really, utah?

I read an article the other week that I could hardly finish because it literally made me feel sick. If you'd like, you can read it here. Apparently, a new bill passed by the Utah state legislature (and which currently awaits the governor's signature) criminalizes miscarriages. In other words, it allows the state to charge a woman with criminal homicide for inducing a miscarriage or obtaining an illegal abortion. But in addition to criminalizing an intentional attempt to induce a miscarriage, the law also sets a standard that might make women legally responsible for miscarriages caused by 'reckless' behavior.

Of course, we all know that it's just another way to cut at a woman's right to choose. So first you bomb abortion clinics and murder abortion providers until women simply can't get access to safe, legal abortions. Then, you set up a welfare system that makes it virtually impossible for single mothers to provide for themselves and/or their child. And then you proceed to complain about single welfare mothers. Etc. etc.

Don't get me wrong-- I am in no way, shape or form condoning this behavior. I wish no one did drugs while they were pregnant. I wish no expecting mothers got into fistfights, or drank, or smoked. I hate the thought of unsafe, illegal abortions just as much as the next person. But do I think the solution is criminalizing 'risky behavior'? Absolutely not. What about better access to prenatal care and safe, legal abortions instead? I think this type of attitude is missing altogether from the pro-life campaign. Shouldn't the pro-life movement be all for increased funding for available contraception and sex education? Would that not be a better way to reduce the number of abortions than simply making them illegal? But it seems that in my experience (and this is completely anecdotal, of course) that the people who are pro-life are also anti welfare, anti universal health-care, anti sex-education, and anti contraceptives in schools, so that just isn't an option, I guess.

This is something I have never understood about the pro-life movement. It's a vicious cycle, and it goes something like this...

Oh, hey there teenager! Today we're going to teach you about abstinence only. Nevermind that you're a teenager with an under developed frontal lobe with little-to-no judgment capacity and also have raging hormones that activate sexual drives. Yeah, who cares if our method doesn't work. You'll just go and get yourself pregnant because you can't get contraception. And then we're going to make it nearly impossible for you to get an abortion because we're going to picket outside planned parenthood and judge you. Then, when you feel as if you have no other alternatives and you resort to this alternative of doing drugs or seeking other unsafe methods, we'll put you on trial, humiliate you and call you a criminal. Have fun in prison, you criminal! Maybe if you had listened to our ineffectual advice on abstinence, and maybe if we had given you access to birth control, and maybe if we had allowed you to get a legal abortion you wouldn't have to spend the rest of your life in jail. Sorry about that!

Also, I don't buy that the aim of this law is to punish the rare woman who pays someone to beat her up or throws herself down the stairs. The aim is to start a precedent toward criminalizing ending pregnancy that can eventually be extended toward less extreme circumstances. Very, very slippery slope and very, very intentionally so. Not to mention the fact that there are so many things that can cause miscarriages and there are even more things out there that may cause miscarriages. This law seems awfully vague, and awfully scary.

Be careful, Utah.