Christianity continuing to make people think that all it's it's interested in is births.
Not doing a very good job of it are they? Both infant and maternal mortality in the US are substantially more than in most developed countries.
The cruelty is the point.
That, and the profits.
In surprise news, a hospital controlled by the RCC is arguing in court that a fetus is not a 'person'. By a strange co-incidence, should the hospital lose the case, it could be required to pay substantial damages.
https://iowacapitaldispatch.com/2025/04/09/aiming-to-limit-damages-catholic-hospital-argues-a-fetus-isnt-the-same-as-a-person/
Weirdly we've been here before with Catholic hospitals in America:
The hospital ended up having to drop that claim. Unsurprisingly, one would have thought, given the inconsistency with basic catholic teaching. So it's surprising to see the argument being trotted out again. Money talks, it seems. And has a very loud voice.
The latest case has also been walked back.
https://iowacapitaldispatch.com/2025/04/18/catholic-hospital-drops-legal-argument-that-a-fetus-is-not-a-person/
The CEO of MercyOne, stated “we are heartbroken that our belief that human personhood begins at conception would ever be called into question. As a Catholic health system, the sanctity of life is not just a belief we hold; it is the foundation of every action we take.
Who would have thought that their legal arguments stating that a fetus isn't a person would lead people to believe they don't think a fetus is a person (when convenient)
What's really strange is that they don't seem to have foreseen that this would be a problematic defence for a catholic hospital to rely on. It was ridiculous back in 2013 - it's frankly bewildering to see them try it on again more than a decade later.
Total scumbag behaviour, and abuse of political immunity
A leading Polish doctor has told the BBC she fears for her patients' safety after being targeted by anti-abortion activists.Gizela Jagielska says she has received thousands of death threats in relation to her work administering legal abortions in a hospital in the town of Olesnica in southwestern Poland.The facility specialises in complicated pregnancies.On 17 April, a group of activists led by radical, far-right MEP Grzegorz Braun came to the hospital, prevented Dr Jagielska from leaving her office and attempted to carry out a citizen's arrest.Footage posted on social media also shows the activists praying."[Braun] kept repeating that I am a murderer, and the police should arrest me as I am a dangerous person," said Dr Jagielska. "He grabbed me, pushed me and blocked me in the [office]."The gynaecologist says police were called, but officers failed to arrest the activists.As a member of the European Parliament, Braun has immunity from detention.…Grzegorz Braun, who instigated the attack against Dr Jagielska, is one of those standing for president, but is polling at just 2%.In a televised presidential election debate on Monday, he made several antisemitic remarks.Braun was expelled from the Polish parliament in 2023 for putting out candles during the Jewish festival of Hanukkah with a fire extinguisher. Earlier this year he was removed from the European Parliament for disrupting a Holocaust memorial ceremony.Two of the three frontrunners in the election race, Karol Nawrocki and Slawomir Mentzen, have both spoken out against abortion.Mentzen, from the far-right Confederation Party, caused controversy recently after he said abortion should be illegal in all cases, including rape, which he appeared to describe as "unpleasantness".
A leading Polish doctor has told the BBC she fears for her patients' safety after being targeted by anti-abortion activists.
Gizela Jagielska says she has received thousands of death threats in relation to her work administering legal abortions in a hospital in the town of Olesnica in southwestern Poland.
The facility specialises in complicated pregnancies.
On 17 April, a group of activists led by radical, far-right MEP Grzegorz Braun came to the hospital, prevented Dr Jagielska from leaving her office and attempted to carry out a citizen's arrest.
Footage posted on social media also shows the activists praying.
"[Braun] kept repeating that I am a murderer, and the police should arrest me as I am a dangerous person," said Dr Jagielska. "He grabbed me, pushed me and blocked me in the [office]."
The gynaecologist says police were called, but officers failed to arrest the activists.
As a member of the European Parliament, Braun has immunity from detention.
…
Grzegorz Braun, who instigated the attack against Dr Jagielska, is one of those standing for president, but is polling at just 2%.
In a televised presidential election debate on Monday, he made several antisemitic remarks.
Braun was expelled from the Polish parliament in 2023 for putting out candles during the Jewish festival of Hanukkah with a fire extinguisher. Earlier this year he was removed from the European Parliament for disrupting a Holocaust memorial ceremony.
Two of the three frontrunners in the election race, Karol Nawrocki and Slawomir Mentzen, have both spoken out against abortion.
Mentzen, from the far-right Confederation Party, caused controversy recently after he said abortion should be illegal in all cases, including rape, which he appeared to describe as "unpleasantness".
In the US, they're putting women in the Matrix in support of the holy fetus:
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/family-forced-keep-brain-dead-pregnant-woman-alive-rcna207002
Keep her alive (family had no choice), imagine the prenatal experience of the fetus and what kind of human being it will turn into. Frightening.
And guess who's going to get hit with the medical fees too? It's all very well using women as a human gro-bag, but heaven forbid the prolifers should pay for the costs attached.
Guy Edward Bartkus, twenty-five years old, left behind written ramblings which said he "disapproved of people being brought into the world against their will", so to make the world a better place, the lad took his car, filled it with explosives, drove it to a fertility clinic and blew part of the clinic to kingdom come, and all of himself.
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c787j90wp6po
On the limited information available so far, doesn't appear to have anything to do with atheism and agnosticism, or with religion and spirituality. "Nihilistic ideation", apparently.
Rather suspect reasoning so. If he "disapproved of people being brought into the world against their will", one would wonder what exactly led him to believe children concieved as a result of fertility treatment are born against their will while other children have a will to be born? Seems like some very messed up belief system at play.
