Democratic women seek a state ban on vasectomies for men

This afternoon, the House Judiciary (Non-Civil) Committee will take up HB 954, a measure that would prohibit abortions on women who are more than 20 weeks pregnant. Current law prohibits abortions after the second trimester, or about 24 weeks.

The bill sponsored by Doug McKillip, R-Athens, asserts that 20 weeks is the point at which a fetus can begin to feel pain. The measure also attempts to tighten “life of the mother” exceptions to abortion:

No such condition shall be deemed to exist if it is based on a diagnosis or claim of a mental or emotional condition of the pregnant woman or that the pregnant woman will purposefully engage in conduct which she intends to result in her death or in substantial and irreversible physical impairment of a major bodily function.

In response, House Democrats have scheduled a 3 p.m. Wednesday hearing at the state Capitol, to propose a bill that would ban Georgia males from seeking vasectomies. From the press release:

“Thousands of children are deprived of birth in this state every year because of the lack of state regulation over vasectomies,” said Rep. Yasmin Neal, author of the bill. “It is patently unfair that men can avoid unwanted fatherhood by presuming that their judgment over such matters is more valid than the judgment of the General Assembly, while women’s ability to decide is constantly up for debate throughout the United States.”

House Minority Leader Stacey Abrams added, “The Republican attack on women’s reproductive rights is unconscionable. What is more deplorable is the hypocrisy of HB 954’s author. If we follow his logic, we believe it is the obligation of this General Assembly to assert an equally invasive state interest in the reproductive habits of men and substitute the will of the government over the will of adult men.”

- By Jim Galloway, Political Insider

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432 comments Add your comment

MT

February 21st, 2012
2:32 pm

MT, no one is forcing you to abort anything – except maybe your mouth.

I look back and fail to see where I personally atacked you. Typical liberal,always got to turn to insults.

MT

February 21st, 2012
2:32 pm

MT, no one is forcing you to abort anything – except maybe your mouth.

I look back and fail to see where I personally atacked you. Typical liberal,always got to turn to insults.

honested

February 21st, 2012
2:32 pm

td,

Personal responsibility, the sort of thing that republican representatives leave at the door when they enter the Gold Dome if they start ‘legislating morality’ rather than stick to the Public’s Business.

jv

February 21st, 2012
2:33 pm

vasectomies don’t murder anyone, so the 2 cannot be compared…incredibly offensive and immature legislation being proposed, but consider the source

JohnD

February 21st, 2012
2:33 pm

AtlantaNative – you need to further investigate paternity law and the legal standing of claim a woman can put on a man who is the biological father for child support. So – zero laws – not accurate.

Incidentally – what you’re argument leaves out. There currently is very little legal support providing equal rights to a father who DOES want to support and is willing to take a child to raise. If the mother decides to abort – there is no legal recourse available to the father to stop it.

Your argument is still about convenience – your hypothetical woman here isn’t unaware of the consequence. The consequence is unintended- but still a very real possibility.

Finally – the current law does allow a woman to ‘do something’ – just let’s be honest about what that something is..

David

February 21st, 2012
2:34 pm

Are you people so ignorant as to not discern the difference between contraception that prevents pregnancy and abortion?

ABORTION is the taking of a LIFE that has already begun. Anyone who does not recognize that life begins at conception is intellectually dishonest, ignoring real science and willfully blind!

What about the rights of pre-born women who are being killed in the womb? Don’t those women have rights too? The right to live.

NO ONE is trying to take away a person’s right to contraception! The Catholic church is not trying to impose their beliefs on any Non-Catholic.

You people who support abortion and advocate it have innocent blood on your hands.

md

February 21st, 2012
2:34 pm

Wasn’t too long ago, women were fighting for equal rights……now that the tables are turned, they don’t much like it. All the wee ones want is to have an equal choice…….where’s the empathy?

Chris N

February 21st, 2012
2:34 pm

This literally might be the dumbest thing I have ever read. It’s unfortunate that people like Yasmin Neal don’t instantly lose their seat in government when they say something so f—ing stupid. Hopefully Neal realizes the stupidity of this and is just trying to make noise and get attention. If not, God help us all that people like this are in positions of power.

