6 ms·

Abortion deserts: America’s new geography of access to care – mapped

13 points by ryan_j_naughton 4y ago

tus666 4y ago
This is an unfortunate headline.
curiousgeorgio 4y ago
Also known as fetal safe zones
- srtjstjsj 4y ago
- jleyank 4y ago
  Cute. These states don't provide health care to the mother pre-delivery, the mother/child post-delivery or any post-natal care. It's great to care for things that are not physical, but pretty sad not caring about anything once it actually exists.
  - curiousgeorgio 4y ago
    > It's great to care for things that are not physical, but pretty sad not caring about anything once it actually exists. Are you implying that fetuses don't exist, aren't physical, or that they just aren't human? Or alive? The care argument is orthogonal to the topic of not killing fetuses. It's like saying we should all pitch in to help execute x minority of people because their families don't also have y and z benefits from the government. Would you say we can spend the public's money to end human life on grounds that we're not also giving enough money to mothers who by and large chose to create the child (you know, by being sexually irresponsible)?
    - olliej 4y ago
      That they're not alive humans, and those states that have higher maternal mortality and lower standards of care for children, also have stated that the wish to ban access to and coverage of birth control. That's something where abortion doesn't even come into it, it's purely about controlling women at that point. I also feel sorry for those women who did try to do the right thing but nonetheless got pregnant, who will now be forced to take massive bills on because the states forcing them to give birth fail to provide the most basic care. The before you get to the women who get pregnancy that puts the mother's life at risk, or who gets a cancer diagnosis and now can't get treated because it would cause an abortion, and of course the children raped by priests. In terms of being "sexually irresponsible", the states that a pro-controlling-women generally provide at best inaccurate safe sex information. It's been well established in numerous countries at this point that stop abortion is achieved by comprehensive sex ed (which also cuts STDs/STIs, a variety of cancers, ..) and easy access to birth control. But again, these states have all declared that they care mostly about forcing women to have babies, and not at all about reducing abortion. Of course the changes these states are planning on will increase the number of people who die during abortions, increase the amount of poverty, and won't stop abortions among the rich in those states because they can always easily fly a neighboring state that respects women's rights. While the conservative states still let women travel without chaperones of course.
      - curiousgeorgio 4y ago
        > That they're not alive humans Science (and God) would disagree with you there, but I suppose you're entitled to your own opinion – wrong and barbaric as it may be.
        jleyank 4y ago
        You can speak for $god? Wow. Good internet connection!
        curiousgeorgio 4y ago
        > You can speak for $god? Don't have to. He's been pretty clear about it already (bible, modern prophets, etc). If faith isn't your thing, science confirms the living humanity of the human fetus. Most of us also have an innate sense that killing one of our own is wrong, full stop. No amount of social or political rhetoric added to the conversation ("but health care...", "my rights...", etc) will change the fact that it's wrong.
- olliej 4y ago
  Oh wow, there I was thinking that conservative states had higher infinite and mother mortality rates, and provide minimal medical support for anyone, child or otherwise?
legitster 4y ago
This is kind of close cousin of those "well, land doesn't vote" maps. Because people are not equally distributed across the country, this will give you a pretty false impression of a change in the average distance. Also, the map of states that ban abortion also includes states that have only proposed late-term bans. So it's doubly not representative of the a typical procedure.
jleyank 4y ago
Unless the Supremes close their current tour, the map will also be "those with difficult access to contraceptives", "where Gay can't be mentioned", "where marriage becomes (re)restricted", ... It might/will also show where tech vs. agriculture occurs and where anybody interested in living later than 1830-1855 will think of living.
- usrn 4y ago
  We have different states so people can agree to disagree. That's the whole point behind the "United States." The alternative to this is a further breakdown of American politics. EDIT: I'm out of quota, here's my reply: We're disagreeing on the interpretation of human rights. You can't just assert that your interpretation is axiomatically right and the opposition can't possibly disagree with you, that's not how any of this works. We're arguing that you want to make murder legal, you can't just assert that it's not murder axiomatically. That's not a reasonable argument. Furthermore sodomy and immigration aren't enumerated in the Bill of Rights, I'm not sure where you got the idea that they were. This isn't a subversion of the Supreme court, this is it doing its job.
  - olliej 4y ago
    You don't get to have differences of opinion as to who counts as a human deserving of equal rights. That's part of the reason for the Federal constitution and Bill of Rights taking precedence over state claims. The fact that conservative states have a stated goal of removing rights from women, PoC, LGBTQ, and immigrants in the US is what makes their intentional subversion of the Supreme Court so horrific.
    - throwaway894345 4y ago
      > The fact that conservative states have a stated goal of removing rights from women, PoC, LGBTQ, and immigrants in the US is what makes their intentional subversion of the Supreme Court so horrific. I’m no great fan of conservative politics, but this has no basis in fact.
exabrial 4y ago
What is it about passing through a birth canal that "makes you a human" and gives you your human rights? Every argument used to justify slavery is being used to justify abortion. "It's my property; they're not human; they're inferior;" etc etc.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
meristohm 4y ago
As a person without a uterus and vanishingly unlikely to ever birth a another living being, I accept that abortion is something I don't reasonably have control over, and default to letting decide those who can give birth. I've mentioned before that I opted for a vasectomy after my spouse and I had enough children (one, in our case, is enough). It's a relative luxury to have access to that surgery, and I'm thankful it is an option. How would it feel if it were an illegal procedure? Or if it were mandated? Whether or not I ejaculate sperm is nowhere close to the risk of dying in childbirth, or carrying to term a child of a rapist, or giving birth to a child the parent(s) will not be able to properly care for, for whatever reason. I write this to suggest you let go of attempts to control what is reasonably beyond your control. That may be uncomfortable, and that's okay. When I was in Japan someone told me about the Shinto perspective of souls, something like "if it's not time for that particular soul to inhabit a body, it just gets back in line for another opportunity." This perspective helps me relax a bit about abortion and thinking I should do anything other than promote public money go to organizations like Planned Parenthood (which does far more for people's health than carry out abortions) and keep abortion legal (where to draw the line on how many weeks is not for me to decide). If you find death and killing an interesting and thrilling topic, I suggest reading On killing : the psychological cost of learning to kill in war and society, by Lt Col Dave Grossman [0]. Fighting and killing each other and other animals is something we all (generally speaking) have access to and can reasonably weigh in on. It is uncomfortable to me how much money and resources we (I'm in the USA) spend on the military (and I served awhile, honorably discharged, blah blah), and I accept we'll keep fighting wars for a long time. Per Gandalf's admonition to Frodo about wishing Bilbo had killed Gollum in the tunnels when he'd had the chance, I don't like the death penalty. I like the banishment option that the Lakota (I think? And likely many other cultures) used, though now we can find belonging online. In some ways I miss the pre-internet days where it was important to get to know one's physical neighbors, regardless of their politics (I make a point to talk with all my neighbors, and sometimes this means we just talk about the weather, and that's fine). [0] https://www.worldcat.org/title/on-killing-the-psychological-cost-of-learning-to-kill-in-war-and-society/ https://www.worldcat.org/title/on-killing-the-psychological-...

