Despite law’s defeat, women fight on for abortion rights in Argentina

Despite law’s defeat, women fight on for abortion rights in Argentina

By Kathleen Durkin
posted on August 26, 2018

Women in Argentina may have lost a vote for the right to abortion on Aug. 9, but they are undaunted. They are not intimidated or afraid. They are angry. They are determined. They are optimistic. With renewed energy, they say they will keep on organizing until they win this fundamental right.

The current struggle is for legalization of elective abortions up to the 14th week of pregnancy; 62 percent of the population supports reform. The lower house of the Argentinian Congress had passed such a law on June 14, in response to the mass movement. However, the more conservative Senate narrowly defeated legalization on Aug. 9 with a 38-31 vote; two senators abstained. The majority of “no” votes were cast by men over the age of 50.

Continued: https://www.workers.org/2018/08/26/despite-laws-defeat-women-fight-on-for-abortion-rights-in-argentina/

This is why Argentina did not legalize abortion this week

This is why Argentina did not legalize abortion this week

by Julia María Rubio
August 11, 2018

After months of debates and a close favorable vote by the Argentine House in June, the Argentine Senate has voted down a bill that would have legalized abortion. Despite House support and a large feminist mobilization on behalf of the bill, the Senate — which over-represents the votes of rural and conservative constituencies — rejected the bill, 38 to 31.

Here are five things to know about the politics of legalizing abortion in Argentina.

Continued: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/monkey-cage/wp/2018/08/11/this-is-why-argentina-did-not-legalize-abortion-this-week/?utm_term=.6f4229f49515

Pro-Abortion-Rights Activists Won in Ireland, But Not Argentina

Pro-Abortion-Rights Activists Won in Ireland, But Not Argentina
Efforts to loosen restrictive laws in the two Catholic-majority countries resulted in two very different outcomes.

Yasmeen Serhan
Aug 10, 2018

When Ireland voted in its historic referendum in May to overturn its decades-old ban on abortion, it looked as if more change could follow. If Ireland voted to liberalize abortion access, maybe Northern Ireland would be next. And after that, who knows? The Irish referendum proved that even a Catholic-majority country was ready to have the debate. Perhaps it wouldn’t be long before others would do the same.

Another vote on abortion did come three months later, this time to Argentina. But this Catholic-majority country decided differently. On Thursday, Argentina’s Senate voted down a bill to decriminalize abortion access in the country, where terminations are legal only in cases of rape or if the pregnancy poses a risk to the life of the woman. The proposed legislation, which would have allowed women to seek an abortion within the first 14 weeks of pregnancy, was supported by 31 lawmakers but rejected by 38. Two abstained.

Continued: https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2018/08/abortion-vote-argentina-ireland/567200/

They Lost Argentina’s Abortion Vote, but Advocates Started a Movement

They Lost Argentina’s Abortion Vote, but Advocates Started a Movement

By Daniel Politi and Ernesto Londoño
Aug. 9, 2018

BUENOS AIRES — They narrowly lost the vote. But as supporters of a bill to legalize abortion in Argentina began to shake off a stinging defeat in the Senate on Thursday, they took consolation in having galvanized a reproductive-rights movement across Latin America and began to consider how to redirect their activism.

A coalition of young female lawmakers who stunned the political establishment by putting abortion rights at the top of the legislative agenda this year seemed to be on the verge of a historic victory with the bill. But intense lobbying by Catholic Church leaders and staunch opposition in conservative northern provinces persuaded enough senators to vote against it.

Continued: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/09/world/americas/argentina-abortion-laws-south-america.html

09.08.2018

abortion rights activists

Adolfo Rubenstein

Benjamin Gedan

Catholic Church

Center for Legal and Social Studies

Center for the Promotion and Defense of Sexual and Reproductive Rights

Center for the Study of State and Society

Cristina Fernández de Kirchner

Debora Diniz

decriminalization of abortion

International Women's Health Coalition

President Mauricio Macri

pro-choice campaigners

Susana Chávez

violence against women

Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars

Argentina holds historic abortion vote as 1m women rally to demand change

Argentina holds historic abortion vote as 1m women rally to demand change
Senate votes on bill opposed by Catholic church and pope that would legalise abortion in the first 14 weeks of pregnancy

Uki Goñi in Buenos Aires
Wed 8 Aug 2018

Ana María Acevedo was a 19-year-old housemaid and already the mother of three children when she was diagnosed with cancer of the jaw.

Her prognosis took a turn for the worse when doctors discovered she was two weeks pregnant, and cancelled her scheduled chemotherapy sessions.

