Remote uteri Control
Women who seek help at Catholic-controlled hospitals cannot be referred to rape crisis centres that supply morning-after pills, under church policy.
I am amazed to find myself, in 2007, after years and years of Australia and Australians being by and large pro-choice, advocating yet again for the right to choose.
I’m not sure where to begin with this- the latest of Health Minister Abbott’s no-abortions agenda. Shall I start with the very real possibility of re-traumatising a woman/girl as she is forced to make her way to a chemist, without appropriate confidentiality, support or aftercare when she has just been raped, to get medication that is part of every thinking person’s expectation of non-negligent rape-counselling.
She’s been RAPED- a crime of power and control. Imagine broken bones, slashes, cuts, bruises, scratches, bites, marks, pain and, possibly, HIV, STD’s, or conception. Rape survivors representing the highest number of women/girls living with PTSD.
Interpersonal trauma more likely to be associated with PTSD- Rape 9.2% (F) Sexual molestation 5.5% (F)
The morning-after pill (Postinor-2) is not illegal, in fact you do not need a Doctor’s prescription since 01/01/04, when it was made available over the counter for about $20.00 in all non-judgmental pharmacies.
The Catholic church, through it’s policy and control of hospitals is placing an extra hurdle in front of vulnerable women /girls in our society. How can a system which exists to offer medical care justify that acute post-rape care does not involve the option to be offered the morning after-pill (Postinor-2)?
“The Code of Ethical Standards, compiled by Catholic Health Australia, says direct referral of raped women to centres that offer the morning-after pill ‘should only occur if reasonable steps have been taken to exclude the likelihood of pregnancy.’ Senior Catholic spokesmen defended the policy as a logical and ethical extension of the church’s opposition to the morning-after pill, which it considers morally no different to abortion.” -Source.
“This [The Code of Ethical Standards, compiled by Catholic Health Australia] is a long-standing policy which is consistent with the church’s position on abortion and it is not a new issue and I have no indications of any of it changing. We don’t ask individuals to take other choices, we certainly don’t try to manipulate the information so they make choices that we are happy with. We provide them with all the information and if they so choose to go down the path of termination or the pill we simply say, ‘We can’t provide it here’.” – CEO Francis Sullivan said.
This is nothing more than the Catholic church asserting it’s power over a population who moves away, rather than toward it and its beliefs. Beware of crypto-Social Workers.
Image from here
January 13th, 2007 at 11:42 pm
I try not to be judgemental about other people’s religious beliefs – generally achievable if they don’t shove their ideas down your throat. But the Catholic Church… I find just can’t abide them – indeed I more and more feel they may actually represent a force for evil. A force that outweighs any good their other works might do.
January 14th, 2007 at 9:17 am
It’s such an interesting dichotomy kartar.
The Catholic church is fulsome and forceful when it comes to refugees and other vulnerable people, but they just can’t budge from the life-begins-at-conception model, however horrifically and non-consensually that conception occurs.
Yet they are opposed to IVF, where there is such clarity that this conception is desired.
January 14th, 2007 at 11:00 am
Why are they opposed to IVF? Surely the creation of life can’t be considered bad by them?
January 14th, 2007 at 12:44 pm
It seems to be about,
“life and death are subjected to the decision of man, who thus sets himself up as the giver of life and death by decree.”
II INTERVENTIONS UPON HUMAN PROCREATION
“A preliminary point for the moral evaluation of such technical procedures is constituted by the consideration of the circumstances and consequences which those procedures involve in relation to the respect due the human embryo. Development of the practice of in vitro fertilization has required innumerable fertilizations and destructions of human embryos. Even today, the usual practice presupposes a hyperovulation on the part of the woman: a number of ova are withdrawn, fertilized and then cultivated in vitro for some days. Usually not all are transferred into the genital tracts of the woman; some embryos, generally called “spare “, are destroyed or frozen. On occasion, some of the implanted embryos are sacrificed for various eugenic, economic or psychological reasons. Such deliberate destruction of human beings or their utilization for different purposes to the detriment of their integrity and life is contrary to the doctrine on procured abortion already recalled. The connection between in vitro fertilization and the voluntary destruction of human embryos occurs too often. This is significant: through these procedures, with apparently contrary purposes, life and death are subjected to the decision of man, who thus sets himself up as the giver of life and death by decree.”
January 14th, 2007 at 10:26 pm
Kartar, I think it’s pretty clear the evil you talk about stems from the sexism present in the patriarchy, the need for men to control something they cannot possibly grasp.
Suki, I had a friend who was the offspring of a gang rape, I can tell you life aint easy for the offspring of rape victims, either – & that isn’t even going into the whole spiritual aspect, which most catholics refuse to believe in – regardless of the fact their religion makes provision for them to have knowledge of the supernatural.
I am looking forward to the day the mad monk is out of office.
January 14th, 2007 at 10:46 pm
ab said,
“I am looking forward to the day the mad monk is out of office.”
…as am I!
And he can take Downer, Ruddock and HoWARd with him.
January 15th, 2007 at 8:07 am
The nut of it all is that objections to women’s rights to control their own bodies or genetic medicine research have their cores in a specific religious belief. None have any basis in fact, logic or evidence.
