What would happen if abortion was criminalised?

 

There are many people,  particularly Evangelical Christians, who are actively campaigning for the 1973 Roe v Wade judgement, that made abortion - under certain conditions - legal in the United States, to be overturned. The question then arises as to what the effect would be if such an event were to happen and abortion became far more difficult to obtain than it is at present.

It seems to me that one has to look at this matter in the round and not be swayed by any prejudices one might have regarding abortion, based on religious beliefs or anything else.

There are many examples across the world that point to the likely outcome. These relate to the practice of women who desperately seek abortions taking all means they can to achieve that. The fact that abortion becomes illegal does not mean that abortions will not take place.

One recourse is to leave the country and seek an abortion in a country where the rules are far more relaxed. Some years ago abortion was far more easily obtained in Poland than in Sweden. There was a steady flow of Swedish women travelling to Polish abortion clinics. Then two things happened - Poland tightened its laws and Sweden relaxed theirs. The flow then reversed, with Polish women travelling to Sweden.

But suppose a woman cannot afford to make such a trip? The temptation then is to get a "back street" or "do it yourself" abortion. Many women have died as a result of undergoing an unsafe abortion, and the vast majority of these cases occur in countries where abortion is severely restricted in law.

The United States has a particular problem in this regard, due to the huge cost entailed in undergoing a live birth. One might say to a young woman that she should go to full term and have the child adopted - but suppose she cannot afford the huge fees that hospitals charge for births and maternity care, these running to tens of thousands of dollars? This prospect can only add to the sense of desperation that a woman of limited means, without health insurance, is likely to feel. She might well come to the conclusion that paying far less to an illegal abortionist is worth the risk.

This is not an easy moral dilemma, and I will confess to having changed my mind on the general question of abortion. I am well aware that - had abortion been freely available in Scotland in 1951/2 - I would quite likely never have been born. A young wife was made pregnant by someone other than her husband, who had no intention of bringing up another man's child. At that time, the adoption route was the only one available, so I was duly adopted.

So why am I not a "right to life" advocate"? It is because I am fully aware that it is always unsafe to generalise from a particular case, and I am also conscious of the big picture - which shows the misery and death that result when abortion services are severely restricted.

© John Welford

Factfulness, by Hans Rosling: A Book Review

 

Factfulness, by Hans Rosling. Sceptre, 2018. ISBN 9781473637498

There is hope for the future of mankind and the world, but only if we learn how best to understand it. That is the message of “Factfulness”, a book published in 2018 by Hans Rosling, a Swedish doctor and researcher who co-founded Swedish Médecins Sans Frontières and was an adviser to the World Health Organisation and UNICEF. He died in 2017, so the book was completed by his son and daughter-in-law, who had been involved in his research for several years.

The book is subtitled “Ten reasons we are wrong about the world – and why things are better than you think”. It begins with a set of 13 questions, these being the ones that the author posed when he gave presentations to audiences of influential people in many countries across the world. Each question has a choice of three answers which means that, as he points out on several occasions, a roomful of chimpanzees could be guaranteed to get them right 33% of the time, simply by pointing to an answer at random. Rosling shows that highly intelligent humans often score considerably worse that the chimps!

Here are three of the questions:

1.      In the last 20 years, the proportion of the world’s population living in extreme poverty has …

A.     almost doubled

B.     remained more or less the same

C.      almost halved

 

2.      How many of the world’s one-year-old children today have been vaccinated against some disease?

A.     20%

B.     50%

C.      80%

 

3.      Worldwide, 30-year-old men have spent 10 years in school, on average. How many years have women of the same age spent in school?

A.     9 years

B.     6 years

C.     3 years

The answers, which are based on evidence collected by world bodies such as UNICEF and the World Health Organisation, are quite likely to surprise many people, and that is borne out by the statistics that Rosling presents. For the questions quoted above, the least pessimistic answer is the correct one in each case, but very few people appreciate this. The chimpanzees apparently know better!

Rosling has no time for splitting the world’s nations into “developed” and “underdeveloped”. He prefers to see a gradation across four levels, where a population at Level 1 lives on $1 a day, water has to be collected from a distant mud hole, food is basic and hard to obtain, and there is no education. This is how roughly one billion people live in the world today.

However, it is possible to rise above this level of absolute poverty, and many populations have done so. As a result, three billion people in the world are now at Level 2 (earning $4 a day), two billion are at Level 3 ($16 a day) and there are one billion at Level 4 (at least $32 a day).

The tendency to regard the world as split into two vastly disparate camps is the first of ten “Instincts” that Rosling describes in the book, their explanations comprising most of the text. These are what prevent people from seeing the truth of what is really happening, and why – when the Instincts are taken into account and dealt with – everyone should gain a much greater degree of hope for the future of mankind. It is only by adopting the principles of “Factfulness” that a proper perspective is possible.

