Even Our Language Fails Us

Scoop: A Texas man has filed legal action to investigate his ex-partner who got an abortion *in Colorado,* where abortion remains legal. The latest antiabortion strategy to intimidate + stop women from crossing state lines. https://t.co/etgMgCUj5O

— Caroline Kitchener (@CAKitchener) May 3, 2024

This reply is exactly right;

The argument here is that if a man gets you pregnant they own you for the next 9 months and if you do anything about it you and anyone who helps you can be sued and possibly jailed for murder. This is exactly where forced birth legislation is taking us.

— 𝕊𝕦𝕟𝕕𝕒𝕖_𝔾𝕦𝕣𝕝 (@SundaeDivine) May 3, 2024

But several replies, meaning to criticize the man who brought this suit, ask the same question, meaning for it to be a defense: “How does he know that it’s his?”

It isn’t. That’s the point.

And, of course, the problem goes deeper. If you are a woman carrying a high risk pregnancy, or knowing you will if you ever get pregnant, why would you want to? The state of Texas (and several others) will literally ask the doctor how dead you were if you get the medical care you need. Because somehow, some way, becoming pregnant makes you subject to the most intrusive authority a state can wield. Trump spoke in the TIME interview of states monitoring women’s pregnancies. That’s only a very small, almost insignificant and unnoticeable step, from where we already are.

The water is boiling.  Even a frog would have the sense to have jumped out by now.