"Belief system" might be going a bit far. But a (speculative) rationalisation for his actions might be:
None of this requires that he should kill himself, so I wouldn't subject it to too rigorous an analysis. SFAIK it's not clear at this point whether he died because he cocked it up — the bomb went off too early — or he intended all along to die in this incident (which would be consistent with "nihilistic ideation"). If the latter, this is just an elaborate and over-dramatic suicide in which he is attempting to make some kind of point — "It would be better if I had never been born, and if nobody else was either". And I suspect that most likely emerges from grief, pain, self-hatred and possibly some kind of personality disorder more than from anything we could term a "belief system".
Seems like a bit of a stretch, given many religious belief systems do oppose IVF and if someone really wanted to reduce births, promoting contraception, family planning, sexual abstinence or even abortion would seem rather more effective. The notion that "the only way to prevent the birth of a child conceived in the conventional fashion is to kill the mother" is not exactly true either (morning after pill, abortion).
I agree that that this could have stemmed from grief, pain, self-hatred and possibly some kind of personality disorder, but more likely in conjunction with some underlying belief system that took issue with IVF rather than as an alternative to it.
The religious belief systems that oppose IVF do so, at least in part, because of IVF techniques that involve the fertilisation of embroyos and then the destruction of those that are not required; they object to the destruction of the fertilised embryos. So if that's where he was coming from, trying to destroy fertilised embryos himself would be perverse.
A bit of googling suggests that, far from being motivated by "pro-life" considerations, this guy regarded himself as (in his own words) "pro-death". (Nihilism, remember.) He seems to be pretty much at the opposite end of the spectrum from pro-life terrorists, which is why they attack abortion clinics (they want babys to be born) while he attacks IVF facilities (he wants babies not to be born).
(And, when I spoke about "the only way to prevent birth", I should have been clearer. I meant the only way he could prevent the birth of an already-naturally-conceived child would be to kill the mother. Either he wasn't prepared to do that or, possibly, he reckoned that that would only prevent one birth, while destroying a whole bunch of fertilised embroyos would prevent many births.)
Isn't everybody born against their will? I certainly wasn't asked.
It's classic "teenage fury" level of reasoning - most people grow out of it before they reach 16.
Still, at least he didn't kill anyone else, so there's that. And it does sound rather like those people who commit suicide in public and putting other people at risk- the German pilot who hijacked a plane for instance, so I suppose we should be glad that nobody else was hurt.
Is there any chance that he was trying to set it up for the explosion to take place later, when other people were around, and in fact just mucked it up?
Still, at least he didn't kill anyone else, so there's that.
One of these 'bare minimum' suicide bombers Jimmy Carr talks about
Just did a bit of googling there myself and I tend to agree with you having done so.
That's funny. I like Jimmy Carr. I remember there was outrage over a joke he made during the Afghan war about the UK being able to put up a really good team at the next Paralympics.
Agreed - posted above mostly to get in before somebody falsely claimed there was some religious or anti-religious reason for the attack.
Hell of a way to tell your mom "I never liked being born anyway"
The Atlantic responds to the what appears to be the bomber's final thoughts:
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2025/05/anti-natalists-prolife-fertility/682918/
What was the last thing that went through his mind?
The detonator
Bartkus described himself as having borderline personality disorder, and his manifesto is at times rambling and incoherent (as in a subsection where he declares his preference for Satan over God).
Despite this, the followers of the latter imaginary being have done a lot more damage than the followers of the former
That's some kick at evolution and all it's done.
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c2le12114j9o
MPs have voted to change abortion legislation to stop women in England and Wales being prosecuted for ending their pregnancy.The landslide vote to decriminalise the procedure is the biggest change to abortion laws in England and Wales for nearly 60 years.Women who terminate their pregnancy outside the rules, for example after 24 weeks, will no longer be at risk of being investigated by police.The law will still penalise anyone who assists a woman, including medical professionals, in getting an abortion outside the current legal framework.…The amendment still needs to complete its legislative journey through both the Commons and the Lords before it can become law.
MPs have voted to change abortion legislation to stop women in England and Wales being prosecuted for ending their pregnancy.
The landslide vote to decriminalise the procedure is the biggest change to abortion laws in England and Wales for nearly 60 years.
Women who terminate their pregnancy outside the rules, for example after 24 weeks, will no longer be at risk of being investigated by police.
The law will still penalise anyone who assists a woman, including medical professionals, in getting an abortion outside the current legal framework.
The amendment still needs to complete its legislative journey through both the Commons and the Lords before it can become law.
Presumably the reason this only affects England and Wales because it's an amendment to the Crime and Policing Bill - Scotland has its own criminal law and NI wasn't even included in the 1967 Abortion Act in the first place. Unclear if / when there'll be any move in relation to Scotland. NI is already decriminalised, IIRC.
I would have thought bringing the law into line with what is actually happening, ie. de facto abortion on demand up to 24 weeks, would have been a more pressing issue.
Here or in all parts of the UK?
Labour MP Tonia Antoniazzi put forward the amendment to the Crime and Policing Bill, which was passed by a majority of 242 votes.
https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/uknews/mps-vote-to-decriminalise-abortion-in-england-and-wales/ar-AA1GU06M?ocid=BingNewsVerp
The link above is NOT connected to the five typed sentences above, though they cover the same vote in the UK [England and Wales] parliament. The vote took place yesterday.
Baby delivered from brain-dead breeder in Georgia. Baby is 1 lb. 13oz. Breeder removed from life support soon after.
https://apnews.com/article/pregnant-woman-brain-dead-georgia-baby-delivered-1dbc32dc986926a8cf65780a3e738dac
So much wrong here.