The ten instincts are:

• ·      The Gap Instinct – described above
• ·        The Negativity Instinct – the media would much prefer to give us bad news than good
• ·        The Straight Line Instinct - trends are much more likely to be curves or slides than straight lines
• ·        The Fear Instinct - proper calculation of risks often makes them less frightening
• ·        The Size Instinct – the tendency to get things out of proportion
• ·        The Generalisation Instinct - lumping things into categories and making false assumptions
• ·        The Destiny Instinct - assuming that Level 1 populations are fated to always stay that way
• ·        The Single Perspective Instinct - it is important to see things in terms of the “big picture”
• ·        The Blame Instinct - looking for scapegoats
• ·        The Urgency Instinct – saying that “something must be done” and then doing the wrong thing

Each Instinct is fully explained and explored, including examples from the author’s own experience, some of which taught him valuable lessons from very bad mistakes that he made. There are multiple suggestions for how each Instinct can be avoided and/or controlled.

One danger that may come from suggesting that the world is not as bad as one might have thought, and that hope is far more reasonable than despair, could be complacency leading to the belief that everything is turning out for the best and we can all just sit back and watch it happen. However, that is not the purpose of this book and it is certainly not the message that comes across.

One area where this is particularly true is climate change, where the author is in no doubt that the world is definitely going in the wrong direction. Even so, despair is certainly not what Rosling advocates. By applying the principles of Factfulness, progress can be made on this front just as it has been on many others.

This is a thought-provoking and challenging book that deserves a wide audience. As well as being an enjoyable read, it cannot fail to change one’s perspectives and make one see things in a new light.   

 © John Welford

 

Clouds

 

A cloud forms when invisible water vapour turns into visible water drops. The warmer the air, the greater its capacity for holding water vapour. When air rises and cools it contracts and its capacity to hold vapour is reduced until it becomes saturated. Any further cooling results in a shedding of moisture as tiny water droplets, which form clouds. Clouds therefore indicate areas of rising, cooling air. Clear skies indicate areas of sinking, warming air.

Air masses sometimes rise quickly and vertically. When this happens they form one of two basic types of cloud – cumulus or stratus.

Cumulus clouds are brilliant white in those upper parts lit by the sun, dark grey in shaded areas. A cumulus cloud is constantly changing. From parts of it fresh towers of cloud rise, while other parts are caught in downdraughts of air and disappear by evaporation of their droplets.

Sometimes the top of the cloud rises high enough for its droplets to freeze into tiny ice crystals. These show in the sky as a frothy, dazzling white mass, falling diagonally in the direction the wind to form what is known as an anvil because of its shape. This type of cloud, known as a cumulonimbus or thunder cloud, can contain up to 50,000 tons of water and usually produces heavy rain or hail.

At other times air masses rise slowly and on a low gradient – often as low as one in 150. This is the case with a warm front, which is warm air gliding above a shallow wedge of cold air from more northern latitudes. As this warm air slowly rises and cools it forms the second basic type of cloud – stratus or sheet cloud. Light rain often falls from the thickest parts of this bank of cloud and in winter it tends to reach ground level as fog.

A cloud composed of small droplets reflects sunlight more than one consisting of large droplets. A silver lining occurs when sunlight behind a cloud composed of large droplets filters through its edges. A layer of strato-cumulus reflects 55-80 per cent of the sun’s energy. The amount reflected by other clouds depends on their density.

The highest clouds, known as noctilucent clouds, shine after dark on clear nights. They are found at heights above 50 miles above Earth and consist of ice-coated dust particles from outer space. But nearly all water vapour is found in the 6-9 miles nearest Earth. A slight amount of vapour is found at about 16 miles from Earth where ‘mother-of-pearl’ clouds can be seen on rare occasions.

© John Welford

The preventive conservation of antiques

 

Old things, just like old people, need looking after if they are to survive. Objects that have lasted for centuries may not last much longer if they are not treated with care and respect and protected from the threats that can cause damage.

The following factors are important elements in what can be called “preventive conservation”. Not every factor applies equally to every type of antique, but, for a general collector, they all have a role to play.

Relative Humidity

This is a major factor that hastens decay and deterioration in all sorts of materials, whether in a compost heap or a museum. Relative humidity refers to the wetness or dryness of the air surrounding an object, there being a safe range within which deterioration is halted or slowed. Some items are very sensitive to humidity, such as books that can show “foxing” or brown marks when exposed to damp, or wooden items that can disintegrate if allowed to get too dry.

