The law, we have long since learned,
is manipulated by agenda, religious belief, personal perception, and everything
we can imagine. Everything we can
imagine except science. Many laws are
written that conflict with other existing laws, or embedded definitions which
are not consistent with those definitions contain in other laws. Abortion laws of the past half century are no
different. Ironically, we even create
laws which claim to provide a required detail of information to patients and
others, yet the limit of information to be provided is clearly not from a fully
scientific standpoint, but from a personal perception of religious belief. The law should not be a platform for such.
The Woman’s Right to Know Act of
2011 in North Carolina is no different. (NCGA Chapter 90, 2011) Its limited provisions to impart information
are sorely incomplete. And with a
society whose basis of defining the most basic scientific definition of Human
life and that which is an individual is based not on science itself but on
personal perception and religious ideology.
Even supposed experts in the medical profession ignore that which they
have been taught through their earliest science books. One such science book states in part "If
the time is suitable, the sperm and egg fuse to produce a fertilized egg, which
is the first cell of a new individual."
(Marieb, 2008) Defining viability
from a scientific standpoint is equally a challenge as historically the meaning
of the word has changed thanks to ever evolving scientific knowledge and
technology.
Having had several experiences with
that which many would claim to be neither individual Human life or viable
Humans due to various medical or genetic deformities, I’ve chosen the path of
recognizing individuals through scientific definition rather than personal
perception or religious ideology. A line
child having had five siblings my mother told me did not survive birth due to
miscarriages. One of whom would have
been older than me and the baby of the family having survived long enough to
know that I would have had a baby sister.
And having lived in various communities of individuals with both
physical and mental disabilities, constantly treated as less than Human, I have
even less reason to follow socity’s desire to use personal perception and
religious ideology as definitions of who is and who is not Human and viable
enough to be considered as having the most basic Human and Civil Rights.
The only way either law or society
can deal with the inconsistencies inherent to law, including various abortion
laws, is to strip away personal perception and religious ideology and set forth
base parameters for law to be built upon.
Once base parameters that are built upon basic science and the
understanding that knowledge and technology can evolve, the only change needed
to be made is the parameter all other laws are to be built upon.
References
Marieb,
E., (2008). Chapter 16: The Reproductive System, Essentials of Human Anatomy
and
Physiology, 9th Edition, DeVry
Migration, 2008, p. 545. VitalBook file.
NCGA
website, (2011), NC General Statutes, Chapter 90, Article 1I, Woman’s Right to
Know Act, North Carolina General
Assembly website, Retrieved 10/18/2014 from http://www.ncga.state.nc.us/enactedlegislation/statutes/html/byarticle/chapter_90/article_1i.html
Further
Reading Recommendations
NCGA
website, (2014), NC General Statutes, Chapter 14, Article 6A, Section
14-23.1, Unborn
Victims, North Carolina General
Assembly website, Retrieved 10/11/2014 from http://www.ncga.state.nc.us/EnactedLegislation/Statutes/HTML/ByArticle/Chapter_14/Article_6A.html
NCGA
website, (2014), NC General Statutes, Chapter 14, Article 11, Abortion and
Kindred
Offenses, North Carolina General
Assembly website, Retrieved 10/11/2014 from http://www.ncga.state.nc.us/enactedlegislation/statutes/html/byarticle/chapter_14/article_11.html
Osler,
M., (2013), Roe’s Ragged Remnant: Viability, Stanford Law & Policy Review, January 2013,
Volume 24:1, p. 216-245
Stam,
P. (2012), Women’s Right To Know: A Legislative History, Issues In Law &
Medicine,
Vol. 28, No. 1, Summer 2012, p. 2.