In reality, all abortion is gruesome, even the kind induced by chemical warfare inside the womb, that largely goes unnoticed. However, the so-called “gruesome abortion ban” passed in 2015 in Oklahoma, which bans a second-trimester abortion procedure, has been upheld by a state judge.
After passing a law against “dismemberment abortions” in which babies are ripped apart in the womb – a necessary procedure to pull a baby through the birth canal – injunctions kept the law at bay until legal challenges were over. Although the finding of the Oklahoma Court will probably be appealed to the State Supreme Court, it can now proceed into enactment.
Julie Rikelman, the director of litigation for the Center for Reproductive Rights said, “It’s essentially a back-door ban on abortion itself. What it bans is the procedure that’s the standard of care for abortion after approximately 14 weeks.”
Rikelman’s group, which is providing the legal resistance against the Oklahoma law, is headquartered in New York City.
The decapitation-and-dismemberment method of abortion is responsible for roughly 7% of abortions conducted in the state of Oklahoma.
Mike Hunter, Oklahoma’s attorney general, stated regarding the ruling, “Dismemberment abortions are barbaric, brutal and subject unborn children to more cruelty that we allow for death row inmates.”
While all abortion is gruesome, this is good news for the folks of Oklahoma.
