The UN Committee on the Rights of the Child, which reports on how well governments respect and protect children’s human rights, is alarmed at the prevalence of the hatches – usually outside a hospital – which allow unwanted newborns to be left in boxes with an alarm or bell to summon a carer.

The committee, a group of 18 international human rights experts based in Geneva, says that while “foundling wheels” and baby hatches had disappeared from Europe in the last century, almost 200 have been installed across the continent in the past decade in nations as diverse as Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Poland, Czech Republic and Latvia. Since 2000, more than 400 children have been abandoned in the hatches, with faith groups and right-wing politicians spearheading the revival in the controversial practice.

Herczog, a prominent child psychologist from Hungary, says baby boxes should be replaced by better state provision of family planning, counselling for women and support for unplanned pregnancies.

“There is growing evidence that it is frequently men or relatives abandoning the child, raising questions about the mother’s whereabouts and whether she has consented to giving up her baby,” he said.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2012/jun/10/unitednations-europe-news

For people born with penises (and conditioned AMAB) to demand total access to AFAB spaces is a gross assertion of unearned privilege and should be rejected, however deeply they may feel some sort of “essential” feminine identity.

Total-access trans advocates have whined and raged against women who assert their moral right to choose and enjoy separate or segregated spaces, and this is bullshit. There are many words for people born with penises who feel totally entitled to women’s spaces, none of which are pleasant. The demonization of trans-exclusionary radical feminists and use of “TERF” as a slur is male privilege . . .

Feminism generally asserts the autonomy of all people to freedom of thought, individual gender expression and broad freedoms of association under law. Such freedoms do not include the right to de-center the vast majority of women for one’s own comfort, including women of color and all ages, who are “cis.” Such de-centering is a selfish attempt to hijack a movement almost two centuries old, and should not be tolerated.

AFAB = Assigned female at birth

AMAB = Assigned male at birth
http://nabokovsshadows.tumblr.com/post/161550773829/anti-terf-as-amab-privilege

Women’s rights groups in Poland have had their documents and computers seized in police raids which took place a day after thousands of activists marched against the country’s restrictive abortion law.

In October 2016, legislation was proposed to completely outlaw abortion overall. The plans prompted around 30,000 people to assemble despite awful weather in Warsaw’s Castle Square, chanting “We want doctors, not missionaries!”.

The far-reaching protests were successful and triggered lawmakers to vote against the restrictive new law just three days afterwards. The eastern European country is one of the few countries in the world to outlaw abortion following decades of total legalisation.

http://www.safeabortionwomensright.org/poland-march-on-3-october-police-raids-in-4-cities-on-4-october/?
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/poland-abortion-police-raids-a7987181.html

The perils of adoption . . .

OTTAWA — For decades, Canadian social workers forcibly separated indigenous children from their families, putting them up for adoption by nonnative families in Canada and around the world.

On Friday, the Canadian government took a step to make amends for that adoption program, which began in the 1960s and lasted till the 1980s, by agreeing to pay 750 million Canadian dollars in legal settlements.

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/06/world/canada/indigenous-forced-adoption-sixties-scoop.html

A GAY dad brutally murdered his adopted toddler daughter after calling her “Satan dressed up in a baby grow”, a jury has heard.

Matthew Scully-Hicks, 31, was allegedly heard yelling “shut up you little f***ing brat” in the months before 18-month-old Elsie died of a brain haemorrhage.

http://www.news.com.au/world/europe/gay-dad-matthew-scullyhicks-alleged-to-have-murdered-his-adopted-18monthold-daughter/news-story/7045bbc3e4e80d79c6489d08732e8f5f

WASHINGTON — The Trump administration is poised to roll back the federal requirement for employers to include birth control coverage in their health insurance plans, vastly expanding exemptions for those that cite moral or religious objections.

The new rules, which could be issued as soon as Friday, fulfill a campaign promise by President Trump and are sure to touch off a round of lawsuits on the issue.

More than 55 million women have access to birth control without co-payments because of the contraceptive coverage mandate, according to a study commissioned by the Obama administration. Under the new regulations, hundreds of thousands of women could lose birth control benefits they now receive at no cost under the Affordable Care Act.

https://mobile.nytimes.com/2017/10/05/us/politics/trump-birth-control.html?_r=0&referer=https://t.co/IuYhebr4us?

When Cristiano Ronaldo confirmed through his Instagram account that he had been the father of twins, he received more than 8 million “likes,” and 290,300 articles were published on the subject worldwide, 71,000 of them containing the phrase “very happy.” There was only one thing that did not appear anywhere: the mother’s name. Who? How was your pregnancy and how do you feel after birth? How many times a day do you think about your children you will never see again? Ronaldo does not mention it, and the only thing that is known about her is that she is American and that she received €200,000 for the babies.

The media perspective is generally that of the buyers—their feelings, their desires (often called “needs”) abound. Mothers remain anonymous, as if they were workers in a baby factory.

No one seems to raise their voice to say the obvious: this is a blatant crime against the rights of women and children. According to Article 7 of the Convention on the Rights of the Child, each child has the right to his or her parents. Surrogate motherhood, whether paid or altruistic, violates this fundamental right. In surrogacy, children lose their mothers, and mothers lose their children. It is not to add, it is to remove. And, as this is an industry (do not be fooled by the romantic poems of generous women who do it for free—altruistic surrogacy does not account for even 2% of cases) the reasons are economic. Let me be perfectly clear: surrogacy is the sale of babies. The rich buy, the poor sell. There is nothing progressive or postmodern about this practice: it is the same old exploitation of women and the poor.

http://www.stopsurrogacynow.com/cristiano-ronaldo-a-woman-is-not-a-factory/