(en) Chile, Periodico-solidaridad - Pleasurable sexuality and
maternity chosen I choose! Where, how and when (ca)[machine
translation]
A few weeks ago Bachelet sent the bill on therapeutic abortion. The initiative caused
mixed reactions between right and conservative members of the New Majority. The saddest
example was the one led by Deputy Pablo Lorenzini DC who said that some violations
occurred because women had drunk a "sips of more", meanwhile the Church wants to prevent
its approval at all costs. And as always little has heard the voice of women. Below we
reproduce a letter written by the Appeals published by Solidarity column 2013. The debate
continues and is relevant to remember those who have driven the battle in defense of the
rights of women. ---- Pleasurable sexuality and maternity chosen I choose! Where, how and
when ---- Chile is one of the few countries that criminalize abortion in all
circumstances. The therapeutic abortion was legalized in 1932, however in 1989 Article 119
of the Health Code forbade any situation changed. The year 2012 bill that sought to
legalize abortion risk the life of the mother, extrauterine fetus was not viable and rape
was rejected by two votes in the Senate. Today the debate is reopened following the
electoral situation and is stressed by the commented news.
?However, the illegality of abortion is state violence and discrimination against women
and girls, not only in cases of rape or fetal infeasibility, which delimit the discussion
in the purely "therapeutic" frame closes the debate on social causes and other conditions
determining that a woman chooses abortion. Given this difficulty, then we can re
conceptualize the therapeutic, as if looking therapy is to relieve or heal physical
ailments and / or psychological women, then it is appropriate to include every pregnancy
that is not part of their life projects. In Chile decisional capacity of women about their
bodies and lives projects not only is truncated by the state legal system, but also by
weak sex education, lack of access to birth control mechanisms, a cultural imaginary
confuses "Woman with mother" as if we were living in the service of society, among other
causes not allow women experience sexuality and pleasure in a responsible and conscious
incubators.
The problem of teenage or unwanted pregnancy should not focus on "abortion or abortion"
but, like any health issue, prevention, ie in the active search for the elimination of
risk factors. Therefore, access to sexual and reproductive education, contraceptives and
condoms mechanisms are essential, because within the consequences of irresponsible
sexuality also many STIs are. However, the position of the "pro-life" conservative groups
also promotes responsible sexuality, have never seen a campaign against abortion in which
condoms and counseling on reproductive health are delivered.
The unfounded fear by these groups on the grounds "as a society we are not in a position
so we can decide freely," the increase in abortions that would occur due to the
decriminalization, not consistent with the evidence, as this shows that the legal status
of abortion does not change the need for women to access it, only dramatically affects
access to a safe procedure, generating a clear socioeconomic distinction between those who
can afford a clinic and who is not, as any right that remains under the excise market in
this clandestine case.
Moreover, although advances in contraceptive use have produced a reduction in unwanted
pregnancies, have not eliminated the access to safe abortion health needs, as it
approaches that about 33 million contraceptive users suffer one accidental pregnancy each
year. The abortion is proposed as a contraceptive mechanism risks have any medical or
surgical procedure for the body should only be considered an unsafe abortion is a major
cause of mortality. Around 47,000 deaths annually from pregnancy-related complications are
caused by these, and can be prevented by sexual education, planning of motherhood and
guaranteed to abortion access in all cases. Ensure universal access to health care for
women and girls is a matter of right to life, what measure can be more "pro-life" that
protect the physical and mental health of more than half of the population?
The legality of abortion is a public health issue, so either moral vision in front of it
we should save it for our own decision to give birth or not a child unplanned, which
should combine all conditions for us feel masters of our bodies and our future, our life
project that is not logical consequence motherhood.
Current legislation on abortion in Chile is a clear evidence of patriarchal structural
violence and often seem to be the work of an invisible hand, but is the result of
political decisions and people now empowered to decide on our lives arrogate. Moreover the
physical and psychological violence that girls and women are subjected is reproduced in a
macabre way within the working class, so our political practice can not be dissociated
from what occurs in the privacy of our households and organizations.
While a law decriminalizing abortion and ensure no will safeguard us from aberrant
behavior that allows and encourages patriarchy as capitalism -for no law can do so only
overcoming these structures of domination that are expressed as state dictatorship over
our bodies and lives, just building a free society with pillars of solidarity, cooperation
and dignity of women and men of all ages. However there are minimum conditions to advance
against the consolidation of misogyny and this is why we demand these minimum conditions
to decide and not die.
Sex education to decide,
Contraceptives to prevent,
Legal abortion to avoid death!
The Lump, Libertarian Feminist Action
http://www.periodico-solidaridad.cl/2015/02/11/sexualidad-placentera-y-maternidad-elegida-yo-elijo-donde-como-y-cuando/
