Throughline by Jill Filipovic

Throughline by Jill Filipovic

They're Coming For All Of It.

IVF. Miscarriage management. Contraception. Laws requiring doctors provide emergency life-saving care. The anti-abortion movement is on the warpath.

Jill Filipovic
May 17, 2023
∙ Paid

Image via WikiMedia

Two things are true: (1) Savvy anti-abortion leaders and politicians lie through their teeth; and (2) the less-savvy anti-abortion leaders and politicians always tell you exactly what the anti-abortion movement is going to do — which is why you should listen to what that second group says, even if first group denies it.

Case in point: The claim that the “pro-life” movement doesn’t want to put women in jail. Several Republican lawmakers have already introduced legislation that would declare an egg a human being from the moment it’s fertilized, and impose criminal penalties accordingly — making abortion murder, and women who have abortions murderers.

Or the claim that the “pro-life” movement doesn’t want to criminalize IVF and other fertility treatments. These same “life begins at conception” / personhood bills would explicitly outlaw or functionally end many common fertility treatments and practices.

The latest comes from Alabama, where Republican legislators are seeking to make the state’s existing abortion ban even more extreme by classifying a fertilized egg as a person and abortion as homicide.

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