Events and Rallies
Last modified: July 15, 2010Film Screening: The Coathanger Project
The Coat Hanger Project is a documentary about abortion and the current state of the reproductive rights movement in the US. Abortion was legalised in 1973 in the landmark Roe vs. Wade case. Since this time the Christian Right has been doing its utmost to claw back the freedoms won. The fight continues. www.thecoathangerproject.com
Tuesday August 10, 6:30pm
Turnstyle Community Hub, 10 Laura St, Highgate Hill
Free entry.
A cheap meal and drinks will be available.
click here to join the Facebook event & invite your friends
Pro-Choice Action Collective
Drop the abortion charges! Repeal all anti-abortion laws!
Free, safe, accessible abortion on demand
www.prochoiceactionqld.org
[...] The Pro-Choice Action Collective has a benefit gig on tonight at the Garden’s Point QUT Guild Bar, as well as protest rallies in Br…. [...]
The Bligh government and media have used the facts of this case to create a distraction from what is really at issue. The couple have been charged under the anti-abortion laws – laws that should not exist. Premier Bligh has claimed that they would have been charged even if those laws did not exist – how absurd! How could anyone be charged under non-existent laws?
Your article fails to address the most important question – how does charging a woman for having an abortion increase the safety of abortion? It doesn’t – the anti-abortion laws are already one of the biggest factors in the misinformation about abortion and the problems of access. If the charges against the Cairns couple are upheld, this situation will get immeasurably worse.
You write that backyard abortions are “quite dangerous”. What an understatement! In the 1940’s “backyard abortions” were the second most common reason for maternal death in this country. Today, around the world a woman dies every 8 minutes because of complications arising from unsafe, illegal abortion. Between 2 and 7 million women every year are suffer permanent disease or injury because of complications arising from unsafe, illegal abortion.
Making abortion illegal and inaccessible kills women.
If the QLD government were genuinely concerned about the safety of women they would repeal the anti-abortion laws and ensure free access to abortion services and information for all women.
But has she been charged for having an abortion?
What I have read suggests she has been charged for having an abortion outside the system. How is controlling DIY abortions somehow encouraging them?
The laws they have been charged under are sections 224, 225, 226 of the QLD Criminal Code:
Section 224. Any person who, with intent to procure the miscarriage of a woman, whether she is or is not with child, unlawfully administers to her or causes her to take any poison or other noxious thing, or uses any force of any kind, or uses any other means whatever, is guilty of a crime, and is liable to imprisonment for 14 years.
Section 225. Any woman who, with intent to procure her own miscarriage, whether she is or is not with child, unlawfully administers to herself any poison or other noxious thing, or uses any force of any kind, or uses any other means whatever, or permits any such thing or means to be administered or used to her, is guilty of a crime, and is liable to imprisonment for 7 years.
Section 226. Any person who unlawfully supplies to or procures for any person anything whatever, knowing that it is intended to be unlawfully used to procure the miscarriage of a woman, whether she is or is not with child, is guilty of a misdemeanour, and is liable to imprisonment for 3 years
Any woman who takes RU486, whether it was prescribed to her or not, could be charged under these laws. Abortion is only accessible legally in QLD because a 1986 court ruling found grounds for “lawful” abortion – when a woman’s life or mental health is at risk.
Legally speaking, all abortions that take place when a women’s life or mental health is not at risk are “outside the system”. Abortion is accessible on a more widespread basis than this because the widespread support for abortion rights have prevented the laws from being used. But the threat that they could be used has always been there which is why the abortion rights movement has continued to demand the repeal of these anti-woman laws. The widespread support for abortion rights is also why the government is trying to create a distraction in this case.
The Bligh government’s feigned concerns about “safety” are a distraction from the real issue in this case – the right of women to access free, safe and abortion on demand.
I’m not a lawyer, so it’s hard for me to discuss law, but each section states “unlawful” use.
Your own website admits that despite the precedent thus far being only for woman at risk, that actual practice is much more liberal, and presumeably without punishment against the doctors perpetrating it.
You can argue all you like that the current laws mean that any abortion outside the ‘woman at risk’ category is illegal and punishable (is it? ‘abortion’ is not even mentioned in sec 224-226?) but you aren’t providing any evidence that abortions provided by actual clinics and medication prescribed by registered doctors would ever be persecuted. It may be technically possible, but that isn’t what happened here.
