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Fetal viability. Discovering Religion Full series. Kelowna scraps courtesy flags program after pro-life flag sparks furor. Kelowna will stop flying courtesy flags at City Hall effective immediately, after a public outcry over the possibility that the flag of a group that opposes abortion and euthanasia would claim the spot for a week this fall.

Kelowna scraps courtesy flags program after pro-life flag sparks furor

At a meeting on Monday, city councillors voted unanimously to retire the courtesy flag pole introduced in 2011 to recognize visiting dignitaries, promote civic occasions and allow not-for-profit groups to advertise community events. The decision followed public uproar over the possibility a proposed flag designed by Kelowna’s Right to Life society would be approved. Last week, the society mistakenly announced on its website that the city had approved its design – which included “pro-life” in bright red capital letters – for a spot during the week of activities surrounding its annual fundraising walk in late September.

The application had not yet been approved, said Tom Wilson, the city’s communications supervisor. Mr. Take Action / Participer « radicalhandmaids. On September 26, 2012 we successfully defeated Motion 312.

Take Action / Participer « radicalhandmaids

Soraya Chemaly: 10 Reasons the Rest of the World Thinks the U.S. Is Nuts. This week the Georgia State Legislature debated a bill in the House that would make it necessary for some women to carry stillborn or dying fetuses until they "naturally" go into labor.

Soraya Chemaly: 10 Reasons the Rest of the World Thinks the U.S. Is Nuts

In arguing for this bill Representative Terry England described his empathy for pregnant cows and pigs in the same situation. I have a question for Terry England, Sam Brownback, Rick Santorum, Rick Perry and too many others: I have three daughters, two of them twins. If one of my twins had been stillborn would you have made me carry her to term, thereby endangering both the other twin and me? Or, would you have insisted that the state order a mandatory fetal extraction of the living twin fetus from my womb so that I could continue to carry the stillborn one to term and possibly die myself? This is my abortion: Photos of my abortion taken with a hidden cell phone. Harper Says He Won't Reopen Abortion Debate Video.

Study links low intelligence with right-wing beliefs. Researchers have found a possible explanation for why certain people are prejudiced: they’re less intelligent.

Study links low intelligence with right-wing beliefs

Children with lower general intelligence are more likely to become prejudiced as adults, according to a Brock University study. The study, published in the journal Psychological Science, examined data from two large-scale British studies, and found lower intelligence scores in childhood were predictors of greater racism in adulthood, which the researchers controversially explain is brought about by adopting right-wing ideologies.

A secondary analysis of data from a U.S. study also showed those with poor abstract-reasoning skills were more likely to have anti-homosexual prejudice, partially linked to authoritarian attitudes. Lead researcher Gordon Hodson told LiveScience that the results of the study indicate a vicious cycle, in which people with low intelligence are drawn to socially conservative ideologies. Open Letter Demanding that Mayor of Kelowna Rescind Anti-abortion Proclamation Petition. An Open Letter to Mayor of Kelowna in Opposition to “Protect Human Life Week” Dear Mayor Walter Gray, The signatories to this letter object to the proclamation you issued on July 3 declaring September 23-30, 2012 as “Protect Human Life Week.”

Open Letter Demanding that Mayor of Kelowna Rescind Anti-abortion Proclamation Petition

This proclamation, issued at the request of the Kelowna Right to Life Society, is highly inappropriate and should be rescinded immediately. When the city states: “It is the intention of this proclamation to promote respect and protection to all human life, especially the infirm, the aged, the handicapped, and the unborn,” it is an implicit endorsement of the Kelowna Right to Life Society’s opposition to safe and legal abortion for women. A quick perusal of the Society’s website makes clear that it is a radical political and religious group primarily concerned with opposing and re-criminalizing abortion, not with protecting the infirm, aged, handicapped, or even babies.

Tory trying to keep 'definition of human' motion alive. OTTAWA - Less than a week after MPs return to the Commons in mid-September, they're set to dive into a debate about Canada's 400-year-old definition of human being - a question that could develop into a full-blown discussion of abortion rights.

Tory trying to keep 'definition of human' motion alive

Conservative MP Stephen Woodworth confirms his motion to have a committee re-examine the Criminal Code provision that states a child becomes a human being only at the moment of complete birth is up for debate on September 21. More on Review Claiming Abortion Hurts Women's Mental Health. This is the third in a series of blogs discussing a controversial review in British Journal of Psychiatry ( BJP ) by American Priscilla Coleman claiming that abortion poses considerable risk to the mental health of women and that its effects account for over a third of suicides among American women of reproductive age.

