Here’s a little interview with moi in promotion of NCLN’s September 27-29th Symposium. I’ll be leading one session on the Morgentaler decision.
(After I drafted the answers to the questions, I emailed them to Andrea and my husband for their review. Andrea wanted to know why I didn’t mention her dreamy eyes and my husband asked why he couldn’t be a merman. Seriously. Oh, the high maintenance people in my life.)
(It gets even better about the 4.20 mark.)
This CTV story needs much, much more coverage.
This mama adopted four children, all with very significant special needs, as babies. Her doctor expresses that she is an “angel” sent to care for these children. He is effusive about the quality of care that she provides and her devotion. She also has a Masters in Special Education and has been a foster mother for 25 years.
According to the CTV coverage, it appears that the Quebec Department of Youth Protection took two of the children away from their mother because the mother put the children on a gluten-free and dairy-free diet. The children have Down Syndrome and autism. One of my doctors has a large autistic patient clientele. Just from sitting in the waiting room and picking up the various autism-related magazines and books, this appears to be a fairly common diet adopted by parents exploring different avenues in hopes of helping their kids. Regardless if you believe in the benefits of the diet, is this really a reason for the state to step in and take children from their mother?
(I’ve been on a gluten-free and dairy-free diet due to allergies for years. Trust me, you can eat healthy without gluten or dairy.)
Additionally, it appears that the Department didn’t follow its own policies when it comes to removing children from their parents. Allegedly, they did not contact teachers, family members or the children’s doctor to verify whether the children were receiving appropriate care, as is supposed to be the case. The mother wasn’t even notified that the children would be taken from her, apparently a very rare move. The Department just took the kids from school and put them in foster care.
The comments made by the mother’s lawyer, Politimi Karounis are insightful. Watch the interview here. Here’s an interview with the mother.
As Robyn Urback says over at the National Post:
The issue is not one of pro-life versus pro-choice. Indeed, both sides should be concerned about an amendment made to Ontario’s Freedom of Information and Protection Privacy Act (FIPPA) made on January 1, 2012, which prohibited the official release of any abortion-related information. Slipped in as part of Bill 122, an act purportedly about public sector financial accountability, the change to Section 65 effectively rendered provincial abortion data after 2010 untouchable to the general public. Freedom of Information (FOI) requests on the topic would not be satisfied. […]
Now, Maloney has taken the issue to the Divisional Court at the Superior Court of Justice, seeking a judicial review of the Information and Privacy Commissioner’s order to deny her request. The decision will have very real implications on the legitimacy of the Section 65 amendment as it relates to the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, as well as the principle of open government and transparency in Ontario (which, granted, is hard to refer to without a smirk given the ongoing saga of deleted gas plant emails in Ontario). Though Maloney is pro-life when it comes to her personal abortion beliefs, Ontarians on both sides of the debate should stand behind her judicial actions.
I couldn’t have said it better myself.
And Margaret Somerville weighs in at the Ottawa Citizen:
But placing restrictions on public access to information about abortions is anti-democratic, said Margaret Somerville, director of McGill University’s Centre for Medicine, Ethics and Law.
“Democracy says that we’ve all got a voice in the public square,” she said. “It doesn’t mean that we’re going to prevail, but it means that we’ve got a right to speak and to be heard. The problem is, you can’t speak and you certainly can’t be heard if you haven’t got the information on which to base what you say.”
Somerville said politicians are uncomfortable with the discussion and, by restricting information, could believe they are lessening the chance the issue will be brought up in parliament.
“No matter what you think about whether abortions should be legal or not, everybody agrees that the less abortions there are, the better it is; nobody is in favour of abortion. You can’t point out what a major issue this is unless you have the information.”
I’ve been aware of this case since Pat broke the news at her blog in May 2012, but it still blows my mind. The Ontario government unilaterally decided to block access to data about procedures we fund. The tax-payers and electorate apparently just don’t need to know. They’ve got it handled. Unreal.
The National Campus Life Network is holding its annual symposium in Toronto this year, and you’re invited! For more information, watch the video below and click on this link.
Pat Maloney, a fabulous blogger and dear friend of PWPL, is taking the Ontario government to court over their undemocratic and unjustified suppression of abortion statistics.
In January 2012, the Ontario government, quietly passed an amendment that restricts Ontarians from making freedom of information (FOI) requests for abortion data and statistics. This came to light after Pat, more investigation journalist than simple blogger like moi, made a FOI request and was refused. The reason the Ministry of Health refused to release the data was because of the new amendment made to Ontario’s freedom of information law. Pat broke the story, and it made national headlines.
PWPL wrote about the story here, when Andrea and I were featured in a 100 Huntley Street segment, and we linked to Margaret Somerville’s Calgary Herald piece.
In the press release she issued this morning, this is what Pat’s lawyer, Albertos Polizogopoulos, had to say about the case:
“As a blogger, Ms. Maloney benefits from the freedom of expression and freedom of the press guaranteed by the Charter of Rights and Freedoms,” explains Polizogopoulos. “The Charter protects her right to comment on matters of public interest. The allocation of taxpayer funds for a medical procedure which remains the source of much controversy is certainly a matter of public interest and the suppression of that information cannot be justified in law.”
I wrote about the case this morning at ActivateCFPL:
Without this data, as Maloney states in her press release, how are Ontarians, particularly organizations such as youth and women’s health groups, going to monitor trends and determine if government or non-profit programming is effective? If a group launches a provincial safe-sex program, without abortion data, how will it assess if the program was effective? Premier Kathleen Wynne has promised to re-introduce what some consider a radical sex-education program. How will Ontarians determine if that is tax-dollars well spent? There is no way to know if such a program would cut the rate of teen abortions or spike them if the government hides the data. […]
So now Maloney has to invest significant time, money and resources to fight this fight. It’s a fight to ensure that Ontarians can keep their provincial representatives accountable on health care costs and programming. And this isn’t just Maloney’s fight. This is a fight for all Ontarians.
