Sorry, Tarheel ladies. If you need to terminate a pregnancy, and for any reason – even impregnation by rape or with life-threatening condition – you’ll have to wait, if Rep. Jacqueline Shaffer (R-Mecklenburg) has her way. HB 465, the “72 Hours Informed Consent by Person or Phone” bill, was passed by the state house on April 23 with a 74-45 vote.
But having to wait another two days longer than the current 24-hour period isn’t, like, any big deal or anything, Shaffer says. It’s the same as, oh … renting an apartment! Or buying a house! Speaking from the House floor before a second vote today, she said:
We see waiting periods all throughout areas of our society in the medical context as well as in the real estate context.
Yeah! That’s it! Gynecology is a lot like real estate, after all, ain’t it? I mean, you have monthly periods *and* pay utility bills for your property every month … and yeast infections are like soap scum in the bathtub that needs to be cleaned out now and again. Both your home and your vagina require regular maintenance! And if your home gets robbed by dirty bandits who weren’t wearing rain boots to cover their smelly feet, well … tough! You’ll just have to wait three days before you can go back inside your own home. That way, you’ll have plenty of time to think about how sinful it was of you to keep your curtains open and your lawn so beautifully maintained, which is what probably caused your home to be robbed to begin with.
And is that comparison rather stupid? Damn straight it is. But before you post your angry reply in the comments below, maybe you should send a message to Shaffer, because her comparison of women’s health to real estate is much, much worse.
You see, every year an average of 32,101 American women will be impregnated by forced sexual contact, according to the National Institutes of Health (and that’s *not* statutory rape in that count, either). But Shaffer thinks it’s okay to make those females, many of whom are adolescents, live through those rapes for an additional two days.
And every year 64,000 women in the U.S. have to terminate ectopic pregnancies, in which the fetus develops outside the uterus and could never complete to birth. But Shaffer thinks it’s okay to make these women, whose own lives are at risk, to wait longer.
Let’s hope North Carolina’s state senate, which is about get this same bill, waits at least 72 hours to think this one over before voting on it.
Image: North Carolina General Assembly
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