I hear your disappointment but disagree with the cynicism.
Until very recently the U.S. had federal laws in place to protect reproductive health choices.
The country experienced an extraordinary attack on its democratic institutions, placing religious fundamentalists in the Supreme Court. A result of carefully orchestrated decades long effort.
The country cares, but a few ultra determined parties care more.
My point more is here, given what happened I am not convinced that this is enough to put up enough controversy to make the government take the necessary action.
The sooner people realize that the "ultra determined" don't actually care about the issue, the better. They care about acquiring power. Pushing on abortion was a good way to get people riled up to vote for them. The people doing the pushing were using it as a tool to manipulate voters, they do not actually care. A lot of people have been made to care, of course, but the people pulling the strings do not. Any issue that can get people passionate will be used this way.
But why? Why did they have an audience? Why did peddling abortion restrictions cause people to vote for them?
I'll tell you why. Because we intentionally gave them an citizenry equipped with the kinds of beliefs and moral compasses with which those sorts of arguments resonate. We spent decades raising people to think that human life is infinity valuable and that even the risk of harm is tantamount to blood in the streets. We have been raising people to err on the side of restricting people's freedom in order to prevent harm, both real harm and the statistical hypothetical small harm. We have done this on purpose so that people become outraged when they hear that some employer's machinery does not conform to the latest safety standards. We have done this so that people shun people who engage in slightly dangerous behavior. Of course, everything has tradeoffs and as a side effect of this we have created a society of people who are happy to err on the side of the fetus to the detriment of the mother's bodily autonomy and vote accordingly.
In short, we are reaping exactly what we sowed.
The reason why anti-abortion rhetoric lands with conservative voters is that american christians have spent decades telling each other that abortion is murder. These christians see any diversion from a christian theocracy by the rest of the nation as a direct affront to them personally, and largely their power and status as top dog traditionally. They refuse to accept that other people having rights does not prevent them from practicing their religion or avoiding abortion. These people actively fight the concept of religious freedom. They claim an alternate history where the US is not only a religion based nation, but a modern southern christian one. They claim that because their religion tells them abortion is forbidden, that they should be allowed to push that religious belief onto people who don't even believe in their god.
I have not noticed this. Risky behavior now has challenges on tiktok. Heroin is popular again.
That said, the way it worked in the US never made sense to me. The idea of establishing trimesters from a Supreme Court decision seems contrived to say the least, not to mention the way the relationship to the constitution was drawn.
It further baffles me how many people seem to act as if what SCOTUS did was a ban on abortion. States are free to choose, so if the country actually does care it ought to show in the ballot box.
Abortion is only illegal in 5 states of the European Union (Malta, Vatican City, Liechtenstein, Andorra, and Poland) and yet I would oppose a European law establishing the right to abortion on all of its members. It's for them to decide.
Firstly, multiple states have been preparing for the overturning of Roe v Wade, the court case which specified the right to an abortion was privacy and therefore protected. There are multiple decades-old laws on the books that says if Roe v Wade is overturned abortion is automatically outlawed in the entire state. There's no ballot-box here.
Secondly, the Supreme Court has washed its hands of multiple institutions that would allow people to vote in politicians other than politicians already in power in their respective states. The Supreme Court has struck down or otherwise narrowed national mandates curtailing racist voting policies. The Supreme Court has outright stated they will now refuse to take up any more cases about gerrymandering, which is a process where politicians get to choose who votes for them basically. This enforces that pro-choice people will always be split up into districts where anti-abortionists are the majority.
The first point creates non-democratic law activation that bans abortion, followed by curtailing the ability for people to vote against this implementation even if they are, in aggregate, the majority of the state.
Now, it's also important to follow on the third point: the united states of america is a giant country. By land mass it is larger than the entire EU. A single state will dwarf multiple countries. This means that even though you have the right to travel to a state that allows abortion, the travel is long and expensive. They will have to fly, pay money for a hotel, and also not work for a week or more.
