#what they would do is that they would have a program basically were pregnant women would be like hey this kid once they're born? | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

rogerslovesstark · 4 years

Text

Loveless

Requested by: @belovedcherry

Can I request a fic where Steve and Reader are in an arranged marriage but he doesn’t want to be and cheats on her and eventually leaves her with no regrets? The reader is left pregnant (he doesn’t know - she wanted to tell him but he was being a dick) and eventually moves on and finds someone else who is cool and loving with her and the child. Steve ends up finding her again and being jealous, possessive, regretful, and angry because he thinks that family should have been his since they were arranged together in the first place unlike her choosing to engage/marry the new guy. I’m not sure about the ending but I think that I prefer the reader to have a happy ending and Steve left in eternal regret. Maybe her being pregnant with a second child with the new guy? Happy growing family?

You knew you weren’t stupid, Steve had found another bed to keep himself warm. Some other woman’s pussy to keep his dick wet. You just wished that he would admit it to you, so you would be able to leave.

Crying yourself to sleep every night because the idea of the man that you love with another woman was just too much to handle. The suffocating pain and idea of him with another woman would choke you and steal all the air from your lungs as you slept in your separate bedroom.

You were truly in love with him and he couldn’t care any less about you, the mere thought of you made Steve want to throw up in disgust. All he wanted to do was party, drink, do drugs, sleep with other women. Some would say that Steve even had a problem, but you tried as hard as you could to help him.

Your families were the only thing keeping you together, the contract that you were both forced to sign that bound you two together. You had fallen in love with Steve the moment you saw him. Your father showed you a picture of him and you swore your eyes were in the shape of hearts.

His soft blonde hair, his blue eyes that could captivate you for hours on end. You couldn’t believe that he would actually be yours. Except it was way too good to be true.

Steve was a fucking dick. When he found out he had to marry you for his inheritance to even be processed, he basically threw a fit.

“Why can’t Bucky marry her dad, he is older than I am, what the fuck,”

“Steven, James is engaged to Dot, stop being a brat, you know that your inheritance comes once you marry, and she’s a nice girl, don’t be an ass.”

Steve was fuming at the news of this arranged marriage, he had seen pictures of you before and he was repulsed by the sight of you. Any time you had to see each other, Steve couldn’t wait till it was over to go sleep with another woman.

There wasn’t a wedding, just documents being signed in the city hall. You had worn a long white dress that complimented your skin tone, light makeup, and a casual hair-do. Both of your parents were in attendance, including Bucky, Steve’s older brother.

You were also both forced to consummate the marriage as soon as you both went on your honeymoon. Your mother-in-law stood in the next room listening to Steve grunt lowly and you embarrassingly squeaking and moaning. He didn’t even care to make you finish. Asshole.

You both were required to have sex with each other unprotected at least once a week, normally when his mother would come over and basically force you to do the dirty. You honestly had no problem with having sex with Steve. He looked like a Greek god and he was packing downstairs.

Steve knew that if you were to get pregnant, his mother would just leave him alone but he just couldn’t be bothered to actually finish inside of you. The thought of you actually pregnant with his child was horrifying to even think about.

Steve’s father wanted to ensure that the empire had an heir, knowing that Steve wasn’t going to settle down unless forced to do so.

He slowly started to become distant from you, leaving for work early, coming home late, you knew he wasn’t staying loyal and it broke your heart. You would go to sleep crying every night because of the infidelity your husband was committing, and that you were completely and hopelessly in love with him and he would never love you the way you loved him.

Watching the two lines form on the pregnancy test had your heart swelling with so much joy, your smile so big. Steve was on his way home and you could finally tell him the amazing news that you would be starting a family together.

When he dropped the divorce papers in front of you, you could physically feel your heart shatter. The idea of the perfect family faded from your head as you began to become protective of your baby.

“You have an hour to get your shit and leave, get a fucking lawyer too because this is most likely going to court,” Steve spit at you from across the counter.

He had no remorse, you were too quiet, you never wanted to go out and party, you didn’t work because you were finishing your masters in Physics. Constantly studying and having assignments to do, your fucking humming as you cooked annoyed the hell out of him.

“But Steve, I’m-“ Your words were cut off as Steve backhanded you. You remained still, not know what to do, just holding your cheek in hand, tears streaming down your cheeks.

“Y/n, shut the fuck up and get the fuck out, Selene will be here in less than 20 minutes to move in and I don’t want to fucking see your hideous face around here anymore,” Steve shouted at you, stunning you into such a thick silence you felt like you could even breathe.

You barely made it to your bedroom, heavily breathing, on the verge of a panic attack gathering all your things, making sure to leave the divorce papers signed on top of your bed.

Looking back at Steve with tears in your eyes, you wished he would crawl back to you and apologize for saying anything hurtful and treating you like you didn’t matter to him. If he had, you would have forgiven him completely and overlooked every time he had wronged you, just wanting a small family to be perfect.

Steve smiled as your car drove off the property, the burden of you seem to finally lift from his chest, not knowing that he was throwing the best thing to ever happen to him away.

++++

You drove away sobbing in your car, you had no money and were in debt because of your master's program. You couldn’t go back to your family's house, being basically shunned by your family if they were to find out that Steve has left you.

You made it to Natasha’s apartment in one piece thankfully, only having packed limited amounts of clothes that your bag could carry.

You knocked on her door and jumped into her arms as soon as she opened the door. Natasha stood in the door frame shocked that you were here so late, especially when it was this cold.

“Y/n, get inside, you're going to freeze your legs off,” Natasha scolded you, ushering you quickly inside. Natasha was worried, you hadn’t called or texted her prior to coming to her apartment and she had guests over too. You didn’t look too well, eyes swollen and red, your face was puffy and you made tear streaks on your cheeks.

“Tash, I’m sorry but I need a place to stay, St-t-eve kicked me out,” You could barely make it through the sentence, still suffering from the heartbreak of your former husband.

“Okay, I have the spare bedroom, but I have guests n/n, so hurry threw the hallway and get in the shower babe,” Natasha whispered, not wanting to embarrass you in front of her colleagues.

The spare bedroom was barely the size of a closet, but you were grateful that Natasha was generous enough to let you use it until you found an apartment. You managed to hold it together though you were hurting so deeply, just wondering what Steve was doing.

+++

Steve and Selene were laying in his bed, breathing heavily after their third round of sex, and Steve was drained. Selene reached over into her bag a pulled out a bag of white powder that she knew Steve loved. Of course, Steve didn’t decline the offer of free drugs to keep the night young and fun.

The rush that went right to his head, a floating feeling, and energy flowing through his veins. Something was off though, but Steve was too high to even identify the feeling.

+++

You walking into Natasha’s living room, seeing a few people in there, two men and another girl, you greeted all of them and stayed next to Natasha. You didn’t really talk, smiling along as Natasha’s other friend cracked jokes, you weren’t even paying attention to what they were saying, you still didn’t know what to do with your life now.

Being pregnant with his child after he told you that he didn’t want you, that he never loved you, and the only reason he married you was to get his inheritance. You felt sick to your stomach knowing you were carrying his child, but you knew that you wouldn’t get rid of it.

You’ve wanted to be a mother since you were a young girl, seeing all those other women holding their little babies, being so loving and caring towards them.

You stood up quietly and walked towards Natasha’s kitchen, needing a glass of water, only to find one of Natasha’s friends in there already.

“Oh, sorry, I just wanted to grab a glass of water,” You murmured, not looking him directly in the eyes. He just stared at you and moved out of the way, his stature not as tall as Steve’s, he was basically the complete opposite.

“I’m Bruce, we have thermal physics together, with professor Wither,” He said softly, his eyes kind and sweet. You noticed him before, he was older than the rest of the class, a genius too. He sat at the front of the class, always being the first to answer a question.

You never paid attention to him, only whenever he would answer a question at lightning speed. He had sweet brown eyes, a little aged but not older than 40. His hair started to salt and pepper, curling towards his face.

“I know Bruce, you really are a genius,” You smiled at him, he just stared at you, your eyes still red from crying, cheeks were swollen from the heavy crying. Bruce wondered what happens, but he didn’t want to intrude into your life. Yet still, he asked.

“Y/n are you alright?” Bruce was worried for you because you always looked so put together during class. Bruce always took note of how you looked in class, not to say he was in love with you, but he was close. Basically, his infatuation with you was so deep, if he had gotten to speak to you for even two hours, he would have fallen in love with you.

++++

Steve woke from his drunken and drug-ridden haze. Everything was blurry and he couldn’t really feel his left arm. The room smelt so strange, he couldn’t even see clearly. He didn’t know what time of day it was.

Steve got up and walked towards the bedroom door, and towards the kitchen, he couldn’t hear your soft humming and he wanted to know if you were home. He stepped into the kitchen and he didn’t see you anywhere, where were you?

He went to the entryway and looked for your keys, only to not find them there, he opened the front door to see if your car was there. A wave of nostalgia crashed over him, remembering your face as you cried leaving in your car, Steve only felt pain now.

Tears filled his eyes slightly when he remember the hateful words he had spoken to you. You were always so sweet to him and all he did was drive you away. He walked back to his bedroom and looked for his phone. The screen showed that it was February, and Steve forced the divorce two March’s ago. Since then he and Selene had broken up.

Steve spent most of his time looking at old photos of you, where you were smiling, looking happy. You had truly loved Steve, always trying to keep him happy, cooking and cleaning for him, trying to be his rock of emotional support.

Steve stared at a specific photograph of you, you had your bouquet of red roses from your wedding day and you were smiling so brightly at the camera. Every time Steve looked at the photo, he started to cry. The last memory of you Steve had was your crying face after he had hit you.

Steve never felt so much pain after Selene left him because he wanted to sober up and she wanted to still party and do drugs. The night after she left, Steve had done psychedelics and the crash after was so horrible, he had gone to your old bedroom and cried while holding your pillow.

The divorce went by quickly, you hadn’t lawyered up and didn’t take anything from Steve, you didn’t want anything to do with him. Steve had hoped you would come to the first and last meeting, just to see your face. Once he realized the depth of his mistakes, he began doing drugs and drinking recklessly, he hadn’t slept with anyone since Selene left.

++++

You hugged Bruce after you told him the news, you were expecting again. You had been trying for about three months and you had finally succeeded. After you had spoken to Bruce for the first time in Natasha’s apartment you two hit it off so quickly, getting engaged after seven months together.

Bruce treated you like a queen. You were the apple of his eye and both of you graduated last June, starting a small research facility that began to gain traction. You had given birth to a healthy 7 lbs 8 oz baby boy named Adam Joseph Banner. You hadn’t tried to let Steve know about anything regarding the pregnancy. You were just glad you weren’t in his life anymore.

++++

You were at the supermarket looking for pasta sauces for tonight's dinner, Adam was running around and you just smiled as he made silly faces at you.

Steve watched as you looked for the sauces. He could barely breathe as he looked at you, you looked so different and happy. Steve didn’t want to come up to you, but he wanted to know whose child that was.

Steve followed you home as you left the store.

++++

Steve watched as you hugged and kissed the foreign man, he was filled with rage. You looked so happy to see him and he just held you and smiled at you.

The little boy hugged the man and started kissing his scruffy face. The little boy looked nothing like the man. If anything, the little boy kind of resembled Steve. Steve waited till you went inside to leave his car and walked towards your front door.

Steve knocked on your door, only to realize that he hadn’t brought you flowers, then again he hadn’t expected to come to see you today.

You answered the door and all the air knocked out of Steve’s lungs. You looked so beautiful up close, Steve wanted nothing more than to grab you and kiss you right there.

You looked at Steve in shock, what the fuck was he doing here. He looked like a mess, hair unkempt, eyes with dark bags underneath, his bread was slightly long and not taken care of. How the fuck did he find you?

“Steve?” You said his name, and Steve broke down, falling onto his knees, sobbing. He had missed you so much and hearing your voice after two years, it sounded like music to his ears.

“Hi y/n,” Steve said softly, you stared at him in shock he was on his knees, looking up at you with what seemed to be like adoration. You didn’t know what to say. Literally lose of words.

“Mommy?” Adam screamed from inside the house, running towards you, jumping into your arms. He cuddled his head into your neck. You ran a hand up and down his back. Steve slowly stood up and looked act the scene in front of him.

“Is he mine, n/n?” Steve asked softly, deep down inside he was hoping that the baby was his, because if he was Steve’s child then there might be a chance that you two would be able to be together.

“He is, and I tried to tell you that I was pregnant with your baby, but you hit me and sent me off with no money, and divorce papers needed to be signed. Why did you come here, Steve?”

Steve didn’t know what to say, how could be explained to you that he wanted you back after everything he had done to you, the last thing you deserved was to live a life like how you used too.

“I want you back, n/n, this was supposed to be my family, not his” Steve said softly, walking closer to you and cupping your face with his large hands, you stared at Steve, not knowing what to say. Steve leaned closer and closer to your lips, wanting to just kiss you.

“Get away from my mommy,” Adam started to yell at Steve, swinging his arms at him, trying to hit him. You quickly backed up and put Adam inside, closing the door behind you. You looked at Steve with shock in your eyes.

“Steve, I’m married now, and I’m pregnant with Bruce’s baby, you can be apart of Adams's life but I have to talk to Bruce about it,” You stated, not leaving any room for argument.

“Talk to Bruce about it? He’s my kid Y/n, I have a right to be in his life, I’m his dad,” Steve shouted at you.

“No you’re his biological father Steve, Bruce is his dad, he was there in the delivery room with me, not you, he was there when I would cry myself to sleep at night because of how sad I was about the divorce, not you, he is there when Adam cries, not you, you haven’t been apart of Adam’s life at all, so don’t you dare try to say you're his dad, because you aren’t, now stay the hell away from my family,” You screamed and slammed your door shut in his face.

He blew it, his only chance to get it back, Steve slowly walked to his car, once the door was closed Steve started to sob. It was supposed to be his family, you were supposed to be his wife and that was supposed to be his family. If only he was so filled with self-hatred, he would have had the perfect family.

#Steve Rogers #Steven Grant Rogers #steve rogers fanfiction #steve rogers x reader #steve rogers angst #captain america #captain america x reader #captain america fanfiction #captain america angst

272 notes · View notes

olivish · 3 years

Text

Some thoughts about Melanie Cavill and her beautiful mind.

I agree with others that Mel is neurodivergent/ autistic. I think this helps explain her passion and focus, and also why, in S1, she was so adept at “putting on a mask” and pretending to be someone else. Basically, I think she had been masking in some way or another her entire life, so when the time came to create the “Hospitality Melanie” persona, it was already second nature.

I think this also explains why it took Melanie so long to see Wilford for the monster he is, and why he was able to control/ manipulate her for most of her life, despite her superior intelligence. On that note, here are some of my MC HCs (I hope it goes without saying, I don’t mean to imply that anything described below is necessarily an “autistic” trait. This is simply how I imagine Melanie the person, who also happens to have autism.)

1. Before meeting Wilford, Melanie struggled to find her place in the world. She dropped out of high school because she was bored with the lessons and couldn’t be bothered to complete assignments. She had no friends, and most adults wrote her off as a trouble-maker.

Her family was poor, so she “borrowed” things they needed for the farm (some of them rather LARGE things), which earned her a juvenile record for theft.

2. Because of this, Melanie believed she’d never go to college. That was fine, she thought, she wouldn’t fit in there. She didn’t fit in anywhere. The only person who didn’t make her feel like a misfit was her father, John Cavill, who was a patient man who loved farming, and who taught his daughter everything he knew about the trade.

It wasn’t long, however, before John ran out of knowledge to share. Melanie was 8 when her father took her to the local library. “So,” he said. “What do you want to know?”

“Everything.”

From that moment on, John watched his daughter surpass him in every subject, every field of study. It was hard, not because he was prideful, but because it felt like he was losing her. But not completely. At least, not yet.

Because for years after that, Melanie would seek her father out, and she’d talk at length about the topics that interested her, and he listened, enjoying her company, even after he ceased to understand a single word that came out of her mouth.

I mean that literally.

“Certains nématodes posent problème en agriculture parce qu'ils parasites des plantes ou des animaux d'élevage, mais la plupart stimulent la croissance en améliorant le cycle des nutriments.” “Mellie.” “Oui, papa?” “You’re speaking French again.” “Oh. Sorry.”

3. Melanie’s mother was a different story. Shanon Cavill, nee Shanon O’Connell, was stern, intelligent and, due to an undiagnosed mood disorder, emotionally unstable. She’d lose her temper at the drop of a hat, and although she loved her daughter, she didn’t understand her. Shanon didn’t understand why someone so brilliant was throwing her life away. Dropping out of school, getting arrested, fooling around with boys, and girls, who didn’t care about her, and who only got her into trouble.

Shanon said many words in the heat of many moments that she could never take back. Foolish. Reckless. Lazy. Quitter.

The day Joseph Wilford showed up at the farm looking for Melanie, Shanon peered at him through the porch screen door. “Did she steal something from you?” she asked. “Because whatever it is, we can’t pay you back, so you’d best just leave before I let the dogs out.”

Looking back, Wilford deeply regrets not heeding the lady Cavill’s advice.

4. Melanie saw Wilford as her missing piece. Melanie always knew she was “bad with people”. To her, human beings were confounding black boxes. INPUT > [???] > UNEXPECTED RESULT, USUALLY BAD.

But Wilford. Joseph Wilford was a social magician! She watched in awe. Everyone adored him. He’d tell a joke and everyone laughed. Anything they needed for their work - funding, IP rights, permits, materials, labor - he procured through sheer force of charisma.

