The Gaming Den

FrankTrollman wrote:Remember that Belgian guy in a vegetative state who people claimed had miraculously recovered and was now able to communicate by being a human ouja board? He's Still In a Vegetative State.

Such a mild correction for the Washington Post. Turns out that Rom can't describe any object his speech therapist can't see, and all you can say is "Additional study has shown the method doesn't work in his case"? For shame.

Everyone with a brain knew it was fraud the moment it came out, because we know assisted communication is fraud! You got these "pro-lifers " making literal meat puppets out of people to mouth their own opinions while soaking the credulous family for hard-earned Euros, and all you can say is that additional study shows that it doesn't work in his case? So the next time someone sticks their hand up a paralyzed man's ass to make them into a political soap-box-Kermit you assholes are just going to eat it up again?

The fuck, media? What the fucking fuck?

-Username17

Are you seriously telling me that you expected them to do better? If anything, I'm surprised the WP made even the smallest move towards admitting that Heuben never was conscious instead of just quietly sweeping the whole thing under the rug.

As I recall, Heuben was actually supposed to write a book about having spent ten years locked in (with the 'help' of that assisted-communication horseshit peddler, naturally). Wonder if they're still going through with that?

FrankTrollman wrote:So the next time someone sticks their hand up a paralyzed man's ass to make them into a political soap-box-Kermit you assholes are just going to eat it up again?

well... I'll certainly be amused by the mental imagery.

My name is Jose, Jose Comatose on a stick....

So, Frank keeps talking about how the human body fairly frequently aborts fetuses naturally.

Well, Utah has called nature's bluff.

That's right, this thing has passed the state legislature by veto-proof majorities and defines miscarriage as criminal homicide. Good times, right?

Here's the local ACLU's letter on the subject: http://www.acluutah.org/HB12VetoLetter.pdf

angel wrote:That's right, this thing has passed the state legislature by veto-proof majorities and defines miscarriage as criminal homicide. Good times, right?

You're gonna have to explain that one because I didn't see it.

angelfromanotherpin wrote:So, Frank keeps talking about how the human body fairly frequently aborts fetuses naturally.

Well, Utah has called nature's bluff.

That's right, this thing has passed the state legislature by veto-proof majorities and defines miscarriage as criminal homicide. Good times, right?

Here's the local ACLU's letter on the subject: http://www.acluutah.org/HB12VetoLetter.pdf

Dude, how soon will it be until we put Yahweh and Jesus into jail?

That would be some fucking rad to the maximum shit.

The ACLU letter states the case better than I could, and in fairly plain terms, but the most salient points are:

• First, the text defines an abortion very specifically as a procedure carried out by a physician or use of a substance under the direction of a physician. If it is not either of those things, it is not legally abortion.

• Then, 'The killing or attempted killing of a live unborn child in a manner that is not an abortion shall be punished as provided in Title 76, Chapter 5, Part 2, Criminal Homicide.'

• In particular, if a pregnant woman loses her child through an 'intentional, knowing or reckless act,' it's punishable as criminal homicide.

• Also, the mother's immunity from prosecution regarding abortions is heavily abridged.

At the point where the burden of proof is on the woman to prove that an abortion they obtain is not unlawful in order to avoid prosecution for homicide, then women are basically guilty all the time in cases of spontaneous abortion.

There are a number of outs in the bill if you are in a doctor's care. If the doctor does something that ends up causing an abortion, you're in the clear. If the doctor wants you to do something to avoid the risk of abortion and you don't do it, ad you abort - you're in the clear. But if you're just at home and you have a spontaneous abortion, you're not covered. So the normal miscarriages, that happen all the time are criminal unless proved otherwise. Which they normally cannot be, because they happen at home and there aren't any fucking medical records.

It's one of the worst bills I have seen. Thank you Mormons, stay classy.

-Username17

angelfromanotherpin wrote:So, Frank keeps talking about how the human body fairly frequently aborts fetuses naturally.

Well, Utah has called nature's bluff.

That's right, this thing has passed the state legislature by veto-proof majorities and defines miscarriage as criminal homicide. Good times, right?

