Texas Abortion Laws Largely Ban the Procedure and Put Women at Risk

[Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin]

BY JESSICA CISNEROS

When Texans woke up on the morning of September 1, one of their basic rights was gone. Over the summer, Governor Greg Abbott (R) signed into law two of the most extreme anti-abortion laws in the country: One bans abortion as early as six weeks, before many people even know they’re pregnant, and emboldens almost any private citizen to sue abortion providers and others suspected of helping someone seeking abortion care — including family members, ride-share drivers, and even clergy members; the other would outlaw abortion if Roe v. Wade is overturned by the Supreme Court of the United States, with no exceptions for rape or incest.

It’s infuriating to realize that even with so much work left to do to ensure everyone has the resources and support needed to survive the COVID-19 pandemic, our anti-choice government officials have decided to make health care even less accessible.

My 15-year-old niece is one of the brightest people I know. When I see the restrictions on reproductive health care that Abbott signed into law, I think about her. I recall stories I heard from mentors who organized at the University of Texas at Austin before Roe v. Wade, and what I saw, lived, and heard from my friends while I was at UT myself, experiencing the world for the first time as an adult. I don’t want to imagine my niece and her friends having to go through the same thing. I don’t want them to experience barriers to getting health care they may need. I don’t want them fighting a fight that was supposed to have been won back in 1973, one that we continue to struggle with today because our bodies are viewed as political pawns.

I live in Laredo, a border town in South Texas, where access to basic health care is extremely limited and reproductive health care is even more difficult to find. One of the many reasons I support Medicare for All is because I believe health care is a human right, not just a privilege for those who can afford it.

-more-

https://www.teenvogue.com/story/texas-abortion-laws-six-week-ban

[Stuckinthebush]

1. Time for corporations to pull out of Texas

Mass exodus. Or face significant boycotts.

[slightlv]

2. At 16, I was one of those

demonstrating for women's reproductive rights. I can't believe at 65, we're having to do this all over again! In fact, I'd really like every Repug and Evangelical rounded up, vetted, and if found to be against covid, women's equal rights, and social progress then they should be deported to whatever country they'd prefer in which to live. We'll even pick up the cost for them. It'd be a lot cheaper than having them screw everything up from here to eternity. We no more take one step forward than we're shoved 2 steps backward. They're already trying to make it as difficult as they can for us to vote. I've heard more than one Repug state that the whole problem with elections started with women winning the vote, and it should be taken away from us completely. If they could (and I believe they could try) they would.

They have this idealized fetish of the 1950's where women and POC knew their places and never stepped out of them. We women were only for sex, keeping the house clean, making sure the "master's" dinner was on the table, hot and ready when he stepped thru the door. Hot and ready, such that he could have a couple of minutes to "rest" before gorging himself on the dinner we cooked.

When I got out of the military, I wanted to go to college. My husband, a Southerner, refused to even consider it. Said we couldn't afford it. He'd been in the military 3x as long as I'd been in. When I discovered the GI Bill and presented the information to him, he said he absolutely would not let me go to college. He would not be married to someone with more education than him. We soon wasn't. We sat down to talk about it one weekend, me wearing a black T-Shirt with the silhouettes of a man and a woman and the words "Behind every great woman is a man who tried to stop her." I filed for divorce the following Monday. He's been married 3x since then. None of them had more education than him, tho...

I have news for these fetishists. The 1950's weren't ideal for anyone -- not the kids, not the pets, certainly not for the women and POC, and not even for these idiot men. They had the responsibility for everything related to earning money, schooling, etc. Married couples weren't partners. They were unequal partners, no matter how much the wife wanted to help out. But one thing the men DID have then was the respect of other men and respect for themselves. How they lost it wasn't because of abortions, women's lib, or women becoming educated and/or working. If you don't like yourself, the problem lies within yourself -- not outside yourself! Yet we're the scapegoats for their poor sense of identity. Learn to love yourself and you may find others find a reason to love you, as well. Hate yourself, and why in the world would anyone else want to love you?

If the men of this country try to take us back to this fetishistic version of the 1950's, it'll be filled with suicides (both by men and women), women dying in back alley abortions, and by their own hands via coathangers. And these men are still not going to have any more respect, confidence, or sense of identity. If the only way they can feel power is by beating up and/or impregnating or killing women and POC, then any sense of power they momentarily feel will be short-lived in prison, as the real strongmen powerbrokers introduce them into a whole new power hierarchy. And they ain't gonna be at the top. It's almost enough to make one feel sorry for them... almost.

[Skittles]

3. worthy of its own thread

I am curious, though, how someone as seemingly headstrong as you could ever have been married to such a Neanderthal!

[slightlv]

4. 18 is the original age of stupidity

and hormones! Plus, first time away from home and in the military... whirlwind romance. Good sex. That was what was important at that time. A couple of years later, not so much... (gryn) At least I got out quickly, and when I did finally remarry, I married an ex-rainbow hippie who adored me and supported me in every venture I attempted. He was so pro-woman, I almost hate to say bad things about men (altho I still do). Hubs puts these guys to shame. And we're coming up on over 40 years of marriage now. With me having fibromyalgia for sure, and possibly lupus, I can honestly say if it wasn't for him, I couldn't have the menagerie of critters we have, nor live in this house. He picks up the slack for me, even tho he's four years older than me.

Not all guys are awful. I just really picked bad the first time. I was just smart enough to get out of it early, go on to college and get my degree, and then make a good career for myself and my daughter. If only she would listen seriously to one thing I'd advise, I'd tell her to get out of this country while she's still young enough to do it and get a job overseas. This country isn't going to be fit for smart, creative women any longer.

[Skittles]

5. I too was in the miltiary at 18

but I always knew to date the bad boys, not marry them

[slightlv]

6. Ah... but I was from KS... some things just don't

leave you easily. Takes a while to shake off that small midwestern town upbringing. I DID have a hell of a lot of fun before I got married, even tho I married at 18.

Weird, but I think a dream I'd had years before had something to do with it. Told my grandma I was going to marry a southerner. Sure enough, this guy was from Alabama. Seemed fated. Fated for disaster! There's only one death match in the entire zodiac... an Aquarian with a Scorpio. I was Aquarian, and he was Scorpio. His mother even demanded he send back her gun. It was pretty darned obvious to everyone, unless you're in the middle of it.

Yeah, young, dumb and stupid. And I'm still paying for it in some ways even now. I had a child by C-section. He wouldn't have sex afterwards because of the scar. Totally gave me a horrible complex about it. Thank goddess THAT didn't last long. I had a lot of fun between divorcing him and marrying my current hubs. If anything ever happened to him, tho, I'd never get married again. I just don't trust men enough. I got real lucky the 2nd time around. There's not too many men like my 2nd hubby. I'd rather be alone with my cats and my dog than beholding to any man at this point in my life.

[janterry]

7. fetishists

^this, tbh

Our country has become MORE sexist. I grieve.