I'm posting this in honor of International Women's Day Mar. 8.
Jun. 24, 2022 "'A woman will have to bear her rapist's child': The liberal SCOTUS justices' blunt dissent to opinion overturning Roe": Today I found this article by Ben Adler on Yahoo news:
On Friday, when the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, the 1973 decision establishing a woman’s constitutional right to an abortion, the three Democratic appointees — Justices Stephen Breyer, Elena Kagan and Sonia Sotomayor — wrote a forthright response casting the majority’s decision as a blow to women’s civil rights.
“With sorrow — for this Court, but more, for the many millions of American women who have today lost a fundamental constitutional protection — we dissent,” they wrote.
“Today, the Court … says that from the very moment of fertilization, a woman has no rights to speak of,” they continued. “A State can force her to bring a pregnancy to term, even at the steepest personal and familial costs.”
Citing laws that have already been passed in more conservative states and would now take effect, they warned of dire consequences in states that will now be free to ban abortion without exceptions for rape or incest, or when bringing a pregnancy to term risks the mother’s health.
They also suggested that the reversal of Roe may lead to the revocation of additional constitutional rights that have come from the same line of legal reasoning, including the right to contraception found in Griswold v. Connecticut. “Either the mass of the majority’s opinion is hypocrisy, or additional constitutional rights are under threat,” they wrote.
Here are five key passages from the dissenting opinion:
1. Some states will — in fact, some already have — ban abortion without exceptions.
“[States] have passed laws without any exceptions for when the woman is the victim of rape or incest. Under those laws, a woman will have to bear her rapist’s child or a young girl her father’s — no matter if doing so will destroy her life.
So too, after today’s ruling, some States may compel women to carry to term a fetus with severe physical anomalies — for example, one afflicted with Tay-Sachs disease, sure to die within a few years of birth. States may even argue that a prohibition on abortion need make no provision for protecting a woman from risk of death or physical harm. Across a vast array of circumstances, a State will be able to impose its moral choice on a woman and coerce her to give birth to a child.”
2. Some states will — in fact, some already have — pass laws that punish women who get abortions, or others who get involved in a woman’s pregnancy.
“Perhaps, in the wake of today’s decision, a state law will criminalize the woman’s conduct too, incarcerating or fining her for daring to seek or obtain an abortion. And as Texas has recently shown, a State can turn neighbor against neighbor, enlisting fellow citizens in the effort to root out anyone who tries to get an abortion, or to assist another in doing so.”
3. Women’s rights are being curtailed, especially those of poorer women.
“Whatever the exact scope of the coming laws, one result of today’s decision is certain: the curtailment of women’s rights, and of their status as free and equal citizens. Yesterday, the Constitution guaranteed that a woman confronted with an unplanned pregnancy could (within reasonable limits) make her own decision about whether to bear a child, with all the life-transforming consequences that act involves. ... As of today, this Court holds, a State can always force a woman to give birth, prohibiting even the earliest abortions.
A State can thus transform what, when freely undertaken, is a wonder into what, when forced, may be a nightmare. Some women, especially women of means, will find ways around the State’s assertion of power.
Others — those without money or childcare or the ability to take time off from work — will not be so fortunate.
Maybe they will try an unsafe method of abortion, and come to physical harm, or even die.
Maybe they will undergo pregnancy and have a child, but at significant personal or familial cost.
At the least, they will incur the cost of losing control of their lives.
The Constitution will, today’s majority holds, provide no shield, despite its guarantees of liberty and equality for all.”
4. This may be just the first in a series of decisions that roll back the right to privacy and gender equality.
“And no one should be confident that this majority is done with its work. The right Roe and Casey recognized does not stand alone. To the contrary, the Court has linked it for decades to other settled freedoms involving bodily integrity, familial relationships, and procreation. ... The lone rationale for what the majority does today is that the right to elect an abortion is not ‘deeply rooted in history’:
Not until Roe, the majority argues, did people think abortion fell within the Constitution’s guarantee of liberty. ... The same could be said, though, of most of the rights the majority claims it is not tampering with. The majority could write just as long an opinion showing, for example, that until the mid-20th century, ‘there was no support in American law for a constitutional right to obtain [contraceptives].’ ... So one of two things must be true. Either the majority does not really believe in its own reasoning. Or if it does, all rights that have no history stretching back to the mid-19th century are insecure. Either the mass of the majority’s opinion is hypocrisy, or additional constitutional rights are under threat. It is one or the other.”
5. The majority argues that women’s rights today should be limited by what the Constitution’s authors thought in a more sexist time.
“The majority’s core legal postulate, then, is that we in the 21st century must read the Fourteenth Amendment just as its ratifiers did. And that is indeed what the majority emphasizes over and over again. ... If the ratifiers did not understand something as central to freedom, then neither can we. Or said more particularly: If those people did not understand reproductive rights as part of the guarantee of liberty conferred in the Fourteenth Amendment, then those rights do not exist.