The first blog discussed the claims of review as they were spread across the United States by anti-choice websites. The second blog exposed the pseudo-science in the conclusions of the review. I also showed how the conclusions were sharply contradicted by other authoritative sources, including a draft report from the Royal College of Psychiatrists which publishes BJP . Since I posted my blog, E-letters continue to appear at the journal website , most of them offering scathing critiques of the review and sometimes questioning the decision of the journal to publish it.

Theory of obstetrics: an epidemiolo... [BMC Pregnancy Childbirth. 2007. Management of the woman with threatened birth of an infant of extremely low gestational age. Fetus and Newborn Committee, Canadian Paediatric Society, Maternal-Fetal Medicine Committee, Society of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists of Canada. OBJECTIVE: To offer guidelines for parents, physicians and other members of the health-care team for management of the probable birth of an infant with a gestational age of 26 completed weeks or less.

Management of the woman with threatened birth of an infant of extremely low gestational age. Fetus and Newborn Committee, Canadian Paediatric Society, Maternal-Fetal Medicine Committee, Society of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists of Canada

OPTIONS: Vaginal birth or birth by cesarean section for fetal indications and active treatment or palliative care of the infant at birth. OUTCOMES: Increased risk of complications for the mother from cesarean section at this stage of pregnancy and the difficulty in making a prognosis before or at birth for an infant of this gestational age. EVIDENCE: Published survival rates and risks of impairment or disability for infants of each gestational age; current information provided by directors of follow-up clinics in Canadian university-based pediatric programs. Prem baby survival rates revealed. A major study has found no significant improvement in the survival rate for very premature babies over the last 10 years, the BBC has learned.

Prem baby survival rates revealed

The research showed babies born above 24 and 25 weeks gestation were more likely to live than in the past. But there was no significant improvement in survival of babies born before 24 weeks - the current time limit for abortion. The data for England comes just weeks before MPs are due to debate the issue. My God wants me to be pro-choice. Fern Hill over at Dammit Janet set upon me a task, to see what the Bible had to say about abortion.

My God wants me to be pro-choice

Short answer: Nada. I could not find a single reference to "abortion", "caused herself to miscarry", or any variation of those. Even "unborn" got me a single reference, and it was to "a people yet unborn". Margo Somerville smackdown. Old news, but I thought readers might be interested.

Margo Somerville smackdown

The ruling of the Iowa District Court in Varnum v. O'Brien, affirmed unanimously by the Iowa Supreme Court earlier this year, held that a ban on same-sex marriage was unconstitutional. Counsel for Polk County, the defendant in the original lawsuit brought by six gay couples, called Margaret Somerville, the ethics guru from McGill University, as an expert witness against same-sex marriage. ‘Pregnancy Begins 2 Weeks Before Conception’ Now The Law In Arizona. In Arizona, women are now legally pregnant two weeks before conception, according to a new law, the Orwellianly-named, “Women’s Health and Safety Act,” signed yesterday by Republican Governor Jan Brewer. The scientifically, medically, ethically, and intellectually dishonest legislation is designed to reduce the amount of time a woman is allowed to have a legal abortion, and is one of the most draconian bills to become law in America.

The bill was sponsored by extremist Arizona State Rep. Kimberly Yee, (image, right) who last month penned an op-ed titled, “No drug test, no welfare.” Yee wrote: ‘Identical’ twins? Not according to their DNA - Health - Health care - More health news - NBCNews.com. ‘Identical’ twins? Not according to their DNA - Health - Health care - More health news - NBCNews.com. Every woman’s reason is unique: Why rape exceptions and abortion stereotypes are harmful. One super important conversation that’s come out of uproar over Rep. Akin’s “legitimate rape” comment is how rape exceptions are total bullshit anyway. Irin Carmon explains: But when progressives cede the moral center to the rape exception, they are implicitly buying into the idea that some reasons to have abortions are more justified than others — and that we should be interrogating these reasons at all. As Tracy Weitz, who conducts empirical research on women who have abortions (remember science?)

Absent fathers: Political leaders like Bill Clinton, Ronald Reagan, Gerald Ford, and Paul Ryan often develop coping mechanisms in childhood that may make them effective leaders. Photographs of Paul Ryan by John Moore/Getty Images, Barack Obama by Alex Wong/Getty Images, Bill Clinton by David Livingston/Getty Images, and Ronald Reagan and Gerald Ford by HAL GARB/AFP/Getty Images. We've heard a lot about the death of Paul Ryan's father: He had a fatal heart attack when the future GOP vice presidential candidate was only 16. Biographical sketches cite the event as a formative early trauma that helped turn Ryan into a "man in a hurry. " With the Republican National Convention days away, we will soon hear Ryan’s origin story—and the role his father’s death played in it—repeated and echoed many more times.

