Showing posts with label liberal. Show all posts
Showing posts with label liberal. Show all posts
Wednesday, April 13, 2011
Tuesday, May 19, 2009
Sadly, the issue is way more complicated than that...
[Edited to include the video and give the names of the people involved.]
Yesterday I saw a YouTube clip of someCongressguy Congressman Tim Ryan on some cable news show Hardball talking about President Obama's speech at Notre Dame, and his call to us to find common ground on the issue of abortion and provide access to birth control to reduce the number of unintended pregnancies. The Congressdude Congressman Ryan was described as "against abortion rights" but he was working with, Congresswoman Rosa DeLauro, a pro-choice legislator to make birth control more affordable and accessible to women, specifically low-income women, to reduce the need for abortions.
I'm all for that, but one thingthe guy Congressman Ryan said bugged me. He also went on about adoption and social services, to encourage women to carry the pregnancy to term. As I write that I realize that this guy did a lot of things I like (I might have to go find the video now); he used the words "carry the pregnancy to term" instead of talking about babies or other words that make the issue more emotional. He also pointed out that not having the abortion means carrying the pregnancy to term and needing social services to care for the child, so we need to provide appropriate health care for the infant and welfare for the mother and child. (So often in the abortion debate the anti-choicers scream and holler about the "baby" but forget to add its post-partum existence into the equation.)
But back to what bugged me -- I know he had very little time to make his points and the interviewer dude kept interrupting him and asking stupid questions he'd already answered, but I got the impression the Congressman thought the only reason a woman chooses to abort instead of carrying the pregnancy to term is economic restrictions: if we provide more info and support for adoption services, women will be convinced to carry the pregnancy to term; if we provide them with proper welfare and social services programs to help them care for the child, women will carry the pregnancy to term instead of abort.
Again, the issue is not that simple. There are many, many reasons why a woman would choose to terminate a pregnancy. This is not a minor inconvenience, this is a life-changing event. Even if she does not intend to keep the child, the pregnancy itself will have a huge impact on her life (and take a huge toll on her body). Think about it. Think about, every day of those nine months.
Going to work, pregnant. Dealing with morning sickness (that lasts all day long). Fatigue, because your body is taking every available ounce of energy to form the fetus growing inside of you. Showing.
Buying new clothes to fit your new body -- bigger bras, because your breasts will get bigger (they're making milk, remember?) And, in case you don't know, bras are effin' expensive. Buying new pants. Buying new tops. Buying new shoes because your feet and ankles have swollen that much.
Think about doing your job every day, pregnant. FOR A CHILD YOU WILL NOT KEEP. Are you on your feet all day? Are you talking to people who will ask you about "the baby"? (Most low-income women -- who have difficulties affording birth control -- don't have cushy desk jobs; they have more physically-demanding jobs. Do you want to wait tables or scrub toilets or restock shelves in your third trimester? Or maybe you have a customer service job, where people will ask you all kinds of baby questions and insist on touching your stomach. What fun!)
Can you afford maternity leave? Even one weekend, to give birth and allow your body to recover? What if there are any complications with the pregnancy, and you need bedrest? Can you afford the pre-natal care? Can you afford the time off from work for the pre-natal care doctor's visits? If you suffer post-partum depression, will you be able to afford more time off to go see a psychiatrist or psychologist? What about anti-depressants, will you be able to afford those?
How are you going to face all those people you interact with on a daily basis after the baby is born, and you don't have it? How are you going to deal with their questions?
And even that is not even scratching the surface of the reasons why a woman chooses to terminate a pregnancy.
This is a deeply personal issue. The reasons I had for choosing to terminate my pregnancy are totally different from the reasons any other woman in the waiting room with me in the clinic that morning had. For some, the economic factor is a big deal. For others, money is not the problem -- the problem is much bigger than that.
This is why we need to leave the option open.
We need to do everything in our power to prevent unwanted pregnancies in the first place (birth control, comprehensive sex ed), but we need to leave the option open, for all the other reasons that your average Congressman can't even fathom.
