I’m sure you have seen the fliers protesting the Freedom of Choice Act (FOCA) plastered on bulletin boards and classroom walls around campus. Sporting an angry looking baby and exaggerated abortion facts, these fliers ask, “What the FOCA?†Good question.
The Freedom of Choice Act was last introduced in 2007 when it was unclear as to whether or not George W. Bush would have the opportunity to appoint another Supreme Court justice, possibly threatening the Roe v Wade decision. Had it ever passed, this act would have prevented the government from putting stipulations on abortions performed prior to viability. However, with President Obama’s recent election, FOCA appears to be the last thing on anyone’s minds … well almost anyone’s.
Pro-choice organizations across the United States have sent the president their priorities for reproductive rights and FOCA wasn’t even included. With failing abstinence-only education programs, health care disasters and an economic crisis big enough to grab anyone’s attention, FOCA has quickly become irrelevant. Not only has FOCA not been presented before the 111th Congress but, should it be, the Speaker of the House has already stated that she will not be bringing it up for a vote.
Why, then, are these FOCA fliers cluttering our bulletin boards? It’s a waste of paper if you ask me.
Stephanie Hopkins
biology and anthropology junior
I would like to address a few of Ms. Hopkins’ concerns on the Freedom of Choice Act:
First, FOCA would not simply put “stipulations on abortions performed prior to viability”, but would overturn almost all current state and federal restrictions on abortion, including “conscience clauses” which allow a physician to refuse to perform a procedure to which they are morally opposed. It would also require all hospitals to perform abortions, including those run by the Catholic Church, who have stated they would prefer to shut down their hospitals.
Second, FOCA was first introduced in 1989, and has been continually reintroduced since then. President (then Senator) Obama stated at a Planned Parenthood conference on July 17, 2007: “The first thing I’d do as president is sign the Freedom of Choice Act. That’s the first thing that I’d do.”
Considering the recurring nature of FOCA, President Obama’s prior comments, and that his party now has a majority in the legislature, there is certainly cause for concern. The FOCA fliers about campus have a purpose, and are certainly less of a waste than the continual condom and spring break trip ads littering most of the classrooms right now.
Matthew Sparks
Computer Engineering Sophomore
Regarding Ms. Hopkin’s comment that the Freedom of Choice Act “has quickly become irrelevantâ€:
Planned Parenthood is the largest abortion provider in the United States. And according to them, the Freedom of Choice Act IS both relevant and important. Their website states: “Planned Parenthood will redouble its efforts to urge passage of FOCA in order to protect women’s health and secure the right to choose for future generations.â€
As can be readily found on YouTube videos, President Obama promised Planned Parenthood, while on his campaign trail, that one of his first acts would be the signing into law of the Freedom of Choice Act. While the economy may currently be overshadowing FOCA, this is an issue we cannot afford to overlook or forget.
With regard to women’s health, Planned Parenthood’s website states: “[FOCA] is a step in the right direction if we want to protect women’s health and safetyâ€. With unrestricted abortion throughout the country, how would FOCA be beneficial to women’s health when it would allow twelve year old girls—whose schools are not allowed to dispense Tylenol without parental permission—to secretly obtain abortions?
Women are indeed responsible for the choices they make, but what about the rights of the child they carry in their womb? With over 50 million babies killed since Roe v. Wade legalized abortion in 1973, isn’t this atrocity the greatest form of age discrimination and the most abject genocide in which our country has yet participated? The massive and continuous murder of millions of children is hardly irrelevant.
Jennifer Graehler
President, UK Students for Life
Nursing Sophomore
Boo hoo, dead babies, boo hoo. Here’s a chance for you to show how loving you are. GO UK Students for LIFE! YOU ARE SO SELF-RIGHTEOUS!