tus666 4y ago

This is an unfortunate headline.

curiousgeorgio 4y ago

Also known as fetal safe zones

srtjstjsj 4y ago
jleyank 4y ago
Cute. These states don't provide health care to the mother pre-delivery, the mother/child post-delivery or any post-natal care. It's great to care for things that are not physical, but pretty sad not caring about anything once it actually exists.
- curiousgeorgio 4y ago
  > It's great to care for things that are not physical, but pretty sad not caring about anything once it actually exists. Are you implying that fetuses don't exist, aren't physical, or that they just aren't human? Or alive? The care argument is orthogonal to the topic of not killing fetuses. It's like saying we should all pitch in to help execute x minority of people because their families don't also have y and z benefits from the government. Would you say we can spend the public's money to end human life on grounds that we're not also giving enough money to mothers who by and large chose to create the child (you know, by being sexually irresponsible)?
  - olliej 4y ago
    That they're not alive humans, and those states that have higher maternal mortality and lower standards of care for children, also have stated that the wish to ban access to and coverage of birth control. That's something where abortion doesn't even come into it, it's purely about controlling women at that point. I also feel sorry for those women who did try to do the right thing but nonetheless got pregnant, who will now be forced to take massive bills on because the states forcing them to give birth fail to provide the most basic care. The before you get to the women who get pregnancy that puts the mother's life at risk, or who gets a cancer diagnosis and now can't get treated because it would cause an abortion, and of course the children raped by priests. In terms of being "sexually irresponsible", the states that a pro-controlling-women generally provide at best inaccurate safe sex information. It's been well established in numerous countries at this point that stop abortion is achieved by comprehensive sex ed (which also cuts STDs/STIs, a variety of cancers, ..) and easy access to birth control. But again, these states have all declared that they care mostly about forcing women to have babies, and not at all about reducing abortion. Of course the changes these states are planning on will increase the number of people who die during abortions, increase the amount of poverty, and won't stop abortions among the rich in those states because they can always easily fly a neighboring state that respects women's rights. While the conservative states still let women travel without chaperones of course.
    - curiousgeorgio 4y ago
      > That they're not alive humans Science (and God) would disagree with you there, but I suppose you're entitled to your own opinion – wrong and barbaric as it may be.
      - jleyank 4y ago
        You can speak for $god? Wow. Good internet connection!
        curiousgeorgio 4y ago
        > You can speak for $god? Don't have to. He's been pretty clear about it already (bible, modern prophets, etc). If faith isn't your thing, science confirms the living humanity of the human fetus. Most of us also have an innate sense that killing one of our own is wrong, full stop. No amount of social or political rhetoric added to the conversation ("but health care...", "my rights...", etc) will change the fact that it's wrong.
olliej 4y ago
Oh wow, there I was thinking that conservative states had higher infinite and mother mortality rates, and provide minimal medical support for anyone, child or otherwise?