He was just like her, except he had that one missing piece.

It was the apparent gap in their interpersonal skills that led Melanie to conclude that she could never be a leader like him. That’s why she allowed Wilford to take credit for her work, why she believed him when he said it was better for all involved if she remained a ‘silent partner.’

That’s also why she never tried to run Snowpiercer as herself. Despite having all the skills, Melanie couldn’t imagine anyone would follow her leadership.

(I think she was wrong about that...)

5. It was Wilford who sent Melanie to college, and it was Wilford who coached her on how to “mask.” As a sociopath, nearly all of Wilford’s social interactions are theatre. They have to be. So when he met Melanie, he immediately saw what her problem was - the silly girl wasn’t acting!

So he sat her down one day and gave her a gift. “A chess game?” she said.

“Not a game. This box contains the secret to the universe.”

She smiled, but he was serious. As Wilford set up the pieces he explained, “This is the whole world. Every type of person you’ll ever meet is here. Pawns, knights, bishops. They all have their rules, their own little scripts. The trick is, figure them out, while revealing nothing about yourself.”

She didn’t understand, but in time, she would. Wilford taught her how to survive, but not as herself. He taught her to hide, to blend in, and to trust nobody but him.

And it worked, to a certain extent. Melanie earned degrees from MIT and Yale, graduating with the highest honors, lauded as a prodigy. A recruiter from NASA asked if she’d be interested in applying for the astronaut program. Elon Musk asked the same thing, but he offered more money.

Melanie could have worked anywhere. Done anything. But she went back to Wilford, partly out of loyalty, and partly because she believed he was the only person in the world who truly knew her, and saw her, and valued her for who she was.

They weren’t lovers, but Melanie considered him just as close. For many years, he was her one partner and closest friend.

6. When Melanie got pregnant with Alex, she was afraid she’d be a bad mother. She worried that she wouldn’t have that mysterious ‘maternal instinct’ that seemed to come naturally to other women. She thought maybe she was “broken” in a very particular way and shouldn’t be a parent.

Those worries disappeared once Alex was born. More than that, Melanie’s deep connection with Alex made her consider that maybe she’d underestimated herself. In motherhood, Melanie found courage. She built stronger friendships with Ben & Jinju, and she began to interact with Wilford on a more equal footing.

She started speaking up about things she never dared interfere with before. She didn’t like the company’s environmental practices. Their anti-union stances. Their parental leave policies were atrocious. Wilford was beside himself. He didn’t recognize her. He couldn’t wrap his mind around what happened.

At a loss, Wilford blamed his catch-all word for human behavior that fell outside his bounds of understanding.

“Sentimentality.”

7. When Melanie lost Alex, she lost faith in herself. It wasn’t just the grief, or the guilt, though those were enormous. Melanie understood now: Alex was her missing piece. Alex was the one thing that made Melanie feel like she could do anything.

It cannot be overstated what a colossal blunder it was for Wilford to return Melanie’s superpower to her. He thought he was being clever in saving Alex, but from the moment Melanie blew up Big Alice’s connector and Alex gave her that grudging look of respect, all bets were off.

Melanie remembered who she was. The awakening started with Layton, but it ended with Alex.

Final thoughts: Melanie’s particular neurology has been a hot-button issue in the past, so I’m a little nervous posting this. Please reach out to me with any comments or concerns. Everything here is written with an open heart in good faith, and while I’m allergic to argument, I am addicted to discussion. <3

#Snowpiercer #fanfiction #hc

19 notes · View notes

trvelyans-archive · 3 years

Note

i am on my hands and knees begging for u to tell me about lila and margot 🙏

jasmine.............. thank you for this gift

under the cut because i expect it’ll get very long <3 :) update after i finished writing: it is, in fact, very long and also took me over an hour. so. take that as whatever sort of warning you might want.

let’s start with margot !

she was born to a couple of really young parents who..... did not want to be parents. at all. they were still in the party-and-get-drunk phase of their life and didn’t want to have a kid to worry about, so a large part of her childhood was spent couch surfing between relatives, mostly her grandfather.

they were really close! he would help her with her homework, they would cook together, he would let her drink underage so that she was well-versed in beer by the time she was like. idk. 16 lol. but she felt closer to him than her own parents, who were good when they were around but. they mostly weren’t around <3

when she was 19, her grandpa starting showing pretty serious signs of memory loss and whatnot and eventually had to be moved into a home. she was living with him by that point, so she had to continue to spend a year or so of her adult life couchsurfing. it didn’t help that she was in school full-time to get an engineering degree of. some kind. i think mechanical engineering. idk. and didn’t have a job, so to pay back her roommates she took up a majority of the housework as well as picked up odd jobs on the weekend. her grandpa’s health continued to decline through this time so she didn’t actually mind being busy because then she. didn’t have to think about it at all <3

and then.............. when she was 20......... her boyfriend of a year suggested that she not only move in with him but that they get married and margot, who has never had stability ever in her life, jumped at the opportunity !

after she graduated, she found it incredibly hard to find a career (even though they were in the same program and He had no trouble finding one), so she was back to not working but her husband didn’t mind and he supported her whole-heartedly. during this time she started running and then eventually started going to a gym with a couple of her female friends from their neighbourhood! she would also spend a lot of time at her grandpa’s but his health was still rapidly declining. eventually her now-husband said that she should probably stop visiting him and margot was like “.... ok i guess”

And then. :)

she kept spending time outside of the house and started taking self-defense classes with a few of her friends and her husband was started to get very antsy. he wanted her to be at home, told her that he didn’t like her going out at night or, eventually, at all, and would find ways to keep her home every night so she didn’t go out. during this time he also started getting. um. very manipulative. he was easily triggered into starting arguments. so she increased the frequency of her self-defense classes and, eventually, they became Very Useful in an argument with her husband. so. we hate him :)

after that she filed for a divorce, moved away and changed her name to her late grandmother’s last name. she started working at a gym in her new town and eventually decided to open her own ! she had gotten the building about 2-3 weeks before the outbreak hit and didn’t have any furniture or equipment of any kind, so she met up with 2 middle-aged women from her old gym and they travelled together until one of them was bitten in a fight with walkers and dragged into a big crowd of them to be eaten and the other one was bitten and margot had to shoot her when she got zombified and tried to attack. :(

that’s where i have left off for now but i am going to develop her More the more i watch the show !!!

okay. backstory over. now for the fun bits:

her faceclaim is mackenzie davis specifically in terminator (without the. lines on her arms and whatever idk what those are) and this picture is the most margot-vibe imaginable.

the haircut was an incredibly recent choice but it came in handy during the outbreak because she didn’t have to worry about keeping hair out of her face. girlboss !

she is 6′2 :) her and her husband were funnily enough the 2 tallest people in her graduating class

she spoke occasionally to her parents after graduating and moving away but they fell out of touch a year or so before the outbreak began and she......................... unsurprisingly doesn’t miss them at all

she has 1 keepsake and it’s an old keychain of her grandpa’s and if anything happens to it. she will kill everyone in any room and Then herself !!!

she likes to where tank tops to show off her big arms. is this very ergonomical in the apocalypse where zombie bites can kill you instantly ? nope! will she do it anyway to intimidate people ? yup!

she Cannot cook. at all. she lived off of take-out and microwavable meals for the first 20 years of her life and then she always had someone else making food for her until she moved away on her own when it was back to takeout.

on the topic of food :) her fave foods are mac and cheese with breadcrumbs and meatlover’s pizza !

she will do literally anything for a good beer. anything. she keeps an eye out for them every time she goes scavenging in buildings and will try to get at least 1 bottle per trip. girlboss !

she cannot sing. in fact she’s not just average, she’s Terrible. she can, however, play mad guitar because her grandpa taught her.

now onto miss lila :)

she was born in a town a couple over from rick’s and was the younger sister of 2 ! she had a really great family and a very very happy childhood :) her dad was a wildlife rehabilitator and her mom was a landscaper who took a lot of pride in their nice big backyard and garden and Land where they. you know. rehabiliated the wildlife and what not

she worked a lot with her dad and mom at their wildlife centre and also helped her mom garden a lot (their house was on the same property as the centre so it was a nice big plot of land). she took a lot of interest in rehabilitating animals and it sparked a very early childhood interest in Caring for things (namely little wild critters) which extended to her helping out little kids on the playground when they got scraped knees and things. she always had a package of bandaids in her backpack from second grade on. an angel <3

in her final year of high school she had a very quick fling with a boy from her high school that ended… poorly. and then she got pregnant! which she. Did not expect. nor want. nor need in her life because she was planning on moving to atlanta to go to medical school and kickstart her career. her sister, who had recently dropped out of school and lost her job, decided to Take One for the team and claim the baby as hers so lila could go to medical school and stuff. their parents promised to take good care of her and they all made a plan to hide lila’s pregnancy from their town (although i’m sure literally everyone knows anyway) and then she moved away in the summer after giving birth to go to school

she quickly finished up her nursing program but was out of job for a few years until she got a job offer to be the nurse at king county elementary school aka the school were one Carl Grimes goes to school. she moved there in may and one night, when her car Squealed to a stop in front of a dog who had run away from his home and was being chased by. Um. a certain sheriff’s deputy who was intending on bringing the puppy back home <3 they got to talking and. Well. the rest is history…..

she was a very beloved member of the staff and kids would often fake sick just to come to her office and get a sucker and she grew esp close to the grimes family :D after a couple of years living in king county she got a job to start working at some fancy prep school in atlanta and decided that actually she might want to. You know. start being a mom now that she was finished with school and had a career. so she moved away from king county at the end of the next school year and was unfortunately in atlanta when it was bombed by the government at the start of the outbreak so she and her daughter and sister all died :) and that’s that !

some fun facts because that was a very depressing end to her story:

she always has suckers in her office at school and her favourites are the watermelon ones.

she can often be found gardening in her backyard or watching the birds in the trees like a little nature baby !!!

she is very meticulous about planning. she Does have a daily agenda. she Will kill you if you touch it. shane likes to leave her little notes in it for her to find when she’s at school. sometimes they are not Just cute. she usually erases those.

she likes collecting ugly thrift store paintings of animals and hangs them up in her dining room and she Does think they are incredibly funny.

she is a vegetarian !!! very unwavering about it. shane finds it annoying because he’s good at cooking steak but she just has a salad and then they’re both perfectly happy <3

sends basically everyone she knows a Christmas/holiday card every year. even the teachers at the elementary school who don’t like her and or barely talk to her !!!

she is a terrible maker of tea and usually forgets about cups before she’s even halfway through them (thank god for her). makes everyone tea when they come over except shane (stupid ass) because he doesn’t like it and usually people just politely swallow it even though it’s too steeped or. sorry idk how tea works. she just Makes It Bad ok

she perpetually forgets to do laundry. Most of her non-scrubs have dirt stains or dressing stains or whatnot (except for her Really nice clothes) which is why she tries to buy a lot of patterns. makes things easier to hide <3

and that’s it for now !!! i have so much other lore for them but i will stop here for now :) thank you very much if you read this also i’m very sorry i have twd brainworms i cannot help it. anyway ok that’s it thanks love you bye

#me writing nearly 2k of oc facts that is literally nothing more than comprehensible gibberish ? yes #also ig i'm just a villainfucker now sorry not sorry babes can't be helped when your villains are mr. jon bernthal :/#BUT ALSO we only stan pre-outbreak. after that he is dead to me so.#ANYWAY YEAH JESUS CHRIST these are probably shitty backstories and also just um lame ocs but <3 that's that #oc: margot #oc: lila #ask #thank u jasmine.... i love u

13 notes · View notes

scarlettrose0 · 3 years

Text

This is an response to people who claim that abortion is an constitutional right.

“Decisions of the U.S. Supreme Court rarely attract much public interest. One news cycle and a few op-eds are probably the norm for even the most important and sweeping decisions.

But one Supreme Court decision eclipses all others in the past century. Far from being forgotten, in the almost 50 years since Roe v. Wade announced that the “constitutional” right to privacy encompasses a woman’s decision to abort her child, including late-term abortions, its fame (or infamy) just keeps growing.

How Roe is Perceived

For many Americans, Roe is a symptom of and catalyst for a continuing decline in American culture and institutions. It represents a tragic failure of the government, an abdication of its duty to defend the vulnerable and innocent. The judicially-created regime permitting abortion on request throughout all nine months of pregnancy has eroded principles on which this nation was founded – the sanctity of life, the equal dignity of all, and impartial justice. Even the fundamental principle of self-government is shaken when unelected judges can overturn the will of the people expressed in the laws of 50 states – as evidenced by the nearly 500 bills affirming life that have been advanced just this year in state legislatures.[1] And how does one begin to assess the meaning and impact of destroying the lives of over 60 million children in the United States?

Many other Americans hold a very different view of Roe v. Wade. They see Roe as being immutable, permanent, and “settled law.” Abortion is, they argue, a constitutional right. End of discussion. In the decades after Roe, the abortion license has been elevated by some to the stature of “freedom of speech,” “trial by jury,” and other bedrock American principles.

It is not surprising that many people share this distorted view of Supreme Court precedent allowing late term abortions. For almost 50 years the abortion industry has refined and perfected this message. Advocates like Planned Parenthood’s former president, Gloria Feldt, proclaimed (with no apparent irony) that through Roe “women were guaranteed the basic human right to make their own childbearing choices – a right as intrinsic as the right to breathe and to walk, to work and to think, to speak our truths, to thrive, to learn, and to love.”[2] What “love” has to do with paying an abortion provider to kill and dispose of your unborn child is anyone’s guess.

Protecting this “right” to late-term abortions has also become a lodestar for abortion advocates and the politicians who support their agenda. Any event or policy affecting a child before or near birth is minutely scrutinized for its potential to undermine Roe v. Wade. Anyone and anything that threatens the shaky “constitutionality” of Roe must be stopped. For example, state laws that punish violent attacks on unborn children and their mothers are ironically denounced by abortion advocates as schemes designed to chip away at the constitutional rights of women. Even expanding eligibility under the State Children’s Health Insurance Program to provide prenatal care to children from conception onward is condemned as “a guerilla attack on abortion rights.”[3]

Allegiance to maintaining late-term abortions has become the sine qua nonfor presidential and even congressional aspirants of one political party. Pro-life Democrats on Capitol Hill are now about as common as unicorns. Fealty to abortion has become a litmus test used by many politicians in evaluating judicial nominees. Individuals who have received the American Bar Association’s highest recommendation based on their knowledge of law, their integrity and judicial temperament have been put through a “high-tech lynching” (as Justice Clarence Thomas described his confirmation hearings), personal smears (Justice Brett Kavanaugh), and attacks on one’s religious beliefs and practices (Justice Amy Coney Barrett). Who can forget Sen. Dianne Feinstein’s opposition to Justice Coney Barrett because “The [Catholic] dogma lives loudly within you…”?

Ignoring the fact that judges are supposed to be impartial and not prejudge cases that come before them, candidate Hillary Clinton in 2016 unapologetically announced having a pro-abortion litmus test for judicial nominees. In the 2019-2020 campaign season, numerous Democratic presidential candidates abandoned all pretense of selecting future judges based on their legal knowledge, integrity, impartiality, temperament, etc. What really mattered was that the nominees would “honor the Constitution” and precedent like Roe.[4]

But are the Constitution and abortion case law really synonymous? This article addresses these questions and the widespread assumption that Roe deserves a measure of deference as a landmark of constitutional law (notwithstanding its immoral outcome). Legally speaking, Roe began the judicial intervention into abortion policy and led to the continuation of late-term abortions. Few decisions in the history of the Supreme Court have cried out so loudly for review, on both moral and legal grounds.

Who Says So?

Among the legal scholars who have roundly criticized the Court’s ruling in Roe as not being grounded in the U.S. Constitution are the following:

Six justices of the U.S. Supreme Court – unfortunately not simultaneously seated – Justices White, Rehnquist, Scalia, Thomas, Kennedy[5] and O’Connor.[6]

Virtually every recognized constitutional scholar who has published a book or article on Roe – including many, like Harvard’s Laurence Tribe, who support Roe’s outcome on other grounds (although he has switched grounds over the years).[7]

The late Constitutional law professor John Hart Ely (Yale, Harvard, and Stanford law schools) stated: Roe v. Wade “is bad because it is bad constitutional law, or rather because it is not constitutional law and gives almost no sense of an obligation to try to be”[8]; and

Edward Lazarus, a former law clerk to Roe’s author, Justice Harry Blackmun, who writes:

As a matter of constitutional interpretation and judicial method, Roeborders on the indefensible. I say this as someone utterly committed to the right to choose, as someone who believes such a right has grounding elsewhere in the Constitution instead of where Roe placed it, and as someone who loved Roe‘s author like a grandfather. …

What, exactly, is the problem with Roe? The problem, I believe, is that it has little connection to the Constitutional right it purportedly interpreted. A constitutional right to privacy broad enough to include abortion has no meaningful foundation in constitutional text, history, or precedent. … The proof of Roe’s failings comes not from the writings of those unsympathetic to women’s rights, but from the decision itself and the friends who have tried to sustain it. Justice Blackmun’s opinion provides essentially no reasoning in support of its holding. And in the … years since Roe’s announcement, no one has produced a convincing defense of Roe on its own terms.[9]

Ten Legal Reasons to Reject Roe

1. The Court’s decision in Roe v. Wade exceeded its constitutional authority.

Under the legal system established by the United States Constitution, the power to make laws is vested in Congress and retained by state legislatures. It is not the role of the Supreme Court to substitute the policy preferences of its members for those expressed in laws enacted by the people’s elected representatives. The role of the judiciary in constitutional review is to determine if the law being challenged infringes on a constitutionally protected right.