This is in regards to Ms. Hopkins remarks on the FOCA flyering campaign that caught her attention on campus. Her undoubted desire to downplay the so called “Freedom of Choice Act†is troublesome to me. Amazingly, there are people willing to go on record and say that such radical laws are not worth our time. FOCA has been around for almost 20 years and its aggressively Pro-abortion slant has kept it from being passed into law. Now the senator who previously introduced it on Capitol Hill in 2007 is now the president of our country.
Hopefully we can agree that government has a responsibility to enact laws for the betterment of society. Surely those with a Pro-choice view can acknowledge that abortion must be regulated by state and local government. Through FOCA, men who sexually abuse minors can hide their crimes when they get their victims pregnant, simply because States will be powerless to require parental involvement in the abortion process. Pres. Obama does not need pro-abortion advocates to tell him sign it into law, it’s a part of his own agenda to do so.
Why all the FOCA flyers now? When is it easier to stop a ball? At the top of a hill when its just getting started or at the bottom when its got a full head of steam?
Greg Adams
UK Students for Life member
If Obama wants to be inclusive and unite the country, he should appoint a pro-life justice to the High Court at his next opportunity. It would prove that he is above the issues of the past and willing to move past them in order to get his goals of universal health care and middle class tax cuts through.
If he appoints a pro-abortion justice, it will prove that he is still stuck in the past and unable to move beyond that to what he thinks is good for the country.
Scientists long ago settled the issue of what happens during abortion. It’s up to Obama to unite the country and “restore science to its rightful place”
This concerns Ms. Hopkins’ statment on “an economic crisis big enough to grab anyone’s attention”. Despite having the economic crisis to worry about, on Jan. 23rd, President Obama took the time to overturn the Mexico City Policy, and I do not think that the state of the economy will keep him from paying attention to FOCA.
The Mexico City Policy was instated in 1984, under Ronald Reagan. It stated that for non-government organizations to be eligble to recieve federal funding, they must refrain from performing or promoting abortion services as a method of family planning in other nations.
Now that President Obama has overturned this policy, abortion providers can spend funds on performing or promoting abortion in other nations and still be eligble for federal funding. Essentially, this means that the government is now sending our tax-dollars to fund abortions in these nations, and with the economic crisis this is the last thing that the government needs to be doing.
If President Obama took the time to overturn the Mexico City Policy, despite the state of the economy, why would he not do the same for FOCA? If FOCA is going to be on the President’s mind, then shouldn’t it be on the minds of U.S citizens as well?
Daniel Sparks
Mechanical Engineering Freshman
I am writing in response to the opinion stated by Ms. Hopkins regarding the Freedom of Choice Act (FOCA). ‘Freedom’ and ‘Choice’, what a clever disguise; using two words that our country prizes so highly to coat the true meaning of a bill. We associate Choice with the ideals of our country, America; where we can all Chose to do what we want, where we can choose where to go to school and what to study. We associate Freedom with America itself, America is almost synonymous for Freedom; the freedom that allows both Ms. Hopkins and myself to express our views in a public forum. However, there is no Freedom, nor is there any Choice, in FOCA.
Is there any freedom in an act that would prohibit medical facilities from refusing abortion services; that would make it illegal for a doctor to refuse to perform a procedure that goes against their moral beliefs? Is there any choice in a law that would remove all parental rights concerning minors seeking an abortion? That would in essence allow a twelve year old girl to have an abortion against her parent’s wishes? These are not the muddied waters that surround the issues over the rights of an unborn child; these are threats to the health, happiness, and well being of people already recognized as members of society.
Also, FOCA would not always place restrictions on abortions performed before the time of viability “if viability it being defined as the time at which the fetus is capable of surviving outside of the mother’s wombâ€. Instead FOCA would legalize abortion at any time during the nine months of pregnancy if there is a risk to the mother’s ‘health’. Health being defined as physical, mental, emotional, or anything else that could possibly be thought of. This is an inarguable example of what FOCA would mean if passed. If FOCA become law, an abortion could (in theory) be legally performed up to a day before the child was born, long after it is capable of surviving apart from the mother. This would clear away all restrictions on abortion of any kind, including the especially abominable practice of Partial Birth Abortion.
