Roe v Wade: it is not men’s right to decide

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For all practical purposes, I am a child of the 1970s. Against my parent's wishes, and certainly in a fashion way beyond my mother's comprehension, I did as a result embrace the women's liberation thinking of that era. Influenced and educated as I was by fortunate choices of girlfriends at that time, equal pay, equal rights for women, the right to abortion on demand and, in a very real sense, the right to women's liberation in both the home and workplace became not just slogans, but matters of lived experience, shaping my everyday domestic and working life.

I have not one moment's regret about that. Nor have I ever had reason to change my mind on any of these issues. The example provided by my parent's generation and which I witnessed in the power relationship between my parents, was wrong. This is a world where all should be equal and where discrimination between men and women should simply not exist, any more than misogyny should.

The threat to women's rights in the USA, represented by the threat of reversal of Roe v Wade, with consequences that would inevitably flow well beyond the borders of the USA, is therefore alien to all I believe in. It is, quite simply, a woman's right to choose whether to carry a child, or not. This feels like, because it is, a matter that is beyond question. But men are questioning it.

The challenge to abortion rights is not mainly from women. Of course, there are exceptions to that, but this is a male-driven agenda, to reclaim power over something that is not theirs to control.

It is, also part of the fascist agenda, in which misogyny is deeply implicit.

Both are ideas alien to me. Neither should be in any way acceptable in. the 21st century. I do, of course, accept the right of men to have an opinion on this issue: I am expressing one right now. But I do not accept the right of men to in any way impose that opinion on women.

Have we really not learned this as yet? If not, we need to be very worried.


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