Yesterday I used obesity as an analogy for the reproductive rights debate. I felt a little uneasy writing about it, because I am rather ignorant on the topic. Today, I read Julie Neumann's post on Change.org's Women's Rights blog, and I felt even more unqualified to have written what I did. Eating disorders are an extremely complex issue and the reasons why a person develops an eating disorder are very personal (unique to each person, there is not one easy answer); yesterday I reduced it to the stereotyped, simplified version (in my defense, I was not discussion the issue itself in depth, I was mentioning it as an example, but still).
Julie shares quotes from several people with eating disorders saying what their eating disorder is "all about" -- the reasons why they do what they do. I felt extremely narrow-minded and ignorant as I read; there is so much more to this issue that we don't even realize, because we are not there. (It's an excellent post, please read it.)
We're not going to fix it with a Band-Aid (eating disorders or reproductive rights). We need to do everything we can to fix the known causes and fix the stuff that we can fix (health care, access to birth control, comprehensive sex ed), but we're never going to make it go away completely. Which is why we need to allow each woman to make the choice for herself.
Yesterday I saw a YouTube clip of some
I'm all for that, but one thing
But back to what bugged me -- I know he had very little time to make his points and the interviewer dude kept interrupting him and asking stupid questions he'd already answered, but I got the impression the Congressman thought the only reason a woman chooses to abort instead of carrying the pregnancy to term is economic restrictions: if we provide more info and support for adoption services, women will be convinced to carry the pregnancy to term; if we provide them with proper welfare and social services programs to help them care for the child, women will carry the pregnancy to term instead of abort.
Again, the issue is not that simple. There are many, many reasons why a woman would choose to terminate a pregnancy. This is not a minor inconvenience, this is a life-changing event. Even if she does not intend to keep the child, the pregnancy itself will have a huge impact on her life (and take a huge toll on her body). Think about it. Think about, every day of those nine months.
Going to work, pregnant. Dealing with morning sickness (that lasts all day long). Fatigue, because your body is taking every available ounce of energy to form the fetus growing inside of you. Showing.
Buying new clothes to fit your new body -- bigger bras, because your breasts will get bigger (they're making milk, remember?) And, in case you don't know, bras are effin' expensive. Buying new pants. Buying new tops. Buying new shoes because your feet and ankles have swollen that much.
Think about doing your job every day, pregnant. FOR A CHILD YOU WILL NOT KEEP. Are you on your feet all day? Are you talking to people who will ask you about "the baby"? (Most low-income women -- who have difficulties affording birth control -- don't have cushy desk jobs; they have more physically-demanding jobs. Do you want to wait tables or scrub toilets or restock shelves in your third trimester? Or maybe you have a customer service job, where people will ask you all kinds of baby questions and insist on touching your stomach. What fun!)
Can you afford maternity leave? Even one weekend, to give birth and allow your body to recover? What if there are any complications with the pregnancy, and you need bedrest? Can you afford the pre-natal care? Can you afford the time off from work for the pre-natal care doctor's visits? If you suffer post-partum depression, will you be able to afford more time off to go see a psychiatrist or psychologist? What about anti-depressants, will you be able to afford those?
How are you going to face all those people you interact with on a daily basis after the baby is born, and you don't have it? How are you going to deal with their questions?
And even that is not even scratching the surface of the reasons why a woman chooses to terminate a pregnancy.
This is a deeply personal issue. The reasons I had for choosing to terminate my pregnancy are totally different from the reasons any other woman in the waiting room with me in the clinic that morning had. For some, the economic factor is a big deal. For others, money is not the problem -- the problem is much bigger than that.
This is why we need to leave the option open.
We need to do everything in our power to prevent unwanted pregnancies in the first place (birth control, comprehensive sex ed), but we need to leave the option open, for all the other reasons that your average Congressman can't even fathom.
Yesterday I used obesity as an analogy for the reproductive rights debate. I felt a little uneasy writing about it, because I am rather ignorant on the topic. Today, I read Julie Neumann's post on Change.org's Women's Rights blog, and I felt even more unqualified to have written what I did. Eating disorders are an extremely complex issue and the reasons why a person develops an eating disorder are very personal (unique to each person, there is not one easy answer); yesterday I reduced it to the stereotyped, simplified version (in my defense, I was not discussion the issue itself in depth, I was mentioning it as an example, but still).
