ProWomanProLife

  • The Story
  • The Women
  • Notable Columns
  • Contact Us
You are here: Home / Archives for Epp

Trouvez l’erreur

June 4, 2008 by Tanya Zaleski Leave a Comment

Ever do those games on the back of a cereal box when you were a kid? (I still do them now, but that’s beside the point.) Remember the one where you had to find all the errors in a given picture? Man with shoe on head, mouse in bird’s nest, spoons flowering in garden…

I felt a little like I was playing that game this morning as I read this article.

If Mr. Epp was well known for his defense of women’s rights, we could believe that he is truly concerned about violence against women.

Error #1) Just because someone holds a particular view on what women’s rights actually entail, it does not mean he is not concerned about violence against women.

His bill is supported by anti-choice groups across the country…For all these reasons, we must denounce Bill C-484.

Error #2) If by anti-choice, she is referring to pro-life, it only makes sense that a bill which is meant to protect life would be supported by these groups. This is not an actual reason to oppose any bill.

Bill C-484… opens the door to the possibility of recriminalization of abortion in Canada, and this, only 20 years after its decriminalization.

Error #3) Abortion has been legal in Canada for almost 40 years now.

In attempting to more severely punish attackers of pregnant women, he is giving the status of personhood to the fetus.

Error #4) The bill would recognize the fetus as something, but it’s far from calling the fetus a person with Charter rights. Considering the pregnant woman would still be entitled to do whatever she likes to it (drink, smoke, do drugs, have an abortion), that’s hardly what anyone could call personhood.

The murder of pregnant women does not constitute an epidemic in Canada; over the last 3 years, 5 pregnant women have been assassinated. Though these deaths are regrettable, we can not consider it a trend. The reality is that conjugal violence is a much greater problem.

Error #5) The number one cause of death among pregnant women is homicide. Pregnant women experience abuse at a rate 6 times higher than women who are not pregnant. Approximately one in five women lose a pregnancy because of abuse. Pregnant women experiencing spousal abuse are struck in the abdomen in 70% of cases. It’s a bit of a problem, I’d say.

Misinformation is the greatest enemy of this bill’s passing. What gets me most is not the risk of this bill not being approved. It’s the why. It is that a segment of women are so petrified of having access to abortion even vaguely questioned that they are willing to prevent a sensible law like this one from being enacted.

Filed Under: All Posts Tagged With: Bill C-484, Epp, La Presse, pro-choice, Quebec and Bill C-484

They’re playing politics again

May 14, 2008 by Tanya Zaleski Leave a Comment

Liberal MP, Brent St. Denis must not have read Ken Epps’ recent document. (If he’d visit our blog more regularly, he’d be on top of these things.) He “tabled a Bill today that would increase penalties for those who knowingly abuse pregnant women.”

The press release states:

Mr. St. Denis believes that the risks associated with C-484 are too dangerous as the potential repercussions are still unknown.  There is a concern that the Bill may establish legal rights for the foetus, which could begin to reverse a woman’s right to choose and punish behaviours and conditions for women that are not criminalized for other people, such as drug or alcohol abuse and mental illness.

As mentioned in Ken Epps’ release:

Only South Carolina has upheld convictions of women under child abuse and endangerment laws, citing South Carolina’s unique judicially enacted “fetal homicide” law of 1984 as a precedent.

There were a few isolated incidents in other states where cases were brought by prosecutors under “fetal homicide” laws… but these cases were later dismissed or distinguished on their facts and are in no way representative of applications of the legislation in the 37 states with these laws.

But the above are mere details. When you get down to it, our politicians are playing chess. Obviously the goal of this newly tabled bill is to draw support away from Bill C-484. If that happens, the subsequent (and nearly inevitable) passing of this new bill will be incidental.

Myself, I’d prefer our laws be formulated based on genuine concern for victims, not on political stratagem.

______________________________

Rebecca shakes her head: Good grief, what a tangle of poor logic and silly syllogisms.

I have very mixed feelings about criminalizing substance abuse for pregnant women. On the one hand, exposure to alcohol and drugs in utero can inflict a terrible burden on the fetus, and a wholly avoidable one. On the other hand, I’m not generally keen on giving the government or its agents more opportunities to interpose themselves in our lives, and am of the opinion that there are few problems so bad that state intervention can’t make them worse.

