Motion 312 - The Handmaid's Tale

 A pregnant women has always been considered legally one person.  Bill C-484, introduced in Parliament on December 13th, 2007,  attempted to change that by seeking TWO murder charges against a person that killed a pregnant woman.  Women are not stupid.  It was clear that this was a sneaky attempt to give fetuses personhood and the bill was defeated in parliament.

But in 2007, the conservatives had a minority, now with a conservative majority in the house we are faced with M-312 study to determine when life begins.  Again the conservatives are coming at abortion sideways by attempting to redefine a person under the law.

Canadians know this motion is a precursor to controlling women by forcing them into a childbearing role through criminalizing abortion. "Fetuses do not have legal rights and cannot be given any, since two beings occupying the same body would result in a serious clash of rights. In fact, if fetuses had legal personhood, pregnant women would lose theirs." [1]

1. Arthur, Joyce. 2012. Counter Arguments Against Motion M-312: "The Handmaid's Tale" http://www.arcc-cdac.ca/action/M-312.html

Canadian politics

Conservative Bill Takes Small Sneaky Step Towards Re-Criminalizing Abortion

The “Unborn Victims of Crime Act”, seeks to amend the Criminal Code to allow separate homicide charges to be laid in the death of a fetus when a pregnant woman is attacked. Currently a fetus is not considered a person under the law until it exits the birth canal alive. The bill tries to amend Part VIII of the Criminal Code, “Offences Against the Person and Reputation”; however, the fetus is not a legal person and cannot rightly fall under this section.

This bill takes the focus from the real issue which is violence against pregnant women and places focus on the victim's fetus. The bill does not protect women, only fetuses and similar laws in the U.S. have resulted in the pregnant woman being charged with a crime against her unborn child rather than addressing the issue of violence against women. A better approach would be to place harsher penalties on persons that attack pregnant women.

Since the focus of the bill is on the "murder" of fetuses and provides no protection for the mother, it is reasonable to suspect that the real intent of the bill is to give fetuses personhood and thereby criminalize abortion.

Bill C-484 was introduced in Parliament on December 13th, 2007 and is projected to be coming up for its second hour of debate on February 29th, 2008.