Alabama’s War on Women

[Loulit01]

Harding says it took at least eight hours to be booked into a cell that night, and it was more than a week before she was finally allowed to see a judge. She was still leaking breast milk, and desperately missing her two daughters. Her family wasn’t allowed to bring her clean underwear, so every day she washed her one pair, saturated with menstrual blood, in the cell sink, then hung them to dry.

Harding says she eventually learned the warrant for her arrest had been issued because of a urine test taken at a doctor’s visit early in her pregnancy. Sitting alone in her cell, she conjured a vague memory of her OB-GYN warning her local authorities had begun to crack down on weed. The comment had struck her as odd at the time: Nine years earlier, when she was pregnant with her first child, the same doctor at the same hospital had told Harding, who’d smoked both pot and cigarettes before she was pregnant, that she’d rather Harding kick the nicotine than the weed. (Studies are unequivocal about the fact that cigarettes contribute to adverse pregnancy outcomes, but the research on weed is less conclusive, with some doctors arguing it at least has therapeutic benefits, like helping with morning sickness.)

“If a baby is born with a controlled-substance dependency, the mother is going to jail,” then-Sheriff Todd Entrekin said at the time. Police weren’t required to establish that a child was born with a chemical dependency, though — or even that a fetus experienced any harm — a drug test, a confession, or just an accusation of substance use during pregnancy was enough to arrest women for a first offense that carries a maximum sentence of 10 years. One public defender would later call these “unwinnable cases.”

Alabama's War on Women

Anti-abortion activists have sought legal rights for embryos since the Seventies. Today, Alabamians are learning the cost of that fight, from IVF to abortions

www.rollingstone.com

This article is well worth reading. Republicans are absolutely out of control and they have SCOTUS on their side. If Trump wins we lose the republic.

 

[Lursa]

There are a few of these cases. I dont know why some eager ACLU lawyers looking to make their reputations dont volunteer to help these women.

But you can see they prey on poor, uneducated, addicted, etc women that mostly dont even know to ask at the time.

 

[Grand Mal]

Harding says it took at least eight hours to be booked into a cell that night, and it was more than a week before she was finally allowed to see a judge. She was still leaking breast milk, and desperately missing her two daughters. Her family wasn’t allowed to bring her clean underwear, so every day she washed her one pair, saturated with menstrual blood, in the cell sink, then hung them to dry.

Harding says she eventually learned the warrant for her arrest had been issued because of a urine test taken at a doctor’s visit early in her pregnancy. Sitting alone in her cell, she conjured a vague memory of her OB-GYN warning her local authorities had begun to crack down on weed. The comment had struck her as odd at the time: Nine years earlier, when she was pregnant with her first child, the same doctor at the same hospital had told Harding, who’d smoked both pot and cigarettes before she was pregnant, that she’d rather Harding kick the nicotine than the weed. (Studies are unequivocal about the fact that cigarettes contribute to adverse pregnancy outcomes, but the research on weed is less conclusive, with some doctors arguing it at least has therapeutic benefits, like helping with morning sickness.)

“If a baby is born with a controlled-substance dependency, the mother is going to jail,” then-Sheriff Todd Entrekin said at the time. Police weren’t required to establish that a child was born with a chemical dependency, though — or even that a fetus experienced any harm — a drug test, a confession, or just an accusation of substance use during pregnancy was enough to arrest women for a first offense that carries a maximum sentence of 10 years. One public defender would later call these “unwinnable cases.”

Alabama's War on Women

Anti-abortion activists have sought legal rights for embryos since the Seventies. Today, Alabamians are learning the cost of that fight, from IVF to abortions

www.rollingstone.com

This article is well worth reading. Republicans are absolutely out of control and they have SCOTUS on their side. If Trump wins we lose the republic.

Incredible.
If not for the 'safe third country' principle those women might qualify for refugee status in Canada. Wouldn't that look bad!

 

[Ginger Ale]

This is sickening. I had a an odd incident this last weekend. I went to the ER because my gallstones were acting up, while there the ER doc asked me if I had any abdominal surgeries in the past and I stated yes, I had a miscarriage and laparoscopy surgery as a result.

Then he stopped and ask, why would the doctor do that for a miscarriage and what was wrong with the "baby?" Granted, this happened 30 years ago but still, I was shocked. I felt odd, and said, that's just what the procedure was for a miscarriage then. He had a scowl on his face.

It took me a minute after he left to realize why he asked. Pretty shitty. I can't imagine what the girls going into that ER are facing as treatment from the likes of those docs.

I really hope to get women's reproductive rights back so my daughters don't have to suffer.