Funding for To the Contrary provided by the E. Rhodes and Leona B. Carpenter Foundation, the Park Foundation, and the Charles A. Frueauff Foundation.

Coming up on To the Contrary, the Alabama Supreme Court says embryos are children.

Hospitals there stop providing In vitro fertilization.

What's next?

Then snipers and drone operators are just some of the roles Ukrainian women are filling in to defend their country.

Intro Music Hello, I'm Bonnie Erbé.

Welcome to To the Contrary, a weekly discussion of news and social trends from diverse perspectives.

Up first, the next battlefront in reproductive rights.

Frozen embryos are legally equivalent to children, according to a ruling by the Alabama Supreme Court.

Not only that, but those who destroy them can be held liable for wrongful death.

This decision not only raises concerns about the future of fertility care there, but sparks a broader debate about parents who rely on in vitro fertility.

Experts warn of disruptions to fertility services, with some saying clinics may shut down or doctors may avoid practice, saying in Alabama, the ruling leaves many couples undergoing infertility treatments in limbo, unsure about the status of their frozen embryos.

Joining us today are D.C.

Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton, Carrie Sheffield of the Independent Women's Forum.

And Erin Matson, co-founder of Reproaction.

Let me start with you, Eleanor Holmes Norton.

So is the whole in-vitro industry, which is a multibillion dollar industry nationwide, Is the whole industry in Alabama going to shut down because of this state Supreme Court decision?

I'm afraid so.

And I think it could spread throughout the South.

There's only one remedy, I think, for this, and Congress needs to get into it, and that is to codify the protections provided in Roe versus Wade into federal law.

Do you think this November, the Dobbs decision, which of course, undid the decision of 50 plus years ago, came down under this 6 to 3 conservative versus progressive Supreme Court justices in the election upcoming.

Are we going to continue to see this a winning issue for Democrats?

Well, we're certainly going to consider this to be a major issue for Democrats.

As a member of the House, I'm going to try to do something about it during this session when Democrats are not in control, but Republicans control it by very few votes.

Carrie, I wanted to ask you, as a conservative, and I'm not clear on the issues, so I'm hoping you can help me here, which is how many Christian conservatives believe in stopping abortion, but don't believe in stopping in vitro fertilization and in fact, have used it for example.

There was a survey out about less than a decade ago that 98% of Catholic women had used birth control in violation of church doctrine.

First, I just from the outset need to say I'm speaking for myself because Independent Women's Forum does not take a position on these issues.

But I would fall into that descriptor that you just said.

I am a Christian conservative who is pro-life and I do support IVF.

There's a vast difference between creating life and destroying life.

So I both support the IVF industry, but I also support the Supreme Court ruling down there because we have over a million basically orphans, people who are creating embryos and abandoning them and just locking them up in shelter or freezers and not actually bringing these children to life.

I think that that's a problem.

And I think there is a big movement actually, among Christian conservatives to even adopt some of these embryos to give them life.

So I think there's an ethical and a responsible way to create life using IVF.

I'm someone who has actually frozen my eggs, so I'm putting my money literally where my mouth is.

So this is a very sensitive issue for me.

But I do not intend to ever create an embryo that I would then practically destroy.

But, you know, you're violating at least some what some conservatives believe to be a pro-life doctrine, which is that only God can make humans.

And it's a miracle each time a human is conceived.

And to conceive artificially is inhuman and goes against the tenets of people who call themselves pro-life.

And I wonder what you think the party and people running for office, as we just saw last week in New York, in Long Island.

There was a Democrat who flipped a seat back.

And a big part of the reason why Suozzi won was because he came out very firmly in favor of choice.

And so and Democrats have seen that happen from, you know, for the ever since the last election, all these special elections have been very positive for Democrats.

And I just wonder, you yourself, as a conservative, as you as calling yourself pro-life, what's this going to do at the polls to Republicans?

Yeah.

So well, I guess just to clarify on your first point, it is really Catholic doctrine, what you're talking about to oppose IVF and birth control.

But as you even pointed out, the vast majority of even Catholic women don't support that.

Well, I'm not Catholic.

And to me, I don't believe there's a biblical basis for opposing birth control.

I don't believe there's a biblical basis for opposing IVF of its own sake.

When you look at the fact that I believe CBS reported 100,000 babies born last year from IVF, to me that's a miracle.

