Pro-Life Canadians: Please ask your MP to vote in favour of Bill C-233 today

Many of Secular Pro-Life’s American readers may be surprised to hear that Canada has no legal restrictions on abortion: it is available at any point in a pregnancy, for any reason. One of the consequences of this legal vacuum is sex-selective abortions: that is to say, fetuses are aborted because they are not the parents’ preferred gender. Although both sexes are targeted by sex-selective abortions (either for cultural or “family balancing” reasons), it is most often practiced against girls. 

Bill C-233 is a Private Member’s Bill introduced by MP Cathay Wagantall (Yorkton—Melville, SK) to amend the Canadian Criminal Code in order to prohibit sex-selective abortion. Polling shows that 84% of Canadian citizens believe that sex-selective abortion is wrong. This broad consensus includes people from all parts of the political spectrum, the religious and the secular, and even bridges the pro-life/pro-choice divide. It should be a non-partisan issue, but your MPs need to hear your voice in support of this Bill! 

The House of Commons will be voting on Bill C-233 today, Wednesday, June 2nd. If you have a few minutes, please call or email your MP and ask them to support C-233. I have included a model below for anyone who would like to use it. 

Find your MP’s contact information here: https://openparliament.ca/politicians/

Read the Bill here: https://www.parl.ca/DocumentViewer/en/43-2/bill/C-233/first-reading

Find more information here: https://defendgirls.com/

You can also easily send an email through https://simplemail.weneedalaw.ca/?topic=370 

Sample email: 

Dear [Mr./Mrs./Ms. MP],

I am writing to you as one of your constituents, to ask you to place your support behind Bill C-233 (the Sex Selective Abortion Act). 

As reported in The Globe and Mail in 2019 (https://nationalpost.com/news/as-abortion-debate-becomes-increasingly-polarized-poll-shows-the-views-of-many-canadians-are-more-complicated), 84% of Canadians believe it is wrong to terminate a pregnancy merely because the parents hoped for a child of a different gender. It is a non-partisan issue that unites Canadian citizens not only across the political spectrum, but also across the pro-life/pro-choice divide.

Sex-selective abortions are overwhelmingly practiced on female fetuses. This is an early form of misogyny that explicitly posits that the life of a girl is intrinsically worth less than that of a boy. There is no room for this view in Canadian society. 

Please stand up for gender equality in Canada by supporting Bill C-233.

Yours respectfully,

[Name]

[City, Province, Postal Code]