The strange thing, though, is that Paul Ryan is hardly alone—American politics is overflowing with stories of absent fathers, alcoholic fathers, neglectful fathers, and untimely deceased ones. Facts on Induced Abortion in the United States. July 2014 • Half of pregnancies among American women are unintended, and four in 10 of these are terminated by abortion.[1] •Twenty-one percent of all pregnancies (excluding miscarriages) end in abortion.[2] • In 2011, 1.06 million abortions were performed, down 13% from 1.21 million in 2008. From 1973 through 2011, nearly 53 million legal abortions occurred.[2] • Each year, 1.7% of women aged 15–44 have an abortion [2] . • At least half of American women will experience an unintended pregnancy by age 45, and at 2008 abortion rates, one in 10 women will have an abortion by age 20, one in four by age 30 and three in 10 by age 45.[4,5] Holy F'ing Sh*t: GOP Sheriff candidate says he might shoot doctors to stop abortions.

THE PRO-CHOICE ACTION NETWORK. By Joyce Arthur, Pro-Choice Action Network Pro-Choice Press, Spring 2005. Rachel Maddow On Todd Akin: Where's The Freakout Over Paul Ryan's Abortion Record? Biology: species membership, definition of organism, testable hypothesis. V_of_tReason : #M312 #cdnpoli... Why The Christian Right Is Wrong About Abortion. Physicians For Life - Abstinence, Abortion, Birth Control - Assault Rape Pregnancies Are Rare. First, let's define the term "rape". No Abortion. No Exceptions. By CAP Action War Room on August 21, 2012 at 5:07 pm. Todd Akin's "legitimate rape" comment: Not a misstatement, but a worldview. Photo by Paul Morigi/Getty Images for Nickelodeon. Knitting group uses wooly wombs to take stand on abortion motion. More minority women die in childbirth. Broadcast Yourself.

Pro-life ‘polling resource’ for Canadian journalists, columnists, and bloggers. Doctors call on Ottawa to reject ‘backdoor’ attempt to recriminalize abortion. Redleaf Prayer Ministries. 'God, Use Me in Whatever Way': Meet the 24-Year-Old Who's Willing to Die for the Anti-Abortion Movement. The defeat of personhood in Mississippi shows how empty a term "pro-life" really is. PHONE #-Antichoice- Church Spent Decades Stealing or Coercing Babies from Unwed Mothers. Personhood Colorado: From Slavery, to Demons, to Nazis.

Slavery in the Bible. Your Voice for Choice. This Is My Body. Opposing Religious Coercion in Health Care: The Defeat of the Abington Hospital Merger in Pennsylvania. Whoa, a Petri Dish That Has a Pulse. 8wk zygote-killed Aurora CO. The War on Women by the Ridiculous Numbers. Conservative MP Stephen Woodworth more than just an anti-abortion crusader. Jjhippie : Doing my part to help find... Republicans, Get In My Vagina! from Kate Beckinsale, Judy Greer, Andrea Savage, Funny Or Die, lauren, Alex Richanbach, and BoTown Sound. When It Comes To Reproductive Health, The National Right To Life Committee Literally Wrote The Media Playbook. George Carlin: Pro Life, Abortion, And The Sanctity Of Life. The War on Women by the Ridiculous Numbers. Here's the real 'gotcha' Embryo. "Vaginas, Sea Level, And The Banning Of Reality" - MOC #149. GOP Anti-Abortion Bill Will Force IRS Agents To Audit Abortions Of Sexual Assault Victims.

Rachel Maddow: The GOP war on birth control. Voice of Choice: Turning the Tables on Anti-choice Bullies. Stern-Stave-Interview. Counter Demonstrations for the Anti-Choice Caravan. Roseblue : @lahtay44 I don't think an... The creepy eliminationism of Suzanne Fortin. Clarification of the CMA's position concerning induced abortion. Anti-choice failures are no reason to give them an inch. Early baby survival 'unchanged' Early term births: consideratio... [Obstet Gynecol Clin North Am. 2012. Fetal PainA Systematic Multidisciplinary Review of the Evidence. Timing of indicated late-preterm and early-te... [Obstet Gynecol. 2011.

Twitter rescues Planned Parenthood. Are Canadians resigned to the current repressive methods of the Harper Regime?

Women

Abortion Denies Too Many Fathers a Right to Father's Day. Liberals, Atheists Are More Highly Evolved? Pew Forum: U.S. Abortion Views by Religious Affiliation. Somerville: Democracy hurt by abortion stats secrecy « Stop FOI Censorship. Oklahoma public school shows film comparing abortion to Hitler and the Holocaust - Orlando liberal. Catholics for Choice.