That is, you know, the Bible says that the Lord is the giver of life, that if you're having 100,000 babies in an in a culture where our demography is down the tube, where we don't have our replacement rate with enough children being born, this is something to rejoice in, especially for women who are infertile and the Bible's full of women who are infertile, who became fertile.

And it was a miracle and it was something to praise.

The problem I have again, is with the destruction of the embryos, the abandonment of the embryos.

And that's where I think you're finding that middle ground, where you're not creating embryos and then destroying them.

You're actually you're trying your hardest to have a natural birth once you've been planted them.

That is the natural way and that is actually healthy.

And that is not that's not playing God.

That's actually using your intelligence through science to be able to conceive in a natural way.

I want to get back to that, to your raising the point that there's a movement now among pro-lifers to rescue those embryos, because that raises all kinds of legal questions, like the fathers, are they supposed to pay for these children?

I mean, you know, but let's get back to it, because I want to give Erin some time.

Your thoughts.

Erin, is this has this created a situation where a lot of women who particularly women who may have voted Republican, are now going to say to themselves, jeez, this this Dobbs decision has just created a maelstrom, an unnecessary maelstrom that puts the United States behind the rest of the world in terms of in vitro fertilization.

Well, it has, Bonnie.

And if you were looking for a way to make the Dobbs decision even more unpopular, the Alabama state Supreme Court has found it.

But with this attack on IVF and fertility treatment, I want us to take a step back what the Alabama State Supreme Court essentially rubberstamped is this idea of personhood, which is something that anti-abortion leaders and lobbyists have been working toward for decades.

They poured billions of dollars into the anti-abortion.

It's truly an industry trying to achieve this.

And what it does is it states it would ban all abortion, it would ban birth control, and it would ban fertility treatment.

And that is essentially what this wackadoo tale court agreed to when it called embryos extra utero children, which is a breathtaking statement.

And so we know that a number of families rely on fertility treatment in order to have the children that they desperately want and will love.

And so this attack is horrific.

And like Delegate Holmes Norton, I'm very concerned that this will spread to other states.

You'll see conservative state legislatures trying to advance this idea of personhood.

And I should just say personhood has failed every time it has directly gone to voters, including in states like Mississippi.

This is something that folks don't want on both sides of the aisle.

So, Eleanor, let me go back to you for a moment, please, on the idea of conservatives launching a movement to bring these frozen embryos who are not going to be brought to life by their biological parents to, I suppose, plant them in the uteruses of either women who do want children and can't or in the uteruses of women overseas or paid to carry them.

What kind of legal problems does this create?

Well, moving embryos from one human being to another, it seems to me, would create a legal problem.

But remember, these extra embryos under decision cannot be destroyed.

They are legally children.

So that leaves in limbo what to do with them and what to do with them after both parents die.

Exactly.

But I'm just saying, if I were a woman who wanted a child by myself, for example, and there were a fertilized embryo somewhere that I could I don't know, use by whatever the terminology will be for these kinds of situations, Does that mean that the father of that embryo, if I bring it to term, owes me child support?

That certainly hasn't been litigated and I would doubt it very seriously.

You would doubt that they would that that person would owe me child support.

Why not?

Well, there is a bill actually pending that would do that.

It's called the Unborn Child Support Act, and it was introduced in 2022 by Mike Johnson before he became speaker, when he was just a rank and file House member.

And it's been reintroduced this term by Claudia Tenney, a congresswoman from New York Republican, who would do just that in terms of requiring a father to provide financial support for the pregnant mother in order to support the unborn child.

So I actually support this.

Why I think it makes sense.

And for the unborn embryos, it is a new area of law as far as an embryo that's in a freezer versus in a in a woman's womb.

That law that I mentioned or the bill is more for the woman who's already carrying the child versus an abandoned embryo.

And so I think it should be both.

Both parents, if you're talking about an embryo in a freezer, then, yeah, it's both rights and responsibilities, because in the Mississippi case, it had to do with a random patient in the hospital wandering down the hall, getting into the freezer and taking these embryos out.

No relation to these three.

It was three separate embryos from three separate families, as I understanding it and destroying these embryos.

And so it's really actually about holding that person accountable.

What happens?

Both parents die.

They you know, a couple marries, they can't conceive.

So they freeze several embryos.

They bring one or two to life.

And then there are several more wasting away somewhere in a freezer.