Here's the local ACLU's letter on the subject: http://www.acluutah.org/HB12VetoLetter.pdf

Oh come on.

The letter is dated Feb 2009. Who the fuck knows the state of the bill at that time since it wasn't even introduced until 1/29/2010. A brief reading of the bill as enrolled reveals a whole lot of nothing. Basically the law makes it a criminal homicide in one specific case:

* a mother causes the death of her unborn child outside of a doctor-supervised abortion/abortion-like procedure
* the mother does so in a knowing, intentional manner.
* the bill also removes the "aggravating" condition that would otherwise apply to a victim under the age of 14 even if the mother intentionally kills her unborn child as described above, so the charge would be criminal homicide, not aggravated criminal homicide.

* A mother is not criminalized for having any sort of miscarriage. The mother must "cause the death of her unborn child".
* A mother is not criminalized for seeking an abortion or for refusing medical care that leads to the death of a child.

Frank wrote:At the point where the burden of proof is on the woman to prove that an abortion they obtain is not unlawful in order to avoid prosecution for homicide, then women are basically guilty all the time in cases of spontaneous abortion.

Err ok I guess. In the same way that if you and your SO are in bed and he/she dies, there is no proof you didn't kill her. If suspicion is raised by competent medical personnel providing after-miscarriage care, the case can be turned over to the cops for investigation. If the OBGYN that follows up with the mother does not suspect foul play, there is no issue. This is no different than a thousand other scenarios that can be constructed where something terrible happens and there are no witnesses and some gatekeeper with a fiduciary responsibility informs the police. One example that comes to mind is child abuse. My kid shows up at the ER with a broken arm. No one knows if I broke the arm or if it happened the way we tell it - Timmy fell out of our tree. The doctor knows to be aware of potential abuse, he checks our story, reviews the previous records and turns the case over to authorities if warning flags are thrown. Not everyone that goes to the fucking ER with their kid has to "prove themselves innocent of child abuse". A good friend of mine had a child die of SIDS. He and his wife were out and their kids, including the infant, were under the care of a babysitter. Was their a behind-the-scenes investigation? Yep. Anything come of it? Nope. Shit happens.

This is no different and maybe, just maybe, some Mormon teenage girl will seek competent help from a doctor rather than risking her life trying to induce a miscarriage.

The law was put into place to deal with a 17-year old that intentionally killed her child (intentionally induced a miscarriage) outside the supervision of a doctor and within a bonafide abortion procedure. I gather that the way the state's previous abortion law was written, the girl could not be prosecuted for this act. This law is doing the Right Thing by forcing women that want abortions to seek medical help rather than using the Play Along At Home kit.

Sheesh.

Lich Lovd wrote:A mother is not criminalized for having any sort of miscarriage. The mother must "cause the death of her unborn child".

That's what a miscarriage is.

Lich Loved wrote:The law was put into place to deal with a 17-year old that intentionally killed her child (intentionally induced a miscarriage) outside the supervision of a doctor and within a bonafide abortion procedure. I gather that the way the state's previous abortion law was written, the girl could not be prosecuted for this act. This law is doing the Right Thing by forcing women that want abortions to seek medical help rather than using the Play Along At Home kit.

No. The Law is doing the Wrong Thing. Because staying at home and inducing miscarriages is something that happens all the time for no reason at all. Miscarriage is the single most common complication of pregnancy, and absolutely all of them are statistically related to your actions and inactions.

Yeah, it's weird and fucked up for a girl to go do at-home abortions. But charging people with murder because they abort at home is fucking insane. Because the chances are very high that your mom has aborted at home at least once. And so has everyone else's mother, because aborting at home happens all the time.

-Username17

We're all very happy for that little explanation of what a miscarriage is, but the important part (based on what Lich-Loved has said, since I can't be arsed to navigate all those amendments) is:

LL wrote:* the mother does so in a knowing, intentional manner.

Last time I checked, miscarriage is not performed in a knowing, intentional manner. Indeed, according to Frank, it's often performed not knowingly at all.