And this is coming from a Republican btw…

TheTruth

February 21st, 2012
2:35 pm

What these ignorant pricks don’t realize is there are situations where MEN are getting vasectomies to SAVE their WIVES life. In my case, (ironically tomorrow), my wife could die if she gets pregnant again and options like this esure or other things for women put them in more danger of things like etopic pregnancies than me getting clipped. Stupid, ignorant people. I’m not going to lend my junk for a woman to have a baby, isn’t my problem, isn’t my goal, and is MY decision to have a child with MY wife, not have a child for someone else to raise. God Speed and may the democrats and people who sponsor or support this bill simply take their government enriched lives and shove it. Keep the government out of our lives, too much….

John K

February 21st, 2012
2:38 pm

Where’s the personal responsibility in allowing people to make their own medical decisions?

Democratic seeks to ban vasectomies

February 21st, 2012
2:38 pm

Ernest T. Bass

February 21st, 2012
2:39 pm

Doubt many bible thumping republican idiots will get behind this one.

After all women are subjective to men and its ok for men to tell women what to do with their bodies.

But certainly not the other way around.

“But I would have you know, that the head of every man is Christ; and the head of the woman is the man; and the head of Christ is God.” (I Corinthians 11:3)

“For the man is not of the woman; but the woman of the man. Neither was the man created for the woman; but the woman for the man.” (I Corinthians 11:8-9)

WOW

February 21st, 2012
2:39 pm

Babies are basically parasites until they are 14 years old. Let’s pass laws to abort them before 728 weeks.

Good Lord. No one is stopping a woman from having her tubes tied.

Dem idiots

February 21st, 2012
2:41 pm

Ladies, if you don’t want babies, get your tubes tied!!!

DJ Sniper

February 21st, 2012
2:42 pm

MT, you just made my point. Your sister had a choice and she made it. The next woman may choose different, but the point is still the same: she had a choice.

td

February 21st, 2012
2:43 pm

John K

February 21st, 2012
2:38 pm

Where’s the personal responsibility in allowing people to make their own medical decisions?

Having an abortion is only a medical decision in the eyes of libs. Abortion is murder and nothing more then another form of contraception.

Ernest T. Bass

February 21st, 2012
2:44 pm

God Speed and may the democrats and people who sponsor or support this bill simply take their government enriched lives and shove it. Keep the government out of our lives, too much….

Republicans always want the government out of our lives.

Unless its something they care about deeply, then it is perfectly fine.

Women Shall Not Speak

“Let your women keep silence in the churches: for it is not permitted unto them to speak; but they are commanded to be under obedience, as also saith the law. And if they will learn any thing, let them ask their husbands at home: for it is a shame for women to speak in the church.” (I Corinthians 14:34-35)

Billy

February 21st, 2012
2:46 pm

Better to be a beliver than otherwise. Laugh all you want. We’ll see who laughs last…

md

February 21st, 2012
2:47 pm

“Where’s the personal responsibility in allowing people to make their own medical decisions?”

Many scientists are now stating that life begins at conception…….if that is the case, does that new being get to exercise it’s personal responsibility??

At the moment, the answer is no…….due strictly to a definition that defines life at a given arbitrary point in time……..which is getting further and further away from actual science.

Atlanta Native

February 21st, 2012
2:47 pm

JOHN D: Good points. Thank you. I just don’t want Woe vs. Wade to be overturned. That’s all. Need I tell you my personal (and yes this whole discussion is about what should be ONLY a personal matter) story of having an abortion in my twenties, with the man I ultimately ended up marrying two years afterwards, and who has shared his life with me as the parents of two beautiful children who are now in college? Do you want to know why I had that abortion? It doesn’t matter. My reasons are personal, but no matter what they were at the time, the fetus fanatics believe I should not have had that right, that the choice was God’s and not mine to end my own pregnancy and manage my body and my life as I saw fit.

Delusional

February 21st, 2012
2:47 pm

W&G – My post at 12:55 said that the only reasons that abortion should be allowed were to save the life of the mother or for rape victims. We may agree on that but that will probably by the extent of our commonality. In my post to you, I commented that one of the few roles of government should be to protect one person form another. That includes protecting a defenseless fetus, which I call a person, from their irresponsible mother and/ or boyfreind. I don’t need the government to protect me from myself which was your sophomoric response to my comment to you.

DianeF

February 21st, 2012
2:48 pm

They ought to also ban condoms. I mean, they don’t really protect anyone from STD’s, or anything. They’re not medically necessary. “Every sperm is sacred!”

freidenker

February 21st, 2012
2:48 pm

Tom, way back, is correct. god performs more abortions (miscarriage) in a day than all abort docs combined. why don’t some of you get in his face! (god, not Tom)

Ernest T. Bass

February 21st, 2012
2:50 pm

Ladies, if you don’t want babies, get your tubes tied!!!

