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[lillim]

So this is yet another sobering look at feminism on the front lines (though I think it's rather innacurate to call it the 'new' feminism - women have been losing their lives in the battle for equality for a long, long time). The thing that really stuck with me though, and I blame hanging out with Team Ranga and the Tee-Esses yesterday, was the

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[matoko]

Not long ago SBS screened a doco on that fistula clinic. Pretty harrowing.

[lillim]

*nods* I read an article on it a little while back, it's stuck with me ever since.

[invader_kitty]

I remember reading some info Save The Children put out in PNG. Something like one woman every 17 minutes dies from child birth related complications. In a country of only five million, that's obscene.

[lillim]

It's appalling, and so depressingly preventable, including giving the option *not* to have those babies in the first place.
It's something that really pisses me off about anti-choicers (and Im not going to call them pro-lifers, because they're not): Childbirth is risky; in some instances, it's deadly. Telling women they *have* to carry to term is telling them they have to risk their own safety and life for that of the fetus they carry.

[kitty_kitty_]

When I think of the privileges I had in giving birth in Australia, especially when I had so many complications, it upsets me that other women do not have a right to the same sort of treatment. If we were in a developing country, Roisin and I would both be dead.

The fact that it is ignored because 'dying in childbirth' is somehow 'normal' is abhorrent. It devalues the importance of women as human beings. The current belief, essentially, is that they should just accept it as their lot, because they have no choice but to be the ones who carry the child. It's almost as if the mentality is, "Oh, whoops, this one's broken. Couldn't produce a child without dying. Better get a new one! There's plenty of 'em."

And forgive me if that makes no sense. I'm writing through a cold. *sniff*

[lillim]

You make a lot of sense :)

The current belief, essentially, is that they should just accept it as their lot, because they have no choice but to be the ones who carry the child

This. How many men run the risk of dying due to conception? The cynic in me thinks... actually, *knows*... that if men ran the same risks that women did when pregnancy occured that this would be dealt with pretty damn quickly.

You know what a lifesaving kit looks like?

[kitty_kitty_]

Oooh. The Birthing Kit Foundation has information on holding an assembly day. I wonder if you can do it in your own house? This might be just the cold talking, but I'm thinking maybe an alternative house warming when I move...

[lillim]

you can, it involves a bit of dosh though to pay for supplies - they bring out the bits and pieces you need.

Kits can be assembled in multiples of 600 or 1000 at a cost of $160 per 200 kits, e.g. 600 kits is $480, 1000 is $800, 1200 is $960, 2000 is $1600 etc.

making 200 kits would cost 10 people $16 each. That's pretty darn doable!