Iranian parliament gives green light to abortion

[NNN0LHI]

http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/OLI255054.htm

TEHRAN, April 12 (Reuters) - Iran's conservative-dominated parliament has approved abortions in cases where the mother's life is in danger or the child would be handicapped, the official IRNA news agency reported on Tuesday.

"It is the first time in the past 26 years that parliament dared to debate such a controversial law," the agency said, referring to the period since the 1979 Islamic revolution.

IRNA said opponents of the bill that argued many disabled people had played important roles in society and that the legislation was open to abuse.

Proponents of the law underlined the financial drain on families of handicapped children .

more

As Iran moves forward the US gets more backward.

[CountAllVotes]

1. big move for Iran

Very conservative country/people. Women's rights must be now finally getting some obvious real attention.

I commend you Iran for protecting women at last (more than is being done here on American soil!).

:kick:

[Merlot]

4. Reads like it's less about womens rights than about "financial burdens"

[daleo]

7. The two are often linked, though. n/t

[aneerkoinos]

2. Interesting detail

Homosexuality is illegal in Iran, but sex change operations are not only legal, but IIRC also part of public health care.

[NNN0LHI]

8. Another interesting detail

Are there any states in the USA that do not to this day still have archaic laws on their books making sodomy between consenting adults a criminal offense? I am not sure myself. But I have a pretty idea.

Don

[nolabels]

3. No, don't do that, please don't................

One of last remaining vestiges keeping Neo-con alliance from invading will be removed..........This will surely let the fundies cast that country as the spawn of SATAN :scared:

[CAcyclist]

5. Legalized abortion is GOOD for society (going on a tangent)

edited- wrong study posted initially - all the items on this study are pdfs so I posted this instead

http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/view.asp?article=2232

Lastly, Levitt argues that the legalisation of abortion in the early '70s helped reduce crime two decades later. This controversial theory rests on two premises - that unwanted children are more likely to grow up and commit crime, and that abortion reduced the number of unwanted births. Using variation in abortion rates across US states, Levitt concludes that nearly one-quarter of the total decline in crime during the past decade can be attributed to the legalisation of abortion. My own research (with Stanford University's Justin Wolfers) suggests that the same may be true for Australia.

So according to Levitt, America's crime success comes down to more police, more prisons, less crack and legalised abortion. On prisons and abortion, there is little for Australian policymakers to learn. Abortion is de-facto legal throughout the nation, and we are probably at the point where the social gain from increasing the jail population would be outweighed by the scarring effect of incarceration.

[nolabels]

6. Bomb, Bomb, Bomb, Bomb, Bomb Iran

That really was an obscure relational tangent. I find it hard to believe even a politician was not playing this. It may or may not have been a political in your face ploy by the Iranian government to the fundies. Either way the same effect will probably take effect. The propaganda machine (corporate owned news) is sure to trumpet this one sooner or later, at least to fundie audience anyway.

Bomb, Bomb, Bomb, Bomb, Bomb Iran

by Stephen Bender


...like the Beach Boys used to sing...

Another Summer Blockbuster?

If the duly reelected American government decides to bomb Iran – or green lights Israel to do it, which is morally indistinguishable – these men will put we the people in the position of having no moral defense against Islamic terrorism. Some leftists – most crassly Ward Churchill – made something like this point after 9/11. That was overblown rhetoric; and the reference to "little Eichmanns" at Cantor-Fitzgerald was a statement of moral idiocy.

It hurts to write and know that we have done unto others much more than they have done unto us – this includes 9/11, I'm afraid. No one "deserved" to die on 9/11, nor will anyone "deserve" to die in a future terror attack in the United States. But then, no one "deserved" to die, as we sat transfixed in our living rooms, under the bombs of "Shock & Awe,"* That's "moral equivalence" too – all human life is precious.

The explanation on offer by amoralists like William Bennett is that our motives are pure, which of course they aren't. And, again and again, we're "the greatest democracy in the history of the world." Why, we're Americans; don't people know that we're a good people? We "work hard and play by the rules"; we try (and mostly fail) to raise upstanding citizens. Sorry, self-regard doesn't cut it. Non-Americans around the world want to see some actual evidence of these alleged values and morals that the president prattles on about.
(snip)

What We've Become

The question should be asked: are we a good people anymore? We are not a great people – that much is certain. Not in a land where more people watch "American Idol" than the State of the Union address. In reality, we are still, as Martin Luther King pointed out nearly four decades ago, "the greatest purveyors of violence in the world." One day, if we are not careful, we will choke on our myths
(snip)
http://www.lewrockwell.com/bender/bender10.html

[Anakin Skywalker]

9. More Enlightened Than Some American Fundies.

Damn! A surprising move!