Informed Consent v Informed Consent: Redux

Hypocrisy boiled to the top yesterday as Ohio Right to Life client-in-chief,  governor John Kasich, signed HB 63. The bill, sloganeered to “protect parental rights and save lives” was designed to “tighten” Ohio’s parental consent loophole that allows  unmarried underage  women to get the juvenile court’s permission, rather than, their parents, to undergo an abortion.

Hypocritical because the same politicians who cry foul over the judicial bypass for abortion, claiming it interferes with family communication and the ability of parents to oversee their daughters’ medical needs, also support Ohio’s “safe haven” law, which encourages teen women to carry a secret pregnancy to term with no parental knowledge or  medical monitoring, give secret birth alone under dangerous conditions, and then anonymously abandon the secret baby at an ER or fire station with no questions asked.

Nobody will ever have to know you had this baby.

ORTL director Mike Gonidakis celebrating its latest victory told the Columbus Dispatch:

Ohio is witnessing the blessings of having the most pro-life governor and general Assembly in our state’s history working together to save lives.

Ya mean like this  (from my earlier Daily Bastardette and Theoconia blogs) Mike:

In the bizarro world of Ohio Right to Life, parental involvement  in teen pregnancies when “saving fetuses” is involved, is essential to the maintenance of “traditional family values” Involvement is eliminated in the name of “traditional family values” when it comes to the safety and welfare of young pregnant women, just delivered mothers, and just born babies as long as the babies are scheduled to be dumped on an ER counter.


Under the banner of informed consent, Ohio Right to Life insists on scaring -warning pregnant women with  a laundry list of what it claims are the harmful affects of abortion,   At the same time it  ignores the harmful affects of  secret pregnancy on the fetus,  the harmful affects of unattended secret birth on baby and mother, and the harmful affects of child abandonment. on both. Moreover, it does not address the legal ramifications of “safe haven.” which are beyond the scope of this piece, but include protracted legal proceedings including  closed court hearings, the the filing of a deserted child complaint, and expensive DNA testing if reunification is desired.

HB 63 was signed with much fanfare that included a bevy of ORTL politicians, supporters and the inevitable troop of babies that appear at all ORTL functions.  (There was even a baby at the Glenn Beck installation.)

Bookmark and Share

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

*