Utah’s proposed legislation is hardly surprising since we already knew the pro-life movement is all about controlling and punishing women.
A bill passed by the Utah House and Senate this week and waiting for the governor’s signature, will make it a crime for a woman to have a miscarriage…. In addition to criminalizing an intentional attempt to induce a miscarriage or abortion, the bill also creates a standard that could make women legally responsible for miscarriages caused by “reckless” behavior. Using the legal standard of “reckless behavior” all a district attorney needs to show is that a woman behaved in a manner that is thought to cause miscarriage, even if she didn’t intend to lose the pregnancy.
Reckless behavior? Like wearing high heels? This is just crazy. It also promises to be a bureaucratic nightmare – not that conservatives will have a problem with government spending over this. But how exactly would you prove such things? Dan Savage asks the same questions…
If every miscarriage is a potential homicide, how does Utah avoid launching a criminal investigation every time a woman has a miscarriage? And women have a lot of miscarriages: one in four pregnancies end in a miscarriage. And how is Utah supposed to know when a pregnant woman has had a miscarriage? You’re going to have to create some sort of pregnancy registry to keep track of all those fetuses, Utah. Perhaps you could start issuing “conception certificates” to women who get pregnant? And then, if there isn’t a baby within nine months of the issuance of a conception certificate, the woman could be hauled in for questioning and she could be indicted for criminal homicide if it’s determined that she intentionally or accidentally induced a miscarriage. Of course, lots of women miscarry before they even realize their pregnant… so Utah will have to pass another law, one that compels all sexually active women—actually, let’s just say all women, Utah, since some sexually active women claim they’re chaste—to come in for mandatory monthly pregnancy tests…
One in four pregnancies end in miscarriage. Guess doctors are going to have to start reporting patients to the government of Utah. And these idiots are the ones screaming about freedom and comparing Democrats to nazis. Project much.