Julie shares quotes from several people with eating disorders saying what their eating disorder is "all about" -- the reasons why they do what they do. I felt extremely narrow-minded and ignorant as I read; there is so much more to this issue that we don't even realize, because we are not there. (It's an excellent post, please read it.)
We're not going to fix it with a Band-Aid (eating disorders or reproductive rights). We need to do everything we can to fix the known causes and fix the stuff that we can fix (health care, access to birth control, comprehensive sex ed), but we're never going to make it go away completely. Which is why we need to allow each woman to make the choice for herself.
Monday, May 18, 2009
A Lesson in Semantics: Pro-Life v. Pro-Choice
I'm sure by now you've heard about the Gallup Poll's report that More Americans “Pro-Life” Than “Pro-Choice” for First Time. As you can imagine, I have a few things to say on the subject.
The poll asked if people identified as "pro-life" or "pro-choice." The problem with asking people this question is that few people understand what these terms mean, especially when we're asking questions about political policy.
You may remember I have ranted on this topic before. This is the Cliff Notes version:
"Pro-life" does not mean, "Well, I personally would not choose to have an abortion." It does mean that you agree with a group of people who want to impose their personal beliefs on everyone. This group also seeks to limit women's access to birth control, and information about their own bodies by forcing abstinence-only programs in schools.
"Pro-choice" does not mean, "I would totally have an abortion. Rock on! I think I'm going to have unprotected sex RIGHT NOW so I can have an abortion!" It means that you understand not everyone's life is as pretty as yours, and that other people want different things and believe different things than you. It means that you want women to have access to birth control and information on how and why to use it.
Pro-life and pro-choice are not about what you would personally do with your body -- they are political stances about what laws you want the government to enact. Pro-life means you want to make one choice for everybody. Pro-choice means you want the government to step back and allow each individual woman to make the choice for herself.
Also, talking about these two sides merely in terms of ABORTION is stupid and small-minded. Discussing reproductive rights only in terms of abortion is like discussing obesity only in terms of lap-band surgery.
How do you fight obesity? Eat healthy food, eat smaller portions, exercise. Is this going to work for EVERY person? No. Some people don't need to exercise because they were blessed with good genes and a high metabolism, so they're thin and healthy naturally. Some people eat all the right foods and get regular exercise but still have problems with weight because of glandular problems, etc. (I'm not a doctor, so I can't elaborate). Some people eat crappy food and never get any exercise and develop health problems, others eat crappy food and never get any exercise and don't develop health problems. Some people are so scared of "getting fat" they develop eating disorders like anorexia or bulimia because of messages the media sends about body image and what "pretty" is supposed to look like.
"Well, people wouldn't be fat if they just went to the gym every week!" Um... that only works if you can afford a gym membership. Or the time to go to the gym or work out. And you own lots of work out clothes, so you can sweat in them and not have to do laundry every day. (No, nobody thinks about that, but do you know how many socks I had to buy when I was training for my triathlon? Do you know how expensive sports bras are? Do YOU have time to do laundry daily, especially when all you have to put in washer is a pair of socks, bike shorts and a sports bra? But I digress...)
"Well, people wouldn't be fat if they just kept their mouth closed and didn't eat that extra piece of chocolate cake!" Yes, that'll work effectively. Let's shame people into getting thin. Not like that creates eating disorders or anything. And that's the only reason people become overweight, that extra piece of chocolate cake. Life is so simple, isn't it?
The issue is complicated. Many of us don't know everything that is involved in the issue because we are not medical doctors who understand how different bodies metabolize food and process calories and protein and so on and so forth.
Do some people need surgery (lap-band, gastric bypass) to help them overcome weight problems due to obesity?
Yes.
Should every overweight person undergo surgery?
No.
If we make these surgeries legal, and allow people to have their insurance companies pay for them, would everyone above a size 10 run to get surgery?
Uh... I dunno, are they? Oh, that's right -- NO, they're not.
Discussing the issue in terms of lap-band surgery is not going to help anybody.
Providing factual, medically-accurate information about what a healthy body weight is, how to eat a balanced diet, how to incorporate regular exercise into your daily or weekly routine... these things will help people, and will help take care of the problem before it becomes a problem.