Justice O’Connor reiterates this principle, quoting Chief Justice Warren Burger:

Irrespective of what we may believe is wise or prudent policy in this difficult area, “the Constitution does not constitute us as ‘Platonic Guardians’ nor does it vest in this Court the authority to strike down laws because they do not meet our standards of desirable social policy, ‘wisdom,’ or ‘common sense.’”[10]

In Roe v. Wade and its companion case, Doe v. Bolton, however, the Court struck down criminal laws of Texas and Georgia which outlawed certain abortions by finding that these laws (and those of the other 48 states) violated a “right of privacy” that “is broad enough to encompass a woman’s decision whether or not to terminate her pregnancy.” Such a right is nowhere mentioned in the Constitution nor derivable from values embodied therein.

In his dissenting opinion in Doe v. Bolton, Justice Byron White, joined by Justice William Rehnquist, wrote:

I find nothing in the language or history of the Constitution to support the Court’s judgment. The Court simply fashions and announces a new constitutional right for pregnant mothers … and, with scarcely any reason or authority for its action, invests that right with sufficient substance to override most existing state abortion statutes. The upshot is that the people and the legislatures of the 50 states are constitutionally disentitled to weigh the relative importance of the continued existence and development of the fetus, on the one hand, against a spectrum of possible impacts on the mother, on the other hand. As an exercise of raw judicial power, the Court perhaps has authority to do what it does today; but, in my view, its judgment is an improvident and extravagant exercise of the power of judicial review that the Constitution extends to this Court.

2. The Court misrepresents the history of abortion practice and attitudes toward abortion.

The apparent purpose of the Roe opinion’s long historical excursion is to create the impression that abortion had been widely practiced and unpunished until the appearance of restrictive laws in the prudishly Victorian 19th century. One example is adequate to show how distorted is Justice Harry Blackmun’s rendition of history. He must overcome a huge hurdle in the person of Hippocrates, the “Father of Medicine,” and his famous Oath which guided medical ethics for over 2,000 years. The Oath provides in part: “I will give no deadly medicine to anyone if asked, nor suggest any such counsel; and in like manner I will not give to a woman a pessary to produce abortion.”[11] This enduring standard was followed until the Roe era and is reflected in Declarations of the World Medical Association through 1968: “I will maintain the utmost respect for human life, from the time of conception.…”[12] But Justice Blackmun dismisses this universal, unbroken ethical tradition as nothing more than the manifesto of a fringe Greek sect, the Pythagoreans, to which Hippocrates is alleged by someone to have belonged.

3. The majority opinion in Roewrongly characterizes the common law of England regarding the status of abortion.

The Court’s strained analysis and its conclusion – “it now appears doubtful that abortion was ever firmly established as a common-law crime even with respect to the destruction of a quick fetus” – are rejected by many legal scholars.[13]

William Blackstone’s Commentaries on the Laws of England (1765-1769), an exhaustive and definitive discussion of English common law as it was adopted by the United States, shows that the lives of unborn children were valued and protected, even if their beginning point was still thought to be “quickening” rather than conception:

Life is the immediate gift of God, a right inherent by nature in every individual; and it begins in contemplation of law as soon as the infant is able to stir in the mother’s womb. For if a woman is quick with child, and by a potion, or otherwise, killeth it in her womb … this, though not murder, was by the ancient law homicide or manslaughter. But at present it is not looked upon in quite so atrocious a light, though it remains a very heinous misdemeanor.[14]

Until well into the 19th century, it was assumed that a child’s life may not begin – and certainly could not be proven to have begun to satisfy criminal evidentiary standards – prior to the time his or her movements were felt by the mother (“quickening”), at approximately 16-18 weeks’ gestation. The Roe Court looks at the distinction in common law concerning abortions attempted before or after “quickening,” and wrongly infers that the law allowed women great latitude to abort their children in the early months of pregnancy. This is akin to claiming that people had a general right to spread computer viruses before laws were enacted criminalizing such acts.

4. The Court distorts the purpose and legal weight of state criminal abortion statutes.

In the 19th century, in virtually every state and territory, laws were enacted to define abortion as a crime throughout pregnancy. They contained only narrow exceptions, generally permitting abortion only if needed to preserve the mother’s life. The primary reason for stricter abortion laws, according to their legislative histories, was to afford greater protection to unborn children. This reflected a heightened appreciation of prenatal life based on new medical knowledge. It is significant that the medical profession spearheaded efforts to afford greater protection to unborn lives than had been recognized under the common law’s archaic “quickening” distinction.

The existence of such laws, and their clear purpose of protecting the unborn, rebuts the Court’s claim that abortion has always been considered a liberty enjoyed by women. These laws show broad acceptance of the view that the life of an unborn child is valuable and should be protected unless the mother’s life is at risk. In that case, of course, both mother and child were likely to perish, given the primitive care then available for infants born prematurely.

How does the Court get around the impressive body of laws giving clear effect to the states’ interest in protecting unborn lives? It attempts to devalue them by ascribing a completely different purpose: the desire to protect the mother’s life and health from a risky surgical procedure. Applying the maxim “if the reason for a law has ceased to exist, the law no longer serves any purpose,” the Court declares that abortion is now “safer than childbirth.” Therefore, laws banning abortion have outlived their purpose. Incidentally, the “safer than childbirth” claim has been found to be unsupported due to a gross definitional distortion of “maternal mortality” and shoddy statistics on abortion-related deaths, explored in other articles.[15]

5. A privacy right to decide to have an abortion has no foundation in the text or history of the Constitution.

Roe v. Wade locates a pregnant woman’s “constitutional” right of privacy to decide whether or not to abort her child either “in the Fourteenth Amendment’s concept of personal liberty …, as we feel it is, or … in the Ninth Amendment’s reservation of rights to the people.”

The Court does not even make a pretense of examining the intent of the drafters of the Fourteenth Amendment, to determine if it was meant to protect a privacy interest in abortion. Clearly it was not. The Fourteenth Amendment was not intended to create any new rights, but to secure to all persons, notably including freed slaves and their descendants, the rights and liberties already guaranteed by the Constitution.

Several rhetorical devices are used to mask this absence of constitutional grounding. The Court mentions several specifically enumerated rights which concern an aspect of privacy, for example, the Fourth Amendment’s “right of the people to be secure in their houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures.” However, the Court fails to connect these to the newly found “right” to abortion because no logical connection exists.

Justice Blackmun attempts to graft abortion onto the line of decisions recognizing privacy/liberty rights in the following spheres: marriage (Loving v. Virginia, striking down a state ban on interracial marriage); childrearing (Meyer v. Nebraska and Pierce v. Society of Sisters, upholding parental decision-making regarding their children’s education); procreation (Skinner v. Oklahoma, finding unconstitutional a state law mandating sterilization of inmates found guilty of certain crimes); and contraceptive use by a married couple (Griswold v. Connecticut). Certainly, marriage and building and raising a family are fundamental aspects of human life that predate human laws and nations. They are implicit in the concept of liberty and the pursuit of happiness, although even these rights are subject to state limitation, such as laws against bigamy, incest, and child abuse and neglect.

But abortion does not fit neatly among these spheres of privacy. It negatesthem. Abortion is not akin to childrearing; it is child destruction.

A pregnant woman’s right to abort nullifies a man’s right to procreate upheld in “Skinner.” He is denied the right to have children; Roe permits him only the possibility of fathering a child, whom his mate can then have destroyed in utero without his knowledge or consent.

The fear of government intruding into the marital bedroom by searching for evidence of contraceptive use drove the Griswold Court to find a privacy right for couples to use contraception in the “penumbras, formed by emanations from” various guarantees in the Bill of Rights. But however closely abortion and contraception may be linked in purpose and effect, they are worlds apart in terms of privacy.

In addition, a “privacy right” large enough to encompass abortion could also be applied to virtually any conduct performed outside the public view, including child abuse, possession of child pornography, and use of illicit drugs.

The liberty interest to be protected from state regulation is never defined in Roe. Instead, the Court describes at some length the hardships some women face, not from pregnancy, but from raising children:

Maternity, or additional offspring, may force upon the woman a distressful life and future. Psychological harm may be imminent. Mental and physical health may be taxed by childcare. There is also the distress, for all concerned, associated with the unwanted child, and there is the problem of bringing a child into a family already unable, psychologically and otherwise, to care for it.

By this reasoning, one might argue that Roe’s liberty encompasses ridding oneself of unwanted toddlers!

Ordinarily, the defense of rights requires us to forgo lethal methods and use means likely to create the least harm to others. We may not, for example, surround our house and yard with a high voltage fence to deter trespassers. This principle is upended in the abortion context. Adoption, for example, would effectively eliminate all the “hardships” of raising “unwanted” children by non-lethal means.

6. Although it reads the Fourteenth Amendment extremely expansively to include a right of privacy to decide whether to abort a child, the Court in Roe adopts an unjustifiably narrow construction of the meaning of “persons” to exclude unborn children.

Much is made of the fact that “person” as used elsewhere in the Constitution does not refer to unborn children when, for example, discussing qualifications for public office or census-taking. That point proves nothing. The Supreme Court has held that corporations are “persons” within the meaning of the Fourteenth Amendment,[16] and they are notcounted in the census, nor can a corporation grow up to be president.

The Roe Court also ignored the clear and uncontested biological evidence before them that individual human lives begin at conception: “We need not resolve the difficult question of when life begins.” This is a question determined by science, not philosophers or theologians or politicians. But while seeming to sidestep the question, the Court in fact resolved the question at birth, by allowing abortion to be legal throughout pregnancy. In the same vein, the Court refers to the unborn child as only a “potential life” although, from the point of view of science, he or she is an actual life from the moment of his or her conception.

The Roe opinion states that a contrary finding on “personhood” (i.e., that an unborn child is a person) would produce the opposite result—presumably foreclosing the mother’s “privacy right” to an abortion. But one does not have to be a “person” in the full constitutional sense for a state to validly protect one’s life. Dogs can be protected from killing although they are not “persons.”[17] And under the Endangered Species Act (ESA), people are prosecuted, fined and jailed for acts that may harm creatures, such as sea turtles, that are not “persons” in the full constitutional sense. Sea turtles are protected not only after they are hatched, but even while in the egg. In fact, each sea turtle egg removed from its nest constitutes a separate violation under the ESA, (see penalty schedule) regardless of whether the sea turtle egg contained an embryo that was alive or “quick” or “viable” or even already deceased at the time of the taking.

7. The Roe Court assumed the role of a legislature in establishing the trimester framework.

Roe holds that in the first trimester of pregnancy, the mother’s “privacy interest” in an abortion trumps state regulation. From the end of the first trimester to the child’s “viability” – which the Court presumed to be no earlier than 26 weeks – the state can regulate abortion practice only in ways reasonably related to advancing the mother’s health. In the final trimester, the state – in the interest of protecting the “potential life” of the child – can regulate and even proscribe abortion, except where necessary to preserve the mother’s “life or health.” Health (see point 8 below) is the exception that swallows the rule.

Pre-decision memoranda among members of the Roe Court acknowledged the serious flaw in establishing arbitrary, rigid time frames. Justice Blackmun himself admitted it was arbitrary.[18] A reply memorandum from Justice Potter Stewart stated:

One of my concerns with your opinion as presently written is … in its fixing of the end of the first trimester as the critical point for valid state action. … I wonder about the desirability of the dicta being quite so inflexibly “legislative.”

My present inclination would be to allow the States more latitude to make policy judgments.[19]

Geoffrey R. Stone, a law clerk to Justice Brennan when Roe was decided, has been quoted as saying: “Everyone in the Supreme Court, all the justices, all the law clerks knew it was ‘legislative’ or ‘arbitrary.’”[20]

Justices O’Connor, White, and Rehnquist denounced the arbitrary trimester framework in O’Connor’s dissenting opinion in Akron in 1982:

[There] is no justification in law or logic for the trimester framework adopted in Roeand employed by the Court today. … [That] framework is clearly an unworkable means of balancing the fundamental right and the compelling state interests that are indisputably implicated. The majority opinion of Justice Rehnquist in Webster v. Reproductive Health Services in 1989 states:

The key elements of the Roe framework – trimesters and viability – are not found in the text of the Constitution or in any place else one would expect to find a constitutional principle. … the result has been a web of legal rules that have become increasingly intricate, resembling a code of regulations rather than a body of constitutional doctrine. As Justice White has put it, the trimester framework has left this Court to serve as the country’s “ex officio medical board with powers to approve or disapprove medical and operative practices and standards throughout the United States.”

8. What Roe gives, Doe takes away.

Many Americans believe that abortion is legal only in the first trimester (or first and second trimester). Many pollsters and media outlets continue to characterize Roe v. Wade as the case which “legalized abortions in the first three months after conception.”[21] While nearly all states have attempted to ban abortion at some point before full-term birth, their efforts have been largely symbolic due to Roe’s “health exception.” As noted above, under Roe, all state laws restricting abortion must contain a “health” exception. Health is defined in Roe’s companion case, Doe v. Bolton, as including “all factors — physical, emotional, psychological, familial, and the woman’s age — relevant to the wellbeing of the patient. All these factors may relate to health.” This definition negates the state’s interest in protecting the child, and results in abortion on request throughout all nine months of pregnancy. The fact that the Court buries its improbably broad definition of health in the largely unread opinion in Doe v. Bolton makes it no less devastating.9. The Court describes the right to abortion as “fundamental.”

The Supreme Court has found certain rights fundamental. Expressed or implied in the Constitution, they are considered “deeply rooted in the history and traditions” of the American people or “implicit in the concept of ordered liberty,” such as the free exercise of religion, the right to marry, the right to a fair trial, and equal protection under the law. A state law infringing on a fundamental right is reviewed under a rigorous “strict scrutiny” standard. In effect, there is a presumption against constitutionality. The Roe Court claims abortion is fundamental on the ground that it is lurking in the penumbras and emanations of the Bill of Rights or the Fourteenth Amendment, along with privacy rights like contraceptive use. It is ludicrous to claim abortion is deeply rooted in American history or traditions or that our governmental system of “ordered liberty” implicitly demands the right to destroy one’s child, but this was an effective way to foreclose state regulation of abortion. The strict scrutiny test was later abandoned in Planned Parenthood v. Casey.

10. Despite the rigid specificity of the trimester framework, the opinion gives little guidance to states concerning the permissible scope of abortion regulation.

Abortion decisions that followed Roe chronologically have not followed Roe jurisprudentially. Many decisions have five separate opinions filed, often with no more than three justices concurring on most points. Eight separate opinions were filed in Stenberg v. Carhart (which effectively nullified laws in over two dozen states banning partial-birth abortion).

The 1992 decision in Planned Parenthood of Southeastern Pa. v. Casey could have resulted in Roe’s reversal. The Casey Joint Opinion (there being no majority opinion) comes close to conceding that Roe was wrongly decided:

We do not need to say whether each of us, had we been Members of the Court when the valuation of the state interest came before it as an original matter, would have concluded, as the Roe Court did, that its weight is insufficient to justify a ban on abortions prior to viability even when it is subject to certain exceptions. The matter is not before us in the first instance, and, coming as it does after nearly 20 years of litigation in Roe’s wake we are satisfied that the immediate question is not the soundness of Roe’s resolution of the issue, but the precedential force that must be accorded to its holding.

Instead they jettisoned Roe’s trimester framework and standard of legislative review, but kept Roe alive: Chief Justice Rehnquist’s dissent in Casey, in which he is joined in part by Justices White, Scalia, and Thomas states:

Roe decided that a woman had a fundamental right to an abortion. The joint opinion rejects that view. Roe decided that abortion regulations were to be subjected to “strict scrutiny,” and could be justified only in the light of “compelling state interests.” The joint opinion rejects that view. … Roe analyzed abortion regulation under a rigid trimester framework, a framework that has guided this Court’s decision-making for 19 years. The joint opinion rejects that framework. …

Whatever the “central holding” of Roe that is left after the joint opinion finishe[d] … Roecontinues to exist, but only in the way a storefront on a western movie set exists: a mere façade to give the illusion of reality.

And later in that dissent:

Roe v. Wade stands as a sort of judicial Potemkin village, which may be pointed out to passers-by as a monument to the importance of adhering to precedent. But behind the façade, an entirely new method of analysis, without any roots in constitutional law, is imported to decide the constitutionality of state laws regulating abortion. Neither stare decisis nor “legitimacy” are truly served by such an effort.

Roe v. Wade must be reversed

Contrary to popular opinion or knowledge, decisions of the U.S. Supreme Court are “often” reversed.[22] Stare decisis (let the decision stand) does not prevent reversal when the constitutional interpretation of a prior ruling is later understood to be flawed. Justice Rehnquist’s dissent in Caseynotes that the Court “has overruled in whole or part 34 of its previous constitutional decisions” in the preceding 21 years. It is the Court’s duty to reverse wrongly decided rulings. “Justices take an oath to uphold the Constitution — not the glosses of their predecessors.”[23]

The Casey plurality weighed the “integrity of the Court” (its reputation for being above political considerations) as more important than fidelity to the Constitution and, not incidentally, more important than the continuing destruction of now over 60 million children. Roe must be reversed to restore integrity to the Court, meaning to the Constitution, political rights to the people and their elected representatives, and most importantly, the right to life to children in the womb.

______________________________________________

A version of this article was originally published in the Respect Life Program (2003) of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops.

Susan E. Wills, J.D., LL.M. is an associate scholar with the Charlotte Lozier Institute.