legitster 4y ago

This is kind of close cousin of those "well, land doesn't vote" maps. Because people are not equally distributed across the country, this will give you a pretty false impression of a change in the average distance. Also, the map of states that ban abortion also includes states that have only proposed late-term bans. So it's doubly not representative of the a typical procedure.

jleyank 4y ago

Unless the Supremes close their current tour, the map will also be "those with difficult access to contraceptives", "where Gay can't be mentioned", "where marriage becomes (re)restricted", ... It might/will also show where tech vs. agriculture occurs and where anybody interested in living later than 1830-1855 will think of living.

usrn 4y ago
We have different states so people can agree to disagree. That's the whole point behind the "United States." The alternative to this is a further breakdown of American politics. EDIT: I'm out of quota, here's my reply: We're disagreeing on the interpretation of human rights. You can't just assert that your interpretation is axiomatically right and the opposition can't possibly disagree with you, that's not how any of this works. We're arguing that you want to make murder legal, you can't just assert that it's not murder axiomatically. That's not a reasonable argument. Furthermore sodomy and immigration aren't enumerated in the Bill of Rights, I'm not sure where you got the idea that they were. This isn't a subversion of the Supreme court, this is it doing its job.
- olliej 4y ago
  You don't get to have differences of opinion as to who counts as a human deserving of equal rights. That's part of the reason for the Federal constitution and Bill of Rights taking precedence over state claims. The fact that conservative states have a stated goal of removing rights from women, PoC, LGBTQ, and immigrants in the US is what makes their intentional subversion of the Supreme Court so horrific.
  - throwaway894345 4y ago
    > The fact that conservative states have a stated goal of removing rights from women, PoC, LGBTQ, and immigrants in the US is what makes their intentional subversion of the Supreme Court so horrific. I’m no great fan of conservative politics, but this has no basis in fact.

exabrial 4y ago

What is it about passing through a birth canal that "makes you a human" and gives you your human rights? Every argument used to justify slavery is being used to justify abortion. "It's my property; they're not human; they're inferior;" etc etc.

deleted 4y ago
[deleted]

meristohm 4y ago

As a person without a uterus and vanishingly unlikely to ever birth a another living being, I accept that abortion is something I don't reasonably have control over, and default to letting decide those who can give birth. I've mentioned before that I opted for a vasectomy after my spouse and I had enough children (one, in our case, is enough). It's a relative luxury to have access to that surgery, and I'm thankful it is an option. How would it feel if it were an illegal procedure? Or if it were mandated? Whether or not I ejaculate sperm is nowhere close to the risk of dying in childbirth, or carrying to term a child of a rapist, or giving birth to a child the parent(s) will not be able to properly care for, for whatever reason. I write this to suggest you let go of attempts to control what is reasonably beyond your control. That may be uncomfortable, and that's okay. When I was in Japan someone told me about the Shinto perspective of souls, something like "if it's not time for that particular soul to inhabit a body, it just gets back in line for another opportunity." This perspective helps me relax a bit about abortion and thinking I should do anything other than promote public money go to organizations like Planned Parenthood (which does far more for people's health than carry out abortions) and keep abortion legal (where to draw the line on how many weeks is not for me to decide). If you find death and killing an interesting and thrilling topic, I suggest reading On killing : the psychological cost of learning to kill in war and society, by Lt Col Dave Grossman [0]. Fighting and killing each other and other animals is something we all (generally speaking) have access to and can reasonably weigh in on. It is uncomfortable to me how much money and resources we (I'm in the USA) spend on the military (and I served awhile, honorably discharged, blah blah), and I accept we'll keep fighting wars for a long time. Per Gandalf's admonition to Frodo about wishing Bilbo had killed Gollum in the tunnels when he'd had the chance, I don't like the death penalty. I like the banishment option that the Lakota (I think? And likely many other cultures) used, though now we can find belonging online. In some ways I miss the pre-internet days where it was important to get to know one's physical neighbors, regardless of their politics (I make a point to talk with all my neighbors, and sometimes this means we just talk about the weather, and that's fine). [0] https://www.worldcat.org/title/on-killing-the-psychological-cost-of-learning-to-kill-in-war-and-society/ https://www.worldcat.org/title/on-killing-the-psychological-...