The more we talk to people about ways to prevent obesity and provide them with the tools they need to take care of their bodies (make fruits and vegetables available in grocery stores, create hike and bike trails in cities so people have a safe place to walk/jog/bike), the less people we will have needing these surgeries or suffering from weight-related problems.
This makes sense when we talk about health and obesity. Why does this not make sense when we talk about reproductive rights?
We spend all this time yelling about abortion, instead of talking about the ways to solve the problem and reduce the need for abortion.
"Pro-choice" means you want schools to provide medically accurate, age appropriate, comprehensive sex ed to teens.
"Pro-choice" means you want insurance companies to cover birth control (at least as often as they cover, say, Viagra).
"Pro-choice" means you want rape victims to be offered emergency contraception when they report the crime in the ER.
"Pro-choice" means you want EC to be available to women.
"Pro-choice" means that you agree a woman has a right to decide what happens to her own body -- that nobody has the right to mandate what choice she cannot make.
Meghan McCain recently wrote a post on the Daily Beast about the Republican Party's problem with sex. She was right about everything, except for one thing:
As Jezebel pointed out:
Our goal is for women to have access to a safe and legal abortion, if they ever need it. In the meantime, we're doing all we can to prevent the situation where she would ever need it.
Eat your veggies. Take the stairs. Use birth control. Be pro-choice.
Or at least admit to it, since more than likely you already are.**
*Not saying anything about Meghan, but I used to think I'd never have an abortion. Until I got pregnant. Many women tell the same story. Just something to keep in mind.
**Your voting patterns say so (make sure you make it to the end... the article has a lot of anti-choice nonsense, skim through that).
The poll asked if people identified as "pro-life" or "pro-choice." The problem with asking people this question is that few people understand what these terms mean, especially when we're asking questions about political policy.
You may remember I have ranted on this topic before. This is the Cliff Notes version:
"Pro-life" does not mean, "Well, I personally would not choose to have an abortion." It does mean that you agree with a group of people who want to impose their personal beliefs on everyone. This group also seeks to limit women's access to birth control, and information about their own bodies by forcing abstinence-only programs in schools.
"Pro-choice" does not mean, "I would totally have an abortion. Rock on! I think I'm going to have unprotected sex RIGHT NOW so I can have an abortion!" It means that you understand not everyone's life is as pretty as yours, and that other people want different things and believe different things than you. It means that you want women to have access to birth control and information on how and why to use it.
Pro-life and pro-choice are not about what you would personally do with your body -- they are political stances about what laws you want the government to enact. Pro-life means you want to make one choice for everybody. Pro-choice means you want the government to step back and allow each individual woman to make the choice for herself.
Also, talking about these two sides merely in terms of ABORTION is stupid and small-minded. Discussing reproductive rights only in terms of abortion is like discussing obesity only in terms of lap-band surgery.
How do you fight obesity? Eat healthy food, eat smaller portions, exercise. Is this going to work for EVERY person? No. Some people don't need to exercise because they were blessed with good genes and a high metabolism, so they're thin and healthy naturally. Some people eat all the right foods and get regular exercise but still have problems with weight because of glandular problems, etc. (I'm not a doctor, so I can't elaborate). Some people eat crappy food and never get any exercise and develop health problems, others eat crappy food and never get any exercise and don't develop health problems. Some people are so scared of "getting fat" they develop eating disorders like anorexia or bulimia because of messages the media sends about body image and what "pretty" is supposed to look like.
"Well, people wouldn't be fat if they just went to the gym every week!" Um... that only works if you can afford a gym membership. Or the time to go to the gym or work out. And you own lots of work out clothes, so you can sweat in them and not have to do laundry every day. (No, nobody thinks about that, but do you know how many socks I had to buy when I was training for my triathlon? Do you know how expensive sports bras are? Do YOU have time to do laundry daily, especially when all you have to put in washer is a pair of socks, bike shorts and a sports bra? But I digress...)