[1] Arina O. Grossu, “Overview of U.S Pro-Life Bills and Provisions Advanced and Laws Enacted from January to May 2021,” Charlotte Lozier Institute, June 8, 2021, https://lozierinstitute.org/overview-of-u-s-pro-life-bills-and-provisions-advanced-and-laws-enacted-from-january-to-may-2021-pro-life-banner-year-as-states-continue-to-reject-the-radical-abortion-agenda/.

[2] Address to the Planned Parenthood Political Academy, Washington, D.C., July 23, 2002.

[3] Bob Herbert, “Sneak Attack,” New York Times, Feb. 4, 2002, A23, https://www.nytimes.com/2002/02/04/opinion/sneak-attack.html.

[4] Max Greenwood, “2020 Dems Break Political Taboos by Endorsing Litmus Tests,” The Hill, May 22, 2019, https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/444914-2020-dems-break-political-taboos-by-endorsing-litmus-tests.

[5] Webster v. Reproductive Health Svcs., 492 U.S. 490 (1989), https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/492/490/.

[6] Dissenting opinions in Akron v. Akron Ctr. for Reprod. Health, 462 U.S. 416 (1983), https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/462/416/, and Thornburgh v. American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, 476 U.S. 747 (1986), https://www.law.cornell.edu/supremecourt/text/476/74.

[7] See Dennis J. Horan, et al., Abortion and the Constitution (Washington, D.C., 1987), 57-88, and John T. Noonan, Jr., A Private Choice (New York 1979), 20-32, for overviews of the major scholarly criticism of Roe.

[8] John Hart Ely, “The Wages of Crying Wolf: A Comment on Roe v. Wade,” Yale Law Review, vol. 82, no. 5 (1973), 947.

[9] Edward Lazarus, “The Lingering Problems of Roe v. Wade,” Oct. 03, 2002, https://supreme.findlaw.com/legal-commentary/the-lingering-problems-with-roe-v-wade-and-why-the-recent-senate-hearings-on-michael-mcconnells-nomination-only-underlined-them.html.

[10] Akron v. Akron Ctr. for Reprod. Health, supra (O’Connor, J., dissenting), quoting Plyler v. Doe, 457 U.S. 202, 457 U.S 242 (1982) (Burger, C.J., dissenting).

[11] Hippocrates, “The Oath of Hippocrates,” Harvard Classics, vol. 38 (New York 2001), https://www.bartleby.com/38/1/1.html.

[12] Declaration of Geneva (1948), amended by the 22nd World Medical Assembly at Sydney, Australia, August 1968, https://www.wma.net/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/Decl-of-Geneva-v1968-1.pdf.

[13] See, e.g., Robert M. Byrn, “An American Tragedy: The Supreme Court on Abortion,” Fordham Law Review, vol. 41, no. 4 (May 1973), 807-862, and Joseph W. Dellapenna, “The History of Abortion: Technology, Morality, and Law,” University of Pittsburgh Law Review, vol. 40, no. 3 (Spring 1979), 359-428.

[14] William Blackstone, Commentaries on the Laws of England (Oxford 1765-1769), 125-126, https://avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century/blackstone_bk1ch1.asp.

[15] See Marmion, Patrick J., and Ingrid Skop, “Induced Abortion and Increased Risk of Maternal Mortality,” The Linacre Quarterly, vol, 87, no. 3 (2020), 302-210, https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0024363920922687; James Studnicki, et al., “Improving Maternal Outcomes: Comprehensive Reporting for All Pregnancy Outcomes,” Open Journal of Preventative Medicine, vol. 7, no. 8 (2017), https://www.scirp.org/journal/PaperInformation.aspx?PaperID=78764&#abstract.

[16] “Under the designation of ‘person’ there is no doubt that a private corporation is included” in Pembina Consolidated Silver Mining Milling Co. v. Pennsylvania, 125 U.S. 181 (1888).

[17] Ely, supra note 6.

[18] Memorandum to the Conference (Blackmun, J.), Nov. 21, 1972.

[19] Memorandum to the Conference (Stewart, J.), Dec. 14, 1972, reproduced in Bob Woodward, “The Abortion Papers,” The Washington Post, Jan. 22, 1989, https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/opinions/1989/01/22/the-abortion-papers/ce695bcc-a7f9-4b09-bd57-8d7efff37a46/.

[20] Woodward, supra.

[21] Michael J. New, “Americans Don’t Really Support Roe v. Wade,” LifeNews.com, May 21, 2021, https://www.lifenews.com/2021/05/21/americans-dont-really-support-roe-v-wade-which-allows-abortions-up-to-birth-heres-why/.

[22] Justice Brandeis said this in 1932. See Horan, et al., supra at 5.

[23] Horan, supra at 11.”

#roe v. wade #abortion #pregnancy #women’s rights #babies #unborn babies #reproductive rights #reproduction health #reproduction rights #prochoice #pro-choice #pro-life #prolife

6 notes · View notes

kalesandfails · 3 years

Text

Gravida 5

I’ve been pregnant five times. Three times, I had babies, and twice I had abortions because the pregnancies weren’t viable.

My body didn’t get it. The people around me didn’t know. I had hope one day and the next day I just felt wretched, swallowing vomit on the subway and wishing my boobs didn’t hurt.

I’d been trying to feed myself because even though my body disgusted me and mostly, then, I threw up everything I let myself eat, I’d been trying to believe I deserved a bagel in the morning, another at lunch, now that I was eating for two. After the ultrasounds where I learned there wasn’t a baby — just my stupid fat body that never got anything right — I started vomiting with an intensity I hadn’t experienced in years, puking my throat raw in subway bathrooms and trash cans, showing up for work and pretending to be okay because what else do you do. Programs still need to be run, patients cared for. The first and truest rule I learned growing up — no one has time for your shit, Amanda — was never truer than it was then.

I just needed this to be over, because I didn’t know what came next, but it would be something different than this. I had wanted those imagined babies, and I was grieving them now that I had just, you know, decaying products of conception lodged in the parts of my body I’d always suspected of being somehow shameful. Now I knew they were, because that’s the feeling I remember most clearly: shame. This was the only good thing I felt I’d ever done; I’d believed for a minute that although I had always suspected I was ruined and unlovable, something worth loving might come from me, somehow.

I felt stupid for believing that now. But I thought, if I can get this out of me, maybe there’ll be room for something besides this immense failure.

It’s not important to this story why I feel this way about my body, or why I turned on myself so violently in the wake of my lost pregnancies that every single morning I woke up, remembered I had a dead baby in my body, and started eating and throwing up so ferociously that by the end of the day I could barely remember my way home from work.

What is important is this: that I know a lot of people, and I knew a lot of people then, and none of them — not my husband or my doctor or the strangers who ultimately performed my abortions and cared for me when I woke up — none of them knew how impossible it felt for me to have these pregnancies in my body, and how the only reason it was possible was because I was throwing up over and over again, on the way to work, in the bathroom at my job, over and over again when I got home. The morning of surgery, I was supposed to have been NPO to prevent aspirating under anesthesia. I woke up, ate a box of pop tarts, threw them up, and lied to the nurse who prepped me so I could still have my d&c.

No one knew any of this. No one knew, or needed me to prove, how ill equipped I was to be dealing with a miscarriage or how badly I needed an abortion or how badly I was hurting myself in order to get through the day. I didn’t have to prove anything or find the words to convince anyone that my abortion was “necessary”. I did not want to continue this pregnancy, which in my case entailed watchfully waiting to see if I eventually passed clumps of dead fetal tissue in my bathroom or got septic and had it removed in a hospital or collapsed on the street from a cardiac arrhythmia, and from the moment I said that to my doctor, no one asked me anything else.

Instead, I was treated like the most important thing, the only consideration, was my well being. This is a basic act of humanity that I attempt to extend to each of my patients now. What would be best for you?

In my entire life, the best example of where I learned this was from the caregivers who scheduled, arranged, and performed my abortions.

It’s less important to me that people can understand what it feels like to be carrying a pregnancy in your body and want it out, or the various horrible situations that might lead a woman to schedule an abortion, than it is for people to understand what it’s like to feel like your life had been made into something you hated, something you didn’t want to live, and then to wake up and realize it’s been handed back to you.

For a person for whom pregnancy is not desired, or for whom a particular pregnancy is no longer possible, abortion can feel like hope. That hope is worth fighting for.

We have to keep fighting, not because what’s happening right now is so horrible (although it is; if you’re confused on this point, it obviously can’t be said enough that people are going to die as a result of forcing them to carry unwanted pregnancies).

We have to keep fighting because access to abortion is a fundamental good.

It’s not an unfortunate reality; it’s one of the best things to come out of the twentieth century. I love that no one has to have a baby they don’t want the way I love that SSRIs and corrective lenses allow me to work and drive and not hurt myself over things I can’t control.

Every person who wants an abortion and gets one is something to celebrate. And I think if that’s what we hold up in our line of vision — women able to leave their abusers without a pregnancy to be held over their heads, children able to heal from rape without carrying its evidence in their bodies, human beings able to enjoy the basic right of physical autonomy, to live the lives they want, to travel and work and exist unimpaired by the random unsolicited feelings of strangers about their bodies — then that will give us the strength to keep fighting.

#abortion texas SCOTUS

1 note · View note

silversavant2021 · 3 years

Text

The Least Protected Group...Single Fathers!

There are several laws that protect various groups in our society, and in various areas...employment, wages, education, etc. According to the U.S Federal Law website, “these laws prohibit discrimination based on race, color, sex, religion, national origin, age, disability, and genetic information, as well as reprisal for protected activity”. However, although they protect according to gender, there is another group within gender which needs protecting in another specific area. That area is fatherhood, and when it comes to their rights to their children after separation, and/or divorce.

If we look through the articles online, and in booklets on custody we will see a great deal of information on what is called conservatorship and in all of these documents the deciding factor is a term called, “the best interest of the child”. In looking at that statement, we would think it would be both parents but it is not.

In Texas, the Family Code gives the father the same rights as the mother as far as custody of the children however that is rarely carried out. The mother is usually granted the position of custodial parent, even if the father is in a better position of stability in order to have the child(ren).

The imbalance has gotten so great until various states are beginning to take action on behalf of the fathers. In Massachusetts, a ballot initiative was created, and approved 85 to 15 percent on protecting the rights of the father. The ballot was an initiative to approve equal legal and physical custody of the children in the case of divorce. This ballot was requesting that “the courts uphold the fundamental rights of both parents to the shared physical and legal custody of their children”. And that state is not the only one requesting this by proposition on behalf of fathers. The Washington Post had an article by Michael Allison Chandler entitled “More than 20 states in 2017 considered laws to promote shared custody of children after divorce.”

One would have to ask; why is this necessary since most custody paperwork state that either parent has the right to conservatorship, or custody? It is because Family Courts use the concept called “best interest of the child” to decide who will hold this position, and that term is wholly subjective. Over the years, this term has been used to give custody, in most cases, to the mother.

Ms. Chandler also states that, “we are led to believe that the plight of fatherless children is caused by husbands walking out on their wives, fathers abandoning their children, and “deadbeat dads” when one of the best-kept secrets in American society today is that two-thirds of divorces are now sought by wives, not husbands”. She claims that the “feminist movement has taught wives that they can seek “liberation” by walking out of their marriage contract and marital duties and still reap the benefits of marriage, i.e. their children and his money.”

In considering the background elements of this controversial topic I interviewed Baba Richard and Sri Namaste Moore, who are “The Infinite Couple” and have a combination of 30+ years of experience, (and success), in dealing with men, women, and couples regarding relationships.

Sri Namaste stated that this basically started with “Women’s Rights” movement, and explained how this played into this situation of mothers being given more rights than fathers in the case of custody.

She elaborated on what two legal rights, which were attached to this movement, brought about:

• Women’s Reproductive Rights:

• Reproductive Rights — claims having the ability to decide whether, and when to have children—are important to women’s socioeconomic well-being and overall health. Research suggests that being able to make decisions about one’s own reproductive life and the timing of one’s entry into parenthood is associated with greater relationship stability and satisfaction.

• AbortionRights:

• AccesstoAbortion-IntheUnitedStates,the1973SupremeCourtcaseRoev.Wade established the legal right to abortion. State legislative and executive bodies nonetheless continue to battle over legislation related to access to abortion, including parental consent and notification and mandatory waiting periods. In addition, public funding for abortion remains a contested issue in many states: federal law has banned the use of federal funds for most abortions since 1977, and currently does not allow the use of federal funds for abortion unless the pregnancy resulted from rape or incest or the woman’s life is in danger. The Affordable Care Act of 2010 reinforces these restrictions, but state Medicaid programs have the option to cover abortion in other circumstances using only state, and no federal funds.

Sri Namaste stated, “Initially, women were supposed to be given Reproductive Rights/Freedoms however a woman had that already, and had already exercised her right when she chose to have unprotected sex. That was/is her exercising her “right to reproduce” by allowing herself to get pregnant. She had a choice to prevent that from happening by several different means.

“Then giving her the sole right to decide to keep the baby, or not, is giving her sovereignty as well. Now she has the right to decide “life or death” with impunity in the case of this child. Even though the child was created by the woman and the man; the father has no rights and even if he wants the baby, (which belongs to him as well), he has no right to it.”

Also, that baby is not “her body”, it is a whole separate entity.

Sri Namaste also stated, “The “double standard” is amazing! If the pregnancy is wanted then, even at the earliest stages, the woman celebrates the pregnancy. She will call the baby “hers”, buys clothes, has a celebration, names the baby, etc. And if she should “miscarry”, (lose the baby), she mourns, has a funeral, etc. HOWEVER, if the pregnancy is unwanted...suddenly it is NOT a baby, it is a fetus – a non-thing.”

I asked her how did all that plays into child custody?

She stated, “Because the woman has already been given “sovereignty” over the baby/fetus before birth so it just carries over when the child is born...she still has those rights. However, everyone should be sovereign over their own life, and when one has a child, that is a “separate” life which belongs to the mother AND the father who made it.”

“Also, because that child is a combination of the mother and the father, she shouldn't be able to make that decision alone, and definitely not on the behalf of the father. The state should be the entity who is stepping in to ensure decisions would be neutral, but they are not.”

I was surprised at how all of this fit together.

In order to get a perspective from a man, from a father’s point of view, and from one who had gone through a divorce and custody within in the court system, I then spoke to Baba Richard, who stated:

“I think fundamentally there is something that is happening here. Once you are a parent then being a good parent is based on time passing and you being engaged in that. In talking about the role of the father, what is happening and is implicit in the whole system is that fatherhood is irrelevant. The “state” is functioning as the “father surrogate” and making decisions as to what the state and the woman are going to do about the child(ren).”

“The father is looked at as an economic contributor at maximum, or somebody that if you refuse, or are not meeting whatever standard they say, economically, then you are punished. The system is already in place that you, father, are here to provide economics so the state and the mother can decide what they are going to do with your resources in order to decide what the future of your child is going to be.”

“Once one starts from a “faulty premise” all decisions after that...none of them can be, “well this is great”, because it is a “domino effect”. Look at fatherhood and motherhood as two parallel lines...train tracks, if you will...equal parallel lines and they must be because they both have equal responsibility for the welfare of what they created. Once we say the only “line” that matters is the motherhood line when going forward, then the fatherhood line veers off...we don’t need that, don’t want that line. So, once you engage with the state those two lines are no longer parallel, and never brought back into parallel. Fatherhood gets a “dotted line” which says “you can pay money but we will decide how often you see the child.”

“Visitation is something you do for someone who is “incarcerated”. You don’t visit your “prodigy”, you don’t “visit” your children, children don’t “visit” you. What are they talking about? Either we ALL visit, or nobody visits. Shared custody by default, NOT an arrangement the father has to negotiate his way into. The presumption should be that BOTH parents will share equal responsibility for raising the child(ren) that they have created between the two of them.”

“When you go into that equation with the idea that “woman create children”, and men- we don’t know what they do...but they are engaged in some level of “malfeasance” or irresponsibility because a child has come forward so now the state needs to come in to make things fair...better...more equitable, for the women. One has to wonder, “how is the state the arbiter between these two people?”

“There is a default belief/assumption that there has been some wrong-doing on the part of the man...the scales are inherently imbalanced and “justice”, the state, is stepping in to balance this inequity. The woman has been victimized by this man through the act of pregnancy and now the state is here to make things right again.”

“You, the woman, being right, and righteous, should be supported in whatever you decide to do. It is impossible for you to not to visit your children because the presumption is that the child is at home, and home is always with YOU.”

However, in the case of the man, let’s bullet point the situation and think like this... “Imagine a world where”:

-You are guilty before the proceedings even start.

-All you will get is a decision as to what level of punishment you will endure.

-You will never be found “not guilty” because this is the nature of things.

-You will incur penalties that are overwhelming in most cases.

There is no court of appeals, the only thing, the most you can get is a lessening of the penalty/sentence but you will have it until the courts decide that you don’t.

“Now where is this? In a foreign country? Or some weird dystopian future where everything has “gone to hell in a handcart”? No, this is what a person live with every day if that person is a MAN, and happen to get divorced from a woman, and there are children involved. Or weren’t married and there are children involved.”

I said, “I don’t understand, why doesn’t the courts give joint custody”? He said...

“It is inherently unfair, and I think that there is a presumption of “guilt” with respect to men who are in court...for whatever reason. When I went for my divorce, the judge, his attitude toward me was hostile for no reason. I am not a criminal, and was not there for an assumption of any criminal activity.”

