cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ml/post/1874605

A 17-year-old from Nebraska and her mother are facing criminal charges including performing an illegal abortion and concealing a dead body after police obtained the pair’s private chat history from Facebook, court documents published by Motherboard show.

  • wizardbeard@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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    1 year ago

    This isn’t subversion, or any sort of theocratic hellscape.

    Girl could have gotten an abortion 100% legally up through 20 weeks of preganancy. At 24 weeks the fetus becomes viable outside the womb. At 28 weeks she (with the assistance of her mother) took meds to kill the fetus and induce a stillbirth, commenting that she couldn’t wait to be able to wear jeans again.

    She goes through natural labor to pass the stillbirth outside of any medical facility or supervision, burns the remains, and buries them on a farm. When questioned by police, she and her mother admit to using Facebook Messenger to discuss their plans.

    The only thing in any way related to the romanticized fiction of some sort of downtrodden freedom seeker you’re talking about is that using encrypted communications would have prevented their discussions from being available to be subpeona’d. That said, admitting to police you even had those discussions in the first place kind of defeats the damn purpose.

    • Butt Pirate@reddthat.com
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      1 year ago

      Allowing her to just get an abortion would have avoided this entire situation in the first place.

      • wizardbeard@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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        1 year ago

        I think I’m missing something here. She was allowed to just get an abortion, for 20 weeks. This was all before the godawful Roe v Wade repeal.

        • Whirlybird@aussie.zone
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          1 year ago

          It was also in a state that didn’t change their abortion stance after Roe v Wade was repealed. Nothing was stopping her getting an abortion for the first 20 weeks like you said.

      • Auli@lemmy.ca
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        1 year ago

        Eh 28 weeks seems kind of late for an abortion though.

        • Viking_Hippie@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          That’s none of your business, though. It’s not your body. Besides, Nebraska is basically a third world country when it comes to maternal health care availability, which makes this applicable:

          In low-income countries, half of newborns born at or below 32 weeks gestational age die due to a lack of medical access

          • wizardbeard@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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            1 year ago

            Comparing any first world state to third world countries is a hell of a jump.

            Generalizing statistics about third world countries to argue they apply to a first world state, no matter how shitty, poor, or ass backwards the state is… that’s an even bigger leap.

            That statement is applicable to the context it was observed in, low income countries, not backwards ass first world states. Please don’t pretend otherwise. Surely you can make your point with statistics actually relevant to the context of Nebraska.

            • jerkface@lemmy.ca
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              1 year ago

              The USA has infant mortality rates that would make most the neutral world (ie “third-world countries”) consider sending aid.

            • Viking_Hippie@lemmy.world
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              1 year ago

              When it comes to de facto healthcare availability, especially reproductive healthcare, most red states would compare unfavourably to the majority of African countries.

              That’s what happens when you have a system based on profits over access for everyone, add an insurance industry whose main focus is to make sure that as little medical treatment as possible occurs and THEN add corrupt politicians whose owner donors think that even THAT is too generous towards the poors and also an invisible section of the bible says that forcing women to give birth to unwanted children while decreasing the number of places to do so safely is holiness itself.

        • s0q@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          You are right, but you’re swimming against the tide here. 28 weeks is a fully formed child that moves and would survive of born at this point. I am all for reproductive rights but going up to 28 weeks is just irresponsible.

    • brainrein@feddit.de
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      1 year ago

      We don’t even know if she had an abortion. May she had a miscarriage and was just trying to avoid what’s happening now, being accused of having had an abortion.

      Now that sounds a lot like theocratic hellscape…

    • wtry@lemm.ee
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      1 year ago

      I’ve taken the liberty of re-reading the article and have some things to point out 1. the girl was 17, a literal child, something you seemed to forget in your comment 2. You mentioned that she wanted to wear jeans again and that that was the motive, but the word ‘jeans’ wasn’t even mentioned, which makes me wonder if you’re tampering with anything in your comment coming from the article. All that considered you have a good point with some things such as in this specific situation such as them confessing to conspiracy was not a good idea, but I will still say use something end to end encrypted when doing something like this.

      • Whirlybird@aussie.zone
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        1 year ago

        It might not be in this article but there are others that state that one of her messages about doing the abortion was that she couldn’t wait to wear jeans again.

        She should have legally gotten an abortion in the first 20 weeks of the pregnancy. I’m all for abortion and reproductive rights, but not when it’s a viable baby already like it is at 28 weeks. She had 5 months to abort legally and easily and she didn’t. Not only did she then illegally abort it, but she burned the stillborn baby and buried it. That’s not ok.

    • bettse@lemmy.ml
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      1 year ago

      commenting that she couldn’t wait to be able to wear jeans again.

      Where was that in the article? I missed it.

    • DogMuffins
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      1 year ago

      This is really interesting (and awful) context.

      This isn’t a simple “my body my choice” type situation.