January 28th, 1988, After 59 Long Years Woman Finally Received Equality Rights
Mon, 2008-01-21 12:56
#1
remind
January 28th, 1988, After 59 Long Years Woman Finally Received Equality Rights
Mon, 2008-01-21 12:56
#2
remind
A week from today, it will be 20 years since woman of Canada were acknowleged to have the Right to Self Ownership. This was 59 years after we actually were acknowleged as "Persons" in Canada. Next year will be our 80th anniversary as being people. Both are significant causes for celebration, and celebrate we should.
Go out and take part in your local communities celebration next Monday, if there is no community event, get together with your gfs and celebrate in a public place, in a public way. Plan a huge community celebration for next year on October 18th.
Mon, 2008-01-21 13:59
#3
Thanks a lot remind! This is an important and special anniversary. Here's a listing of upcoming events we know about. Please mark your calendars!
[b]Events Commemorating the 20th Anniversary of the Morgentaler Decision[/b]
[b]Toronto, Friday, January 25[/b], 8:30 am - 5 pm. Symposium to Mark the 20th Anniversary of R v. Morgentaler, Of What Difference: Reflections on the Judgment and Abortion in Canada Today. This symposium will examine the significance of the judgment today: What difference has it made to women, providers, and the politics of abortion in Canada? Sponsored by NAF Canada and the University of Toronto, Faculty of Law. Location: Flavelle Classroom C, Faculty of Law, University of Toronto. Free registration. Register and find details at: [url=http://www.law.utoronto.ca/conferences/ofwhatdifference.html.]www.law.ut... Contacts: Dawn Fowler, [email protected] or Joanna Erdman, [email protected]
[b]Toronto, Friday, January 25[/b], 7:30pm. Fundraising Reception for National Abortion Federation Canada 's Patient Assistance Fund. Many women lack the resources to pay for costs associated with abortion care, such as transportation, childcare, and medications. Also, some women cannot access medical coverage and require financial support. Donations to this fund will allow NAF Canada to provide financial assistance when it is urgently needed. Textile Museum of Canada, 55 Centre Avenue. $30 per ticket or $50 for two tickets. RSVP by January 24 to [email protected] or 250-598-1858.
[b]Toronto, Saturday, January 26[/b], 7pm. Another World is Possible: Cultures of Resistance. An evening of music, art, film, and poetry inspired by diverse struggles for justice as part of the World Social Forum Global Day of Action, and a special tribute to the reproductive choice movement on the occasion of the 20th anniversary of the Morgentaler Supreme Court decision legalizing abortion in Canada. Featuring Dionne Brand, LAL, Marcelo Puente and Heather Chetwind, Choice Monologues, Ulla Laidlaw, PATAC (Phillipine Theatre Group), Global Aware Photo Exhibit, video on World Social Forum by Velcrow Ripper, and many other artists and performers. Free admission. Ryerson Student Campus Center, 55 Gould St. More info: [url=http://www.ryerson.ca/tsf]www.ryerson.ca/tsf[/url] Contact: [email protected]
[b]Ottawa, Monday, January 28[/b], noon-1 pm. Planned Parenthood Ottawa will be peacefully standing outside the Morgentaler Clinic at 65 Bank Street to thank Dr. Henry Morgentaler and to remind everyone that there is still an ongoing struggle for accessibility nation-wide. If you would like to join us, please do. Bring pro-choice signs, bring your friends, sisters, brothers, coworkers, and neighboors. We anticipate anti-choice groups to be there as well. Also, on Tuesday, January 22, from 3pm-9pm, please come to a poster-making session for the rally at Planned Parenthood Ottawa, 251 Bank Street, Suite 201. Materials provided. Invitation and details: [url=http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=21600536808]http://www.facebook.co...