“While waiting for other people to handle their business I saw many different types of cases. There were people who came through who had committed crimes. I had committed no crime, was only there due to processing a divorce. Me, and this woman, had decided we did not want to go forward in life anymore. I couldn’t understand how I warranted all of this “ire” from the judge? I didn’t know him, personally. We both, (my spouse and I), were there at the same time, and when he talked to her, he was nice, and soft spoken...and then when he talked to me it was, “well, what's this!!!” spoken in anger.

I asked him, “But there are documented “rules” that apply to everybody, even mothers; why aren’t they enforced? He said...

“Because there is another issue as to why things go the way they go. Men are not prepared. Actually, it is almost the opposite of being prepared. They are intentionally unprepared because number one, one of the things that I saw in the four or five guys that I know, including myself when I got divorced, is that they are emotionally exhausted...there is a great deal of stress, strain, etc....and a man has to still keep up everything while all of this going on.”

“One of the things about the linear nature of men is that we, we don't do well with this kind of “stress”. We don’t maintain hatred in “perpetuity”. Even if you look at a man whose been trained as a military soldier...yes, they may be upset about the enemy...but the actual pulling of the trigger, or launching the missile is very dispassionate. This is just a job that he is doing...combatants over there...we got them all right, cool. Let's go home, you know, but they don't usually keep that “emotional charge” every day.

“But it's one of the things about the feminine, and I've seen it, they can hold a grudge. Oh my God...even if the two people haven't been together for decades, kids are grown, and gone on and whatever. And it's like, you want to set her off, mention his name in her presence, and it's just like the day that they got divorced.”

“The point being is that when they go into this court situation, number one, most people don’t have any experience with this...it’s not like buying a car, one gets to do this many times so they know what to expect. When they go into this situation, it's the first time, and they don't know what to think or how it's going to go. Also, all they want is for the pain to stop, and they think that after this, we can be “okay”, it’s official.”

“Most men are at the point where they think, “You know what, I'll start over, whatever car, house, whatever things. I don't care. I don't care about any of that because being able to sleep at night”, even if they have to sleep on a pallet. However, here’s the hinge that door swings on...the men go into this thinking that what she wants is stuff, right? What they find out is what she wants is for him to suffer, and no amount of money, no amount of stuff, all the things that he gave, the “quid to the pro quo” that he thinks is going to happen... doesn’t!”

And so that's a double whammy because then they're shocked because they're like, wait a minute, I gave you what you said you wanted...all the stuff. I let you have whatever it is that you want up to, and including what I considered the most precious...the care of the children. But now he finds that the woman, the court, and the state are thinking, “how much worse can we make this? What else can we do?” Whatever he thought he was going to give, that's not enough, and he is thinking, “Wait a minute, I gave everything so how can that not be enough? There isn’t anything more to give.” And the courts state, “you better come up with something because now we have rules in place that where we're going from present into the future. And now as a state, we can enforce those rules and say, not only have you given all of your material possessions presently, now we are going to look into the future and you will give all your possessions in perpetuity, or until the child(ren) are 18-21 years old.”

“Suddenly, he comes into this realization that the rules that are imposed upon men in that situation are only for men. There are no equivalent rules for women. So, if he doesn't do whatever the court says, then there are penalties and it is NOT that she can’t do what the court says and “be penalized”, it is because she has no rules!”

Personally, I was shocked, and had nothing else to say.

As I began to research further for the solution(s) to this challenge for “fathers”, I decided to do some research on this topic with “Father’s Rights” organizations. I found three agencies, and interviewed the three men who had started, and/or participated in them. What I found was confirming.

The first person interviewed in this arena was Joshua Banks, who is the Founder/Facilitator of IDADS, (Involved Dads of Action Developing and Succeeding), and he is the Program Coordinator. His agency has been in operation since 2015, and his motivation was dealing with families for 7 years as a Pastor. He assisted 300+ people through online summits, and approximately 80 fathers on a weekly basis.

He states, “It is always better for the child when there is joint custody however the system seems to be in opposition to this. It seems that “best interest of the child” always translate to the Mom. A majority of the fathers I deals with want to be involved in their children’s lives, and the few who are reluctant is due to the “toxicity” of the relationship with the mothers.”

His advice to fathers seeking joint custody to:

Engage the Mom, try to get her “onboard”.

As soon as the child is born, go to child support court, (whether you live together or not), so there will be no risk of “arrears”, (even if you only put payment as $100). This is because even if you take care of your child, pay bills in the household, etc. the “child support system” does NOT acknowledge/recognize support paid OUTSIDE of their courts. This will make it easier when you go to Family Court regarding custody.

Build Credibility - Employment, shelter, and a proper environment for his child.

Effort - It won’t be easy, and he will have to “fight”.

Involvement - No matter how difficult it is made, stay involved!

Attorney - If at all possible, get an attorney.

His agency is currently involved with the Attorney General’s Father’s Rights Division; Child Protection Services - Father’s Rights Coalition; and the University of Texas - Child and Family Research Partnership under Dr, Osborn. His agency also receives referrals from Child Protective Services.

The second person I interviewed in this area was Isaac Rowe, who is the Founder of “The Man In Me”, and he is the CEO. His agency has been in operation since 2012, and his motivation was seeing the “fatherless sons” in his arena. He was also troubled by what he saw a friend go through not being able to be with his father...saw it from a “child’s” standpoint. He decided to tell fathers to fight for their rights, and more time with their children. He assists 300+ men through conferences, and speaking engagements, and approximately 80-120 men weekly/bi-weekly.

He states, “Joint custody is always best for the child because everyone is doing their part for the sake of that child. A father’s participation beyond “court appointed visitation” is very important, and valuable to the child. The biggest hinderance I have seen is that the judges will rule against fathers, and there is definitely a double standard.”

He doesn’t have much dealings with the agencies in the area however they have helped fathers to come to his meetings. His advice to fathers seeking joint custody is to:

• Try to co-bond with child,(easier when mom is onboard). • Take care of himself,(spiritually, mentally, physically, financially). • Get in programs to better themselves • Don’t give up,or sign over rights, [you will still have to pay child support]. • Show responsibility; employment, housing, etc. • Don’t get behind in child support payment; no child support arrears.

The last person I interviewed in this area was Marcus Griggs, who is the Director of Fatherhood Services at “The Man In Me”. His motivation was having a well-adjusted dad, and see what not having one had done to youth, and men. He transitioned from working with youth to working with men. Also, he saw the “system” was not set-up for “families”, (which included fathers). He assists 30-40 men on an average.

He said, “All the men I deals with want to “father” their children. I feel that it is better for the children to have both parents, and even research has proven that there is damage to children due to a lack of fathers.”

He states the biggest hinderance to fathers is: • They are not a consideration • They have to“jump thru hoops” to qualify which is not done with mothers.

• Laws are not enforced with mothers.

His advice to fathers seeking custody is to: • Be prepared for an“intake”,which is required of fathers, only. • Get information - know what the requirements are before you go to one.

• Be employed, have a residence, etc. • Have a willingness to fight for their child(ren).

He also said there is a program called “NCP-Choices” which assist fathers with “back child support” however there may be a qualification that the fathers have a “good” relationship with the mother. He also receives referrals from Child Support Services.

I must say that I did note that each person stated some sort of “appeasing of the mother” as a prerequisite to any possibility of getting joint custody, and even a service. This speaks directly to the bias-ness of that system.

In my research I noted several situations, these included the:

Bias-ness of Judicial Systems in Texas, [and in most states]:

-Fathers have to “appease” the mother in order to get visitation.

-Fathers have to “appease” the mother in order to get joint custody, even when he is qualified.

There are NO rules, requirements, regulations, or qualifications for mothers

Unfairness of the “System”:

• If a woman births a baby, and is unable to take care of it, she gets free

“Government assistance/subsidies” in the form of:

• Medical Care • Food Stamps • Finances Aid

• Housing – Section 8 vouchers/certificate • Free, or Subsidized Daycare • Earned Income Credit on tax returns

However, if a father creates a baby, and he is unable to support it he gets:

• Excessive child support payments, and if he is unable to pay then:

-He loses his driver’s license -He is put in jail. -His income tax is garnisheed.

-He is stigmatized, and alienated from his child.

My question is, “Shouldn’t the one chosen to be the CUSTODIAL PARENT be the ONE who is most capable of, and the most responsible in caring for the child with the LEAST amount of assistance from the government”?

Then there is the case(s) of:

There are REQUIREMENTS which the fathers have to achieve, and which have to be PROVEN in order to have visitation, and/or to be “custodial” parent, when the mothers do not.

If mothers do not allow the fathers to see their child on the appointed days, the courts do not enforce his rights, or penalize her behavior. The father’s are sent to a different court for that.

Fathers are required to take “fathering classes/counseling” and to pay for them, while this is never required of the mother.

In my reviewing the “Standard Possession Order and Parenting Time” on the TXACCESS. ORG website I found the “visitation schedule” that is given to fathers, (yearly time given to spend with their child(ren)):

The schedule of time assigned to fathers in order to see their children are “every first and third weekend, every fifth weekend, 2 hours on Weds. or Thurs. each week”, every other holiday week, and 30 days in the summer. This amount to, (yearly-2020):

Regular Weekends = 48 days

Fifth Weekends = 8 days

Thursdays - 2 hours = 4.3 days

Alternate Hours

• Sub-Total is: 60.3 days a year

Holidays Weeks - alternate between odd/even years (additional 7 days when it is his year).

Summer Vacation - 30 days • Total of 90.3 to 97.3 days a year! That is not even 1/3 of the year!!!

As I began to look at the negative impact on fathers when the mothers are the “custodial parent” I realized something. As a mother of 4 adult children, and 18 grandchildren I realize that women learn how to be “good mothers” by being with their child(ren) on consistent, daily, hands-on basis. When fathers only have “visitation rights” that is minimal access. They do not get the opportunity to properly develop “fathering abilities”, to learn and grow with their child(ren), and/or to actually experience being a “father”. Also, if they aren’t as good at it as mom, then they are penalized for not being “good” at something they were not allowed to do by the court systems, and the mothers, who didn’t allow it.

Finally, there is another challenge to this...according to the US Department of Human Services/Child Protection Resources Online, mothers were more likely to abuse their children than fathers at a percentage of 70.6% vs 29.4%.

According to Allie Morris, of the San Antonio Express-News, it is reported that in 2018, 211 children had died from child abuse in Texas. It is also noted that in half of those deaths, CPS- Child Protection Services had been investigating the cases. If the statistics are true, (from CPS), then in most of those cases the mothers had custody. I have to wonder how many of those cases were because the children were allowed to remain with the mothers, instead of being given to the fathers.

Also, why are courts, and CPS, ignoring this information instead of making it a consideration when determining who would be in the “best interest of the child”?

As you can see, there is a need for legislation to be put in place not only to “protect” fathers from the bias-ness of what is already in place, but children as well. There needs to be a revision of the Judicial System on the behalf of fathers and their children for the future.

#child support #father's rights #children #family

1 note · View note

peakphysicaltherapywellness6 · 3 years

Text

Sports Physical Therapy Near Me

Finding a good Sports Physical Therapy clinic near you might not be as easy as opening up the Yellow Pages. There are so many's around and most of them are fly-by-night operations. I know because I have had some very bad experiences with physical therapy in the past. One of them was from a Sports Physical Therapy clinic near my house for over a year. Here is what happened:

We went to see the sports physical therapist, thinking that it would be a routine checkup, since we had been seeing him on and off for the past year. The PT before us had taken a lot of pictures and mentioned that he did well with recovering injured players. Since he specialized in upper body treatment, we figured that this would be something worth trying out. Our first session turned out to be a long one, going over a variety of upper body injuries, with the PT showing none of any progress, at all, during the entire time that we were there. We left feeling very disappointed that he could not even do basic upper body treatment on our clients.

After leaving the sports physical therapy near me, I started looking into Sports Physical Therapy Parlors. This process was much easier because there were more providers of this service in my area. But, like Sports Physical Therapy, this was not without its problems. I had heard horror stories from people who had gone to a Sports Physical Therapy clinic that the actual physical therapists did not treat their patients well. In fact, they were quite rude and treated their athletes in such a way that it actually scared them. I decided that for my own peace of mind and safety, that I was going to start looking into one of the newer PT's in my area.

Looking Online I found some PT's that were quite legitimate. However, they also found themselves in some negative headlines as well. One PT told a group of female runners that she could not get pregnant while at the same time allowing a woman who had an injury to run another program at the same gym. I immediately called the women's local PT's office and spoke with one of the lead trainers about this story. She told me that this particular PT would never treat her patients properly if she found out that she was pregnant.

After doing my research I started calling some of the PT's located in my area to find out more about one2four program. From what I gathered I found that PT's who work for one specific company are required to work for the entire staff of the company if they want to be hired. It also seemed that the Sports Physical Therapy at one place tended to pay better than Sports Physical Therapy at another. So, it really depended on where the PT took up employment. Some of the PT's that working for one specific agency were paid a very nice salary while at the same time having to meet certain requirements.

There are a few sports physical therapy specialties that are available such as orthopedic, geriatric, neurological, and cardiovascular. Orthopedic PT's usually deals with injured and diseased knee joints. Geriatric PT's work with individuals of this age group dealing with arthritis and other related problems. Neurological PT's usually specialize in conditions such as stroke and other types of severe neurologic injuries. Cardiovascular PT mainly deals with cardiopulmonary conditions and heart problems.

Tumblr Wordpress Jigsy Bravenet https://peakptandwellness.com/

#Sports Physical Therapy Near Me

1 note · View note

qbrooklyn1056 · 3 years

Text

El angelito que cambió NYC!

The lack of resources when it comes to children should never be an issue. Why is it that rich children get treated so, much better than less fortunate children? Aren't children, children and they all should be loved and tread equally? This is no where near the case for most poor children. The system seems like they fail to protect black and brown babies, like to them its not as important as finding justice for white baby. When describing children, you think of lovable, sweet and some of the smartest little humans you’ll come across. Children are the key to joy some may say and their pure innocence makes up for some of the most hilarious and memories moments. What happens when you have people who use their children innocence for their own personal gains, and the lack of a system making sure putting the safety of children needs at top priority. You get a dead child and a ton of excuses. Either way, 6-year-old Elisa Izquierdo, who would have been 32 years old this year, but instead is resting in Cypress Hills Cemetery. This would be at the hands of the people who she should’ve been most protected by.

Elisa Izquierdo was born on February 11th 1989, in Brooklyn NY, at Woodhull hospital. She was born to Gustavo Izquierdo, who was a Cuban immigrant dancer, and her mother Awilda Lopez who was Puerto Rican. The pair met in a homeless shelter in Fort Greene Brooklyn, where Izquierdo was a caretaker, and she was a resident of the shelter. Two years into the relationship Lopez got pregnant with Elisa. Izquierdo would break up with Lopez after discovering she was heavy into using crack cocaine, and that was actually part of the reason she was into the shelter anyway. She would lose her two oldest kids to child welfare (Now ACS), the same year Elisa was born. Elisa had crack cocaine in her system and Elisa was permanently place with her father. He made sure she was his world and got her into a good school, but a health condition would interfere with him paying for Elisa schooling. Says the daily news, who covered the whole story throughout the trail.

Should a parent that had been on drugs get their children back? For most, I would say, Hell No, not untroubled the child is 17 and older. This way the child can fight back or speak up against the abuse if its happening. Plus,, most abuse patents, usually only go after the weak and small, because they can't fight back. Now, the same year her mother claimed to completely drug treatment and had an apartment on Manhattan Lower East side, Rutgers Houses projects. She was now married to a maintenance worker named Carlos Lopez. Lopez was granted unsupervised visits every second weekend. This is where her two oldest siblings would tell family, that Elisa was being abused and lock in a cupboard by their mom and step-dad. (Family members did nothing). While Elisa would return home and begin bedwetting and had scars all over including her genitalia. She would vomit after coming from her mom house and would refuse to go in bathrooms. (Information also provided by the daily news), I don't know about most people, but if a child is showing all these signs, something is very wrong. This is nothing you sweep under a rug this is something the U.S. Marshall's should even be notified of. This little girl was being treated like a human punching bag, all for just being herself. Elisa story should be made into a movie or shown at them programs for people who abuse kids. Should also be shown to new parents, so they can have an understanding of the real world. Even people thinking about having a baby Should see this story, so they know how much work kids are but they may also come to realize they're not ready for a child.

Her father is the type of dad I believe anybody wouldn't want as a dad or any woman would love to have a baby by him, because of how much he cared and loved his daughter. He was a real standup guy who just wanted the best for his baby girl. He never could imagine that the person he had a baby with, was the devil in the flesh. Himand teacher notice the bruises, and she said she didn’t want to go back to her house ever again. Elisa also, told a social worker what had happened, and Izquierdo tried everything to stop the visitation rights, but the courts said she could continue to see her daughter, but under the conditions she doesn’t hit her child Izquierdo would purchase tickets for Cuba for the date of May 26, 1994, he planned on moving him and Elisa there. He would be rushed to the hospital in May, finding that he had Lung Cancer, he would pass on the same day him and his daughter was supposed to start their new life May 26, 1994. The director of the school still tried to report the mother after the father died because the school was worried. Since he wasn’t there to fight for her anymore. I sometimes wonder why God took him away from that Elisa, because she really needed him at this time, but even though this story is tragic. It's because of Elisa's story a rules and regulations have change when it comes to children.

