Today, Bush's Department of Health and Human Services released a new proposed set of regulations defining "abortion" broadly enough to encompass many methods of contraception, including birth control pills and the IUD. The idea is that it would then use rules prohibiting federal funding of abortion to force hospitals not to offer birth control.
This is why we absolutely cannot re-elect another Republican president. These are really not good people. They are after theocracy, any way they can get it. John McCain is one of these nasties. Too many people at election time make excuses when they vote Republican, saying it's about taxes or whatever. If you vote Republican, you are voting for ultra-right-wing "Christian" religious nuts. Any single man ought to be scared shitless. There's no middle ground, and there are no "moderates" in that party anymore.
What will these wingnuts think of next?
Friday, July 18, 2008
Republicans are out to Ban Birth Control
Posted by The Law Talking Guy at 9:57 PM
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This is news to you? They've all but said this was their intention from the start. They do not honor women.
Oh my god. OH MY GOD.
I knew they were crazy, but I didn't know that they were THIS crazy!
Actually, maybe I did - I saw that whole thing a few years back about how all women should always consider themselves "pre-pregnant", and thus not drink, smoke, or do anything else that might harm a baby if she were to fall pregnant, deliberately or otherwise. Convenient lack of mention of how high alcohol consumption by the father has been linked to birth defects in some cases.
What offends me is that this lack of honouring women (you're so right on that USWest!) is obviously supported by a whole load of non-equality desiring men - whenever I meet a man with that attitude, I want to slap him silly. Especially when they're supposedly intelligent men, talking down to me because I'm "the chick". But I think LTG has hit the nail on the head as far as how to get these idiot men, who wouldn't stick up for women's rights for women's sake, or condemn this kind of appalling attitude towards women (mostly because they share it) - remind them that no choice for women = biiiiiiiig bill for them.
And on a bit of a tangent, although related since we're talking about the Republicans: a bad attitude towards women is one of my big problems with a lot of major religions, especially when the bad attitude is explained by using the religion as the excuse (this goes for a lot of bad attitudes actually). If you believe in a religion which says anything along the lines of your god(s) having created everyone equal / love everyone / etc, then that really does mean EVERYONE.
I've tried to compose my reply to this post several times, but I start screaming and stomping around, which doesn't really help with my typing.
OK, not that this matters, but classifying IUDs and birth control in this manner reflects not only a deep disgust for the idea of women as people but an astonishing ignorance of how various contraceptive methods actually work. Though I suppose that's not really the point. It's about mollifying ultra right-wing men.
I can't think of any group of ultra-religious women who are opposed to all forms of birth control. Maybe the "quiver-full" crowd, but even Mormons and Catholics use it.
Since Law Talking Baby was born, I've been pretty good about not saying, "you just don't understand, you don't have kids," but I will say that motherhood made me even more wildly pro-choice than I was already. Nobody ought to be forced into parenthood over shoddy health care.
-Seventh Sister
Most guys who are pro-life grew up in a world where they will likely never have to face the decision about an abortion. Pregnancy is often referred to as an "accident." I mean, it's one thing to regulate women's sexual behavior - lots of guys seem to be oblivious to the fact that abortion laws are really about doing that. It's quite another to tell men that they'd better not have sex, either.
And Pombat, your reaction is EXACTLY why I'm hoping the GOP pushes forward on this. Millions of suburban women who blindly voted GOP will blink and say, "Oh my God!"
Yeah,and all these women will be wishing they had a female in teh white house.
Ohh, an dPOmbat, the pre-pregnant thing so pissed me off . . . as if all of us are planning on having children! Before long, they will arrest a pregnant woman for endangering the life of her child if she takes a puff on a cigerette or has a glass of wine.
Nevermind that (as others who blog here know better than I do) the studies showing that alcohol has negative effects on children are not scientific studies about alcohol on fetuses. You can't get a grant to feed mothers increasing levels of booze while pregnant. The studies reveal only that the children of that pregnant women who are severe alcoholics (in treatment or in prison usually, thus recorded for the study) are subject to fetal alcohol syndrome. In almost every other country outside the English-speaking world, women have moderate amounts of alcohol while pregnant (a glass of wine with dinner) and it appears to have no ill effects on the kids. Just as moderate alcohol consumption appears to be beneficial in adults as well.
