Thursday 8 September 2011

Would-be theocrats are here, too

I've read, and from time to time posted about, numerous stories from the US which suggest many people there are working to set up a fundamentalist Christian form of government, and impose their antediluvian worldview on everyone, oppressing, and, if necessary, killing anyone who doesn't fit into their ridiculously narrow template of acceptability (I'm doubly damned, of course, being both a boylover and an atheist). Now, it seems, fellow travellers are here in the UK, too - there was a vote in Parliament yesterday on a proposal, supported by sundry Christian and 'pro-life' groups, to prevent organisations which provide abortions from being able to offer women pre-abortion counselling, the object, of course, being to restrict access to such services and reduce women's control over their own reproductive system. In an ideal world, abortion wouldn't be necessary, because everyone who wished to be sexually active would have access to accurate information and effective contraception, but the same organisations who are against abortion are often just as opposed to the provision of sex education and contraception, especially to younger people. Fortunately, the proposal was heavily defeated, but the fact that the issue was debated and voted on in the first place shows that we here in the UK need to be vigilant if we're not to join the US on what appears to be a slippery slope to theocracy.

Love & best wishes to all
Sammy B

2 comments:

  1. Sammy,
    I think that in every country in Europe, ruled by conservative , these themes come again and again on the agenda. We have been regulated the abortion for 30 years, . Nevertheless, conservative zealots keep trying to revise this regulation.
    Nikki

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  2. Guten Tag Nikki
    It all comes down to one thing, in my opinion - although I'm an atheist, I'm quite content that everyone has the right to believe exactly what they want to believe. Unfortunately, there are many people, especially religious people, who aren't prepared to extend the same courtesy to me, and to others not of their persuasion. And when that discourtesy extends to their trying to tell me how I should live my life, I tend to become very annoyed, very quickly.
    Abortion is one of those issues that is often seen as highly emotive, and, as I said, in a ideal world it would be unnecessary, except as a medical emergency, because any pregnancy would be planned and wanted, but we don't live in an ideal world, so, in my opinion, any effort to restrict its availability on purely religious grounds, which this was, is totally unacceptable. Do we really, more than a decade into the 21st century, want to go back to the situation of women having to seek out 'back street abortionists' at the risk of imprisonment or even their own death to appease the god-botherers? I sincerely hope not.

    Love & best wishes
    Sammy B

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