A hygrometer can be used to measure relative humidity, and the values adjusted by changing the temperature or by using a humidifier or dehumidifier to add or remove moisture from the atmosphere in which the antique items are kept. As well as the actual value of the relative humidity, sudden change is another destructive factor, so any such adjustments should be made with care.

In museums, relative humidity can be controlled item by item, if each is enclosed in its own glass cabinet. However, this is not so easy to achieve in the home, so it might be desirable to keep antiques that require different relative humidities in separate rooms.

Water

Direct contact with water can come about as the result of flooding, which would have most relevance to furniture items. If there is a risk of flooding to a room, such as in a house near a river, for example, valuable items can sometimes be mounted on blocks that would keep them raised above likely flood levels. Alternatively, keeping such items in upstairs rooms might be advisable.

Another problem is spillage on wooden furniture, resulting in bloom or ring marking. Prevention is definitely better than cure in such cases, so placing flower vases on top of valuable pieces, for example, is to be avoided.

If water is to be used when cleaning an item, it is best to test the effects in an inconspicuous area before proceeding further, because water can dissolve adhesives, dyes, paints, etc.

Light

Excessive light can damage antique items, such as furniture or paintings, by causing fading or colour changes. It can also lead to deterioration in fabric items such as clothing, tapestries or book bindings. The damage is caused by the brightness or intensity of the light, such as through south-facing windows (in the Northern Hemisphere) and also by ultraviolet light, which cannot be seen but is just as destructive.

A lux meter can be used to measure the absolute amount of light entering a room, with this being controlled by the use of filters, dimmers, and so on. The positioning of light sources in a room is also important, so that bright light does not fall directly on to the objects. Ultraviolet light can be controlled by avoiding the use of fluorescent lighting, although sunlight also has a high UV content.

Insects and mould

Organic materials are excellent insect food and also for the growth of moulds, if the conditions are right. Moths do not damage fabrics, but their larvae do. Likewise, the larvae of the furniture beetle, commonly known as woodworm, make no distinction between floorboards and valuable pieces of Chippendale. Other pests include the carpet beetle and fur beetle and, in some parts of the world, termites.

Getting the relative humidity right, and making sure that ventilation is adequate, should prevent moulds and fungal growths forming. If there is a problem, the important thing is to dry out the atmosphere gradually and increase the level of ventilation. Fungicides should be used with care.

Insecticides should be used with great care, as they can also cause damage to the items you are trying to protect. It is better to examine objects carefully and regularly for signs of attack and deal with small problems rather than large ones.

Heat

As well as its role in relative humidity, mentioned above, excessive heat or cold can have a direct impact on antique objects, and should be avoided. For example, resins and waxes can melt, and paint can blister.

Dust and pollution

Keeping antiques dust free is not only important aesthetically but also in terms of preventing deterioration, because dust can attract moisture and chemical pollutants such as sulphides that tarnish silver and also form sulphuric acid. Dust can also act as an abrasive that weakens textile fibres.

The use of dust sheets and plastic coverings can prevent dust from reaching valuable objects, although this makes it less easy to appreciate the beauty of one’s antiques! Acid-free tissues can be used to advantage when cleaning.

Abrasion and over-cleaning

Despite the above note about the value of keeping items dust-free, it is also possible to overdo the cleaning and polishing of antique items. For example, the value of a piece of silver will be greatly reduced if the hallmarks are rendered unreadable by over-zealous polishing, and the loss of fine detail will in any case detract from the appeal of the item as a whole.

The use of abrasive cleaning materials can cause scratching, and, for many antique items, the patina of dirt acquired over centuries is part of their attractiveness and should not be removed.

Cleaning must therefore be done with great care, only using mild cleaning agents and gentle pressure. The whole point of owning an antique object is that it does NOT look like new!

Handling and storage

The more that fragile items such as glass or porcelain are moved or handled, the greater their chance or being dropped. Excessive handling can also cause finger-marks which could in turn attract mould. The leather bindings of books can be damaged when pulled from a shelf, and ancient manuscripts should only be touched when wearing soft gloves.

Likewise, an antique’s safety may depend on how secure the surface is on which it is displayed. The top of a wobbly bookcase is probably not the best place for your priceless Ming vase!

Items in storage are also not safe from deterioration if the conditions of storage are incorrect. For example, an attic is quite likely to suffer from extremes of heat and cold or to be damp. Materials in which items are wrapped can also have an adverse effect, as such things as newspaper or foam rubber can release harmful chemicals when they deteriorate.

With all these factors to bear in mind, it sounds as though collecting antiques is an activity that is fraught with peril! However, the responsible collector appreciates that he or she holds these items on trust for future generations, and has a duty to posterity to ensure that they are preserved as carefully as possible.

That said, the above precautions should not be too arduous to take, and, as said earlier, not every hazard applies to every type of antique. It does, however, behove the collector to be aware of the threats that apply to the objects he or she wishes to collect, and to act accordingly.

