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South Carolina bill outlaws websites that tell how to get an abortion

washingtonpost.com

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Re: South Carolina bill outlaws websites that tell how to get an abortion

#42
post #11

From the article: "South Carolina state senators introduced legislation that would make it illegal to “aid, abet or conspire with someone” to obtain an abortion." This bill isn't law, which is what I thought based on the headline.

Bills in general aren't laws, they are proposals for laws. [0]

[0]https://www.govinfo.gov/help/bills

Re: South Carolina bill outlaws websites that tell how to get an abortion

#43

> For the NRLC, which wrote the model legislation, limiting communication is a key part of the strategy to aggressively enforce laws restricting abortion. “The whole criminal enterprise needs to be dealt with to effectively prevent criminal activity,” Jim Bopp, the group’s general counsel, wrote in a July 4 memo, comparing the group’s efforts to fighting organized crime. This basically tells you everything you need t…

I always worry when we start painting large groups of people with a single brush and labeling them the enemy. There are plenty of people who oppose abortion that are appalled at something like this or the Texas bounty hunting law. If we continue to try and paint each other group as a monolithic enemy other division will continue to rise and polarization will increase and the effects will be devestating.

But opposing abortion and not caring about the consequences for women and families IS appalling.

Re: South Carolina bill outlaws websites that tell how to get an abortion

#44
post #11

From the article: "South Carolina state senators introduced legislation that would make it illegal to “aid, abet or conspire with someone” to obtain an abortion." This bill isn't law, which is what I thought based on the headline.

Phrasing a proposed bill as if it has taken effect is a standard tactic to evoke extra emotion resulting in extra clicks. Edit: seems I was wrong because bill means proposed law, so the clarification would have been redundant

A bill is a proposed law, by definition. You're assuming bad faith where there isn't any.

Re: South Carolina bill outlaws websites that tell how to get an abortion

#45

How is this allowed in light of the interstate commerce clause? SC would have no recourse for web hosts that have no nexus within it's borders? Are they going to start to force local ISP's to block out of state hosts?

>How is this allowed in light of the interstate commerce clause? Laws are allowed until the Court rules on them. The states can pass all manner of fucked up laws (and they will), and they will stand while we figure this out -- or, until the Supreme Court rules in their favor. Edit: changing Supreme Court to Courts, since the appellate court exists. But the point is the same.

> Laws are allowed until the Supreme Court rules on them

No, they aren't. Unconstitutional laws are unconstitutional ab initio, and lower courts can and do refuse to enforce laws on that basis, and the Supreme Court may never even get to rule on them since appeal to the Supreme Court is not by right; the farthest that cases in the federal system get by right is the Court of Appeals.

Re: South Carolina bill outlaws websites that tell how to get an abortion

#46

Not a lawyer but doesn't this have serious 1st amendment problems? Article gets into this a bit: "Eric Goldman, a professor at Santa Clara University School of Law, said the First Amendment and Section 230, a bill that shields internet providers and tech companies from liability for the posts, photos and videos people share on their sites, provide a strong defense in many instances for websites and providers facing l…

The strategy is one of intimidation.

Re: South Carolina bill outlaws websites that tell how to get an abortion

#47

> For the NRLC, which wrote the model legislation, limiting communication is a key part of the strategy to aggressively enforce laws restricting abortion. “The whole criminal enterprise needs to be dealt with to effectively prevent criminal activity,” Jim Bopp, the group’s general counsel, wrote in a July 4 memo, comparing the group’s efforts to fighting organized crime. This basically tells you everything you need t…

[deleted]

Re: South Carolina bill outlaws websites that tell how to get an abortion

#48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why are we using a 200+ year old document that represented the preferences of maybe 20% of the country to regulate the internet? That seems so completely absurd, almost like people are turning it into a holy book or fetishizing it.

>Why are we using a 200+ year old document that represented the preferences of maybe 20% of the country to regulate the internet? Because it and following interpretation provides the boundaries for law in the US. And comparing it to a fetish, or labeling it a 200 year old document, when is has been changed since then (last amended in 1992, still has multiple amendments pending, and can be changed again) is also absur…

The amendment that was ratified in 1992 was proposed in the 1700s.

The amendment prior to that was from 1971, over fifty years ago. We're rapidly approaching the point where we can say the constitution hasn't been updated with new ideas in generations.

The world today is wildly different from the world of the 1970s, and yet we've made no changes to the constitution. We used to update it every decade (at least). Something has changed, culturally, that makes it harder to change.

Re: South Carolina bill outlaws websites that tell how to get an abortion

#49

> For the NRLC, which wrote the model legislation, limiting communication is a key part of the strategy to aggressively enforce laws restricting abortion. “The whole criminal enterprise needs to be dealt with to effectively prevent criminal activity,” Jim Bopp, the group’s general counsel, wrote in a July 4 memo, comparing the group’s efforts to fighting organized crime. This basically tells you everything you need t…

I always worry when we start painting large groups of people with a single brush and labeling them the enemy. There are plenty of people who oppose abortion that are appalled at something like this or the Texas bounty hunting law. If we continue to try and paint each other group as a monolithic enemy other division will continue to rise and polarization will increase and the effects will be devestating.

The effects are already devastating. From the point of view of a women unable to access medical services due to these laws it is literally a matter of life and death right now.

So you can worry or you can act.

Re: South Carolina bill outlaws websites that tell how to get an abortion

#50

> For the NRLC, which wrote the model legislation, limiting communication is a key part of the strategy to aggressively enforce laws restricting abortion. “The whole criminal enterprise needs to be dealt with to effectively prevent criminal activity,” Jim Bopp, the group’s general counsel, wrote in a July 4 memo, comparing the group’s efforts to fighting organized crime. This basically tells you everything you need t…

>The reversal or Roe was not about "kicking it back to the states", it was the first step in trying to make abortion access illegal nationwide. Yes, and it makes me angry that so many commenters on this and other forums said, "Well, they have a point. It should be left to the states." As if women whose lives are at risk can wait for their judicial philosophy to cleanly play out; as if the raped 10 year old being forc…

Yep. It's frustrating to see the threads on HN of people talking about this as if it's only hypothetical. Like it's a change to the Linux kernel and not something that impacts thousands of people every day. I don't care about the technical mechanisms of implementation, I care about how it affects the people around me dammit.
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