Overall, this means a severe curtailing of abortion access to millions of people, who are disempowered as a population to participate in democracy.
That's precisely the ballot-box. Elected officials did that.
>The Supreme Court has outright stated they will now refuse to take up any more cases about gerrymandering, which is a process where politicians get to choose who votes for them basically.
I'm sorry but gerrymandering is orders of magnitude more complex than this. There is not even a widely agreed upon position on what would constitute fair voting districts.
If you truly believe the country simply isn't democratic then its problems are simply so large in comparison I can't imagine caring about abortion at all. The truth of the matter, I believe, is that the national divide on abortion simply isn't solved yet, SCOTUS delayed it, but even after being established as legal in the entirety of the US for a long while a good bunch of US citizens still don't agree with the legality of the practice.
"Only" about 6 in 10 US citizens are pro-choice.
https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2022/07/15/key-facts-a...
So we also expect things like human rights to be somewhat consistent. But we seem to be on a waning trend as far as national unity goes.
except in certain cases
tldr; Something created by court opinion can be ended by court opinion
Abortion was guaranteed by a decision of the Supreme Court, which was based on the majority of the court's opinion of what the Constitution says. As the makeup of the court changes, it's opinion of what the Constitution says changes. Without a Federal law or even more powerfuly, an amendment to the Constitution, abortion is left to the states and subject to 50 different constitutions, courts and legislatures. That there has not been law or amendment says that there is not a strong enough majority or super majority of Americans that want that right guaranteed by the Constitution.
And with overturning ROE, I saw it more as forcing the issue to be actually resolved, rather than having a, IMO, wrongful precedent. Aka, it"s a state issue, until it is codified into federal law.
I agree that women's reproductive choices should not be subject to control by 50.1% of voters. The problem in this case is too much democracy, not too little.
Citation needed.
2/3rds of US voters did not support overturning Roe. [1]
[1] https://maristpoll.marist.edu/polls/npr-pbs-newshour-marist-...
Being able to get "abortion pills" is very much part of proper reproductive healthcare
Plastic Surgery is healthcare, as it can help treat mental disorders affected by body dysmorphia. Additionally, plastic surgery is much, much more common than you think and not always done for vanity. Even if it was, that's the individual's choice to have the procedure performed.
Do you have a source on that 99%? Most sources I'm seeing from a quick google search state that pregnancy is objectively dangerous for people that can get pregnant in many cases, much more than 1%
I think it's important to allow women to make decisions about pregnancy based on their perceived risk, rather than blithely dismissing the morning after pill as being akin to steroids.
Far more than 1% of pregnancies carry health risks. Not only that women denied abortions are more likely to have complications during their pregnancy.
> Do you consider steroids healthcare?
Do you not? I've been given steroids for allergies, rashes, and muscle injuries.
> What about something like plastic surgery?
How is surgery anything but healthcare?
Indeed; I'd put it at about 100%. Pregnancy is no joke.
Being forced to carry a pregnancy to term can cause bodily issues, psychological, and financial issues.
Or you know... just let a woman choose what they want to do with their body?
Plastic surgery is perfectly legal and you are fine to do it.
Steroids have shown averse and life threatening affects and really should only be prescribed.
Like I figured there was a legitimate reason they were prescribed, but I never actually knew first hand about. Now... my cats a small dose of steroids. The examples of people in this thread have been enlightening on that subject.
But unfortunately they do have a bad reputation. I mean if you hear steroids there is likely one image that comes to mind.
I'd be interested in some scholarly sources regarding the efficacy of the information you're describing.
There's nothing special and privileged about "natural" processes; if there were we wouldn't need medicine at all.
Come back and re-read this sentence if you ever get cancer.
Sucks to be a parasite I guess
Furthermore, 1% "health threat" is quite high of a percentage, don't you think?
It is deeply depressing seeing comments like this on HN. But at least I feel better seeing the reaction.
But how many controversies about Google's (and facebooks) data collection is it going to take until we (developers, government, etc) take this seriously.