But this is just nonsense:

There is a concern that the Bill may establish legal rights for the foetus, which could begin to reverse a woman’s right to choose and punish behaviours and conditions for women that are not criminalized for other people, such as drug or alcohol abuse and mental illness. (emphasis mine)

First of all, how could this criminalize mental illness in pregnant women, for heaven’s sake? Second, the point would be to punish drug or alcohol abuse that harms another person, in this case the baby. We already punish non-pregnant people who use drugs and alcohol in a manner that harms other people. In fact, we punish non-pregnant people who use drugs or alcohol in a manner that has the potential to harm other people, without waiting to see if actual harm occurs; this is the whole concept behind charging people with drunk driving.

I’m all for an honest discussion of how far society can go to protect an unborn baby’s health at the expense of the mother’s liberties. I’m certainly open to objections that, even if we all agree that an adult’s right to abuse their own body is suspended when doing so harms their unborn child, there is no way to criminalize such behaviour without massive unintended consequences. But when the debate stays at this level, I’m forced to wonder if the other side is congenitally incapable of an honest, good-faith debate on the subject.

______________________________

Véronique wonders: How can you recognize that abusing pregnant women is somehow worst than abusing a non-pregnant one without recognizing what makes a pregnant woman different from a non-pregnant one? Are people that shortsighted?

That being said, I stood up and clapped when I read in the press release:

“The goal of my Bill is clear: to protect a foetus lawmakers must protect the carrier of the foetus which is the pregnant woman.”

Indeed. You can’t protect a foetus without protecting the woman. You can’t hurt a woman without hurting the foetus. When a foetus is aborted, you have to hurt the woman to hurt the foetus. This is why we are prolife because we are prowoman.

_____________________________

Tanya adds: Exactly what I was thinking, Véronique. Is the law now to elevate a pregnant woman above a non-pregnant woman?

If we ignore what is so particular about being pregnant (being with child) then we are simply elevating the importance of one individual above another. What sort of dangerous precedent is that?

Filed Under: All Posts Tagged With: C-484, Epp, Pregnant women, St. Denis

From the horse’s mouth

April 3, 2008 by Tanya Zaleski Leave a Comment

Ken Epp has addressed some concerns the pro-abortion side, namely Joyce Arthur, has for his bill, Bill C-484, here.

I think that if Ms. Arthur would debate what my bill actually says instead of basing her arguments on a misrepresentation, she would be advocating for C-484. How can she argue against protecting in law the unborn child which the pregnant woman has chosen to keep, and to provide criminal sanctions against any third party who would unilaterally take that choice and that anticipated new life away from her, without her consent, against her will and with violence?

Anyone?… Anyone?

Filed Under: All Posts Tagged With: Bill C-484, Epp, Joyce Arthur, Ken Epp

Follow Us

Facebooktwitterrssby feather

Notable Columns

  • A pro-woman budget wouldn't tell me how to live my life
  • Bad medicine
  • Birth control pills have side effects
  • Canada Summer Jobs debacle–Can Trudeau call abortion a right?
  • Celebrate these Jubilee jailbirds
  • China has laws against sex selection. But not Canada. Why?
  • Family love is not a contract
  • Freedom to discuss the “choice”
  • Gender quotas don't help business or women
  • Ghomeshi case a wake-up call
  • Hidden cost of choice
  • Life at the heart of the matter
  • Life issues and the media
  • Need for rational abortion debate
  • New face of the abortion debate
  • People vs. kidneys
  • PET-P press release
  • Pro-life work is making me sick
  • Prolife doesn't mean anti-woman
  • Settle down or "lean in"
  • Sex education is all about values
  • Thank you, Camille Paglia
  • The new face of feminism
  • Today’s law worth discussing
  • When debate is shut down in Canada’s highest places
  • Whither feminism?

Categories

  • All Posts
  • Assisted Suicide/Euthanasia
  • Charitable
  • Ethics
  • Featured Media
  • Featured Posts
  • Feminism
  • Free Expression
  • International
  • Motherhood
  • Other
  • Political
  • Pregnancy Care Centres
  • Reproductive Technologies

All Posts

Meta

  • Log in
  • Entries feed
  • Comments feed
  • WordPress.org

Copyright © 2025 · News Pro Theme on Genesis Framework · WordPress · Log in