To the editor:

I am completely baffled and dismayed by a letter stating that our government “would never consider … enacting legislation that sought to regulate our personal decisions regarding reproduction.” This country’s reproductive rights are obviously less restrictive than those of China, which limits the number of children a woman can have, but the statement about reproductive rights in this country is dead wrong. Did the writer just wake up?

Legislatures across this country have been enacting repressive laws on everything from contraception to abortion — and essentially nothing on affordable health care and child care for decades now. Where is their “respect for the human rights of the individual?” This year the Supreme Court will make a ruling that may ultimately destroy Roe v. Wade. And there goes a woman’s ability to make her own choices. Forcing a woman to have an unwanted child is every bit as reprehensible as dictating how many children a woman may have. No country or person has the right to tell a woman what she can or cannot do with her body and, thus, her future.

Women may soon be forced to bear a child despite rape, incest, threat to their own health or the child’s, or a multitude of personal reasons. A woman’s right to choose has become another political football. There is no justification for lawmakers to make personal and moral decisions for women. It is not their business or place to play God with other people’s lives.

Leslie Mills,

Lawrence