Are we comfortable with the government deciding what information we and can’t access about their activities and funding? If we’re comfortable with one $30 million a year restriction, what’s next?
What Ontario’s government did to restrict otherwise generally available data from its citizens is unthinkable and arrogant. It tells me that they don’t think the people who elected them are entitled to know how their tax dollars are being spent or if government programing is effective. Frankly, passing this amendment was a condescending move. Hats off to Maloney for taking the government on.
Read the rest here. And drop by Pat’s blog, Run with Life, to offer a few words of support. I’m sure she’ll appreciate it. Going through the legal system to take on a provincial government is no easy task.
“The idea of neutrality in the speech context not only requires that the state refrain from choosing among viewpoints, but also that it not structure public debate in such a way as to favor one viewpoint over another. The state must act as a high-minded parliamentarian, making certain that all viewpoints are fully and fairly heard.”
— Owen Fiss. “State Activism and State Censorship,” Yale Law Journal, 1991
In the July 8th issue of Maclean’s Barbara Amiel writes about the abortion she had in 1965. She was 24 years old and four months pregnant. She shares this story in the context of a piece on maternal instinct in our society, or the lack thereof.
Looking at nature, she argues that all other living things, from “the thumbnail-sized strawberry poison-dart frog” to the Pacific octopus to “struggling little shoots in Antarctica” fight for survival. But we Homo sapiens tackle survival differently. She says that we don’t necessarily fight to mate and ensure our offspring survive: “Humans don’t have to do any of these things. We choose to mate but not to breed. Or on breeding, we can choose abortion.” Is this natural? She says that “the choice not to pass on our genes seems against our nature.”
Does she regret her abortion? Did she understand what the abortionist did to her or her child?
And until I looked at fetal development charts for this column, I never understood what was inside me: a tiny being with limbs and fingernails that might have felt discomfort as the doctor’s instruments murdered it. I couldn’t wait another four months and have the child adopted, let alone climb up a tall tree to find a safe home for it. Though I fully support legal abortion (as a dark necessity not as some precious human right) I rue our need for it. […]
Perhaps it is rank sentimentality, that cheapest of thrills, that brings tears to my eyes when I watch the graceful mating ritual of weedy sea dragons mirroring each other’s movements as they dance into the underwater night to mate and transfer eggs onto the male for safekeeping. Perhaps it is the shadow of errors my free will made. Meanwhile, having your daughter view the BBC’s Planet Earth or Life series would be a cool move. Even better, it’s in most public libraries—taxpayer dollars paying for material extolling the propagation of life—even while we pay Dr. Morgentaler’s followers for its extinction.
Amiel calls her abortion a murder. I was surprised to see this language in Maclean‘s. She almost seems regretful that she had her abortion. Perhaps she is. It’s a sad story.
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Andrea adds: “And until I looked at fetal development charts for this column, I never understood what was inside me: a tiny being with limbs and fingernails that might have felt discomfort as the doctor’s instruments murdered it. I couldn’t wait another four months and have the child adopted, let alone climb up a tall tree to find a safe home for it. Though I fully support legal abortion (as a dark necessity not as some precious human right) I rue our need for it.”
There is nothing compelling in the snippet there to suggest there actually is a need for it, quite the contrary. It’s a terribly sad column. I agree with this, wholeheartedly: “we have this burden of free will that allows us to make the most ghastly mistakes as well as great advances.” And in that sense, she fits right in with PWPL, for we should be able to name something as a mistake, whilst simultaneously knowing we cannot hold people back from making major, difficult, awful mistakes. That said, I’d rather not fund their mistakes with my tax dollars…
I too, have recently taken to noting the lack of maternal instinct around me and the manner in which many mothers, even, devalue their own position and work. Crazy upside down world. We claim to value family and relationships above all else, but we do not act in a manner conducive to supporting this apparent belief.
photo credit: Canadian Film Centre via photopin cc
And Lucinda Creighton, the pro-life Minister we wrote about last week, was forced to resign. The Prime Minister did not allow a free vote on the bill.
She went on to say that the electorate would not forget the vindictive action taken by [Prime Minister] Kenny in inflicting such harsh sanctions and penalties on those party colleagues who dared to defy his authoritarian whip.
“It disgusts me that the Taoiseach would demand that his party colleagues should vote in favour of this horrific and fundamentally flawed piece of legislation and threaten them with being thrown out of the party if they fail to do so. What kind of a leader is he? What kind of a leader throws a colleague out of the party for doing exactly what they told their electorate they were going to do before election?” Ui Bhriain said.
Only five members of the majority Fine Gael party dared to break ranks and as a result were automatically expelled from the party.
Lucinda Creighton, one of those who voted against the abortion bill, resigned from her position as Ireland’s European Affairs Minister, saying the government broke a commitment to keep Ireland free of abortion.
“It’s very disappointing and I would rather that I wasn’t here. For me, this is a very important piece of legislation, one which is against a commitment that we made at the last election – a promise had been made, a very fundamental promise – on abortion.
“I just felt that I couldn’t remove from that promise that we made at the last election,” she told RTE News.
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Andrea adds: I like Lucinda Creighton’s integrity and will remember her name.
Should directing a think tank cease to challenge her, Andrea has confided that she is seriously considering pursuing a career as a mermaid. In a fit of glee last week, she sent me this link.