion preceded my concern for assisted dying, and I held that a woman’s right to abortion throughout the years of my Christian ministry. I came more slowly to recognise people’s right to die, a good ten or twelve years after I had decided that the decision for abortion should be vested in the individual woman and in the individual woman alone. Hopefully, she will consult with her husband, if she is married, but he should have no controlling say in her decision. I can think of no good secular reason for intervening in a woman’s privacy and liberty interests for the sake of supposed foetal rights; and in an overpopulated world, lots of reasons to enforce, by abortion if necessary, as is done in China, a limitation on family size, for overpopulation is already putting too much stress on a seriously compromised environment, and spiralling population growth has serious implications for the future of the planet. The madness of Christians campaigning for the rights of foetuses, when our habitat is being destroyed by excessive population growth, should be evident. With the suddenness of the melting of the arctic icecap this year, and the likelihood of the methane being released from permafrost, there is every probability that our environment will suffer very sudden, sustained loss. We owe it to the future to curb population growth. Arguing about the morality of abortion in such a situation reminds me of Nero fiddling while Rome burned (which, it is said, he could not have done, the violin not having been invented yet — but he could have played a lyre!).
While democracy is the best way yet we have of ensuring some degree of fairness and inclusiveness in society it does tend towards government by amateurs – well that’s my view here in UK. Just thinking about attempts to fix the economy, the recent rail franchise fiasco (Virgin rail etc) and now emotionally charged and religiously motivated comments about abortion we watch as the amateurs have to be corrected once again by reason and the experts laying out the facts. In a discussion I heard on the radio this morning about the sugggestion of a 12 weeks limit for abortion, a spokesperson answered for the medical profession by calmly pointing out that 90% of abortions are already carried out before 13 weeks and only 1% after 20 weeks, most of the later ones being carried out because of congential complications. One would think that a health minister would a) know the facts and b) have more pressing issues to take his energies.
I missed the “Today” programme this morning, where presumably you heard that discussion. Thanks for the info. I am reminded of a fairly recent “Today” programme, when Jeremy Hunt was Culture Secretary, and presenter James McNaughtie famously made an (unintentional) spoonerism with Hunt’s surname and his then position in government. Somehow seems more appropriate now (not that I approve of such gender-specific insults
).
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“With the suddenness of the melting of the arctic icecap this year, and the likelihood of the methane being released from permafrost, there is every probability that our environment will suffer very sudden, sustained loss.”
Yes, but sea ice coverage in the Antarctic has reached new record highs, so we here in the south are all clearly going to be beaten to death by hail and crushed by glaciers while your lakes are boiling away.
http://nsidc.org/data/seaice_index/images/daily_images/S_timeseries.png
Or it could just be normal climate:
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2012/08/07/1117576/-Current-Cyclone-North-Pole-Record-Low-Ice-in-2012
And your methane panic is way out of date: it turns out that it’s been seeping out for centuries and nobody noticed.
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/09/25/remember-the-panic-over-methane-seeping-out-of-the-arctic-seabed-in-2009-never-mind/
None of which affects the morality of abortion, of course. But your arguments will have more effect if they are backed by reason rather than alarmist hysteria.
“Most women, of course, who become pregnant, will act responsibly” And often the responsible thing is abortion. The approach of the right wingers is that they will punish 99 innocent people to prevent one “guilty” party going free. It applies to all their ideas.
Corio, as I was writing those words I thought of you, and said to myself, “Corio will have something to say about that.” Well, there you are then. And my “methane panic” is not a panic, but, even if it has been “seeping” out all along, it has not been, as it may be, if the permafrost is no longer “perma”, completely free to escape in quantity, which will add a great deal to greenhouse gas emissions. I still have to go with the reasonable side on this one: that is, the consensus side, and not the marginal sceptics. The sceptics may be right of course, but it is looking less likely. As for the antarctic, it may be that land ice is diminishing while sea ice is increasing, with an overall loss of antarctic ice. See here:
http://www.skepticalscience.com/antarctica-gaining-ice.htm
However, in the end, it is scarcely fair to speak of “alarmist hysteria” when I am simply pointing out a simple fact — that there are limits to the carrying capacity of any environment, and it is neither hysterical nor unreasonable to suppose that the earth is reaching its limits with human populations. There is (or may be, if we are reasonable about it) a future, after all, and using resources at the present rate is not obviously sustainable.
