Today, March 8, another International Women’s Day is celebrated. But in reality the only rights that are retreating in the West in the 21st century are those of women, with the first right to abortion. It is a right that Western societies took for granted in the second half of the 20th century, but in the US due to the religious Right and, to a lesser extent, in Europe due to the rise of the Far Right, a debate began to abolish it.
The decision of the Supreme Court
American women are in the worst position of all Western women: not only did the US Supreme Court overturn the right to abortion after 50 years, but the Alabama Supreme Court ruled two weeks ago that IVF embryos must to be considered children.
It could hardly have been predicted that the Supreme Court’s landmark Roe v. Wade decision in 1973, the institutional legalization of the right to terminate pregnancy in the US, would be overturned five decades later. However, in June 2022, the Supreme Court decided that each State can legislate as they wish on the subject in question, justifying anachronistic expectations and claims mainly of the religious Right. “American women today have less freedom than their mothers” had commented the then president of the House of Representatives, Nancy Pelosi. That decision opened the door to the extension of the ban, e.g. in frozen embryos.
However, even though the US Supreme Court’s ruling struck down the “national right to abortion,” each State’s battle is far from over. Thus in (deeply Republican) Kansas, they rejected a measure that would have repealed abortion protections, while voters in Michigan, California, and Vermont enshrined the right to abortion in their state constitutions. Voters in Kentucky and Montana shot down measures against abortion. In Ohio they approved the reservation of the right to abortion.
On the contrary, at least 14 States (Alabama, Idaho, Texas, Oklahoma, etc.) have initiated the establishment of total bans against abortion from the 1st day of conception.
For the first time in 50 years, Texas has banned the voluntary termination of pregnancy, even in cases of rape or incest. The only exception is the risk of death or serious disability for the mother. Last December, the spotlight was on a decision by the Texas Supreme Court to ban abortion for a woman with a dangerous pregnancy. Georgia and South Carolina banned abortion after six weeks of pregnancy. Other States prohibit it after 12-18 weeks.
“There is a lot of confusion regarding state-by-state legislation, making the decriminalization of abortion even more frightening for those women who desperately need medical help,” the philosophy professor at George Washington University tells “Step” Vanessa Wills. Commenting on the decision of the Alabama Supreme Court (that IVF embryos are considered children), he adds that it just confirmed “how undemocratic and reactionary the judiciary is in the USA”.
The impact of overturning Roe v. Wade was immediate in the lives of thousands of American women. As of 2022, large “waves” of internal migration to states where abortion is legal are recorded (outside New Mexico there was a 220% increase).
The issue has emerged as a key point of contention in the face-off between Democrats and Republicans in the final stretch of the presidential election. It appears to boost voter turnout and benefit those campaigning for reproductive rights.
However, the right to abortion will also be put to the ballot on November 5, in the form of a referendum in 12 States: in the traditional “strongholds” of the Democrats, Maryland and New York, and in the ambivalent States of Iowa and Nevada, as well as in Florida, Arizona and in Colorado, where Republicans prevail more often. Also, in the States of Missouri, Arkansas and Montana, where, with very few exceptions, the winners are always Republicans, and, finally, in South Dakota and Nebraska, where the Republican Party has ruled since 1980.
The “alliance” of the extremes
On March 26, the US Supreme Court will hear an appeal regarding access to mifepristone, a substance used in medical abortion (which is an alternative to surgical termination of pregnancy).
“The anti-abortion movement in America has always been tied to right-wing Christianity, making allies of the Republican Party and the religious Right” underlines in “Vima” o Mark Lance, a professor at Georgetown University. He adds that he doesn’t think “the federal ban on abortion would be a big priority for him Donald Trump” in the event of his election to the White House. Something about which “we would have to worry if she was elected Nikki Haley or o Ron De Sandys».
Europe is resisting the counterattack of the ultraconservatives
At a time when in European countries the right to abortion either does not exist (Andorra) or has been tightened (Poland), a piece of news – an “antidote” to the regression of the USA, and a “gift” for International Women’s Day, comes from France . Last Wednesday, the Senate voted in favor of a proposal to enshrine freedom of access to abortion in the French Constitution. If it is approved by the National Assembly tomorrow Monday, a constitutional review will take place to insert the relevant provision into the Constitution and France will become the first country in the world to constitutionally protect abortion.
“Hoping to reconcile the contradictory positions within her parliamentary group”, according to “Le Monde”, even the far-right leader Marine Le Penin yet another ideological “butt-flip”, had proposed to include the right to abortion in the French Constitution.