It's actually really simple:

HB 12 wrote:The killing or attempted killing of a live unborn child in a manner that is not an abortion shall be punished as provided in Title 76, Chapter 5, Part 2, Criminal Homicide.

HB 12, definition of abortion wrote:the intentional termination or attempted termination of human pregnancy after implantation of a fertilized ovum[, and includes any and all procedures undertaken to kill a live unborn child and includes all procedures undertaken to produce a miscarriage.]

Got that?

If the pregnancy is terminated, it's homicide unless it's an abortion. It's an abortion only if it is performed by a doctor. Also, doctors are only allowed to conduct abortions under a set of incredibly strict and limited guidelines.

Miscarriage == Spontaneous Abortion == Abortion Not Conducted by Physician.

If you thought things were shitty for women and girls in Utah before, to the point that they would induce miscarriages in themselves at home rather than risk going to a doctor - you were right. But you ain't seen nothing yet! Now girls can be investigated for murder if they even admit to being pregnant and subsequently abort. Wanna guess how many extra ectopic pregnancies are going to go untreated because of this crazy shit?

If you want people to stop committing dangerous unskilled surgery on themselves (and you do), the correct answer is to allow them to go to physicians and get abortions whenever they want for no reason at all. Not to threaten to investigate them for murder every time you find out that they were pregnant and aren't any more.

-Username17

Frank, even if we grant you all of that, it still fails to address the point of intentionality in criminal homicide.

76-5-201 wrote:Except as provided in Subsections (3) and (4), a person commits criminal homicide if the person intentionally, knowingly, recklessly, with criminal negligence, or acting with a mental state otherwise specified in the statute defining the offense, causes the death of another human being, including an unborn child at any stage of its development.

Now Frank, you're the med student, so I'll ask you: do spontaneous abortions, i.e. miscarriages, occur intentionally, knowingly, recklessly, or with criminal negligence?

If the answer is no, as I expect it is, it wouldn't make this a good bill; this bill is probably a travesty anyway. But it would mean that women won't get investigated for miscarriages.


As an aside:

76-5-201 wrote:(4) A woman is not guilty of criminal homicide of her own unborn child if the death of her unborn child: (a) is caused by a criminally negligent act of the woman; and (b) is not caused by an intentional, knowing, or reckless act of the woman.

Sooooo....it's okay to kill your unborn child through criminal negligence...as long as you didn't do it recklessly?

.......?

A medical term (spontaneous abortion) is being conflated with a political term (abortion) for the purpose of exaggerating the awfulness of the bill.

Frank's saying that because, medically speaking, a miscarriage is also known as "spontaneous abortion," that any woman who miscarries is performing an illegal procedure on herself, which makes her a murderer under the law.

Legally equating an unborn child at any stage of its development to a human is stupid beyond belief.

Maj wrote:A medical term (spontaneous abortion) is being conflated with a political term (abortion) for the purpose of exaggerating the awfulness of the bill.

Frank's saying that because, medically speaking, a miscarriage is also known as "spontaneous abortion," that any woman who miscarries is performing an illegal procedure on herself, which makes her a murderer under the law.

No.

Stop lying, you lying liar. That is the exact opposite of what I am saying. In real life, an Abortion and a Miscarriage is the same thing. But in the politics of Utah, Abortion has an incredibly specific and defined meaning that is in fact separate from their definition of miscarriage. What they just did was two parts:

• First, they redefined criminal homicide to include every killing of an implanted zygote that was not part of an "abortion."
• Second, they redefined abortion to include only those medical procedures performed by a medical doctor under the provisions for such procedures in Utah law (which are themselves incredibly harsh, but that's largely a separate complaint).

So if you have a spontaneous abortion, it's not an abortion under Utah Law, because a doctor did not do it. And therefore it is "criminal homicide" under Utah Law, because a bundle of cells died and it was not an Abortion.

Keep in mind, that in a very real way, every miscarriage is in some way th result of something you did. Maybe you smoke, or didn't sleep enough, or didn't eat enough, or got exposed to paint fumes, or whatever. The point is that any of that bullshit could potentially be prosecuted. Now obviously they are not going to enforce that by investigating every fucking miscarriage. They can't, because the Miscarriage rate is 4 times the entire violent crime rate in Utah.