© John Welford

St Roch: a legend featured in many works of art

 

The legend of St Roch begins in Montpellier (on the south coast of France) in the late 13^th century with the birth of a boy bearing a cross-shaped birthmark on his left shoulder, this marking him out as being blessed by God.

As a young man he set off on pilgrimage to Rome, with his dog, but on his journey he came to a town in Italy that was stricken by plague. He found that he had the gift of healing but also became a victim of the disease himself. However, when wandering outside the town he was found by a dog that took care of him, bringing him bread every day and healing him by licking his wounds.

When he got home to Montpellier he was not recognised by his friends and family because of the ravages of the disease, and was thrown into prison for being an imposter. When he died, still in prison, a tablet of stone was found in his cell on which was a statement to the effect that anyone who prayed for his soul would be protected against the plague.

At a later date, Roch’s remains were stolen and taken to Venice, where they lie today in the church of San Rocco.

St Roch is the patron saint of dogs, invalids, bachelors and much else besides. In recent years AIDS has been added to his portfolio. His feast day is 16^th August.

As a subject for art, St Roch is usually shown in the company of a dog, sometimes with a loaf of bread in its mouth, and he is showing somebody the mark he bears of the plague, namely a bubo on his upper thigh. At a time when bubonic plague was rampant in Europe, these images were very significant to people of all classes, because the plague spared no-one. Pictures and statues of a saint who had cured others of the disease, and survived it himself, were therefore a cause of hope.

However, it has been remarked that several artists overplayed their hand somewhat by giving Roch not only the buboes of bubonic plague but also the leg rashes and bumps that are associated with septicaemic plague, from which recovery was exceptionally rare.

Another typical feature of artworks featuring St Roch is the pilgrim’s staff he carries, this being a reminder that Roch was on a pilgrimage when his encounter with the plague took place.

However, one aspect of the legend that is not represented in art is the facial disfigurement that caused him not to be recognised. The Roch we are shown is generally smooth-skinned and, one would assume, instantly recognisable to anyone who had known him only a few months previously. It would seem that saints can be crippled or otherwise handicapped, but, if young, must never be ugly.

A typical painting is that by Parmigianino (Girolamo Francesco Maria Mazzola, 1503-1540), which shows St Roch, accompanied by dog and bubo, healing a sufferer.

Tinteretto (Jacopo Robusti, 1518-1594) had a particular association with St Roch, because he was commissioned to decorate the church of San Rocco in Venice and also the neighbouring Scuola (Brotherhood) di San Rocco, a building dedicated to caring for plague victims.

For the latter, the four leading painters in the city were invited to compete for the honour of painting the round centerpiece of the main ceiling, by producing designs which would then be considered by the Brotherhood’s committee before the winner was given the commission. While the other three painters went away to work on their designs, Tintoretto measured the space in question, painted a canvas in double-quick time, and stuck the result in place. Naturally, the other artists were furious, and the head of the Brotherhood angrily enquired why Tintoretto had broken the rules. All he could reply was that that was how he worked. If the Brotherhood were not happy, he would make a free gift of the painting. As the Brotherhood’s policy was never to reject a gift, they had no choice but to accept, and so Tintoretto’s “San Rocco received into Heaven” (otherwise titled “The apotheosis of St Roch” - see illustration above)) is there to this day.

Tintoretto also painted, for the church of San Rocco, “St Roch presented to the Pope”, “St Roch taken to prison”, “St Roch curing the plague victims”, “St Roch comforted by an angel”, “St Roch in solitude” and “St Roch healing the animals”.

St Roch is sometimes shown alongside other figures such as the Madonna and Child, as he is begging for their help on behalf of plague victims. An early example is by Giorgione (1470-1510), which also incorporates an image of St Anthony, and there is a much later one by Jacques Louis David (1748-1825), who is normally associated with depictions of classical subjects and the glories of the reign of Napoleon Bonaparte.

In David’s “St Roch and the Virgin” he is shown as the intercessor between the plague victims at the foot of the rock on which the Virgin sits, and the Madonna and Child. Although Roch is shown with the pilgrim clothes and staff, and the dog’s head can just be seen, we are spared the bubo this time.

Many other artists have portrayed St Roch in various guises, a short list of these artists being: Giuseppe Angeli, Carlo Crivelli, Giambattista Pittoni, Bernardo Strozzi, Bartolomeo Vivarini and Girolamo Pellegrini.

Portrayals of saints and miracles have gone out of fashion over recent centuries, although images of suffering have not. With the addition of AIDS to St Roch’s list of responsibilities, perhaps it is time for a modern artist to revive the tradition and produce a modern take on an old legend.

© John Welford