As young parents, my wife and I are beset by puritanical idiocy, such as the suggestion that after a single glass of wine, a nursing mother must "pump and dump" for 24 hours. Thank God our very well-respected pediatrician says, "If you're okay to drive, you're okay to breastfeed." Not to mention the organic food mania that bugs me so much. The next time an Angeleno asks me, "Is it organic?" I am tempted to point to the sky and say, "Is our air?"
There were two things that really pissed me off about the pre-pregnant thing:
1. it was targeted at JUST women - purely control.
2. it reduced every single woman, regardless of whether she was planning to have children, was old enough to be interested in sex, ever intended to have sex with a man (who could get her pregnant), had already had children and wasn't going to have any more etc, to nothing but a womb and potential baby-provider - there is more to women than just the potential to bear children!
LTG - yes, I hope those 'blind' voters will have the OMG, or maybe even the OMFG reaction too. If not, if they're too stupid to, well, makes the battle for equality that much harder for everyone doesn't it?
Seventh Sister - I know it was serious, but your first line did make me giggle - I've found I can't type so well when I'm waving my hands around and ranting to Spotted H.
And knowledge about the way contraceptives work IS part of the point I believe - if they don't understand how something works, they cannot possibly write decent laws about it. Can you imagine someone with zero knowledge about cars writing policy for safety checks? Or someone who has no idea what makes a safe building writing policy to govern the building industry? No. And in just the same way, anyone wanting to legislate access to birth control / abortion / etc better damned well understand what they're talking about first.
Oh, and I think "I'm now a mother, and I still believe women should have the right to contraception / abortion if they don't want a child, because I now fully understand just how much being a parent entails" is a perfectly valid thing for you to be saying - you have more knowledge about the whole area than the backwards men writing the laws after all.
LTG - "is it organic?" should be met with a horrified expression, followed by mock whisper in their ear that you would NEVER feed a child something grown in such an unhygenic manner/matter... ;-p
"Yeah,and all these women will be wishing they had a female in teh white house."
There is a lot of research out there right now about representation. Do women need women representatives to have their prefered policies delivered? Do African Americans need African American reps etc etc.
The answer is far from clear so far. Ideology is hard to untangle from identity in many cases. This would be one of them. Liberal men feel just as strongly about this as liberal women. And there are conservative women - as Seventh Sister pointed out - in the world who would march on the street with signs in favor of this initiative.
In short, the fact that Hillary Clinton lost the nomination to Obama will like not have any impact on the Democratic parties oposition to this scheme by the GOP.
RBR, you may well be correct that there is no statistical correlation between the needs of a particular ethnic/gender/racial sub-segment of society and the policies enacted by representatives of that subgroup. But government is also about symbolism and subjective feelings o finclusion. There is something to be said for the fact that most African-Americans and women would feel more part of the society, more included and satisfied, to see some African-Americans and women in high government office, even if an all-white-male government would produce identical policies.
The point I was trying to make was that the reason Bush and his crowd are out to ban birth control has much to do with their ideology, an ideology that many women share.
You are right that it is useful to have a diverse body of representatives that reflects the diversity of our society.
But it is a dangerous mistake to imply that only a woman could adequately oppose this kind nonsense. Just as it is a mistake to vote for or against a candidate based on their demographic characteristics.
Obama will probably let Hillary get out in front on this so she can be seen to be an important part of the party but don't mistake that for Obama being a fan of banning birth control. If Hillary were not in the mix at all, I'd expect Obama - as leader of the Democratic Party - to take the lead on opposing this.
At the moment, it's just a set of proposed regulations. Under the APA there is a "notice and comment" period of 90-180 days before the a final set of rules is promulgated, and they may not look like this. Frequently regulations change a lot from first publication to final promulgation. Even then, Congress can override them. So it's good that some senators are speaking out now, but I don't expect the full party leadership to get engaged until we reach the final agency stage, i.e., where they are not just "proposed" regulations. We may never get there, of course, because the election is just over 100 days away.
Good point. By the time notice and comment is over with the election will have happened and the transition be underway (knock on wood).
The one point y'all didn't mention in this thread is over population. I was listening to the Diane Rehm show today. Paul Erhlick the population scientist was on today. As far as he is concerned none of the candidates are talking about the need to limit our population. If we get rid of all of our most reliable forms of birth control, we might as well expect the end of the world next year, which is maybe what the rapturists are hoping for.
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