As an initial matter, note a mistake in the just preceding sentence. We referred there to the ‘people’ who ratified the Fourteenth Amendment: What rights did those ‘people’ have in their heads at the time? But, of course, ‘people’ did not ratify the Fourteenth Amendment. Men did.
So it is perhaps not so surprising that the ratifiers were not perfectly attuned to the importance of reproductive rights for women’s liberty, or for their capacity to participate as equal members of our Nation.
... Those responsible for the original Constitution, including the Fourteenth Amendment, did not perceive women as equals, and did not recognize women’s rights. When the majority says that we must read our foundational charter as viewed at the time of ratification (except that we may also check it against the Dark Ages), it consigns women to second-class citizenship.”
Roe v. Wade, the landmark Supreme Court decision of 1973 that granted women the right to an abortion in every state, has been overturned by the U.S. Supreme Court.
The decision comes a month after a 98-page opinion obtained by Politico — allegedly authored by Justice Samuel Alito and leaked to the press in a major breach of confidentiality — stated that "Roe was egregiously wrong from the start," and that "we [the Supreme Court majority] hold that Roe and Casey [another ruling on the right to abortion from 1992 which upheld the previous court decision] must be overruled."
The draft document, labeled as the "Opinion of the Court," also said, "It is time to heed the Constitution and return the issue of abortion to the people's elected representatives."
The process of overturning Roe v. Wade began when Mississippi's ban on abortions after 15 weeks was struck down by a federal court. The state then asked the Supreme Court to either overturn Roe v. Wade or allow states to pass pre-viability abortion bans. Oral arguments were heard in December.
Prior to the verdict, Elizabeth Nash, state policy analyst at the Guttmacher Institute, a research group focused on abortion rights, told PEOPLE that the country will likely "start to see states, particularly the South, the Plains and Midwest, look to adopt abortion bans." Twelve states, including Mississippi and Texas, have "trigger" laws in place that would automatically ban abortions.
"And that would make it very hard for a large percentage of women in the country to access abortion care in their own state. It means a lot more people would have to travel for care," Nash said.
"And the people who are most impacted by these abortion restrictions and bans are people of color, low-income individuals, young people and LGBTQ individuals — people who are already burdened with insufficient access to healthcare."
However, there are efforts to maintain the right to abortion as Roe is overturned. Many states such as New York, Hawaii, California and Washington have statutory protections for abortion rights in their laws.
Supreme Court Overturns Roe v. Wade, Eliminating the Constitutional Right to Abortion | PEOPLE.com
Jun. 25, 2022 Sign this abortion services petition: I signed it and shared it on Facebook:
Tracy —
Thank you for adding your name to tell the Liberals to ensure every Canadian has access to their abortion rights.
In Canada many individuals seeking abortion services can’t access them – this must change.
We’re building support for a national plan – every signature matters and adds pressure to the Liberals.
Will you help grow the campaign?
Share this petition on Facebook right now
Thank you for all you’re doing — we’ll keep you posted as things unfold.
-The NDP Team
Abortion services must be accessible to every Canadian. « Canada's NDP
This week's theme is about International Women's Day and abortions:
"Ob-gyns slam Dobbs ruling overturning constitutional right to abortion"/ American Civil Liberties Union
"U.S. Supreme Court ruling on abortion 'horrific,' says Canada's Justin Trudeau/ "‘We need to secure access here first’: Why Canada can’t help Americans with abortions yet"
My week:
Mar. 8, 2023 Taylor Swift "The Man" video: I was listening to my Stingray channel of music on Telus. This song came on and I decided to watch the video. Coincidentally I watch this on International Women's Day:
Pros:
1. This is a good video with the lyrics. They show men's bad behavior and sexism.
Cons:
1. I was kind of angry after watching this.
My opinion: It's good to show about sexism or a topic that you want to discuss and how you want it to change.
However, I got angry at the topic.
It's kind of like reading job articles about women in the workplace: sexism, sexual harassment and assault, and the gender pay gap.
It began with a tip from a single foreign worker.
Now, police north of Toronto say they have rescued 64 Mexican migrants exploited by an international labour trafficking ring and in living conditions so deplorable that officers themselves have been left shaken.
On Feb. 8, police acting on search warrants in East Gwillimbury, Vaughan, Toronto and Mississauga located dozens of workers who they say were lured to Canada with promises of a better future. Instead, they were given mattresses on the floor, housed with dozens in bug-infested rooms, faced threats and, in some cases, say police, sexual assault.
"These workers are coerced with promises of a better life, decent wages, quality housing and eventually documentation. These are almost always false promises," York Regional Police Deputy Chief Alvaro Almeida told reporters on Friday.
One foreign worker — not the one who blew the whistle — spoke to CBC News in the days following the raid, and described the squalid housing he and others were forced to pay for out of their wages.
The man, in his 20s, was a farm worker, but managed to leave before the police raid. CBC News has agreed to protect his identity because he fears deportation.