Any sensible, responsible, logical person who had a child with an illness that would be treatable with known effective gene therapies would logically be guilty of abuse and neglect by withholding such treatments, whatever the parent’s spiritual persuasion. If you are a hardcore vegan and decide to raise your baby on soy milk, you’d go to jail in a heartbeat when the baby fails to thrive. A parent’s beliefs and opinions have zero bearing on the medical requirements of a human in their care.
Any woman who is not prepared in her life circumstances to bear and raise a child, likely on her own, would be grossly irresponsible to not consider terminating an unintended pregnancy, particularly upon the admonishments of religionists. Until the church not only agrees to bankroll raising the results of unwanted pregnancies but also guarantees there will be no psychological trauma to mother or child as a result of giving a child over for adoption, they’ve got less than no business registering objections to abortion. And why are women the only target of the wrath of religionist reproductive doctrine?
The god-botherers reckon that their invisible friend told them it was perfectly peachy to write their belief-based rules into public laws which affect all residents, not just those who subscribe to their flavour of faith-based faerie tales. They think that all of humanity is subject to their religion’s rules- and would, of course, accept them readily if they only knew better. The christian right must piteously lament the loss of organised religion as government, but the Holy Roman Empire has been toast for 201 years. We’re bloody well over it.
Now, if those who base their lives in rumour and belief want to be governed by laws rooted in such nonsense, secession is always an option… but relocation is a better one. Antarctica would be good- the moon would be even better.
January 15th, 2007 at 8:58 am
“A parent’s beliefs and opinions have zero bearing on the medical requirements of a human in their care.” Does that include the belief in pro-choice of a parent with a child in utero Weezil?
I do not think your prejudice would survive one serious evening reading a compendium of the lives of the Church’s saints.
Polemics aside, why should Catholic hospitals be forced to participate in abortions? Why should Catholic nurses and doctors be forced to participate in something they legitimately conscientiously object to? It sounds like you are all clamouring for conscription abortion.
You mistakenly think that “women [are] the only target of the wrath of religionist reproductive doctrine”.
The Catholic Church teaches that male vasectomies are wrong, that men are not to participate in sperm donation or IVF and are not allowed to be engaged in sex outside of marriage (including masturbation). The Church teaches that cooperation between couples will lead to a more giving, unconditional love. Love always means sacrifice. The right to abortion (and contraception for that matter) is really just an unfettered right to have sex with someone that you don’t fully love.
The Catholic Church neither supports the rapist or the abortionist, to get back to the thread. Catholics support the mother AND baby.
January 15th, 2007 at 8:32 pm
Unfortunately for you marcel, the rest of the world has progressed to 2007, while you remain rooted to 1806.
January 15th, 2007 at 9:30 pm
Marcel
“I do not think your prejudice would survive one serious evening reading a compendium of the lives of the Church’s saints.”
Does that include the lives of members of the Inquisition? Priests who molested children? Those that condoned the murder of Jews – both in this last century and pogroms past?
“The Catholic Church neither supports the rapist or the abortionist, to get back to the thread. Catholics support the mother AND baby. ”
Really? It’s healthy for a woman to bear the child of rapist? And ‘support’? What a fascinating word. Does the Catholic Church pay for the upbringing of children whose mothers they persuade not to have an abortion? Or blackmail/bully/deceive into not having one? Oh wait. No.
“just an unfettered right to have sex with someone that you don’t fully love….”
lol. Masturbation too? You really, really do need to get laid Marcel. I think the pressure is getting to you.
January 15th, 2007 at 10:47 pm
Marcel, you have succeeded in completely avoiding the issue you always succeed in completely avoiding…
Marcel’s famed original-sin-of-omission, for those who have forgotten (including Marcel) is: When did his invisible friends gain the authority to tell those of use who don’t believe in faerie tales how to live- and do so through insinuating dogma into law?
Marcel, I don’t give a motherless fuck what your cathlicks teach. If I’m not a cathlick, I’m not obliged to care- and definitely not obliged to obey.
Marcel dribbled: “…really just an unfettered right to have sex with someone that you don’t fully love.”
Clearly, quite a number of cathlick priests have found a way around that little inconvenience of unintended pregnancy from sex with “people they don’t fully love”… they just go fuck some defenceless altar boys and prepubescent girls.
January 15th, 2007 at 10:51 pm
“A parent’s beliefs and opinions have zero bearing on the medical requirements of a human in their care.” Does that include the belief in pro-choice of a parent with a child in utero Weezil?”
There is no such thing as a child in utero, Marcel. How on earth would it get back in ferfuxsake?
It’s not a child unless it’s been born!
January 17th, 2007 at 3:06 pm
The right to abortion (and contraception for that matter) is really just an unfettered right to have sex
Stripped of its final words (which are just a smokescreen), I think this quote exposes the real reasoning behind the anti-abortion stance: they oppose this right and want to punish women for exercising it.
I wonder how much opposition to abortion there would still be if the father was made solely responsible for caring for the offspring after birth?
January 22nd, 2007 at 8:26 am
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