"Well, people wouldn't be fat if they just kept their mouth closed and didn't eat that extra piece of chocolate cake!" Yes, that'll work effectively. Let's shame people into getting thin. Not like that creates eating disorders or anything. And that's the only reason people become overweight, that extra piece of chocolate cake. Life is so simple, isn't it?
The issue is complicated. Many of us don't know everything that is involved in the issue because we are not medical doctors who understand how different bodies metabolize food and process calories and protein and so on and so forth.
Do some people need surgery (lap-band, gastric bypass) to help them overcome weight problems due to obesity?
Yes.
Should every overweight person undergo surgery?
No.
If we make these surgeries legal, and allow people to have their insurance companies pay for them, would everyone above a size 10 run to get surgery?
Uh... I dunno, are they? Oh, that's right -- NO, they're not.
Discussing the issue in terms of lap-band surgery is not going to help anybody.
Providing factual, medically-accurate information about what a healthy body weight is, how to eat a balanced diet, how to incorporate regular exercise into your daily or weekly routine... these things will help people, and will help take care of the problem before it becomes a problem.
The more we talk to people about ways to prevent obesity and provide them with the tools they need to take care of their bodies (make fruits and vegetables available in grocery stores, create hike and bike trails in cities so people have a safe place to walk/jog/bike), the less people we will have needing these surgeries or suffering from weight-related problems.
This makes sense when we talk about health and obesity. Why does this not make sense when we talk about reproductive rights?
We spend all this time yelling about abortion, instead of talking about the ways to solve the problem and reduce the need for abortion.
"Pro-choice" means you want schools to provide medically accurate, age appropriate, comprehensive sex ed to teens.
"Pro-choice" means you want insurance companies to cover birth control (at least as often as they cover, say, Viagra).
"Pro-choice" means you want rape victims to be offered emergency contraception when they report the crime in the ER.
"Pro-choice" means you want EC to be available to women.
"Pro-choice" means that you agree a woman has a right to decide what happens to her own body -- that nobody has the right to mandate what choice she cannot make.
Meghan McCain recently wrote a post on the Daily Beast about the Republican Party's problem with sex. She was right about everything, except for one thing:
Here’s what I’ve never understood about the party: its resistance to discussing better access to birth control. As a Republican, I am pro-life. But using birth control and having an abortion are not the same at all. Actually, the best way to prevent abortions is to educate people about birth control and make it widely and easily accessible. True, abstinence is the only way to fully prevent pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases. Still, the problem with abstinence-only education is that it does not make teenagers and young adults more knowledgeable about all the issues they face if or when they have sex—physically and emotionally.Meghan, if you want access to birth control and comprehensive sex ed, which you must because that's what you just wrote, then you are pro-choice. You may not like abortion, and you may never choose one yourself personally*, but if you want better education about sex and contraception, if you want women to have access to birth control, then you are part of the pro-choice movement. It's not about abortion, it's about reproductive rights. This includes birth control and comprehensive sex ed.
As Jezebel pointed out:
It seems, slowly, that the anti-abortion folks are being incrementally successful in defining "pro-choice" as "very, very pro-abortion".We're not "pro-abortion." Our goal is not for women to get abortions. (If it were, we'd join the abstinence-only, no-EC, birth-control-not-covered-by-insurance bandwagon in a jiffy! Really, can you think of a better way to increase the number of abortions? Whoo-hoo!)
Our goal is for women to have access to a safe and legal abortion, if they ever need it. In the meantime, we're doing all we can to prevent the situation where she would ever need it.
Eat your veggies. Take the stairs. Use birth control. Be pro-choice.
Or at least admit to it, since more than likely you already are.**
*Not saying anything about Meghan, but I used to think I'd never have an abortion. Until I got pregnant. Many women tell the same story. Just something to keep in mind.
**Your voting patterns say so (make sure you make it to the end... the article has a lot of anti-choice nonsense, skim through that).
Tuesday, March 24, 2009
Abortion, pregnancy, and slavery
So, according to Mike Huckabee, abortion is like slavery. So, if you're against slavery, then you have to be against abortion, too, for the same reasons. Because they're the same. (Read the lovely article here: Huckabee likens abortion to slavery at Missouri fundraiser - Kansas City Star.)