At 5 a.m. each morning, he said a bus would take the workers to a farm where they would pack vegetables. At the end of the week, he says he would be left just $50 in a cash envelope — after deductions for food and lodging.
At the Toronto duplex where he was housed, there were six to eight workers in a room, pairs of two sharing a mattress, he said in Spanish.
"We really came to suffer from deception by those who hired us, with extensive work hours and sleeping in dirty places with cockroaches and bedbugs… These were the daily conditions we faced."
At 5 a.m. each morning, he said a bus would take the workers to a farm where they would pack vegetables. At the end of the week, he says he would be left just $50 in a cash envelope — after deductions for food and lodging.
At the Toronto duplex where he was housed, there were six to eight workers in a room, pairs of two sharing a mattress, he said in Spanish.
"We really came to suffer from deception by those who hired us, with extensive work hours and sleeping in dirty places with cockroaches and bedbugs… These were the daily conditions we faced."
My opinion: This article reminds me of this:
"#MeToo movement becomes #WeToo in in victim-blaming Japan"/ "Outrage as women in Japan told not wear glasses in the workplace"
Aug. 17, 2020 Saying: I found this on Facebook:
"You never look good when you are trying to make someone else look bad."- Unknown
Cham: Sometimes people need to be exposed for who they are hahah or maybe I should stop being petty
Tracy Au: There's a difference between trying to make someone look bad, and exposing them for who they are. It's like those #MeToo accusers and victims, they are plainly telling everybody about the perpetrators. They're not trying to make them look bad.
Mar. 6, 2023 "TD Bank customer lost $480 after e-transfer cancelled — despite having autodeposit": This is a really good article by Erica Johnson and Kimberly Ivany on CBC. This is to forewarn that e-transfer isn't reliable:
Christine Mason of Edmonton says she was pleased last September when someone wanted to buy the power tools she'd advertised on Kijiji — a cordless grinder, charger and two batteries.
A man who said his name was Steve said he'd head over after work and would pay $480 by e-transfer, since he didn't carry a lot of cash.
"It sounded plausible to me," said Mason. "He was in the trades and I thought, 'OK, that's fine.'"
After inspecting the tools, "Steve" opened a banking app on his phone.
Mason entered her email, watched him type in $480 and hit "send." She then read a confirmation number, indicating the transaction was done.
She'd set up her TD Bank account with autodeposit — a feature designed to protect against the risk of fraudsters intercepting funds, because money is directly deposited into an account, with no additional steps needed, such as answering a security question.
Autodeposit is advertised as being "fast" and "secure." Mason added it specifically for the e-transfers she'd get selling items online, so she was confident the money would soon show up.
It never did.
By morning there was still no notification, no money in her account. So she called TD.
She says she was told $480 had indeed been earmarked for her account shortly after 9 p.m., but the transaction was cancelled about 90 minutes later.
The customer service rep also said the sender's first name was actually Riley, not Steve, but couldn't say where he banked, for privacy reasons.
Mason says she was repeatedly put on hold and then told to go through the bank's fraud department. "And then the conversation was cut off."
E-transfer test
Go Public tested how easy it is to cancel e-transfers after they're sent.
We first asked customers with the big five banks and a few credit unions to e-transfer $5 to an account that required a security question be answered to enable the deposit.
In all cases, senders were able to cancel the e-transfer until the recipient had answered the security question. Such transfers expire after 30 days.
Despite that, every financial institution showed a notification indicating the transaction was completed.
"There's definitely a mismatch there, of what's actually happening and the information being displayed," said Eyram, the engineer and fintech expert. He says financial institutions should not tell customers a transaction has been completed until that's actually happened.
In the second part of our test, senders e-transferred $5 to accounts that had autodeposit set up.
When the e-transfers came from one of the big banks, senders never had an option to cancel it.
Some credit unions, though, allowed senders to cancel for more than half an hour after the e-transfer was sent — even though the notification the sender received indicated it was completed.
The would-be recipient was not informed of the cancellation.
"That is very tricky and something that should not be happening," said Eyram.
Mason now believes the man who ripped her off must have sent his e-transfer from a credit union.
E-transfers are "as safe as whatever the sender's financial institution is and the receiver's," he said. "You can't just trust your own bank, right? You have to trust the sender's."
TD Bank customer lost $480 after e-transfer cancelled — despite having autodeposit | CBC News
Mar. 7, 2023 "Young Canadians keep up pandemic-inspired DIY projects to save money": Today I found this article by
Young Canadians keep up pandemic-inspired DIY projects to save money - BNN Bloomberg
Mar. 8, 2023 Limo company job interview: Today I went to this interview. My dad drove me because it was far (1 hr and 2 buses) and cold. The interview was average.
Mar. 10, 2023: This week was different. My grandma had been sick for a week. She rested and took medication. My parents took her to the hospital.
My brother and I fended for ourselves by making our own meals.
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