I’ve no inclination to trawl back through a thread in which many of the comments were very unpleasant. If you have a relevant quote I am sure you can provide it.

If the lady had chosen any location in which there were no restrictions then she would have no problem at all.

There are always some restrictions. You cannot pray in my front room or sitting on the M25. In her own front room or church, no problem.

For the avoidance of doubt any comments in response to a previous post are directed to its ideas and not at any, or all, posters personally.

No but the street isn't private property and as for the M25 apparently you can glue yourself to it and pray to your heart's content.
Let's wait and see if these exclusion zones are extended to stop political protests.

The street may not be private but once subjected to an order it is just as restricted.

Glueing yourseto the M25 doesn’t mean you are there legally. It just means you are making yourself a bigger nuisance.

Political protests won’t be stopped anymore than praying has been. It might be controlled a little to ensure any disruption to the lives of others is minimised.

For the avoidance of doubt any comments in response to a previous post are directed to its ideas and not at any, or all, posters personally.

.

Then you have misunderstood. Anyone arrested in the vicinity of an abortion clinic has not been either for praying or for intimidation! They. have been because they broke a legal order restricting such activity. I am quite sure that an arrest would be the last resort or used for persistent offenders determined to make political points.

Debates about abortion itself have no place in this thread. They are all well known arguments which go round in circles. This is only about the right of authorities to ensure that those wishing to avail the legally provided services of an abortion clinic can do so without being subjected to unwanted interference.

The interests of anyone who simply wishes to pray to their God are not impacted at all. They can do that in a million other places. It’s only if they deliberately target a specific area that they are restricted and they will only do that if their agenda includes more than just prayer.

For the avoidance of doubt any comments in response to a previous post are directed to its ideas and not at any, or all, posters personally.

Possible but probably not advisable.
It depends on who decides what represents acceptable protest going forward.

I have not misunderstood you continually stating that the purpose of the repressive legislation is to stop intimidation – just some of your cavilling against people standing silently in a public street: -

“Only those feeling intimidated can possibly know whether anyone doing anything is responsible for it. That the person standing silently doesn’t believe it intimidates is irrelevant.”
“Protecting the vulnerable from intimidation is never ridiculous. Thinking that those seeking help in an abortion clinic aren’t vulnerable to intimidation is ridiculous.”
“It has nothing to do with this issue though, where the concerns are obvious, as is the intimidation.”
“A user might well think that an innocent bystander is intimidating”

Of course discussion of abortion itself has a place in this thread. The fact that there are legally provided clinics for abortions does not make it less grubby and morally questionable, in the same way that a legal dispensary for drug addicts does not make drug taking less reprehensible. By the way, some left-wing ‘ethicists’, such as Dr. Peter Singer, argue that foetuses are neither rational nor self-aware and as a result, the preference of a mother to have an abortion automatically takes precedence. He also has said that young children have no automatic right to life and that it could be wholly ethical to terminate the life of a living, dependent child if it were disabled or even if its existence jeopardised the life chances of the mother. Singer argues that newborns lack the essential characteristics of personhood, “rationality, autonomy, and self-consciousness" and therefore "killing a newborn baby is never equivalent to killing a person, that is, a being who wants to go on living". (He has also argued that there is no moral reason why people should not have "mutually satisfying" sex with their pets.)

Edited by georgenorman (28 Dec 2022 10.15am)