[b]Ottawa, Wednesday, January 30[/b], 7-9:30 pm. Gala Night, featuring Honourable Senator Lucie Pepin, Judy Rebick, video presentation from Dr. Henry Morgentaler, and performers Lesley Hoyles (singer), the Asinabika Women's Drumming Circle, and introducing Peggy Cooke, winner of the Pro-Choice Canada Contest. Free admission, but limited to 200 people. Location: House of Commons, Centre Block, Room 200. Invitation-only event: you must RSVP before Jan 28 to Tracey Bellingham at [email protected] or 613-789-9958 ext 222 or toll-free 1-888-642-2725, ext 222.
[b]Regina, Monday, January 28[/b], 12:30-2:30 pm. Celebrating the 20th Anniversary of the Morgentaler Case. Enjoy tea and anniversary cake. Free admission. Location: Women's Centre, University of Regina. More info: [email protected] Also, in the days leading up to the event, there will be a "coat hanger campaign" to promote awareness of abortion rights.
[b]Vancouver - Monday, January 28[/b], 6-10 pm. The Morgentaler Decision: Before and Beyond. Celebrate the 20th anniversary of the historic Supreme Court decision that finally gave Canadian women true reproductive choice. Reception, cash bar, speaker's panel with Jackie Larkin, Nitya Iyer and Shelagh Day. New documentary film "Henry." Location: SFU Harbour Centre, 515 W. Hastings St., Vancouver. Free admission. Poster with details: [url=http://www.prochoiceactionnetwork-canada.org/Morgentaler-Jan-28-08-flyer... More info: [email protected]
Mon, 2008-01-21 14:13
#4
remind
Thank you for the list joyce, looks like women are celebrating across the country. And so we should! I live in the midst of nowhere, but am going to get together with other women to give honour to those who fought so hard for women's rights and to celebrate those rights.
Tue, 2008-01-22 09:03
#5
remind
Joyce, please check your private messages.
Wed, 2008-01-23 06:17
#6
TemporalHominid
quote:
Originally posted by remind:
[b]A week from today, it will be 20 years since woman of Canada were acknowleged to have the Right to Self Ownership. This was 59 years after we actually were acknowleged as "Persons" in Canada. Next year will be our 80th anniversary as being people. Both are significant causes for celebration, and celebrate we should.Go out and take part in your local communities celebration next Monday, if there is no community event, get together with your gfs and celebrate in a public place, in a public way. Plan a huge community celebration for next year on October 18th.[/b]
wow
it blows my mind that these developments happened so recently.
Sat, 2008-01-26 04:16
#7
Judy Rebick's articles in the Globe and the Post:
[url=http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/LAC.20080126.BKREAD26/TPSto... years, 3 books and 1 hero[/url]
quote:
The once-raging abortion debate has been on a slow simmer for some time now. Hysterical predictions of abortion clinics on every corner did not come to pass. Young urban women take the right to an abortion for granted, and many think that it is a battle won long ago, like the right to vote. No doubt, for a few days around the anniversary, the old arguments will re-emerge. So here are three pro-choice readings that will not only offer some ammunition for those debates, but also a history of the battle here and in the United States and a glimpse of the future of the struggle for reproductive rights, which is far from over.
[url=http://www.nationalpost.com/opinion/story.html?id=265045]Celebrating a victory for women[/url] - she takes on Barbara Kay and David Frum in this one.
quote:
No one has been silenced on the issue, as Barbara Kay suggested this week in her column. Dr. Morgentaler has fought province by province to ensure that the legal right to abortion is supported by medicare. In New Brunswick access to abortion is restricted by provincial legislation that is undoubtedly unconstitutional. In P.E.I. there is no access to abortion at all.In his column on abortion last week, David Frum pointed to the U.S. anti-abortion movement and the bugaboo of late-term, partial birth abortions. Ninety per cent of abortions in Canada take place in the first 12 weeks. In fact, one of the major impacts of the legalization of abortion is that the waiting time for the procedure has been reduced considerably. A mere .04% take place after 20 weeks and only when the health or life of the woman is at stake. The gruesome procedure he describes does not happen here at all and is rare in the U.S.