Continued: https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2018/aug/07/argentina-abortion-vote-legalisation-senate-mass-rally

Why women in Argentina are speaking up about their abortions

Why women in Argentina are speaking up about their abortions
Regular protests addressing violence against women in Argentina have led to a national debate about women’s rights in the country—particularly abortion.

Jul 26, 2018
Author & Photographer: Bridget Gleeson

One morning in December 2008, Daniela Luna woke up in an unfamiliar hotel room in Miami. Naked and disoriented, she was surrounded on either side by men she hardly knew—men who, like her, worked in the art world.

“I couldn’t understand what happened to me. I felt like I’d been run over by a train,” said Luna, a curator and artist, now 40. In a phone interview from Miami, she recalled how she tried to get a morning-after pill the following day, but it was only available with a prescription. On Christmas Day, after she had returned to Buenos Aires, she found out she was pregnant.

Continued: http://roadsandkingdoms.com/2018/argentina-women-protests/

An Irish woman in Argentina: Now, both my countries have voted for abortion

An Irish woman in Argentina: Now, both my countries have voted for abortion
The decriminalisation of abortion in Argentina has been brought within striking distance

June 18, 2018
Sophie Parker in Buenos Aires

As Ireland took to the polls on May 25th, Argentina was celebrating May Revolution Day, commemorating the first successful revolution in South America’s Independence process. As I followed events across the ocean from my adopted home in Buenos Aires, I couldn’t help but think of Ireland’s Eighth Amendment referendum in terms of revolution: not exactly a “quiet” one, to use the Taoiseach’s word, but as part of a worldwide uprising that is increasingly difficult to drown out.

By the time the Eighth Amendment was repealed in Ireland, the debate in Argentina’s Congress on the decriminalisation of abortion was well under way. On June 14th, just before 10am, the streets around the Congress building erupted with roars of jubilation and relief as the nail-bitingly close result was revealed: the bill, first presented over a decade ago by the National Campaign for the Right to Legal, Safe and Free Abortion alliance, had passed.

Continued: https://www.irishtimes.com/life-and-style/abroad/an-irish-woman-in-argentina-now-both-my-countries-have-voted-for-abortion-1.3534574

‘My body, my choice’: Argentina moves closer to legal abortion with key vote

‘My body, my choice’: Argentina moves closer to legal abortion with key vote
The chamber of deputies is voting on a crucial bill that would legalise abortion in the first 14 weeks of pregnancy

Elizabeth Sulis Kim
Wed 13 Jun 2018

Even as calls for women in Argentina to be given the legal right to abortion have grown louder on its cities’ streets, a change in the law had seemed unlikely – until now.

But a vote on abortion on Wednesday could transform Pope Francis’s homeland from a country where women can go to jail for having an unlawful termination to one of Latin America’s most progressive countries on reproductive rights.

Continued: https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2018/jun/13/my-body-my-choice-argentina-moves-closer-to-legal-abortion-with-key-vote

Argentina’s historic vote to decriminalize abortion, explained

Argentina’s historic vote to decriminalize abortion, explained
Argentina’s Congress has taken up a bill to decriminalize abortion. It probably won’t pass, but activists say it’s a victory regardless.

By Emily Stewart
Jun 13, 2018

Across Latin America, 97 percent of women live in countries with restrictive abortion laws. Argentina’s lower legislative house is debating whether to change that and pass a bill that would decriminalize abortion in the country up to the first 14 weeks of pregnancy.

The vote is expected to be close, and even if it does pass, it’s unlikely to get through the Argentine Senate. Still, activists see the fact that the issue is being voted on at all as a major step for women’s rights in the country and throughout the region.

Continued: https://www.vox.com/2018/6/13/17460824/argentina-abortion-bill-ni-una-menos

Argentina moves closer to legalising abortion

Argentina moves closer to legalising abortion
A bill to liberalise the country’s restrictive law may fail in congress. The next attempt will probably succeed

Jun 9th 2018
BUENOS AIRES

WHEN María Florencia Alcaraz discovered that she was pregnant in 2015 she was unprepared for motherhood. The contraceptives she was taking hadn’t worked. Aged 30, she was employed as a journalist in the justice ministry. With a general election in the offing she worried that she would lose her job under a new government. Unable to end the pregnancy legally in Argentina, she turned to friends for advice. One gave her misoprostol, a stomach-ulcer drug often used to induce abortions. At 13 weeks into her pregnancy she popped the pills alone at home and spent a day in bed. The DIY abortion gave her “a sense of relief and autonomy”, she recalls.

Continued: https://www.economist.com/the-americas/2018/06/09/argentina-moves-closer-to-legalising-abortion