And both parents die.

Eleanor, under this Alabama decision.

Those are children and they are now orphans, I suppose.

But what happens then?

Where does where's the legal responsibility to keep them frozen or, I mean, what are hospitals going to do, keep them frozen ad infinitum?

They're probably going to dispose of them.

If both parents die as I think that they're that there's nothing they can do if both parents are not available.

And I don't think they're going to keep them frozen, frozen in perpetuity.

What do you think about Johnson's bill that Carrie mentioned that makes not just the fathers, but the mothers, the biological mothers of these embryos forcing them to pay for children they did not choose to bring to life?

That still has to be litigated.

I don't see how you could do that without a court saying what comes next and how the heck would a judge begin to try to answer that question?

That's a very difficult question.

Isn't it so difficult that I'm not sure I know the answer?

Well, I think big picture overall, the fact that we have a million embryos in freezers is a big problem.

And I think it shows how runaway the IVF process has become.

Like I said, I think there is a healthy and ethical middle ground so that if you're creating an embryo, then you intend to use it.

You intend to implant it.

If the embryo then has a natural death, that's the natural process.

But I don't think creating, you know, dozens and dozens of embryos that you never have any intent to use is ethical or right in terms of holding people responsible for multiple embryos they've created years ago, decades ago.

The technology has advanced, so it's now much more likely to have to just freeze one or two if you want one or two children and you'll get them.

But back then that their they didn't have that they hadn't perfected the art of in-vitro.

And so you had to freeze many embryos, embryos in the hope that one or two would become fetuses in the womb.

So you're going to go back and hold people liable for the sin of having created embryos that they didn't end up using.

There was a lot of lack of thinking about this.

And I know you mentioned, you know, Roe v. Wade was around for 50 years.

The reality is that humanity's been around for however many centuries.

It was not the norm to kill your child in the womb and that's celebrated.

That's not normal.

That's only been something happening in the last 50 years.

So taking a step back, how strange is that and how unethical is it that a culture would create embryos with the intention of abandoning them or destroying them?

That's contrary to human nature.

And that's contrary to even just like, you know, Darwinian natural selection that you would not want your offspring to be born.

I just think I think the Supreme Court ruling on Dobbs was wonderful because it actually showed how it's actually the default of Roe v Wade created this just autopilot of unethical thinking.

Yeah, well, I mean, just listening to Carrie talk, I know that I don't ever want her to come into the room with me in an OB-GYN and dictate, you know, how personal decisions should proceed.

And so I want to address a number of things.

One, it's just like, let me ask you this.

I mean, isn't it you're a pro-choice activist.

Isn't this kind of ruling your dream?

As soon as women find out and men find out that if they freeze embryos, the Republican Party is going to either make them use them or can pursue them for, you know, with the death penalty for killing those so-called children.

Well, no, Bonnie, it's a nightmare and it's a real life true life nightmare that's unfolding right now, where you have people having their autonomy stripped from them, where you have people who are desperately hoping to conceive a child who are now having their fertility clinics shuttered, where you're having people have their autonomy stripped away from them.

There's simply no way, Bonnie, to assign rights to eggs, to embryos, to blastocyst, to fetuses without revoking rights for women as a class.

And that's what's happening here.

And I also just want to address two things that Carrie said.

One, it's just patently untrue that abortion did not exist prior to Roe v Wade.

Abortion is a longstanding practice that has existed in all cultures.

There is traditions that go beyond the medical abortion procedure that happen, traditions in indigenous communities and beyond.

So that's just not true.

That's always been the case.

There has always been abortion, and no matter what they do to the laws, there's always going to be abortion because people will find a way when they have to find a way.

The other thing that I just want to address briefly that hasn't been brought up is this idea of only one embryo at a time in IVF.

And to go back to that point of that's why we shouldn't have people who are advocating fetal personhood in any sort of medical appointment with us.

As you know, fertility treatment is not a comfortable affair for women.

And often, you know, in order to produce extra eggs, to get eggs extracted.

It's not a walk in the park.

And so it's perfectly understandable all that people would want to create multiple embryos at once, not only for the pain factor, but also for the efficacy rates and wanting to make sure that they do have embryos either now or in the future that will hold a pregnancy that will work.

Well, if I can respond right now, we're sorry.

We're out of time on this topic, but thank you very much, Carrie.