According to Mr. Huckabee, slavery was about having "life-or-death power over another," and it is still immoral "that one person could own another human being and have full control even to the point of life and death over that other human being."
Uh, Mr. Huckabee, did you perchance get your sex ed in Texas or Florida? Are you even aware of what pregnancy is, or how it works?
The way pregnancy works, the woman has "full control even to the point of life and death" over the parasite living inside of her. That's the way the system is set up -- that's the way God set it up to work. Did you catch that whole "inside of her" part?
If the woman does not take proper care of herself, what happens to that fetus? If the woman does not have access to proper pre-natal health care, what happens to that fetus? If the woman takes drugs (illegal or prescribed) during the pregnancy, what happens to that fetus?
YOU CANNOT SEPARATE THEM. I really wish you people would stop talking as if you could.
Just as the woman has complete control, "life-and-death power," over the fetus inside of her, that fetus also has that same "life-or-death power" over the woman. In some cases, the fetus has the power to kill the woman. It happens, often.
This is not done by "choice" by either party, this is the way the effin' system works. This is the way pregnancy was designed. The woman and the fetus are inherently tied, and cannot be separated. The life of the one is deeply affected by the existence of the other, and the potential life of the other depends on the choices made by the one.
Even after they are separated, after the baby is born, it still depends wholly on the mother -- whether the biological one or a surrogate. The mother's life is forever changed, and her health, as it was during the pregnancy (even one without complications) is affected, negatively. If that baby is going to survive, someone needs to care for it, literally 24/7, until it develops to the point where it can move and communicate on its own, and can take care of itself. That newborn has taken control of that woman's life.
Yes, for a woman who wants that baby, the risks and harms, and work, are well worth it, but that doesn't mean they are not there. (On a coincidentally timely note, Heather Armstrong's book on her experience with post-partum depression, and how it nearly killed her, was released today. Check it out.)
My point is, your argument about how one life should not have "life-or-death power" over another? God made that happen. He designed it that way. Go tell Him it's "immoral."
And must I state the obvious? When you stand on your platforms and tell me I can't terminate an unwanted pregnancy because of what you believe, how is that NOT you having control over my life?
When I first started this post, I was enraged that you would so cheaply use slavery to peddle your anti-choice views. But, now that you've made me think about it, the comparison you make is twistedly apt.
Taking away our reproductive rights and freedoms is, in fact, a new form of slavery. You are forcing women to be slaves to their bodies. You are controling our lives and our decisions. As if you owned us.
You do not have a right to own us. To control our lives in this way. If you find slavery immoral, then by that very same reasoning, you must find the anti-choice movement immoral.
According to Mr. Huckabee, slavery was about having "life-or-death power over another," and it is still immoral "that one person could own another human being and have full control even to the point of life and death over that other human being."
Uh, Mr. Huckabee, did you perchance get your sex ed in Texas or Florida? Are you even aware of what pregnancy is, or how it works?
The way pregnancy works, the woman has "full control even to the point of life and death" over the parasite living inside of her. That's the way the system is set up -- that's the way God set it up to work. Did you catch that whole "inside of her" part?
If the woman does not take proper care of herself, what happens to that fetus? If the woman does not have access to proper pre-natal health care, what happens to that fetus? If the woman takes drugs (illegal or prescribed) during the pregnancy, what happens to that fetus?
YOU CANNOT SEPARATE THEM. I really wish you people would stop talking as if you could.
Just as the woman has complete control, "life-and-death power," over the fetus inside of her, that fetus also has that same "life-or-death power" over the woman. In some cases, the fetus has the power to kill the woman. It happens, often.
This is not done by "choice" by either party, this is the way the effin' system works. This is the way pregnancy was designed. The woman and the fetus are inherently tied, and cannot be separated. The life of the one is deeply affected by the existence of the other, and the potential life of the other depends on the choices made by the one.
Even after they are separated, after the baby is born, it still depends wholly on the mother -- whether the biological one or a surrogate. The mother's life is forever changed, and her health, as it was during the pregnancy (even one without complications) is affected, negatively. If that baby is going to survive, someone needs to care for it, literally 24/7, until it develops to the point where it can move and communicate on its own, and can take care of itself. That newborn has taken control of that woman's life.
