Over the past week or so people have been increasingly alarmed by the actions of the Alabama state government, which was pushing through a frightening bill that outlaws abortion. Today, the governor proudly (for some reason) signed it into law. Some highlights about the now-law in question:
- It outlaws abortions for pregnancies six weeks or more along; six weeks is usually when periods being late get noticed so how would someone even KNOW?
- It punishes doctors who perform abortions with up to 99 years in prison; this punishment you may notice is harsher than what rapists receive.
- Speaking of, the law makes no exceptions for rape or incest!

Alabama as a state has one of, if not the, highest rates of mortality rates for infants/births, so, figure that shit out.

Alabama's state legislature is mostly white dudes. Very few women, very few POC.

Strangely enough, televangelist Pat Robertson is against this law. He's calling it extreme. I had to sit down for a bit to digest this detail.

Here's the dumbass governor's official twitter comment about this:

Today, I signed into law the Alabama Human Life Protection Act. To the bill’s many supporters, this legislation stands as a powerful testament to Alabamians’ deeply held belief that every life is precious & that every life is a sacred gift from God.

At this point there isn't a whole lot to do but watch and wait the court battles lead up to the SCOTUS, which is not looking very good right now in that regard. One thing I'm having trouble finding is the reception this had as a bill among state residents (which is to say, did the state legislature ignore its constituency or not?). I figure we needed a place to go "what the fuck" for a bit at least. This is pretty heavy duty.

Edit - Bonus points to the "all life is sacred" angle! There's an inmate scheduled to be executed tomorrow.