Which actually makes the law worse. Not only is it barbaric and insane, it's not even fair. Because it's totally unenforceable. All they are going to do is periodically send random girls to jail in order to scare all the girls into line.

-Username17

So in a moment of distress a women that isn't ready for a child goes on a drinking binge, and that ends up causing complications leading to a miscarriage later even after her head has cleared and she is ready to have the baby....Utah would deem her actions as crimnal?

I am so lost....

FrankTrollman wrote:But in the politics of Utah, Abortion has an incredibly specific and defined meaning that is in fact separate from their definition of miscarriage. What they just did was two parts:

• First, they redefined criminal homicide to include every killing of an implanted zygote that was not part of an "abortion."
• Second, they redefined abortion to include only those medical procedures performed by a medical doctor under the provisions for such procedures in Utah law (which are themselves incredibly harsh, but that's largely a separate complaint).

Not to put too blunt of an edge on it, but your first claim is not correct. It's always best to start with the exact legislative text and work forward. To wit:

H.R. 12 76-5-201 wrote: 76-5-201. Criminal homicide -- Elements -- Designations of offenses.
(1) (a) Except as provided in Subsections (3) and (4), a person commits criminal homicide if the person intentionally, knowingly, recklessly, with criminal negligence, or acting with a mental state otherwise specified in the statute defining the offense, causes the death of another human being, including an unborn child at any stage of its development.
(b) There shall be no cause of action for criminal homicide for the death of an unborn child caused by an abortion, as defined in Section 76-7-301 .
(2) Criminal homicide is aggravated murder, murder, manslaughter, child abuse homicide, homicide by assault, negligent homicide, or automobile homicide.
(3) A person is not guilty of criminal homicide of an unborn child if the sole reason for the death of the unborn child is that the person:
(a) refused to consent to:
(i) medical treatment; or
(ii) a cesarean section; or
(b) failed to follow medical advice.
(4) A woman is not guilty of criminal homicide of her own unborn child if the death of her unborn child:
(a) is caused by a criminally negligent act of the woman; and
(b) is not caused by an intentional, knowing, or reckless act of the woman.

Criminal homicide is the killing of a zygote, fetus, unborn child, or whatever your preferred term is in a relatively narrow set of circumstances. (That is, cases where the death was intentionally, knowingly, or recklessly caused, or the result of criminal negligence.) It further curtails the scope of such by exempting pretty much everything that the mother is capable of doing without intentionally trying to kill the child-to-be in Section 4.

The language of the statute makes it abundantly clear that there is a mens rea component to the law. Which flat-out excludes purely natural phenomenon such as miscarriages, stillbirths, and the like from the definition of criminal homicide.

FrankTrollman wrote: Which actually makes the law worse. Not only is it barbaric and insane, it's not even fair. Because it's totally unenforceable. All they are going to do is periodically send random girls to jail in order to scare all the girls into line.

The law's as barbaric as most drunk-driving statutes, except the burden-of-proof in the latter is a whole heck of a lot easier to meet. Make of it what you will. Its sanity, however, seems beyond reproach: It's reasonably well-constructed to do what it sets out to do. Now then, reasonable folks can disagree over whether they think the bill is a good idea. But the proposed legislation itself is far more modest in its ambitions than some of what has been attributed to it.

And given the burdens of proof required by in order to actually convict someone under this particular proposed legislation, I'm sure each and every one of those "random girls" sent to jail will deserve to be there.

FrankTrollman wrote: First, they redefined criminal homicide to include every killing of an implanted zygote that was not part of an "abortion."
.
.
So if you have a spontaneous abortion, it's not an abortion under Utah Law, because a doctor did not do it. And therefore it is "criminal homicide" under Utah Law, because a bundle of cells died and it was not an Abortion.