Anti-abortion activism, however, has not abated in France. “Few in number but very organized”, this is how “Ouest-France” characterizes the religious and far-right actors who organize anti-abortion marches, under the “inclusive” slogan “For life”, even though “the public discourse against abortion remains rare”, as she admits Marie MathieuPhD in Sociology and co-author of the book “Sociology of Abortion”.
Facebook ads, Pokemon figures, stickers on Parisian bicycles are some of the “weapons” of French activists in favor of “unborn life”
“The amounts dedicated across Europe by these anti-abortion movements amount to around 130 million euros per year, up from 20 million euros in 2009,” notes the executive director of the European Parliamentary Forum on Sexual and Reproductive Rights, Neil Dutt.
In Italy, the prime minister Georgia Meloni for now he has contented himself with calling on opposition parties and unions to condemn the “intimidation” of the reactionary Pro Vita & Famiglia association, which campaigns against abortion.
In Spain, abortion was decriminalized in 1985 and legalized only in 2010. “Despite Catholic and conservative forces pushing, the government changed the law in 2023 to override parental consent for underage girls with unwanted pregnancies. Only the far-right VOX objected,” the Spanish journalist tells “Vima”. Juana Reywhich also notes the widespread phenomenon of doctors who “for moral reasons” refuse artificial termination of pregnancy.
In Hungary, abortion has been grosso modo legal since the 1950s. Viktor Orban from time to time it brings the subject back,” the professor of Gender Studies at Eötvös Loránd University and researcher at Freie Universität Berlin points out to “Vima” Aniko Gregor. Something that the Hungarian social scientist also confirms Haju Gabor speaking to “Vima”: “There is strong social support for access to abortion in Hungary. That’s why, despite 14 years of the illiberal right-wing government with a two-thirds parliamentary majority, the laws that regulate it have not been amended.”
In Poland, following a ruling by the Constitutional Court in 2021, access to abortion was tightened, except in cases of rape or danger to the mother’s life.
According to Dr. Nomiki, specializing in European Law, Dafni Akoumianakiin Ireland, which was “among the most conservative countries on the issue”, abortion was decriminalized in 2019 following a referendum.
Last June, Malta’s Parliament passed a law allowing abortion for the first time. In Malta, which was the last member state of the European Union where abortion remained prohibited, women can now terminate their pregnancy only if their life is at risk and the fetus is not viable. “The legislative regime remains quite strict, as the religious element in society is strong,” explains Mrs. Akoumianaki.
The context and the few disagreements
One of the best legislative “shields” in Greece
Greece has “one of the best laws, if not the best”, argues the gynecologist Eftychia Leontidou, one of the emblematic figures of the women’s movement in the country. “It would be best”, he adds, “if it were also included in the Constitution, as in France, and if the condition of parental consent in minor cases, as in Spain, was revoked.”
As early as 1924, abortions were allowed in Greece “for special medical reasons”. In 1939, the “medical indication” was supplemented for the first time by the so-called “moral indication” which justified the killing of the fetus in cases of rape, seduction of a minor or incest.
For the first time, artificial termination of pregnancy was allowed up to the 12th week in 1978, in cases where the mental health of the mother was at risk (provided that the fact was confirmed by a psychiatrist in a Public Law Nursing Institution) and up to the 20th week if abnormalities were detected in the fetus .
With article 304 of the 1986 PK, which is still in force, abortion was standardized by weeks. It is legal until the 12th, without any conditions, and until the 19th in case it is “the result of rape, seduction of a minor, incest or abuse of a woman unable to resist”.
Since then, the issue of abortion has left the public sphere in Greece. The occasional “discrepancies” include the issuance of a calling card by OTE with the image of an unborn baby begging to live and the controversial video “The Silence of the Scream”, which was distributed in high schools and shows the fetus in pain.
“The 1986 legalization, which means safety, reduced the number of abortions by 25%. We used to ask “how many abortions have you had?” and the number was in double digits. This is over” says obstetrician-gynecologist Alexandra Makri in “Vima”, even though “60% of the turnover of the private sector is abortions and not births”.
It cannot be established whether Greece is at the European average in abortion – compared to Northern European countries which have the highest rates and Western and Southern European countries which have the lowest – because abortions outside public hospitals are recorded as miscarriages . The Europe-wide trend is for the number of abortions to decrease year on year – the decrease is related to awareness of contraception and increased availability of the morning-after pill.
What is expected now is to see how surrogate motherhood and artificially assisted procreation, two current issues, “will drag the issue of abortion into a new trajectory”, says Eftychia Leontidou.
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