This is were we see things get really bad for little Elisa. This is were child welfare dropped the ball over and over. This is were this beautiful little girl will lose her life because everyone around her was dropping the ball. Her mother would get temporary custody after she filed a permanent custody order of Elisa, Izquierdo family would challenge the decision, Lopez lawyer made her seem like a saint, who wasn’t going to use drugs again, and Elisa wanted to be with her biological mother. Judge Phoebe Greenbaum approved permanent custody in September 1994. Elisa was withdrawn from private school and sent to public school 126 in Manhattan. She was said to be “uncommunicative, emotionally disturbed, and urinated often”. Also, the principle at the new school said “Elisa was tearing out hair and walking with difficulty.” In 1995, some ones sent an anonymous letter to child welfare and said Lopez cut off Elisa hair and was locking her in dark rooms. The school kept reporting and child welfare kept saying “Not reportable “due to lack of evidence. The evidence was obviously there. It was supposed to be a caseworker checking on Elisa all the time. Lopez back on drugs and that spring withdrew Elisa from 126 and didn’t enroll her another school. She was in her six child and but Elisa for some reason was always her target. Why wasn't this judge disbarred? This is a slap in the face to any child going through abuse. You are basically giving the abuser a pass to do whatever they want to the child with no consequences. Do you really think that a person on drugs, who beats her child everyday, is going to change overnight? I'm here to tell you absolutely not, Not when they don't even like there own child. I believe a lot of these people should have been brought up on charges and given prison time to show the world we will not tolerate this kind of abuse.

To imagine this poor little girl being beating and abused by somebody that she hope would protect, turned out to be a monster. The mother was an evil women with real problems, besides drug use. In my opinion she knew exactlywhat she was doing, because she didn'treat all her kids that way or even think about doing half the things she did to Elisato the others. I mean this women made this child. eat her own feces, sexually assaulted with a hairbrush, hair mopped with the floor, and way more horrible things. Carlos Lopez would beat Elisa and the oldest two because they weren’t his. November 22nd. Lopez would phone her sister and says her daughter was “retarded on the bed" and she had fluid coming from her nose and mouth, which was said to be brain fluid. She was told to take her to the hospital and she said “I’ll think about it after she did the dishes.” The next day a neighbor came to see what was going on and told Lopez to call the police and she said “No.” The neighbor did and Lopez talked of committing suicide. She would admit that she threw her daughter into a wall two days prior. The autopsy revealed broken fingers, vaginal tear, burns, welts, and a bone protruding through her skin.

Elisa story gained lots of media attention and the Newspapers, such as dateline, New York times, and time magazine just to name a few. Everyone was in some way scolding child welfare services for dropping the ball horribly. Judge Phoebe Greenbaum faced a lot of backlash and claimed she followed proper procedures in the case. Then Mayor Rudolph Giulliani would create ACS (Administration for Children Services). Devoted to child welfare, which years down the line would have a lot of similar cases like Elisa. In 1996 then Governor George Pataki signed Elisa's law which is for every agency whether private or city work together to make sure children are safe, and to also protect the child’s privacy or workers in case of any situation with abuse. This is about the need to increase accountability in the city.

This whole situation is just wrong, so many people failed this child and looked the other way. I guess it goes back to what I was asking at the beginning. I believe poverty can play a big part in children not getting enough love and support from their families, because they have to work and make sure things are taking care of. One thing I learned is no matter what, talk to a child and see if anything is going on. Any little sign of anything you confront the situation, you don’t want to wait until it too late to do something about it. Hurting one of most God creatures is absolutely disgusting, and there should be no coming back from that. I wonder if she was from a family with money would child service had taken her case way more serious? The answer most likely is yes. Money talks in this country and the sad part is, people don’t take action until its always too late. One child is too many to lose to child abuse.

• Daily News

1 note · View note

actualmuslimwomen · 3 years

Text

CHAPTER 2

PROFILES OF MUSLIM WOMEN IN JAPAN

2.1. Profiles of Muslim Housewives

2.1.1. Nana

Nana is a married Muslim woman with two children and she has been living in Shizuoka for ten years. She came to Shizuoka, Japan in 2007 and attended Kokusai Kotoba Gakuin Japanese Language School in Shizuoka City for two years. After graduating from the Language School, she continued studying at the University of Shizuoka and took the Graduate Program. At first, she was hesitant to pursue this study, because it was all out of her plans. But, back on the day when she wrote self-introduction in a form for the Japanese Language School, an intention to continue to Master Degree Program was clearly written. When she was still in the Japanese Language School, her hoshonin (guardian) noticed this and encouraged her to continue to take the Master Degree Program. "Wasn't your mokuteki (objective) to go for daigakuin (Graduate Program)?" That was what her hoshonin said. Since this was originally not her pure intention, she half-heartedly took the entry examination. But, at that moment, she had a partner, who is also her current husband, who helped her a lot in going through the exam until she passed the exam.

Having the decision on continuing the Graduate Program has also made her go through a lot of events. There were positive events, and also unfavorable events such as during her Graduate Program's study, when she had a quite hard treatment from her professor. From the day she attended the Acceptance Ceremony, she was already given cold words from her professor. Even when she tried to apply for a scholarship program, which needed a recommendation from a professor, her professor refused to give the recommendation at first. But, with such an event to occur, it actually made the people in her surroundings stand up for her and help her. Some fellow International student colleagues bravely opposed the professor and demanded to give her a proper recommendation, which eventually she obtained along with the scholarship. This was one of the positive events that happened during the graduate school days. Another positive event happened when she got pregnant in the first year of the study. Actually, before starting the first term on her Graduate Program, she went back to Indonesia to get married, and within one year after the marriage, she got pregnant. For that reason, Nana decided to take a temporary absence until she gave birth. During her absence, some of her shakaijin (working-adult) colleagues helped her continue the study and research by giving reference materials. This action from her colleagues was done so that, if she returned in the next term, she could catch up with the rest of the study.

After the pregnancy and giving birth, there was another important event that she experienced. That event was about deciding to wear hijab, which was actually a breakthrough for Nana. Being a born-Muslim did not make her wear hijab automatically when she had arrived at her puberty. Although her mother never forced her to wear hijab, she always inquired her about wearing one as a reminder because it is basically a duty for a Muslim woman. "When are you going to wear one?" asked her mother. And it was actually living in Japan that made her decide to wear hijab. One of the reasons for her to wear hijab was that she had a Japanese friend who converted to Islam and she wore hijab proudly. "She's a mualaf (a person who converts to Islam) and she wears veil. Well covered. Compared to me who's a Muslim since I was born, I'm uncovered," Nana felt ashamed that she was not as faithful to her religion despite of the fact that she was born as a Muslim. The second reason was that, after Nana had her first child, she noticed the appearance of her friends. Nana had been attending pengajian (Islamic Recitation Group) and realized that her friends in the pengajian were all already wearing hijab. She was the only one who wore the hijab only during the pengajian. After seeing her friends having no problems with hijab, such as breastfeeding their babies while wearing hijab, Nana made a decision that she must wear one, too. She wanted to be as comfortable as her friends in breastfeeding her baby while wearing hijab. When Nana tried to wear hijab, her five months old daughter at that time recognized her and smiled at her. This made her even more determined in wearing hijab. His husband did not even oppose her in the decision, but instead he asked if Nana was completely determined or not, "You're going to wear veil? Are you sure?" Nana only answered 'Insyaallah' while praying that she was never to be moved to uncover her hijab.

After having her first child, Nana realized some changes in her life. The first is the relationship with her new family after wearing hijab, which will be explained afterwards. The second one is concerning more on the Halal food. She stated that in the early years living in Japan, she has been eating non-halal products a lot, such as chicken at fast food restaurants, as long as they were not pork. "I even went eating at KFC," she laughed. But since she was married, especially after having a child, Nana became more concerned about halal food and tried to be more careful in selecting halal products. Besides, acquiring halal meat nowadays is very easy. There are some methods to acquire these halal meat or products, for example, by buying at the Gyomu Supa (supermarket for business retail). There are also Muslim friends who provide halal meat through pre-order method, and also halal stores provide delivery services throughout Japan. Other than concerning about the daily-consumed halal products, Nana is also concerned a little about cosmetics. She is usually not very strict in choosing cosmetics, as long as they are suitable for her sensitive skin. But, for aging skin care that contains collagen, she will always make sure of the ingredients first for the collagen before buying. But recently she uses Momohime, halal cosmetics and orders them through an online shop. "The products are expensive but great. Today I just asked them to send some products again." Further, regarding medicines and vitamins, Nana admits that she is a moderate vitamin consumer and is not too choosy, because if it is for health, any options are permissible. "Ki ni shinai (I don't care). Shou ga nai (it can't be helped). Anyhow, it's for kenkou (health), because as long as it is for health it doesn't matter." This was the same with the case when she gave birth to her child. During the intensive check ups, she always saw a female doctor, but just when she gave birth, the only available doctor at that time was a male doctor, hence the procedure followed the same way.

The situation Nana faced was that she had no other choice but seeing a male doctor or staff, which was considered as an emergency event. Even though she says she has no problems with encountering male staff, actually she feels awkward and shy. For example, when she goes out to buy women's sanitary napkins, if the cashier is a male, she would comment, "Why, male?" She is hesitant at first, but she reassures herself and proceeds with the payment. In her mind, it is only one of the staff's jobs and the thing that she buys is women's need, so it is not necessary to be embarrassed. Other than awkwardness that she feels, Nana is also impressed with how the Japanese puts the sanitary napkins in a different covered plastic bag, "Aite no kimochi (other party's feeling), chanto wakatte kureru (kindly understanding). That's good." But there is one situation that she feels uncomfortable with, and that is about the no boundaries in making relationships between male and female in Japan. Especially, in every corner in Japan, there will always be an area with people who wander around the city to find a one-night stand partner. In Shizuoka City, there is such an area and Nana admits that, when she was in Nihonggo Gakkou, she used to pass by the area with her friends. But, after she was married, it never happened, especially when taking the kids out. Another concern that is related with the opposite sex is about going to beauty salon. Nana realizes that, if she wears hijab, she will not have the freedom to go to beauty salon as she used to. Nana often went to beauty salon before she wore hijab, but since now she wears hijab, she will have to have her hair cut in Indonesia or she needs to find a beauty salon that does not have a male staff. She went searching for beauty salons with such condition and she found one near Higashi Shizuoka Station, an exclusive salon called Noah with only one female staff and reservation was required. "So, she doesn't have any assistants and there were no other okyaku san (guest) when I came. So I guess that's how the system was made, it was safe," she says, reviewing about the salon.

Indeed, having children definitely has changed Nana's life a lot. At the first time she decided to wear hijab, she knew that it would have an impact on her daughter too. "Daughters are to follow her parents," she says. After her wearing hijab, her eldest daughter began to follow her wearing hijab, too. The child even decided which to wear as her own dress. "I want to be oshare (dressed-up nicely)! Mama, how do you think, niau (does it match)?" Even in summer, when Nana was concerned about the possibility that her daughter might suffer necchushou (heatstroke), she advised her to wear short pants to school, but her daughter insisted on not wearing them, saying "Nande (why)! I want to wear that one! That dress!" Nana never forced her daughter to wear hijab and it was her daughter's own will to wear like her mother. That was why Nana explained to the school her daughter attended that she would sometimes wear hijab and might look different from other kids, and also that her daughter would not eat kyuushoku (school's meal) because of containing pork and ask for a room for prayer. Wearing hijab is actually an obligation for adult women, but Nana explains that this may be called renshuu (practice) for her daughter and the school allows it. "It's totally okay. Go ahead, if you please." Other than concerns about her daughter's different appearance, Nana was also concerned about the ijime (bully) case that might happen to her daughter. But so far there happened nothing to her daughter at school, and there was nothing more than asking why her daughter brought her own bentou (bento/lunch box) to school and she would politely answer her classmate, "Because your meal contains buta niku (pork), I don't eat it."

For Nana, her children and her family are the most important in her life. She remembers the fact that, when she used to be active in the organizational activity in the Shizuoka Muslim Association as one of the lecturers in their Kids Program, though it was an important duty for the Muslim children, her children and family came first. "But then, my condition was dropping down by doing all of those activities. I got tired easily, plus I have kids too, right? I knew that we were lacking of lecturers, but family's first, so I asked permission to quit." Nana admits that she was quite involved in the Islamic activities with the people from the Shizuoka Muslim Association, but now she reduces all of those because of her own activities. Nana is currently working as a part-time worker in a plastic factory, where she has been allocated to a job in kensa (inspection) division. She works four days a week, which means she has three free days for her family and other activities. Outside of working, she also participates in pan kyoushitsu (bread-making class) with some other Indonesian Muslim women. Having those two sorts of activities and taking care of children and husband at the same time is quite exhausting. Especially when Nana's condition is dropping, everything will be a disaster in an instant. "I'd easily fall tired and catch fever... especially since I have to prepare bentou for kids, too in the morning, so I need to take care of myself and avoid being sick," she says. This shows that family is really important for Nana. Whenever they have the chance to spend time together, they would sometimes take a walk around the city. Once, an unfortunate event occurred to Nana and her family while taking a walk in the city. It was in a crossing near the Granship, when a Japanese elderly woman approached her. "She has such a strange appearance, wears thick glasses and weird hair style, riding a bicycle and then stopped." Normal Japanese people would greet and ask simple questions such as 'where do you come from?' or something, but this woman suddenly murmured, and several times she uttered 'ISIS' towards Nana and her family. Of course, Nana and her family ignored this person and left immediately. In fact, for ten years living in Japan, this experience might be the first of having inappropriate treatment from the Japanese. In Nana's current company, she has never been questioned about her appearance or judged about her faith. She is even allowed to wear hijab in the company. As the only employee who wears hijab, she is also allowed to perform prayer in a place although small, which the company provided her. Her company also often holds nomikai (drinking party) and if Nana decides to join the nomikai, the company will instantly reserve a restaurant with kaisen (seafood) menu. "Anyway, if I put maru (circle mark), the staff in charge of mise (restaurant) will understand what is permissible for me."

So far, Nana feels that the people around her quite understand about her being a Muslim and she thinks that she can socialize quite well with them, too. For example, she currently lives in a danchi (multi-unit apartments) and she is often chatting with her next door's neighbor and her neighbor also often gives some food to her family. This also proves that living side by side with the Japanese is not a big problem for Nana and her family. Well, not only living side by side with the Japanese, but also socializing with other Muslims from other countries, too. Around three years ago, a female acquaintance from Bangladesh passed away here in Shizuoka. "When we went to see off the passed away, we were really surprised. There were no women but only men who prayed for the body. I just realized that we have different bunka (culture), like in Arab, where women aren't to go out, only men will pray." Nana says about her seeing off the passed away with some of her female Muslim Indonesian friends for the first time. In Indonesia, there is a tradition where everyone would gather to see off the passed away, but for the Bangladesh people, it was only the men who were allowed to see off the passed away. So, it was quite a new experience for Nana.

2.1.2. Sita

Sita is a Muslim from Indonesia who has already been living in Japan for eleven years. She is a married woman with a six-year old son. Her current activities are around being a housewife at home and a part-time worker. Sita was married in 2010 and since then she had been wearing hijab. The decision of wearing hijab came from her own idea because she noticed that it was about the time she wore hijab. "Well, nobody knows when hidayah (blessing) comes down upon us," she says. Other than that, every woman from her family was already wearing hijab, so it was a supplementary reason to wear one. Her husband was joyful to hear her decision and he said, "Good, then I have less sin to bear." But, even though this was a good thing, of course, Sita was also worried about having jobs. When she was not wearing hijab yet, she used to work at konbini (convenience stores) and mise (restaurants), but now it is no longer a work that she can do. She actually loved jobs related to sekkyaku (serving customers directly) type, but with her new appearance it might not be possible anymore, so she applied for her current job at a supermarket. At first the interview went smooth, but in the process of concrete talking about hiring her as an employee, it took a longer time than usual. "Before I wore hijab, it was always quick. Two or three days after the interview, they would immediately call me, but this time it took time and I wondered if they were hiring me or not," explained Sita. But it was worth waiting, because after more than a week, Sita was called and told that she was hired. Although she was hired, the people at her workplace were also surprised at her appearance. She said that people would normally think her hijab was removable so that she could wear the supermarket's uniform at her workplace, but in fact it is irremovable. Nevertheless, she was hired anyway and was put in the kitchen division to make sushi.

As previously mentioned, Sita loves the sekkyaku type jobs, because she wants to practice her Japanese and because she likes to talk. When she was hired at this supermarket, she had no idea whether she could have her ideal job or not, but it turned out to be the perfect one. It has been five years since Sita started to work at this supermarket and she remains covering her head while at work, and she talks a lot with other employees. "I wear this turtle-neck manset (long-sleeves inner t-shirt) at work so that my neck is covered. I'm wearing a cap, so my hair won't show," says Sita. And it is actually a warm workplace, because everyone talks to each other at work and they are often having a short break to eat snacks together. They are all talking like a family and even sometimes talk about Islam and Sita's choice of appearance. From these chats, the employees and Sita could get to know more of each other. Therefore in events like Ramadan, Sita does not have any difficulties in performing her duty. As a matter of fact, when there is this snack time during a break, one of other employees kindly wraps up the snacks for Sita to bring home and then she can eat them at home when she is breaking the fast.

