“Girlfriend, I can’t stand the smell your morning sickness makes in the bathroom in the morning. You’re gonna have to find another woman to share the rent with.”

“No, I won’t remain your husband while you’re carrying *his* child. I’m getting a divorce.”

“Honey, you know your father and I love you, but we think that thirteen is too young to be a mother.”

Also note that the fines the bill imposes do not go to support the pregnant woman. Nor are there affirmative defenses - of dad is 18 and mom is 17, and he says “I don’t think you should have the baby because I can’t feed us working down at KFC”, he’s going to *jail*, which really helps make those child support payments.

It’s a bad bill. It’s also one that’s likely to get struck down for a due process clause violation (IANAL) of the 14th amendment. But it doesn’t help the women it claims to (since it’s intended to fine people who would need to make child support and alimony payments) and it harms the ability of couples to have rational discussions about consequences. Nothing stops the guy from leaving and divorcing the second the kid is born. It’s an anti-choice law badly disguised as a pro-women one.

A person who has actual knowledge that a female individual is pregnant shall not do any of the following with the intent to compel a pregnant female to seek an abortion:

[…]

(b) file or attempt to file for a divorce from the pregnant female.

(c) withdraw or attempt to withdraw financial support from the pregnant female that had previously been supplied or offered to the pregnant female.

(d) change or attempt to change an existing housing or cohabitation arrangement with the pregnant female.

My first thought on seeing this was how dangerous it might be for the women involved.

If a man is abusive enough to threaten a woman to have an abortion, how much more abusive will he be when he doesn’t have an option to walk away? If he thinks a woman might be able to force him to stay?

How many abusive men, when faced with a prison term or a fine for abandoning a pregnant wife or girlfriend would stay and make their lives miserable? Or hurt them or kill them? A dead woman can’t press charges.

As the partner of someone who was coerced into an abortion by a threat to withdraw support (by a boyfriend who was, to put it nicely, a manipulative, abusive jerk), I think this is a a good law. As Amp points out, there are things that seem ridiculous and are probably unenforceable, and some things that could have been included weren’t–but still, it seems to me that this law has a sensible purpose.

Still, “disingenious” isn’t much of a response to the good law / bad law issue, and neither is the “this law doesn’t protect my pet group” argument.

This proposal is therefore disingenuous at best and sneaky at worst; props to Amp for (as usual) dissecting the logic to make that clear.

I also agree that the (c) and (d) provisions are probably unenforceable except maybe (as Q grrl points out) against parents of underage women.

Do “C” and “D” specifically relate to male partners? I could see how both would protect underage women from being thrown out on the streets by their parents.

I don’t see that there’s a lot of good in redefining “coercion” away from the criminal, at least not if you put any value on free communication. Beating: bad. Threatening a beating: bad. And so on.

Threatening to LEAVE, on the other hand, or not to love someone, or not to trust them… hell, these things happen all the time.

Those statements are not directly related to pregnancy–though they may be triggered by one–and it makes no sense to have then suddenly become criminal just because the recipient happens to be pregnant.

Coercion is a terrible thing - coming from a pro-life or pro-choice person alike. I have been told by more than one man during pregnancy scares in my past that if I had the baby the relationship would end. I will never have an abortion in spite of fear of losing the man I love and it will indeed be some coercive male’s loss if I do become pregnant and he demands it of me. (Please note: I am pro-choice but would never make the choice to abort personally).

Yet I haven’t seen “Choice For Men” advocates saying a word against this law.

I don’t think this argument is any fairer when used against C4M advocates than it is when it’s used against feminists.