So Corio means an ostrich with your head up your…..Pull your head out. What happens to all the carbon we have been burning for 150 years? Perhaps there is not cause and effect in your oil-fueled world.
The “it’s the woman’s decision” argument is a red herring, since that is (in most cases) not the issue with the “pro-life” faction. This argument rests on the assumption that a fetus (of any age, apparently, in your view) has no need of any sort of protection. Where do you draw the line? How many years after birth?
You can question the claim that a fetus is a person, with evidence, and suggest a (perhaps fuzzy) line yourself, but what is the point in debating when you claim the other side claim something (it’s about the right of the church to control women) which is not the issue with most “pro-life” types?
Hopefully, she will consult with her husband, if she is married, but he should have no controlling say in her decision.”
What if she is not married but knows the father? Should she consult with him? Right, he has no say in her decision, but he has equal (if not more) financial responsibility for the child. What kind of logic is this?
Sorry Phillip, it’s not a red herring. It is the most relevant question to ask, for hers is an adult life, and what she does with her life is up to her, not to others, not even her husband, and not to a chance partner, for sure. The “father” — he’s not a father until a child is born — if financially responsible, is only so once a child is born, and, if the woman decides to carry the foetus to term, perhaps before, but that is only if she makes that decision. But it’s hers to make. How can we justify intevening in the decision of a adult human being? You clearly come at this from a religious point of view. What gives you or anyone else the right to determine arbitrarily that a foetus is a person, thus giving you the right to intervene? Personhood, while vague, has some fairly well-known parameters, and a foetus doesn’t match any of them.
“Sorry Phillip, it’s not a red herring. It is the most relevant question to ask, for hers is an adult life, and what she does with her life is up to her, not to others, not even her husband, and not to a chance partner, for sure.”
This follows only if you assume that the fetus is not a person. I am not criticizing your position on this issue in detail, but rather criticizing a) your logic and b) the effectiveness of your argumentation, since many if not most religious people will have no idea what you are talking about since they don’t even see the issue of removing choice. For them, it is all about life. Again, one can disagree with this position, but one shouldn’t claim that the other side believes something they don’t.
“How can we justify intevening in the decision of a adult human being?”
Again, this rests on the assumption mentioned above. Should someone raising children be allowed to let them die if, for whatever reason, they do not want to raise them? If so, up until what age? You seem to claim an absolute right for a person to decide about her own life, regardless of the consequences for other lives. If you don’t say where you draw the line, it looks like you are a fifth-column agent from the other side making an exaggerated caricature of the “pro-choice” position.
“You clearly come at this from a religious point of view.”
Completely wrong there. It is probably impossible to be more convinced of atheism than I am.
“What gives you or anyone else the right to determine arbitrarily that a foetus is a person, thus giving you the right to intervene? Personhood, while vague, has some fairly well-known parameters, and a foetus doesn’t match any of them.”
I don’t claim that right, but I also claim that there is a difference between a five-year-old child and a five-hour-old fetus. You haven’t said where you draw the line, even after birth.
“This follows only if you assume that the fetus is not a person”
That is what christians do in practice. If the fetus is a person, that means a miscarriage is a passing away. Yet christians in general don’t hold funerals for miscarriages. Another point is that in an emergency, any catholic can perform a batism. Yet catholics don’t perform such an emergency baptism on a miscarriage.
Baptism and funerals are among the most important rituals for christians yet they are frequently denied for fetuses. Thus christians don’t regard fetuses as persons/
Good point, one which I have also made myself. However, I think this applies only to early-term fetuses, not to those near full-term, and certainly after birth (while Eric was arguing it was OK to chuck them into the volcano).