As long as that killing was both:

* based on an act of criminal negligence AND
* done so in a knowing, intentional, reckless manner

It is written right there in the bill making this position of yours patently false; in no way can you be found guilty of a crime if no intentional, criminal negligence occurs. Even if you are criminally negligent and not intentionally so, you cannot be prosecuted. This is basic criminal law. To be guilty of a crime , the person has to BOTH commit a prohibited act and do so in some form of knowing manner. That knowing manner may be through intention (committing the prohibited act intentionally), recklessness (foreseeing the prohibited act but not desiring it - killing someone in an armed robbery for example), or criminal negligence (neither foreseeing the outcome of an act nor desiring it, but one in which a reasonable person would have realized would cause the prohibited act).

What this bill says is that if the physical evidence suggests

* there was an abortion of a fetus outside the Utah definition of abortion
*AND the person was criminally negligent
*AND furthermore that the person RECKLESSly or INTENTIONally performed the act

then you have a crime. These words are defined legal terms and not just bullshit phrases. The inclusion of reckless/intention in the Utah law means that the state of mind of the accused must go beyond simply not knowing the outcome of an act and must at least know that the outcome was possible (recklessness) if not outright desired (intention).

I understand your zeal about this issue and I can see a "slippery slope" argument being made here, but saying that every killing of a zygote outside Utah's definition of abortion is a crime is simply not true. The best you can hope to say is that every zygote killing can be investigated as if it were a crime if reported to the authorities as such. You still have not addressed how this bill is any different from any other scenario where a potential crime is committed and it is up to the medical gatekeepers to report it. Explain how this is different than:

A wife with bruises and concussions: Was it falling down the stairs or DOMESTIC VIOLENCE? A child with a fractured skull: A skateboarding accident or CHILD ABUSE? Suicide of a spouse or MURDER?

You might as well be outraged that every accidental death can be investigated as a murder. Oh wait, many of them are, at least in a cursory way, and no one is charged because there was no criminal intent involved in the death and no action by another to cause the death. The same is exactly true in the case of spontaneous abortion in Utah.

I do agree that in the case of spontaneous abortion that a woman could be charged. My wife had a miscarriage (at home of course and through no fault of her own). Our OBGYN explained that given we had three kids already they were surprised that we hadn't had one before, so I well understand how common it is. Had we been in Utah, then under this bill it is theoretically possible that my wife could have been charged IF her providers reported it as a possible crime AND the prosecutors felt their was enough evidence to bring to a grand jury AND the grand jury agreed with the prosecutors and handed out an indictment. This is hardly a cause for fear as it is no different than any other felony criminal proceeding initiated by a report from a medical gatekeeper.

Juums wrote:And given the burdens of proof required by in order to actually convict someone under this particular proposed legislation, I'm sure each and every one of those "random girls" sent to jail will deserve to be there.

Bullshit. The girl who self-induces a miscarriage out of fear of the social repercussions of being found pregnant/getting an abortion does not need to be sent to jail under any rational or humane metric you choose to use.

Lich-Loved wrote:

FrankTrollman wrote: First, they redefined criminal homicide to include every killing of an implanted zygote that was not part of an "abortion."
.
.
So if you have a spontaneous abortion, it's not an abortion under Utah Law, because a doctor did not do it. And therefore it is "criminal homicide" under Utah Law, because a bundle of cells died and it was not an Abortion.

As long as that killing was both:

* based on an act of criminal negligence AND
* done so in a knowing, intentional, reckless manner

It is written right there in the bill making this position of yours patently false; in no way can you be found guilty of a crime if no intentional, criminal negligence occurs.

Who gives a shit whether you can be found guilty or not? Intent is fucking hard to "prove" in any kind of real world, but we're talking Utah, where they think harassing girls like this is OK.

The point is not whether you think it's going to be fairly applied. We already know it won't be. That it can't be. The point is that asking the police to investigate miscarriages as if they were homicides is insane. Whether they end up clearing girls of wrongdoing because they can't possibly prove beyond reasonable doubt that actions that ended up in miscarriage were intentionally performed to cause a miscarriage or not, the simple fact of bringing in CSI to harass women and girls after miscarriages is inhuman.

