Tomorrow, Ohioans will vote on Issue 1 — the enshrinement of reproductive rights in the Ohio Constitution. The amendment will likely pass. If it doesn’t, Ohio will be governed by a six-week abortion ban, with no exceptions for rape, incest, or the health of the mother.
A local Evangelical pastor has been seeking out people who have VOTE YES signs in their yards, asking them why they are baby killers. In his Bible-sotted mind, if you support a woman’s right to choose, you are a baby killer; a murderer. I do not doubt that he believes that abortion should be criminalized and anyone who facilitates, participates in, or has an abortion should be criminally prosecuted and incarcerated.
I have no hope of meaningfully interacting with people who think I am a “murderer” because I think women should have a right to control their bodies; that abortion is an essential part of reproductive care.
So, does this mean I am a murderer; a baby killer? Of course not. Eight out of ten abortions take place in the first trimester, long before the zygote, tissue, or fetus is a “baby.” To be sure, the fetus is “potential life,” but not a baby (in the normative sense of the word). Once a fetus reaches viability — 22 to 24 weeks, roughly six months — then a case can be made for regulations to ensure that only fetuses that have fatal birth defects or are threats to the health and life of the mother are aborted (which account for roughly 12,000 abortions per year).
All of us have a right to bodily autonomy — including pregnant women. I will vote YES tomorrow because I want women, including my two daughters, daughters-in-law, and thirteen granddaughters, to have the absolute right to control their own bodies. Appeals to God, the Bible, or other dogma carry no weight with me. I don’t care what the Bible says, the church says, or some preacher says about the matter. My only concern is for women themselves.
Bruce Gerencser, 67, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 46 years. He and his wife have six grown children and thirteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.
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When I went to Cedar Point last week, I only saw “NO” signs. If getting harassed was a side effect of putting up a “YES” sign, I can see one reason they were so scarce.
Yeah. It better pass!
Even the most hard wired forced birther doesn’t really take their beliefs to their natural conclusion as, otherwise, we’d replace the universal use, both legally and culturally, of being ‘born’ with being ‘conceived’. Nobody thinks that country of birth should be replaced with country of conception, we refer always to birth rights, not conception rights, and so much in law depends on being first born, and not first conceived.
Forced birthers are entitled to their opinions, even to the extent that the law be changed to execute women who have abortions. Just as pro choice are entitled to change the law such that forced birthers have their tongues removed and be made to walk barefoot all their lives. Alternatively, we agree to live in a society where abortion is permitted until it’s no longer medically abortion; an induced abortion after 22 weeks is surely just a natural birth?
Foaming at the mouth anti abortion Christians will assert that god is in control but deny that the billions of miscarriages throughout history make him the greatest abortionist of all time. Can’t have it both ways.
Forced-birthers are this country’s Taliban: They don’t really care about the “unborn” so much as they want to control women’s bodies.
Banning or severely restricting abortion will degrade women’s health care: Practitioners who fear that they could be prosecuted for performing a procedure that saves a woman’s life are leaving those places where abortion is banned or severely restricted, or even their professions.
I wish a lot of these forced birthers were capable of having a genuine conversation about what these abortion bans mean to real people in actual situations. When it’s “baby-killers” vs “protectors of innocent life”, that isn’t a conversation. Talk to people you know, and you’ll be surprised how many women with wanted pregnancies needed abortions. Talk to women you know about how we feel about being told that our state gets to determine our Healthcare and life trajectory decisions. Pregnancy and birth are FUCKING HARD, they take a toll on your body and on your psychological health. No one should be forced to go through that, ever. And people who are incapable of being forced to go thru that should shut the fuck up, stand back, and let people for whom that is a possibility make their own decisions.
I like viewing women as noble, worthy of esteem, on a pedestal because of the sacrifices they make.
Not interested in being trapped on a pedestal – too easy to fall off, or to be knocked off.
Also not a big fan of making sacrifices – or worse, much worse, being socially pressured to make sacrifices.
And please don’t label me with moral attributes solely on the basis of the organs in my body. My ovaries ain’t into philosophy.
Congratulations Ohio!!!! Even the news in my little country is celebrating this win for those that want to stop the slide if the US becoming Afghanistan today!
Ohio, you did it! Yet another red state that, when the vote was put directly to the people, voted NOT to ban abortion care!