Or use a condom.

Then you can decide when you do or don’t want to have a baby.

But of course using a condom is a “sin”

Elmer

February 21st, 2012
2:51 pm

I believe Women in the USA have more rights than anywhere in the World. Abortion in about Individual Rights and ONLY about individual rights, i.e the fetus is an INDIVIDUAL and the Mother has no right to violate the fetus’s rights by murdering it. The fetus is an individual, why can’t the very smart Liberals understand this simple truth?

Dem idiots

February 21st, 2012
2:53 pm

Democraps are pro-choice, right?! How about choosing to not get pregnant in the first place…

Carole

February 21st, 2012
2:54 pm

DamnYankee
Vasectomies, from what I understand — being a male and all — do not involve the murder of an innocent child in early development.
++++

You’re correct, they result in NO child. A vasectomy prevents the sperm from entering a man’s semen. Thereby preventing it from creating a pregnancy. Contraceptions do the same thing for women. So why isn’t the church or anyone else up in arms about men who have them?

For those who think that even as a joke or childish act the legislators are wasting their time, then explain to me some of the legislation in the past year by Repubs like: deciding how close you can get to shooting a deer; no one can implant a micro chip in a person without their permission; and as has been mentioned here, the fact that you can put a silencer on a hunting gun/rifle just to name a few. Why should the Repubs have all of the fun?

Ernest T. Bass

February 21st, 2012
2:56 pm

“Every sperm is sacred!”

Classic Monty Python bit.

Listen if you ban abortions do you know what you will get.

Abortions in Mexico and Canada for those close to the border.

Closehanger abortions in the middle.

And a whole lotta babies thrown in dumpsters.

Is that more humane ?

Nobody is “pro abortion”

But the reality is women are going to have them.

Lets at least do it in a safe environment and not in the dark but out in the light.

DJ Sniper

February 21st, 2012
2:57 pm

Dem idiots, you are one of those people I referred to earlier; the kinds that think that the only women who go for abortions are the one who were irresponsible when it comes to sex.

Ernest T. Bass

February 21st, 2012
2:58 pm

Democraps are pro-choice, right?! How about choosing to not get pregnant in the first place…

If only using a condom weren’t a “sin”

DJ Sniper

February 21st, 2012
2:59 pm

Excellent point Ernest. Do people really think that abortion is going to magically go away simply by being against the law?

Lisa

February 21st, 2012
3:01 pm

Good work Ladies – Good for the goose, good for the gander.. Also, make sure those Catholics who don’t want birth control don’t get viagra too.

Xx

February 21st, 2012
3:02 pm

Democrats…….abortion at 9 months….what’s wrong with that? Brilliant…..

CTW

February 21st, 2012
3:03 pm

No sex unless trying to conceive…isnt that what the Bible says anyway? Since we’re a Christian nation, let’s make that the law too. That’ll put an end to all these silly “reproductive rights” everyone thinks they deserve. LOL

Raiderbeater

February 21st, 2012
3:03 pm

It saddens me “Right to the Womb”, “Republican crazies” “Semen should be regulated the same as babies”. Ok. I’ll play your game. When is a fetus a baby. Everyone ask yourself and come up with an answer. Ok….got it? Some believe at the point of a heart beat, other at the point it comes out of the mother. So……have you ever seen a late term abortion? They put scissors in a womans vagina and snap the “fetus” to pieces, pulling out the small limbs, smashed head, scrambled organs, etc.

Ask yourself…10 minutes before a woman gives birth is it a baby? No? Yes?

Lets say the woman goes into early labor at 8 months…..any less a baby?

People are so undisciplined, selfish, in the world today….”right to the womb” the child that was brought together by TWO people is who has claim to the womb…..and if a man were able to carry a child the belief would be no different.

“Crazies”….I’ll leave it up to people who are actually wise to understand who those people are.

Ernest T. Bass

February 21st, 2012
3:03 pm

Excellent point Ernest. Do people really think that abortion is going to magically go away simply by being against the law?

They do but they aren’t thinking it all the way through.

They just get to a point they like and then they stop there.

But that isn’t reality.

John K

February 21st, 2012
3:03 pm

So td, when did you get internet access in the uterus you’re trying to control?