I do agree that in the case of spontaneous abortion that a woman could be charged. My wife had a miscarriage (at home of course and through no fault of her own). Our OBGYN explained that given we had three kids already they were surprised that we hadn't had one before, so I well understand how common it is. Had we been in Utah, then under this bill it is theoretically possible that my wife could have been charged IF her providers reported it as a possible crime AND the prosecutors felt their was enough evidence to bring to a grand jury AND the grand jury agreed with the prosecutors and handed out an indictment. This is hardly a cause for fear as it is no different than any other felony criminal proceeding initiated by a report from a medical gatekeeper.

You've met the criteria for investigation for murder in Utah. They probably wouldn't convict you, because the intent wasn't there. But how would you like the police sniffing around for a fucking murder investigation after your wife's miscarriage?

Utah's abortion laws were already draconian and insane. The fact that they made it so difficult for a woman or girl to get one from a competent medical practitioner is what drove the original 17 year old girl (and lots of other Utah residents, let's be honest) to attempt to induce their own miscarriages. The solution to that disgusting situation is to let girls get abortions from competent medical professionals without harassment. Not to investigate miscarriages as if they were homicides!

-Username17

Juums wrote:And given the burdens of proof required by in order to actually convict someone under this particular proposed legislation, I'm sure each and every one of those "random girls" sent to jail will deserve to be there.

I don't think there's anything we need to say other than to quote this.

FrankTrollman wrote:The fact that they made it so difficult for a woman or girl to get one from a competent medical practitioner is what drove the original 17 year old girl (and lots of other Utah residents, let's be honest) to attempt to induce their own miscarriages. The solution to that disgusting situation is to let girls get abortions from competent medical professionals without harassment. Not to investigate miscarriages as if they were homicides!

This is a great point. I am sure as fuck not going to bat for the prosecutorial mindset in Utah. I only wanted to point out that as a matter of law, having a miscarriage is not itself a crime as stated by the OP and that in fact the state tried hard with his bill to avoid any of that sort of nonsense. The ACLU letter is just alarmist crap because it does not match the law as enrolled, probably because the first, preliminary versions of the bill were really poorly written and it was that version upon which the ACLU based their objections, but that is just a guess.

In the end, the people of Utah do not think abortion is right and so they made it harder (I am not sure how - not that I disagree - but if someone would summarize Utah abortion law in a sane fashion I would love to read it or point me to the relevant sections of the URC so I don't have to wade through 20 sections of it myself). Half the fucking country doesn't support abortions - and before you jump all over me, I am a supporter - they also do not think it is right or safe to have people inducing their own abortions. Is the law in itself a bad one? I still do not believe so because it makes it a crime to do something you sure as fuck should not be doing. Is it a bad law from a moral standpoint given the other abortion laws and environment in Utah? Yes, because it could have just the effect you mention and you don't even need to be a part of the tinfoil hat crowd to see what Utah is trying to do with the bill.

I wonder if the bill will be signed. Even if it passes by a veto-proof margin the governor could still kill it and force a showdown. I think we all know having the votes to pass something is not the same as passing it. Anyone know if this thing is signed into law yet?

LL wrote:Is the law in itself a bad one? I still do not believe so because it makes it a crime to do something you sure as fuck should not be doing.

As Frank pointed out, the number of potential crimes (and those requiring investigation) would just be overwhelming. So the Utah government has two choices here. They can either institute a massive, unprecedented crackdown that makes the War on Drugs look like Encyclopedia Brown or they can just have one that's essentially unenforceable. Both are just as shitty.

If you can't enforce a law it's a failure of one and shouldn't be on the books. If you can't enforce a law that has such a latent dysfunction (harassing women and putting people we know ahead of time to be innocent into jail) it should be gotten rid of as soon as possible.

Regardless of the rightness or wrongness of what you're trying to prevent, if you can't meet this incredibly simple standard then the law shouldn't exist.

Lich-Loved wrote:Is the law in itself a bad one? I still do not believe so because it makes it a crime to do something you sure as fuck should not be doing.

It's a law that applies a penalty to acts that occur primarily because of the existence of strong disincentives to a totally legal act. Disincentives created by previously enacted laws. I think that automatically makes it a bad law. That the penalty is incredibly harsh doesn't help.