Even though Sita is working, her main duty is taking care of her child and husband. That is why she takes a half-day work so that she can have the rest of the day to care her family. Since her son is still in the kindergarten, Sita must take him to the school by herself and pick him up. She will also need to take his son to a les (extracurricular lesson), too, once a week. At his son's school, not only her son is often called gaijin (foreigner), but also Sita is often surrounded by other kids and commented about her hijab, and she will respond wisely saying, "It is cute, isn't it?" Because Sita knows that, if she answers whether she is a Muslim or it's called hijab, the children will ask more and more because children at their age are at the most crucial stage of having curiosity. That is why Sita only answers lightly with a smile and the children will pass. Indeed, wearing a hijab is uncommon in Japan. Moreover for the people who wear it, it is not that easy to obtain hijab in Japan. For Sita, she always buys her hijab in Indonesia when she returns to Indonesia or has them delivered from Indonesia. Sometimes Sita will also buy long scarves at Uniqlo to mix and match her hijab collection. Getting hijab is not easy, but Sita tries not to think about it too hard, either.

Sita also mentions about her other activities. She sometimes does presentations about Indonesia or does work as tsuyaku (interpreter). But, those are side jobs. Where there is an offer, Sita would do it. Sita also tells that she used to join pengajian (Islamic Recitation Group) with other Muslim women in Shizuoka. But not anymore, because there were times when arguing about who is taking care of food or cleaning the trash is longer than the pengajian itself, and Sita just could not take it anymore. "It's much better if I don't come, or else it will be a ghibah (gossip)," she says. Other reason was that her house was located too far to reach the Musalla, where the pengajian was held. As an option, Sita chose to participate in the same forum through Facebook. If there were events or donations needed, Sita would respond immediately and, if she could do something, she would gladly donate. Even though Sita does not participate too much in the pengajian, she still has good relationship with the other women. Currently, she is participating in a bread-making class with some of her Muslim women fellows from the pengajian. Actually, this bread-making activity is like a hobby for her. She even considers that one day she can sell halal breads with her friends, because halal breads are still very limited nowadays.

Talking about halal products, this is, of course, a big concern for Sita, especially since she has a child who is going to school and is going to be provided with school meals during lunchtime. Sita told her child's teacher to allow her to bring different food for her son, because their family did not consume pork or alcohol or anything related. The teacher allowed it and in lunchtime, the teacher would transfer the food from the tappa (plastic ware) to the school's plate so that every kid would eat from the same plate. Sita's son was said that he never realized that his different meal was actually her mother's cooking. In the daily life, Sita buys halal meat or halal products from her friend in Yaizu who will deliver the ordered goods directly to her house, but she also sometimes buys through online shop whenever her friend's stock is not available. So, there are alternatives. Even buying fish or vegetables, Sita can just go to the nearest supermarket, and she does not need to buy from the halal shop either. Although some stuff is still limited, actually halal products are abundant in Japan. Sita says that she always check on Facebook about halal items, "The page is called Serijaya. You can see so many lists of halal products there." So, it is quite easy to think about choosing halal products.

Basically, a Muslim will not eat pork, drink alcohol, and consume anything that is rooted from pork and alcohol. Although chicken and beef are allowed, if they are not slaughtered in the Islamic way, they cannot be consumed as well. Even a capsule of medicine is considered to be questionable for consumption. This capsule may be made from pork's part and then turned into a gelatin, which is then used as the part of the capsule. This kind of medicine is inconsumable and need to be avoided. The Japanese might be curious as to why Muslims cannot consume pork or alcohol. Regarding this, Sita is often asked the following questions. "Still confused to answer properly in details. I usually only answer because it's God's command and I'm only performing my duty to fulfill it," she explains. Other Muslim's duties include performing prayer, fasting and wearing hijab for the women. Each and every duty has its own rules. For Muslim women, once they wear hijab, they must not show their hair and other body parts and have physical contact with the opposite sex who is not a blood-relative. Other than husband, son, father, grandfather and uncle, a woman cannot show her body to them. After wearing hijab, Sita does not go to beauty salon anymore to have hair treatment. Before she wore hijab, she used to go to have her hair cut at beauty salon, but now she does not go there anymore. One of the reasons is to fully perform her duty as a Muslim woman who wears hijab.

Although it was previously mentioned about the fact that women are unable to have physical contact with non-blood relatives, it is a must but not inflexible. Sita tells about her experience with doctors in Japan, especially when she gave birth in Japan. She often went to see doctors whenever she felt unwell, and at these times she could choose female doctors. When she was pregnant, she went to see female doctors during the consultation session. During giving birth, however, when an immediate act of caesarean section was necessary, her doctors and surgeons were mostly males. At that time, in such an emergency, there was nothing to be done and, according to the Islamic teaching, it was forgiven. "I didn't know anything about this kind of surgery and I wasn't prepared. I was even shocked to know that I had to wear nothing for this surgery, but shou ga nai (it can't be helped), for the sake of my child's birth," Sita explained.

2.1.3. Eni

At the beginning of the interview, Eni introduced herself primarily as a housewife who had a side job. She prefers that kind of expression. Currently Eni is an employee of a company that runs in a travel field. Her current company, CSA Travel, is originally a fudousanya (real estate agent) company, which is responsible for renting houses for residence purpose. The new travel division is meant for a completely different purpose, which is to provide lodging for tourists in the area of Mochimune, Shizuoka, especially for Muslim tourists because there is a mosque going to be built in Mochimune. Eni admits that she is still completely new with this job because, so far, she has been doing many freelance jobs only. Previously Eni spent more time in hopping from one company to another to do her job, which was a freelance interpreter for kenshuusei (trainee), but now Eni is settled. She began to work in this company because it was introduced by SIBA (Shizuoka International Business Association) and she just applied to the company to undergo an interview and then she got the job. The current company's shacho (president director) is also very considerate towards Islamic values. When Eni had a job interview with this company, she asked if she could have ten minutes' break to do prayer during her work and then the shacho allowed her to use any empty rooms in the company for her prayer. Besides, nowadays halal products are becoming more popular and one of shacho's interests is to attract more Muslim tourists to come to Mochimune. Other than the lodgings, shacho also works with the local ice cream shop to sell an ice cream with Shizuoka's characteristic products shirasu (young sardines) and wasabi (horse radish) yet edible for Muslims and other tourists.

Eni also tells about some of her other experiences in applying for part-time jobs in the past. She used to apply for arubaito (part-time job) in a supermarket around 9 years ago and was hired. Eni was wearing hijab at that time and during the interview there was no discussion about the hijab at all. But on the day when she was supposed to start working, her tenchou (manager) mentioned about her hijab, because he thought that it would not be a matter whether Eni wore the hijab or not. She was asked to unveil her headscarf and wear the sankaku nuno (some kind of bandana), but then she explained that she couldn't unveil it. Luckily, the people from the supermarket supported her to continue working even though her appearance would be different from others. "If that's the case, next time you must wear a black headscarf, don't wear the patterned one. Over your headscarf, you can wear the sankaku nuno," said one of the employees. From then on, Eni started to work in the hall area mainly arranging the products on the shelves and sticking discount stickers on products, which means Eni will attend customers sometimes. "I work from five to nine in the evening and that's souzai (side dish/delicatessen) time, the time for sticking nebiki (price reduction), waribiki (discount) stickers, that's part of my job," she says. For one year working in the supermarket, Eni admits that she is quite content with the experience. She could interact with the customers, although some of them would be quite surprised when they see Eni's different appearance. But there were some customers who were kind to her, giving her a merchandise only for thanking Eni for doing such a great job everyday sticking the discount stickers. There was also a Japanese couple, who intentionally stopped by the supermarket only for greeting Eni without buying anything. These were precious experiences for Eni.

But there were not always good things to happen, and Eni also had unpleasant experiences. For example, when she applied for other arubaito, several times she was declined because of her hijab. Eni says that she loves jobs that relate her with the customers. That way she can keep practicing her Japanese language skill. So, whenever she applies, she always passes the interview, but the moment she mentions about hijab, the pass stamp is no longer valid. "It's okay for you to wear hijab, but please take it off during working." According to Eni, around four years ago there were not so much information on halal products and on Islam, so it was kind of a surprise to see someone with hijab. That was why many places she tried to apply to all said no to her application. She applied to konbini (convenience store) and restaurants, but all of them did not employ her. She applied as kitchen staff at a restaurant with the hope of being able to wear long-sleeved uniform or something like that, but was not employed yet. The restaurant she applied to was a small one, which usually let the kitchen staff also do work in the hall, therefore wearing hijab was not encouraged because it would make the customer uncomfortable. But then, Eni kept trying until she got a position as a kitchen staff in a souzaiya shop (delicatessen shop) for toasting breads. When she is working, she will wear a cap that will cover her whole hair and head, a mask and long-sleeved uniform. In this bread store, Eni worked from five in the morning until ten for five days in a week and for six years long. The store itself is located in Shizuoka Station, formerly named Cafe Denmark, currently named Little Mermaid.

Next, Eni tells about her experience on hijab. Eni has been wearing hijab since she was in Junior High School, because in Indonesia she had been to Islamic School since Elementary School. The habit of wearing hijab was continued to High School, even though it was not an Islamic School. She has already been accustomed so that she has continued wearing one until now. But Eni also tells that she once felt downhearted for wearing hijab. On the second year since she was in Japan, she unveiled her hijab for a year. She says, "Because I don't think I perform prayer properly, and then at work too, I deal with pork or anything that is haram, so inside me I feel like I don't deserve (to wear hijab)." After uncovering her hijab, Eni thought that she would feel more relieved from the burden she felt, but she was wrong. In fact, the burden was felt twice bigger. It was when she was still in the Japanese Language School, that the sensei and friends around her supported and encouraged her. "They were not giving the type of ouen (support) like 'Come on, wear hijab again,' no, only tried to involve me with more activities," she admits. After a year of unstable emotion, Eni decided to return to Indonesia after graduating.

Two years after having been back in Indonesia, Eni actually returned to Japan again, being this time as a brand new Eni. During her stay back at home, Eni took an extension of Undergraduate Program in a university in Indonesia for two years. During that time, she did not wear hijab yet, but when she graduated from the university, she got married and afterwards she wore hijab again. It was the marriage that made her feel reborn again as a Muslim. "I guess because there were the two of us now, I kind of feel lighter, easier," she admits. Afterwards, Eni continued her life in Japan with her husband normally. As a matter of fact, Eni really loves to interact with people, and meeting people and sharing knowledge are really her interest and because of that, Eni participates in a lot of social activities. When Eni returned to Japan again, she took a kamoku rishuusei (Special Register Student) class in Tokoha University and studied there for one year. Besides of studying, of course, Eni also did arubaito and participated in a lot of voluntary works. She says, "Well, because of not having children, just like I said, work from five to ten, then I have a lot of free time, because I'm under my husband's visa, which is limited, right? Only twenty-eight hours a week. So, I spend my free time, such as volunteering at Elementary Schools." At Elementary Schools Eni would come during the shakai kamoku (Social Subject) class and explain about basic Islam and school children in Indonesia. As Eni went to the schools, she was really glad that the children's reaction to her wearing hijab was not that negative. This was probably because children were pure, and they would comment anything just purely without judging. "I was often called ninja!" she says while laughing. Other than this, Eni also joined the volunteer group for Daidougei (Street Art Performance) or opened a class at Aicel (Shizuoka City Women's Community Center) for the Japanese people who were interested in learning about Indonesian traditional food and culture. There, Eni would be the main speaker.

In the daily life, Eni admits that there has been nothing bothering her, meaning that she can socialize and blend with the Japanese well and she thinks she has never been treated inappropriately since she came to live in Japan. As a matter of fact, Eni lives her life just like other normal women. Eni likes to go shopping and cooking. Basically she is doing the things she likes. Eni really likes to make handmade items, such as wallet, book cover, and many others. She can spend hours staying in a store with handcraft materials. "In summer, there's a pool in Ooya, right? If people love to go swimming, I love to go to these handmade stores. It's refreshing for me," she says. Other than crafting items, Eni also loves to cook. It is one of her biggest hobbies that is now also applied at her work, serving the guests at the lodging for breakfast, lunch and dinner. For cooking, Eni is selective in the ingredients. Of course, she will choose halal meat, which she can buy online, and avoid ingredients like mirin (sweet rice wine) because it contains alcohol. But when she eats out, although she can avoid pork or any menu with meat, sometimes there is food that might still contain mirin. At that time, she would just eat it because it is difficult to avoid everything. "If the choumiryou (seasonings) contains mirin or something, it's difficult. Some says, if it is heated, the alcohol is tobasu (ridded). So, the alcohol percentage is decreased, hobo nai (roughly none), my friends said," Eni explains. Other products that Eni is concerned about are medicine. She will always tell that, if she is to be given medicines, she needs medicines that do not contain pork. Fortunately, there is not much of such medicine, according to the doctor she consults with. And usually women will also have concerns about her toiletry needs, but Eni is in fact not like other women. She does not even have milk cleansing for her face, since, when she bought it once, it turned out that it contained pork after she confirmed the fact at the manufacturer's customer service. But the point is not that she wants to avoid non-halal products. It is her lifestyle actually. Her husband while laughing even comments, "Are you a woman or not?" because she only shares toothpaste, soap, shampoo and husband's facial foam with her husband.

Living in Japan, Eni sometimes gets feedback from the people in her surroundings. For example, when Eni is fasting during the Ramadan, people will consider about her and ask if she is okay fasting without drinking at all. When she is speaking in a culture class, she will be asked various questions about Islam. There, Eni would try her best to explain to them about basic Islam, what are not supposed to do and what are pardoned in Islam. In Islam, there is a teaching that those who are non-mahram (unmarriageable kin) are not allowed to have physical contact with each other, but there are times when it is pardoned because of certain situations. "For example, I have to sotomawari (do outside work) with my douryou (coworker), male partner, ride the car, it's fine," she says. The point is, if we women set a 'border', naturally we will have the same reaction from men, as long as we do not have wrong intentions. In such a case as going to see a doctor, if possible, we should get female doctors, but in an emergency, it is pardoned to have a male doctor to check on us. So, basically that is how Islam is and Eni always tries her best in explaining about these to the Japanese. And, in Islam, women's privacy is extremely important, as shown in such a case as going to beauty salon as an example. As previously mentioned, there are things that are not supposed to do in Islam. Showing body parts to the opposite sex except mahram for Muslim women who especially wear hijab is forbidden. That is why some Muslim women who wish to get groomed sometimes find it hard to have privacy in going to beauty salon. Luckily, Eni has a friend in Shizuoka City, who lives not far from her apartment, owns a beauty salon for women or at least serve for women by reservation. The friend is a Japanese and this is very helpful for Muslim women if sometimes they need to refresh themselves by having hair treatment. "But yeah, the lady is a bit old, so the style too is kind of old. But, not bad for a refreshing, I could have hair treatment," Eni says.

Lastly, Eni tells about her current living environment. Basically, she lives in apaato (apartment) with Japanese people mostly in the surroundings, but there are also other people from other countries living in the apartment too, such as Philippines, Nepal and Indonesia as the majority. This is because she already befriends the Oya-san (owner), and is often asked for help to promote the apartment whenever there are vacant rooms and Eni always promotes the apaato to her Indonesian friends. For Eni, it is important to keep in touch with her Indonesian friends, too, because God knows what will happen among them. Eni usually gathers with her Indonesian friends at pengajian (Islamic Recitation Group) and shares Islamic knowledge and activities. Also when it comes to important events such as attending a friend's baby's funeral here in Shizuoka, she and her friends would work together trying to see if there is anything they can do to help. But the most important for her is to spend time with her husband. Because now both are working, there is not much time for them to leisure together. That is why, whenever there is free time, Eni would prefer to spend time only with her husband.

2.1.4. Miho

As a Japanese who converted to Islam, Miho tells a lot of interesting experiences and stories about her life. Miho starts with her story about her journey in becoming a Muslim. It was when she was in the U.S. as a foreign student for three years. At the beginning, she was interested in Islam because of her Muslim woman friend. She thought that her friend was such a role model for her and that was why she decided to learn about Islam. She then joined a Muslim community and studied Islam with them and then was encouraged to wear hijab. She says, "So, I had an ideal figure (of a Muslim woman), I want to be like them, I want to be a Muslim by wearing hijab." Within this community, Miho found strength in being a Muslim and felt confident to be one. And then, Miho became a Muslim at the age of twenty-four. Not long after she became a Muslim, Miho met her soul mate, who is her current husband now. She got engaged with the man before she made a return to Japan.

Returning to Japan, Miho brought a big surprise for her own family because she converted to Islam and especially was already wearing hijab. Miho indicates that her mother was the one who opposed her the most in being a Muslim, moreover wearing hijab. After Miho returned to Japan, she lived in Tokyo and worked there and sometimes in the weekend she would visit her parents in Shizuoka. When she was at work or alone at home, Miho would wear hijab in her daily life. But, when she visited her parents, she would take the hijab off, because her parents did not like it. She says that this was to respect her parents' opinion and she does not want to push her faith to her family at that time. Although, while she was working in Tokyo, she was allowed to wear a uniform that was different from other employees or use an empty conference room for performing prayer or even wear hijab, she did not wear hijab when she entered the company. Miho was faced with internal conflict because of her parents' astonishment. On one hand, she wanted to keep her faith as a Muslim because that was what she believed in, and on the other hand, her parents were worried about what people would say if they knew she was her parents' daughter. That was acceptable because Miho indeed had an unusual appearance because of converting, even when she was in Tokyo, she was considered to have a unique appearance with her hijab and a big nose pierce. "Wearing hijab is not the only item to make you Muslim, you know, it's something else, it's your faith, it's your insight," she confesses. And then, a year after having worked and lived in Tokyo, Miho returned to the U.S. and got married and lived in the U.S. for a while. Getting married and being back in the U.S., back to her old community's environment, made Miho's life easier. She admits that, when she returned to the U.S., she was calmed and gained strength in having more faith. After living for a while in the U.S. and having her first child, Miho returned to Japan with her new family. Well, of course, if she returned to Japan, it meant she had to live with her parents temporarily before she was settled and it meant she had to face the conflict with her parents again about her faith, but this time she was more prepared.