Here are links in case anyone's interested in reading the idiocy by [url=http://www.nationalpost.com/opinion/story.html?id=253948]David Frum[/url] and [url=http://network.nationalpost.com/np/blogs/fullcomment/archive/2008/01/23/... Kay[/url].
Sat, 2008-01-26 04:17
#8
And apparently the National Post has scored an exclusive scientific miracle solution to the whole abortion "problem".
[url=http://preview.tinyurl.com/393ma4]http://preview.tinyurl.com/393ma4[/url]
[ 26 January 2008: Message edited by: Michelle ]
Sat, 2008-01-26 13:32
#9
remind
quote:
Originally posted by Michelle:
[b]the National Post has scored an exclusive scientific miracle solution to the whole abortion "problem".[/b]
Oh yes, a world where women become brood cows for others who cannot conceive.
Notwithstanding how absolutely impossible this would be, as the process described must be done long before women actually become aware they are pregnant. That would unless of course women get paid to become brood mares for "transoption".
And this:
quote:
Consider, too, that the children currently available for adoption in Canada are disproportionately burdened with problems of one kind or another. Many suffer from physical problems such as fetal alcohol syndrome. Many are toddlers, or even older children, not infants, who have been seized from abusive homes by Children’s Aid Societies and made wards of the state by the courts. Would-be parents may be unwilling to take on the extra challenges that such children pose, but would happily take on the care of an uninjured, pre-born baby without undesirable psychological baggage.
Unfuckingbelievable. A perfect child for the perfect world eh?!
Sat, 2008-01-26 16:44
#10
remind
Judy's article was great, and really hits home with her last note of the fight is still on. particularily so considering this.
quote:
Death threat disrupts abortion meeting
Morgentaler escorted from gathering marking 20th anniversary of historic abortion ruling...Two standing ovations and one death threat.That's the reception Dr. Henry Morgentaler received at a University of Toronto symposium yesterday marking the 20th anniversary of the landmark Supreme Court ruling overturning Canada's abortion law.
"Over the past 37 years I have dedicated myself to the struggle to achieve rights to reproductive freedom and to provide facilities for women," Morgentaler told the symposium, held by the law faculty. "
[url=http://www.thestar.com/News/GTA/article/297596]http://www.thestar.com/Ne...
Sat, 2008-01-26 17:40
#11
quote:
Originally posted by Michelle:
[b]And apparently the National Post has scored an exclusive scientific miracle solution to the whole abortion "problem".[url=http://preview.tinyurl.com/393ma4]http://preview.tinyurl.com/393ma4[/url]
[ 26 January 2008: Message edited by: Michelle ][/b]
This line in the article sticks out:
quote:
How realistic is this, medically? Well, we’ve been doing something similar with cows since 1971.
Of course, what the author doesn't say is that she doesn't intend fetal transplants to simply be a choice that women could opt for, rather her intention is to ban abortion and make women "choose" between adoption, keeping the baby, or engaging in her crackpot fetal transplant idea.
Sat, 2008-01-26 17:57
#12
This is probably the first and last time you'll see me agreeing with a Colby Cash column[url=http://www.nationalpost.com/opinion/columnists/story.html?id=096c7762-58... live Morgentaler![/url]
quote:
So why, then, is there no law concerning abortion in Canada after 20 years of anarchy? If you've been reading these pages all week, you've heard David Frum blame the supposedly antiquated, "weird" views of the late Justice Wilson; he remains silent on the disguised inertia of the Conservative government of 1988 and the undisguised inertia of today's. And you've heard from Barbara Kay, who is less afraid to place the blame at the door of successive Parliaments. But her puzzling account insists on the basis of polling data that Canadians do not like the post-Morgentaler lawlessness, and that politicians are prevented from acting only by a small band of "pro-choice zealots." Does she imagine there are no pro-life zealots in this country? Why haven't they won the argument? If 68% of Canadians really favour some legal limits on abortion, what can the political problem possibly be? When was the last time a government even had the chance to do something that two-thirds of us approved of?The answer, of course, is that the polls are pure wind, nothing more. The respondents are merely trying to sound polite and moderate at a time when the freedom of their girlfriends, daughters and sisters is under no genuine threat from the state. Most Canadians are perfectly comfortable without an abortion law. If they weren't, there would have been one long ago.