Extreme is bad no matter how you look at it

February 21st, 2012
3:04 pm

The government needs to stay out of personal decisions…..period. They shouldn’t pay for birth control of any kind or compel anyone to do so. Sleep with who you like, it’s not their business. Things go wrong, it’s your problem not the taxpayers.

Dem idiots

February 21st, 2012
3:05 pm

DJ Sniper…you got me all wrong.

I’m “one of those people” who happened to be adopted at birth. My biological mother was raped by her sister’s (ex)husband when she was 12 years old, had me at 13 and gave me up for adoption as a result. If she aborted me, I wouldn’t be here.

This is why I will continue to fight abortion with all my being!

Carole

February 21st, 2012
3:06 pm

Dem Idiots

Ladies, if you don’t want babies, get your tubes tied!!!

Democraps are pro-choice, right?! How about choosing to not get pregnant in the first place…

++++++++++

You are a case study for the pill and condom back up. How about this, instead of a woman getting her tubes tied you and other men keep the old snake on lockdown. Secondly, all Democrats are not pro choice. And most are not in favor of abortions. They are in favor of the government NOT telling women whether or not she can have a medical procedure. That’s what you Repubs can’t seem to understand.

You’re the modern day Pharisees and Sadducees that Jesus had to deal with in the Bible.You want less government, except when it comes to people’s personal habits. But as long as it impacts your wallets in a way that you deem negative you want them out of your business.

Raiderbeater

February 21st, 2012
3:07 pm

CTW – “No sex unless trying to conceive…isnt that what the Bible says anyway? Since we’re a Christian nation, let’s make that the law too. That’ll put an end to all these silly “reproductive rights” everyone thinks they deserve. LOL”

Uhh….actually no, the Bible doesn’t say that anywhere. There is actually a book called the Song of Solomon that speaks of sexual intimacy between a husband and wife…..and not for procreation…for pleasure. The world loves to show the bible as dark and gloomy.

CTW

February 21st, 2012
3:10 pm

You caught me – I have no idea what the Bible says. I only go by what I heard growing up in a Christian household in Georgia.

Raiderbeater

February 21st, 2012
3:11 pm

Carole – Wow.

Did you just somehow elude that Jesus is pro “womens medical procedure” (abortion)?

I’m going to love to see the long drawn out justification.

Freedomfighter

February 21st, 2012
3:11 pm

I am always amazed at the ignorance people have of what the Scriptures say….thanks Raider. It is bizarre what people believe is in there and what is not in there….not to mention how so many people like to take a section or a word or two and take it out of context. Who doesn’t have the open mind?

CTW

February 21st, 2012
3:11 pm

Apparently it’s also against God’s will for two people of different races to marry too…so Ive heard.

Peadawg

February 21st, 2012
3:11 pm

Like I said on Jay Bookman’s blog…b*tches be crazy.

Raiderbeater

February 21st, 2012
3:13 pm

CTW – I 100% agree with you, a “Christian” in the US can be interpreted in many different ways.

Most people I know say they are “Christian” because there grandmother took them to church until they were 12.

Raiderbeater

February 21st, 2012
3:16 pm

CTW – Unequally yoked regarding races isn’t in the bible either. It is when talking about one who has faith in Christ and one who doesn’t. Jesus specifically rebuked this when he made all things clean in the New testament. God told the Israelites not to marry outside there race for a while in the old testament to build their nation.

commoncents

February 21st, 2012
3:19 pm

Carole 3:06- “You are a case study for the pill and condom back up. How about this, instead of a woman getting her tubes tied you and other men keep the old snake on lockdown. Secondly, all Democrats are not pro choice. And most are not in favor of abortions. They are in favor of the government NOT telling women whether or not she can have a medical procedure. That’s what you Repubs can’t seem to understand.”

“Keep the old snake on lockdown?” Perhaps you should keep your legs closed. If that’s too much to ask, then be responsible for your actions and accept the consequences.

If you are drunk and run someone over, you must be held responsible,
If you are having sex, get pregnant, then abort the child, you must be held responsible.

In both situations, you are responsible for the life you take.

Raiderbeater

February 21st, 2012
3:20 pm

Going back to my previous statement…..many bad dealing these days with “Christians” are those in a “Christian family”. Unfortunately many of those are in the Southeast. Because their parent or grandparents went to church and they go every Easter and Christmas it doesn’t make them experts or even followers of the faith. Yet they will call themselves “Christians” because of their community.

These people are not educated in the faith and only use it….unfortunately, as an avenue to belittle or best someone in an argument while seeming “Hollier than thou”.