Don't Miscarry in Utah

I clicked on the link to this article, because I think that a lot of students kind of fart around and mark time for their senior year, and the kids that need to be there could benefit from a culling of the herd, so to speak. A focusing of resources, if you will. However, the real subject of the article is proposed legislation in which miscarriages may become a prosecutable offense in Utah.

So, 12th grade may become optional because the government is broke. But it's not too broke to investigate/ prosecute/ imprison women who have miscarriages, if the mother's actions may have been the cause.

What about giving birth to a child with health problems? Will the mother's prenatal care be investigated? Where will it end? While I'm not above giving dirty looks to pregnant women I see smoking or drinking, I'm not sure this is a road the government should go down. In fact, I'm pretty sure this road is a very, very bad one which should be avoided.

Several women close to me have suffered miscarriages, and I can't imagine them dealing with that emotional pain while facing a criminal investigation into the events leading up to it. Not to mention, how horrible would it be to lose a pregnancy and be judged to be at fault for it? How many women go through that in their own minds already, thinking about what they could have done differently and if it would have changed anything? Now, compound that with a police investigation and, possibly, a criminal trial.

I realize that is not the intent of the law, but since the police cannot actually read people's minds, you have to think that at least some women found criminally responsible for their miscarriage would have simply been guilty of poor judgment. OK, I think that's enough of a rant about a proposed law (which one hopes will be quietly dropped from consideration never again to see the light of day) in a state through which I have never even driven, nor do I have any future plans to visit.