Yes, for a woman who wants that baby, the risks and harms, and work, are well worth it, but that doesn't mean they are not there. (On a coincidentally timely note, Heather Armstrong's book on her experience with post-partum depression, and how it nearly killed her, was released today. Check it out.)
My point is, your argument about how one life should not have "life-or-death power" over another? God made that happen. He designed it that way. Go tell Him it's "immoral."
And must I state the obvious? When you stand on your platforms and tell me I can't terminate an unwanted pregnancy because of what you believe, how is that NOT you having control over my life?
When I first started this post, I was enraged that you would so cheaply use slavery to peddle your anti-choice views. But, now that you've made me think about it, the comparison you make is twistedly apt.
Taking away our reproductive rights and freedoms is, in fact, a new form of slavery. You are forcing women to be slaves to their bodies. You are controling our lives and our decisions. As if you owned us.
You do not have a right to own us. To control our lives in this way. If you find slavery immoral, then by that very same reasoning, you must find the anti-choice movement immoral.
Thursday, March 19, 2009
Science, schmience!
Don't penalize Texas students for any belief about science, bill says | Top Stories | Star-Telegram.com
Really, Texas legislature? Really?
Please, fight your ideological battles outside the classroom.
What's next, 2+2 can equal whatever you want? After all, if one loaf of bread and two fish can feed multitudes, then what does that say about math?
Can you hear the rest of the country laughing at us? Because I can.
If you live in Texas, please call your legislators and ask them to oppose HB 4224, authored by Rep. Wayne Christian, R-Center. Please.
Really, Texas legislature? Really?
Please, fight your ideological battles outside the classroom.
What's next, 2+2 can equal whatever you want? After all, if one loaf of bread and two fish can feed multitudes, then what does that say about math?
Can you hear the rest of the country laughing at us? Because I can.
If you live in Texas, please call your legislators and ask them to oppose HB 4224, authored by Rep. Wayne Christian, R-Center. Please.
Sunday, March 15, 2009
"With this latte, I thee kiss"
Today is Freddy's and my first wedding anniversary. (Yes, we got married on the Ides of March. We like to tempt fate.)
A month from today is the deadline to pay Uncle Sam (or ask him for our money back). Freddy and I will file our taxes together, as a married couple; sadly, many couples are not afforded that luxury.
Yes, I know doing your taxes is not the most fun thing in the world -- but you know what? Respect is pretty cool. And not being allowed to do your taxes together is a huge reminder that WE DON'T RESPECT YOU. And that is not cool.
A month from today, couples who are mad as hell and are not going to take it anymore will participate in Same Sex Kiss Day. Go to Starbucks, and kiss your same-sex partner (or friend, or acquaintance...) The point? To show homophobes that gay people are, indeed, just PEOPLE. Novel concept, I know.
The more we see them, the less mystical they will be. Sounds silly, but the whole concept of not letting them get married is pretty damn silly, too. Isn't it?
By the way, March also holds another important anniversary for me -- a week and four years ago, I got divorced. And, honestly, it's a close tie as to which one of these was "the happiest day of my life."
So, yeah... "the sanctity of marriage"? We heteros have made a joke out of that already. And you know it's true, so I'm not going to make a list of all the hetero "marriages" and divorces that have made a mockery of the institution -- for those who let that sort of thing bother them.
Go to Starbucks! Kiss! Repeal Prop 8 -- nationwide!
A month from today is the deadline to pay Uncle Sam (or ask him for our money back). Freddy and I will file our taxes together, as a married couple; sadly, many couples are not afforded that luxury.
Yes, I know doing your taxes is not the most fun thing in the world -- but you know what? Respect is pretty cool. And not being allowed to do your taxes together is a huge reminder that WE DON'T RESPECT YOU. And that is not cool.
A month from today, couples who are mad as hell and are not going to take it anymore will participate in Same Sex Kiss Day. Go to Starbucks, and kiss your same-sex partner (or friend, or acquaintance...) The point? To show homophobes that gay people are, indeed, just PEOPLE. Novel concept, I know.
The more we see them, the less mystical they will be. Sounds silly, but the whole concept of not letting them get married is pretty damn silly, too. Isn't it?