GOP needs to really take notice. If it isn’t clear that even red state citizens want access to reproductive Healthcare, then I don’t know what is clear.
People under age 60, women in particular, grew up with Roe, Title 9, and a plethora of laws that made it possible for women to have access to education and jobs and sports just like males. While everything wasn’t and still isnt perfect, I knew I (and my nieces and daughter and sisters) could have AGENCY over my own life path in a way my grandmother’s definitely coukd not, and my mother’s transitional generation had to fight for. Example: my mom was highly intelligent, and in the late 50s/early 60s was one of 3 girls in a class of 300 ALLOWED to take advanced math and science classes in high school. ALLOWED. And she graduated 3rd in the class. Whereas my generation didn’t have a gender allowance/restriction.
As women, we won’t go back to those days before women had agency. And many of our male counterparts don’t want us to go backwards either. Men also want to have reproductive freedom, the ability to plan their family sizes. Ask them – they’ll tell you it’s important to them too.
Votes matter. I learned that lesson. For years I was a GOP voter, secure in my Whiteness, my middle-class economic status, my reproductive agency. I am ashamed to say my privilege was highlighted when Trump entered the 2016 race, and there was no way I could support that batshittery, a batshittery that I couldn’t have envisioned then. Since then, I have spent years trying to learn more about racism, inequity, gay rights, and now I understand why it’s wrong to vote for candidates not committed to all human rights. People’s rights are being taken away by a handful of judges, by extremist legislators, and now I understand how fragile our rights are. We have to remain vigilant.
Congratulations, Ohio, for speaking up for human rights.
Hi Obstacle- Your comment about Trump made me remember that I can say that I never voted for him, even as a “Republican”. In 2016 I voted for the Libertarian candidate, 2020 for Biden.
I remember going on a hike with a friend right after the 2016 election. He (and everyone else I knew) had voted for Trump over Hillary Clinton. I told my friend that, while I was never a fan of Bill and Hillary, I could not vote for Trump, even as a conservative. Something about him at the time just made me not feel good.
I have never liked bullies, regardless of where they fall on the spectrum left or right.
Even though I am Catholic and live in Ohio, I am glad the voters have spoken on both abortion and recreational MJ. I have already read how Republican state leaders are planning their strategy to diminish both referendums. Right out of the Trump play book. And of course the religious leaders are upset that their attempt to use the political system failed. A reminder that Jesus said his kingdom is not of this world.
I no longer call myself a Republican. I’m an Independent who generally supports Democrats. I will vote for someone whom I may disagree with if I perceive they are a decent human being. I will not vote for a jackass even if I agree. That’s how the Republican Party found itself in it’s current predicament.
One persistent issue that has led me away from the Republican Party is the idea that it is somehow ok to undermine the result of a popular vote. Neither of these two referendums is taking anyone’s freedom away, or imposing some kind of 1984 style restriction on religion, speech, etc. But to hear some of these folks talk, Marxism is right around the corner. If Democrats were trying to subvert the result of a referendum with the margin of victory these both had, there would be a riot on the steps of the state capitol building. So why do these Republicans think it is ok for them to do likewise?
I generally can converse with reasonable people on both right and left, religious and non-religious. Increasingly, I find myself unable to talk with hardcore Trump supporters.
Yay Ohio! Dave and OC have summed up the situation very well.
I was a high school freshman when Roe vs. Wade was decided. Title IX passed the year before. I was being raised as a Roman Catholic boy. In spite of what the priests said (or perhaps because of it: I had a rebellious streak), I knew Roe was a good thing and even though I didn’t think I would benefit from it, I was happy for Title IX. Perhaps that had something to do with my seeing myself as female—a way I wouldn’t get to live for several more decades—and seeing girls who were smarter, more talented and even better athletes than I was.
Also, my relationship with my mother and maternal grandmother influenced the way I saw girls and women: I started thinking, around that time, of how their lives might have been different had they access to the education and other opportunities I would enjoy. I wanted the girls I knew—some of whom were friends and girlfriends—to have those opportunities simply because I liked and respected them.
(Years later, my mother told me, “If I could do my life over again, I still would’ve had you and your brothers. But I would’ve done it about 10 years later: I would’ve gotten an education and a career first.)