And this fact really confirms the fundamental wisdom of the Morgentaler decision. The overturning of the old legal regime was decided on a 4-2 vote, with Justices W.R. McIntyre and Gerard La Forest in dissent. The pair wrote that "there is no evidence or indication of general acceptance of the concept of abortion at will in our society." This must now stand as one of the great inadvertent jests in the history of the court. For the 20 years since their statement, abortion at the will of the mother is just what we have had. The number of people who have proven themselves actually willing to do something about the situation, as opposed to merely inveighing against it as an occasion for outraged verbiage, is minuscule. Domestic politicians of all parties recoil in fear, almost uniformly, at the suggestion that any abortion might ever be prevented by the force of law. And even criticism from other Western countries, which all regulate abortion themselves, has been rare verging on nonexistent.
This is where we are. This is what we wanted, whether we admit it to ourselves or not. And this is as it should be, with the final decision in the hands of the one who must chance the hazards and agony of birth. Long live Morgentaler! Long live anarchy!
Sun, 2008-01-27 06:32
#13
remind
Judy put a portion of Justice Wilson's reasoning in her article. And what an excellent feminist perspective of the law it was.
quote:
Justice Bertha Wilson went much further. It was really the first time we saw a feminist interpretation of law at the highest level."Section 251 is more deeply flawed than just subjecting women to considerable emotional stress and unnecessary physical risk. It asserts that the woman's capacity to reproduce is to be subject, not to her own control, but to that of the state. This is a direct interference with the woman's physical 'person.'"
Wilson added that it was likely impossible for a man even to understand the dilemma of a pregnant woman contemplating an abortion, "not just because it is outside the realm of his personal experience – but because he can relate to it only by objectifying it, thereby eliminating the subjective elements of the female psyche, which are at the heart of the dilemma."
Sun, 2008-01-27 12:53
#14
I don't buy the "impossible to understand" analysis, no matter who is purveying it. Biology is not destiny. Just as women can understand any question despite their life experience as women, so too can men.
To me, the apparent difficulty of the abortion question relates to the fact that the ideology/philosophy of individualism has no category for two-beings-in-one-body. So fetuses get full status as individuals in the theory, when clearly they are something less.
A more mature theory recognises the difference between a blastosphere and a human being, and does not accord rights to the former.
Sun, 2008-01-27 13:18
#15
remind
quote:
he can relate to it only by objectifying it, thereby eliminating the subjective elements of the female psyche,
Mon, 2008-01-28 10:18
#16
remind
Happy Equal Rights Day, Women Across Canada!!!!!
Watched CBC Sunday Night last night with Dr. Morgentaler being interviewed, and saw the clip of Judy going after the man with the knife, have not seen that in years. It brought back all of the memories and emotions, I, as a women, experienced leading up to that SCC decision, 20 short years ago.
The fight was for so much more than freedom of choice regarding abortion. It was for, the right to self-determine period, and not have your life via your body, controlled by the state, or others, no matter what any choice was, or would be in the future.
But clearly, some would still like to force their beliefs upon others, and thereby curtail others rights. Thus it seems, the fight for equality rights is not yet over.
Mon, 2008-01-28 11:47
#17
I was at the pro-choice rally today outside Morgentaler's Ottawa clinic. We wore hearts on our coats that read "I (heart) equality and choice" and carried many of positive placards. Mine read, "Thank you for giving me a choice" on a big red heart with glitter.