There is one point on which I will agree with Ms. Hopkins. FOCA has yet to be reintroduced to the 111th Congress. Currently, it is not even on the floor. However, we are entering a very interesting time in our nation’s history. We now have as president a man who has promised Planned Parenthood that “the first thing I would do as president is sign the Freedom of Choice Actâ€. This is completely about choice, but not in the way most people might think. This is the choice of a whole nation. A nation that proudly buys cosmetic products labeled as “cruelty freeâ€, because we care about the treatment of the animals used in lab testing, and rightly so.
We need to stop and ask ourselves where our priorities lie; when masses of people rally for the humane treatment of animals, but no one stops to consider the treatment of the unborn. If a vet were to perform a kind of euthanasia equivalent to an abortion in pain and brutality on a cat or a rabbit there would be immediate public outcry. Everyday abortions are performed on unborn children all over the world. Just read how an abortion is actually performed, and then ask yourself “how can we as a nation get any sleep at night, how can we allow such things to happen in the land of the free� A waste of paper; not in my eyes.
Megan Buland
Forestry Freshman
Jennifer Graehler, get a grip. All you right to lifers can take your pro-Jesus shtick and put it you know where. 12 year old girls getting abortions? Give me a break. How many 12 year old girls do you know have had abortions? Do you think that 12 year olds just go around having sex all day because there aren’t consequences?
Jennifer, you’re a smart girl. You know better than this. The ONLY time such an instance would occur is during rape. Which is primarily what abortions are for. Your “movement” has this insane idea that only poor people have sex without worry because they can freely get abortions. It’s just like birth control, except it makes Jesus even more pissed!
Not to beat a dead horse here, but let’s look at your position and what I’m assuming what you believe. I have a feeling you’re one of the abstinence-only sex ed. believers. Maybe if teenagers, or in your extreme case, 12 year olds, were taught how to properly employ safe sex habits they wouldn’t have to get abortions. Maybe the daughter of the savior of the Republican party, you know who I mean, had known about contraception and didn’t have her mind clouded with such inane anti-contraception religious BS she wouldn’t be a teenage mother. Maybe that would be the case with so many other teenagers who you want to keep in the dark. Maybe being the result of a rape and having a teenager mother and an awful, poverty filled life is what “God” wants because it’s moral. Or maybe your idea of “morals” is just convoluted enough to allow the suffering of some for the self-righteousness of others.
Regarding the postings from our anonymous contributors:
Ahhh, how brave (and vulgar) we are…under the veil of anonymity, of course! Such thoughtful and logical analysis would surely make your English professors proud!!
It never ceases to amaze me how, when faced with a very specific pro-life argument (such as the current discussion regarding FOCA), the “counter-arguments†quickly devolve into personal attacks laced with vitriol and assumption. Miss Graehler’s religious beliefs—or lack thereof, for that matter—are irrelevant to the discussion at hand. And, by the way, I am certain that Michael X’s “pro-Jesus shtick†comment will resonate well with the many Muslims, Hindus, Atheists, and otherwise non-Christians who also oppose abortion and FOCA.
All morality aside, there are several major secular objections to the previously proposed legislation that must be addressed:
1. FOCA tramples on state law, as determined by the will of the people.
2. FOCA tramples on parental rights.
3. FOCA compels tax dollars to fund said trampling.
4. FOCA violates the First Amendment rights of faith-based hospitals.
5. FOCA legalizes previously banned and unwarranted medicine.
Regardless of one’s personal or public beliefs regarding abortion, these five objections alone should give one pause before accepting any such legislation.
Mark Tucker
BSEE, ‘00
just wondering if there exists a UK Students for Death group? and if not, why not? leave the choicers out of the question and let’s provide community for all. :-)