From IVF, two Ukrainian women leaving home to save their country.

Female soldiers in Ukraine are defying stereotypes and societal norms by playing an increasingly crucial role in defending their homeland from Vladimir Putin's relentless aggression.

As the conflict enters its third year, Ukrainian male soldiers expect more fatigue and strain.

President [Volodymyr] Zelenskys administration must Consider Enlisting more Women.

News organizations report the number of women serving in Ukraine's armed forces is at least 43,000, if not thousands more.

18,000 of them have children.

They serve in roles ranging from doctors and medics to drone operators and in combat.

They are filling such positions as machine gunners, tank commanders and snipers.

Ukraine doesn't conscript women.

Each volunteers for battle.

So carry your thoughts on this.

Actually, I was thrilled in researching this topic to learn that in Ukraine they have one of the best snipers, if not the best sniper in the world, a woman.

Yeah, I think it's noble for these women to stand up and defend their homeland.

And I think it does show the power of arming women and supporting arming women so they can it help solve that imbalance of being smaller physically.

If you have a firearm, you can fix that imbalance.

And so this sniper woman.

That's it.

That's really impressive.

I think that the bigger problem, though, that the West is facing is that if you look economically, Vladimir Putin is actually stronger now financially than when he was before the invasion.

Well, I'm amazed that Ukraine is using women in positions that the United States has not gone to, to use them and creating, I think, a model for the rest of the world.

If you're for women's rights, then there's no reason that only men should fight or for that matter, be used in in certain positions.

And Ukraine is demonstrating that women can be used in any position.

And I think they are setting a pattern for the rest of the world, including the United States.

Any place that men go, women should be allowed to go to.

And if you look at the war in Ukraine, this is a critical moment globally in the struggle against authoritarianism.

We're even fighting it here at home.

And I find it, you know, of course, they would need to engage women as well because they need all hands on deck as Putin declares this war.

One thing I also noticed about it and rather like is to see the role also in Russia that women are taking and rising up against Putin specifically.

So [Alexei] Navalny was just murdered in prison and his wife appears to be taking up the charge.

I think that's brave and bold.

When I was watching videos of Russians protesting his death, many of the Russians who were being arrested were women.

It looks like Ukraine is going to have to start drafting women.

Up until now, it's been women choose to join the military.

Lots of them are mothers.

Should this be a choice for women when it's not for men?

Well, I don't think it should be a choice for women any more than for men.

Women are not the only human beings that can take care of children.

So there's going to be a draft.

It doesn't seem to me that women should be excluded.

Acknowledging the biological realities and the difference between men and women is important.

The reality is that women are far less useful in combat than men.

There are lots of other roles behind the scenes intelligence gathering, logistics, medical.

Only 70% of men pass the physical, at least in this country.

So 30% of men who apply to join the military.

One of the divisions don't even qualified physically.

If you qualify physically, what's the darn difference?

And then secondly, the drone operators are on the front lines.

and they, by the way, a woman was responsible for, you know, flying a drone from behind the Ukrainian lines to an oil refinery in Saint Petersburg that she blew up So that's a frontline job.

I guess I'm talking about combat as in like going in and, you know, ground invasion, drone operators different from ground invasion.

I'm talking about ground invasion, which is a lot of they're right up there with the artillery.

Yeah, but the Russians strategy has been a ground invasion.

That's been a big part of it.

So that's all I'm saying is, you know, I think Putin would be laughing if he thinks that Ukrainian women on the front lines will stop his ground invasion because he's a sexist.

I think he is a misogynist.

I believe in peace.

I love peace, I oppose war.

And I don't I oppose this idea of military drafts, period, especially here in the United States.

But that said, if we're going to have one, it needs to be equal.

And if we're going to draft men, we need to draft women.

We should not have sex discrimination under the law.

There are tests, physical tests that take place for certain roles.

And Bonnie, you were asking earlier, you know, for women pass the test.

Yes, exactly.

She passes the test.

She's ready to go.

And I don't buy into the idea that women are obviously physically inferior to men.

That's not true.

And I, for example, one of my passions and hobbies is running.

I routinely cross the finish line faster than some men.

So it's really you know, and so I don't want to hear about how women can't do things.

We know that women can do things.

We know that some women are not suited for the front lines.

We know that some men are not suited for the front lines.

Let the military sort that out with their test.

All right.

That's it for this edition.

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