Misrepresenting this as an attack on licenced medical practicioners to me seems somewhat irresponsible. It may encourage clinic closures, denial of services, and an increase in “unsafe illegal abortions”.
Your own website mentions “unsafe illegal abortions” – what constitutes an illegal abortion, and what should happen to those women who procure one?
There are all sorts of issues with abortion access in Australia and Queensland – not limited to education, access, and pricing – these are serious issues that need to be addressed. But trying to distort what is going on in this case isn’t really going to help.
Also in relation to sec 224-226, do you really think that there should be no laws surrounding the poisoning of pregnant women by third parties in order to cause miscarriage?
You still fail to answer the most basic question: how does charging a woman for having an abortion increase the safety of abortion? Until you stop to think about the answer to that question you are going to keep getting caught up in legalistic knots.
The charges are brought under the anti-abortion laws – that is not a contention, it’s a fact. The very point is that there should be no such thing as an “unlawful” abortion – just as there are no specific regulations for “unlawful” appendectomy.
This is not the first time the laws have been used. The last time they were used was in 1986 – against two doctors at the Greenslopes clinic. The findings in that case was what liberalised the interpretation of the laws – which was a massive gain for women’s rights. But that court finding was explicit that it was not legalising “abortion on demand”. More recently, similar laws were used in 1998 in Western Australia to charge two doctors for carrying out an abortion.
You seem to think that it is unthinkable that the legal system would act against the interests of women’s rights and abortion access. This view denies both the history of attacks against abortion access and the long history of women’s struggle for the right to control our own bodies. The access to abortion that exists today is the product of a long and hard fought battle, which was resisted every step of the way by the establishment. It is a battle that is far from over.
Being charged for pursuing an underground abortion by smuggling drugs and not consulting doctors would presumeably have some effect of discouraging women from pursuing such a risky and dangerous course of action, and therefore actually seek professional help from an actual clinic.
Please note: Your own website mentions illegal abortions (Some Facts About Abortions). Are you now saying that unsafe abortions should not be illegal? What constitutes an unsafe abortion? Should it be illegal? What should happen to parties involved in such an act? How does that relate to this couples circumstances?
The 1986 case resulted in a (partly)fantastic ruling that illuminated in legal terms that there was actually such a thing as a ‘legal abortion/miscarriage’. Would you prefer this decision was not made?
I fail to see the relevance of a WA situation to Qld law (were they tried under Qld law, that makes no sense?)
And finally, I have not said it is unthinkable that the legal system can act against the interest of any party. I think it’s a rather cynical and irresponsible attitude to assume that this is the only way that laws will be enacted, the sole motivation for their creation, and that somehow making certain areas of peoples lives “unlegislatable” is the best way to protect them.
I’m pretty sure if you asked your boyfriend’s sister to perform an appendectomy on your child, you would all be in a lot of trouble. There is certainly situations where an appendectomy could be considered illegal.
One might argue that if education was non-existent on where to get an appendectomy, the local community generally frowned on appendectomies, the nearest appendectomist was far away, the cost of appendectomies were prohibitive, and that in that one might be able to feel some sympathy for someone who took such a course of action, but it really is not the sort of action that should be condoned – nor is it fair to say this is a problem caused by vague 100-year old laws against ‘illegal cutting open of children’s stomachs to remove organs’ (the problem lies with all those other issues I mentioned).
The problem certainly isn’t going to be solved by removing the law and being done with it.
And I don’t think saying their shouldn’t be any laws regarding who, what, where, when and how appendectomies can be carried out is really the best way to protect members of community.
(Yes, that analogy ended up a little stretched … but I didn’t start it)
Aaargh To long post:
Appendectomy analogy should have also -
“The legal status of appendectomies was rather vague at best” or something to that effect.
Making abortion illegal means that women (mainly poor women) have to resort to unsafe means to have an abortion. That’s what we mean by unsafe, illegal abortion – illegal abortion = unsafe abortion.
Making abortion illegal does not mean that it doesn’t happen. Abortion is a fact of life for women – it always has been and it always will be. When abortion is illegal it means that women have to resort to unsafe means.
The WA situation is entirely relevant – because it is the same political system and the same political forces that are at play. The political establishment is fundamentally sexist. That is not “irresponsible” or “cynical” – it’s a historically proven fact.
No specific laws about appendectomy exist because it does not need to be regulated outside of already existing laws. Nor does abortion.