Parents' love was everything, regardless of whatever her child's condition might be. After Miho brought her new family to her parents, she got an approval from them gradually. In the household, the parents might still feel awkward with Islamic rules about food, clothes, not to mention performing prayers, but step by step Miho's parents were being cooperative. At the beginning, Miho's parents felt so sad to see their grandchild could not eat just any food, not even snacks because sometimes they would contain pork essence. When she and her family were doing fasting, her parents were not. There were so many differences for which they had to catch up with each other. Afterwards, Miho's parents became more accustomed to Islamic teachings and now are becoming more selective and cautious especially in choosing food for the family. "Alhamdulillah, my mother began gradually to understand, to respect our faith, so we don't have those issues anymore," says Miho.

One barrier after another, Miho's conditions are now in the perfect phase. Although her family having overcome their conflict about her faith, Miho still has to face the surrounding Japanese society itself. Being a Muslim, which is a rare view in Shizuoka, and raising her children of half Japanese and half Moroccan blood is not an easy task, but no matter what a challenge there might be, that must be accepted. Miho and her husband started to concern about their children's future, about the environment they will grow in and keeping their faith at the same time. Miho decided to gather every Muslim she could find in Shizuoka City and started a mission in enlarging the Muslim community in Shizuoka City. If this community proves a success, Miho and her husband will be blessed with two things. The first is to have a good Muslim environment for her children and other Muslim families in Shizuoka and the second is to promote the Muslims to the Japanese society. Miho and her husband were finally able to gather the Muslims and established the Shizuoka Muslim Association in 2010. The community became an organization and there were so many activities inside, such as studying the Quran for the women program, Kids program, and then also the communal studying for the rest of the organization's members. For three years, the activities were held in different places, such as renting rooms or in members' houses in rotation, until they were settled in one place. "Alhamdulillah in 2013 we were able to rent a place for Musalla. With a solid address, we can have solid funding for the masjid and organizational activities," Miho explains. It seems that Miho really strives for a great cause and she is extremely serious in doing this.

The organization is a precious thing for Miho. Just as she herself is a Muslim, it has privacy and it needs to be respected and when privacy is violated, anyone naturally will make an effort to protect it. So, there were hate letters addressed to the Shizuoka Muslim Association, which were intimidating and filled with racism. For Miho, even though it was not personally addressed to her, she was hurt because it meant that people were very 'subjective' toward Islam and Muslims in Japan, including her. It was very disappointing, but at the same time it made Miho and her other fellow Muslims to tighten their bond even more. This was, by far, the most hurtful attitude toward Muslims since she moved back to Shizuoka in 2006. As a matter of fact, Miho experienced many interesting things as a Muslim. One of her funny experiences was when she was approached by another Japanese and asked which country she came from, receiving a comment that her Japanese was considered perfect. Of course, this was a hilarious moment and Miho slowly explained that she was a Japanese and she was a Muslim. "Nihongo jouzu desu ne (Your Japanese is perfect)! Dochira no kuni kara desu ka (Where do you come from)?" She explained about the reaction from the Japanese to her. It seems that Miho has the urge to tell everyone that she is a normal person just like everyone else, and only she is now with a faith that she believes in. Miho has a job, has a family, treats her family well, has concerns, and communicates, just as a normal person would do.

Miho explains that as a woman, she is like any other women and buys monthly woman's needs such as cosmetics, toiletries, sanitary napkins or even vitamins. Miho also shops for clothes in stores like Uniqlo and also do groceries in supermarkets or drugstores like Welcia or Valor or Gyomu Supa (supermarket for business retail) like a usual housewife. But, the difference between Miho and other women or housewives is about buying halal products. As a Muslim, it is very important to prevent oneself from consuming prohibited items in Islam, such as pork, alcohol and everything else that contains substances from pork and alcohol. That is why Miho is selective in the items she uses or consumes everyday, especially the ones that are also consumed with her family. For cosmetics and toiletries though, Miho chooses organic products to avoid gelatin or collagen-based products. For vitamins and medicines, she avoids those that contain gelatin, or if the medicines are prescribed, she would just accept it the way it is. She also mentions that she goes to beauty salon once in a while, not very often because she does not really have the time and she thinks that prioritizing her family is better than spending time for herself. This is also very interesting. Miho wears hijab and, once she does, she cannot show her unveiled look to the opposite sex unless they are family or husband or children. So, when Miho goes to the beauty salon, since most salons in Japan always have male and female staffs, she always ask for a special place in the corner and only female staff should take care of her. But after several times having been to such a beauty salon, Miho found a fellow Muslim woman who owns a beauty salon and would do the service for her privately.

This subject about attitude towards the opposite sex is really important for Miho, especially to educate her children. In this modern era, it is very common in Japan that both women and men are very easy to have physical contact as if there were no more boundaries between them. Miho teaches her children not to imitate these behaviors, saying that, even if they are common in television, that does not mean it can be justified. "Although it's everywhere, it's inappropriate. Because, really, you get brainwashed by those things, when you see it often everywhere and popular, you think you start feeling that's okay, that's the scary part," Miho says. The point is, she wants her children to be protected from things that are prohibited in Islam and they are prohibited for sensible reasons. Miho herself had an experience where a stranger, a man, approached her and touched her hijab and shoulder while standing so closely to her. For Miho, this was a very offensive attitude towards her. She does not want this kind of event to occur to her children, and that is why she teaches her children the basic knowledge about this. Luckily, her children are responsive to this matter and one day they even protested to their mother about a photo where Miho stood closer to the other male than her husband accidentally. "In that picture, when my kids saw it, 'Mum! Why are you so close to this man other than your husband? It's not good!" Miho told about her children's reaction. As a matter of fact, Miho is quite strict with this matter and tells that women in Japan actually have options to avoid these unnecessary physical contacts. Miho claims that she gave birth to her children with a midwife, not a doctor in a hospital. She says that she wants to have a full treatment from female staffs from the beginning of her pregnancy until laboring and post-laboring. In her opinion, this choice that she took was very important because, in the end, it was the staffs that adjusted their schedule for the patient, and not otherwise. "But, when you go to the hospital, you know, the nurses always work by the shift, it's always done by the group, everything always have to go by their timing not your timing," Miho explains. But, even though Miho is very strict about this issue, she says that it does not matter for her to go to see a male doctor for her nose, although she would still prefer female doctor to male doctor.

Miho is also concerned about other things in her children's life, such as socializing with other kids and the products that they consume outside instead of the ones that are prepared at home. One of her children joins a soccer club and sometimes the school will hold a soccer camp and of course in the middle of the camp there would be a meal break. Sometimes Miho would accompany her child and she would communicate with the teachers and other parents about her family's situation, namely the religious norms of not eating pork or pork-related food. Luckily, the teachers and the other parents respect this and they even ask Miho to explain to them what are allowed and not allowed. "They're like very modest in trying to learn," Miho says, "So, Alhamdulillah those kinds of talk I experience a couple times, I feel like, uh, those are necessary and sometimes challenging but, when you try to be sincere and polite and modest, things are just going to be well, you know, they understand." Another concern for Miho about her children is regarding how the children will later socialize with the larger society, because they all grow each every year. Miho hears from another Muslim family living with a child going to the junior high school in Shizuoka, that kids about that age would start to learn attacking or bullying other kids and call the poor child 'Islam terrorist' and things like that. So, for Miho, it is a very big concern about her child who is going to go to the junior high school next year.

Born as the second child of four in the family, Miho feels blessed that currently her parents and brothers and sisters are supporting her as a Muslim woman. She has been a Muslim for eighteen years and that is a blessing, although she feels that she still has so many lacks of things. Since the beginning she decided to wear hijab, she was determined to show to her children a good Muslim household she has. First, to educate the children wearing hijab properly is a must for a woman when she is on coming of age, and it is also important to teach the children to live side by side with other people peacefully without pushing Islam as a faith to other people. It is also Miho's principle to help each other, especially among the fellow Muslim brothers or sisters whenever they need help. For example, when there were several fellow Muslim people who passed away in Shizuoka, Miho and other members of the Shizuoka Muslim Association would support the family left by giving a proper burial service. One of the passed away was a woman and Miho helped performing ghusl (washing the body of the dead) before the body was buried in the cemetery in Shimizu. All of these are also part of Islamic teachings and Miho believes that there are more to learn, not only internally among the Muslims living in Shizuoka, but also in making good relationships with the non-Muslim neighbors and the local residents.

2.1.5. Juri

Juri is a Japanese woman who has been married to a Palestinian Muslim. Before she was married to her current husband, she was already becoming a Muslim. She says that she likes listening to the sound of Holy Quran's verses being recited and that was one of the reasons she was interested in being a Muslim. She says, "The sound of it being recited is comfortable and peaceful." After Juri became Muslim, she married her husband not long afterwards. At their early stage of marriage, Juri did not wear hijab yet. She wanted to wear hijab just like other sisters in the mosque where she used to study about Islam, but she never had the confidence in wearing one yet. But, after she had her first son, who turned one year old, she was determined to wear the hijab on that day. "So, it's like a memory for myself and for my son's birthday, it's like connected," she says about choosing the date for her reminder on wearing hijab.

Juri and her husband used to live in Auckland, New Zealand for fifteen years, before they decided to move to Japan for a long term in 2016. One of the biggest reasons she and her family came to Japan was to take care of Juri's ninety-six year old grandmother. So, in Juri's household now, there are six family members, including Juri, her husband, her three children and the grandmother. With this kind of condition in the household, Juri automatically became a full-time housewife who supported her husband, children and grandmother. In her daily life, Juri mostly spends time preparing meals for her children and husband, and when everyone goes to school or work, she will take care of her grandmother, such as changing her diapers or taking her to see the doctor on her wheelchair. Basically, Juri is just an ordinary housewife, but she feels rather special herself because she is a Muslim now.

When Juri decided to become a Muslim, she told her family about it. Her father and brother were supportive toward her decision. Juri's father even told his daughter that he respected what his daughter believed and that she must have confidence in doing what she believed. Indeed, before Juri became a Muslim, she was a Buddhist but she never really practiced the Buddhist teachings. She even went to church several times, but she did not feel anything special by going to that place. After she learned about Islam and the Holy Quran, however, Juri realized that this was the right choice for her and her heart said so. When Juri decided to wear hijab, her father and brother were going to visit her in New Zealand, so Juri informed her father of her condition of wearing hijab before she went to meet him and pick him up at the airport. Her confirmation was for her father not being surprised, but her father's reaction was, "Yeah, okay, okay. No problem." It was a sign of support from Juri's father, but her mother was different. Juri's mother was against her decision in becoming a Muslim, moreover wearing a hijab. "She always speaks negatively and I don't want to hear about it. I've heard it before and I don't need to hear it anymore," says Juri. Even Juri's husband calls her a racist. It seems that Juri's mother is overthinking about her neighbor's opinions rather than accepting the condition of her daughter's family. Nevertheless, Juri still respects her mother and she never cuts her relationship with her mother.

Juri's concerns do not stop here, because there are more worrying things to face in living in Japan, such as children's education. Juri wants her children to have the proper education, academically and religiously. As a start, before moving to Japan, Juri contacted kyouiku iinkai (Board of Education) to research about which school is best for her kids. She researched if the school has many international kids or not, because she did not want her kids to feel being left out. Juri explained to the Assistant Principal whom she talked to before her kids entered the school, that her children would not be able to eat the school meal if the meal contains pork, alcohol and related ingredients, therefore, she would bring their own meal for her children. Juri deliberately did not mention about her being a Muslim, but from such a request, the Assistant Principal recognized it as due to a religious reason. Fortunately, it was allowed and even the children were allowed to use the library if they ever want to perform prayer. As we all know, Juri's children were all born in New Zealand and that made English as their first language. The next thing that concerned Juri was the language problem for the kids at school. One day, one of her boys complained to her, about the male students at his school who often talked nastily and also about their physical contact. Much concerned, Juri talked to the teacher about this matter, but of course, the teacher could not always monitor her son all the time. Meanwhile, Juri's son complained again to his mother, this time because his mother told everything to the teacher. "Why Mama told everything to Teacher? Don't interfere!" the son told his mother. It is natural for Juri to worry, because she knows that her child has a little bit language problems so that he cannot express himself well. Difficulty in communication is part of Juri's greatest concern.

The next thing that concerns Juri is about the religious education for her children. Unlike in New Zealand, where it was easy to get religious education even for adults because there were mosques, Islamic communities and Islamic activities every Friday or Sunday Schools, in Shizuoka it was totally different. Juri's husband is involved in the Shizuoka Muslim Association, but in the Association there is no longer Kids Program, so Juri's children cannot have lessons outside their house. "Sometimes kids need to learn outside from other people, not only from their parents, because kids get bored easily. Outside, they can study with other kids and not easy to forget," Juri says about her opinion. This situation makes Juri wish there should be more communities that help Muslim children actively learn about Islam. Juri is also reminded of her situation back in New Zealand, where everything was less strict and easily accepting something new, unlike in Japan. New Zealand is like Canada, a country with many cultures and languages and thus makes people respect each other's culture and way of thinking. In Japan, when there is a new culture coming, it is not easily accepted and the Japanese people are too afraid to implement the idea. As an example, two weeks ago Juri went to the City Hall with some Muslim ladies and they talked about school lunch with some people from the Board of Education, kyuushoku senta (School Meal Organization) and other people. One Japanese male told them that in Japan it was difficult to start something new if they do not have the basics or start from zero, because Japanese people do not want to take risks.

Another thing that is different from New Zealand is about getting permission. In New Zealand, Juri's children went to school with multicultural children of different races and religions and they were getting along well with each other. The school automatically provided the children's needs, such as prayer space at taiikukan (School's Gymnasium) whenever the children wanted to pray, and the children were free to do fasting during the Ramadan and there were even Islamic lessons once a week for the Muslim children. But, in Japan, if parents do not come to the school to tell the teacher about these religious matters, the children would probably be prohibited from doing anything without previous consent. That is why, two to three weeks before the Ramadan starts, Juri visits the school to tell the teacher about her children going to do fasting. Fortunately, this was allowed and even both of her sons managed to complete a whole month fasting. "It was very hot this year and last year as well, but this year my eldest one did it for one month completely. Second son, did it completely for one month this year for the first time. Even though he had a little bit headache or tummy pain, he wanted to do it, Alhamdulillah," says Juri.

Juri, who seems not to come out of the house too often, actually is sharing her husband's and children's pain in the society, especially that of her children. Juri's children are half Japanese and half Palestinian, but they have a Japanese look and they sometimes wonder if they are Japanese or gaijin (foreigner). Her children are often called gaijin either by fellow students or adults. Juri says that her daughter is the most sensitive about this. "Gaijin dakara wakaranai yo ne (you don't understand because you're foreigner), shou ga nai ne (can't be helped)," says Juri about one of the comments for her daughter. This is very sad and unacceptable but it is the fact. When Juri and her family decided to move to Japan, many people in her surroundings told her that they were moving to one of the best countries in the world. As a matter of fact, they were all wrong, because reality is not as beautiful as imagination. "People don't know what they are talking about, because here, it's us who face the reality," says Juri. Indeed, after living in Japan, her children seem to have less childhood than when they were in New Zealand. "In New Zealand, school holiday means no homework, here, too much homework. They used to play a lot with other kids, here, they don't see other kids that much," explains Juri. But, Juri wisely tells her children that everything that occurs to them in life during living in Japan will make them stronger in personality, because, if the children have felt the worse, their mental will be built better. Another comment from Juri, "We have good time here, but struggling as well."

Although Juri mainly tells about problems around her children, she also tells some of her experiences, too in Japan. As a woman, Juri might buy sanitary napkins for each monthly period. Here are the problems, namely, the male cashier and his son. When Juri sees a male cashier, she will wait until a female cashier is available, because she does not feel comfortable with a male cashier serving her. But, when it is an emergency, she will have no other choice. The second problem is her son being around her when she is buying sanitary napkins. He will ask questions loudly and keep asking until he is satisfied. For Juri, it is quite embarrassing, because the child is asking about woman's privacy and Juri thinks it is not yet the time for a twelve year old child to know. So, in that case, Juri will wait until her son is not looking at her any longer and she would pay for the napkins. "If I don't do that, he will not stop asking me about it," says Juri. And then, regarding woman care, Juri explains that she is not interested in buying makeups or stuffs, and she does not even go to a beauty salon. Well, that is because, in Japan, it is hard to find a beauty salon that is dedicated for women only and it is impossible to have her hair to be seen by the opposite sex. In New Zealand, Juri sometimes called over some Japanese ladies to her house to cut her hair, but in Japan she has not found any woman who can cut for her personally.

Juri also tells about how people in her surroundings react when they see her. When she was in New Zealand, it was a common thing that, if people approach her, they would ask about her appearance or her faith. Meanwhile in Japan, it never occurs. Instead, people talk secretly and comment about her appearance, such as 'Who is she? Is she a Japanese? Why is her Japanese so good?' This is by far the most inappropriate thing that ever happened to Juri. But Juri tries to take the positive side, because at least she has never been physically abused by anyone. When Juri spends her time playing table tennis with her family at chuo kaikan (Central Assembly Hall), they are usually with other Japanese people, but no one ever bothers her family. "Everyone was being normal," she says.

1 note · View note