By the way, March also holds another important anniversary for me -- a week and four years ago, I got divorced. And, honestly, it's a close tie as to which one of these was "the happiest day of my life."
So, yeah... "the sanctity of marriage"? We heteros have made a joke out of that already. And you know it's true, so I'm not going to make a list of all the hetero "marriages" and divorces that have made a mockery of the institution -- for those who let that sort of thing bother them.
Go to Starbucks! Kiss! Repeal Prop 8 -- nationwide!
Photo by John Woelke.
Saturday, January 31, 2009
DFW Theatre: One in 3
Wednesday night I went to see One in 3, "a play about the reality, not the politics" of abortion.*
The website doesn't give much info about the "story" of the play, but that's because it's not really a linear-storyline kind of thing. It reminded me of The Vagina Monologues (PS - SMU and UNT are participating in V-Day, if you're interested), but ties together by a specific topic.
The play takes place in the waiting room of an abortion clinic. Through monologues, duets, and not-overdone use of multi-media, these series of open-ended vignettes give us glimpses into the lives of the women who walk into those clinics every day.
We don't follow each women through to find out how her story ends; we see her come in to the clinic, and through her interactions with the nurse and/or other patients or through flashback-type scenes we find out why the woman is there. The receptionist (Molly Milligan) breaks the fourth wall and shares a few statistics about abortion with us, for example that 49% of pregnancies in the US are unplanned. While not every unplanned pregnancy is going to be an unwanted pregnancy, "unplanned" is the first prerequisite for "unwanted."
At first it struck me that we did not find out what happened to the women after they walked out of the waiting room. "Dena," the receptionist, is the only character (and actress) who stays with us throughout the play; the other women come and go, and the actress returns as another character. The cast does an amazing job of playing such diverse roles, becoming each woman. Emily Ko goes from an uptight adult to a shy minor to a crunchy-granola EcoNazi; it was mesmerizing to see her body language change so completely for each role to accurately portray such diverse ages. Rhianna Mack also stands out in this area, first appearing as an African-American high school senior with full "street" attitude complete with Ebonics (I swear I had this student in class last semester; I had to resist the urge to write her an office referral), then appearing as the clinic counselor: warm, comforting, mature (and eloquent).
At first I wanted to know what happened to each woman. Some of them still seemed conflicted as they sat in the waiting room; some, I felt the counselor would not allow to have the procedure done because the women did not seem ready or sure about their choice. And, conditioned by Hollywood, I want everything to be tied up in a neat little package with a pretty pink bow on top and a happy ending spelled out for me. But then I got it -- that was not the point.
The point is to get people talking. To get people to realize that women have to deal with this. Pregnancy happens, whether you want it to or not. And it happens for a wide variety or reasons. In a perfect world, unwanted pregnancies would not happen. But the world is far from perfect. So let's deal with the reality, not the "shoulds."
The women portrayed in the play are real women. The writers spoke with several women who have had an abortion, and these characters evolved from those conversations. Also, they are not the stereotyped extreme: this is not a play about the thirteen-year-old who was raped by her father and how we need to keep abortion legal because of her. Yes, we do see the heroin junkie who's going in for her second abortion. Yes, we see the homeless woman who was raped.
But we also see the woman who just got a promotion at work and is not ready for a child right now, who does not want to condemn her child to be raised by a nanny because she's a "phantom mom." We see the girl who does have love and support from her family and the boyfriend, but she does not want to have a child right now.
We see women in so many different situations who make this decision for so many different reasons. Sometimes that reason is, "Because I cannot bring a child into this life right now -- that's not right for the potential child." And sometimes, that reason is "Because this is what I need to do, for me, at this point in my life."
I have SO much more to say about this, and I probably will say it. But I'll end this post here for now.
Please go see One in 3. The run has been extended through next weekend (it's been selling out, so they're doing something right).
The play is not propaganda. As the writers explain in the program,
Showtimes are tonight (Sat) at 8:00 pm (this performance will be followed by a talkback, which I highly recommend), and next weekend, Friday (2/6) and Saturday (2/7) at 8:00 pm, at The Green Zone in Dallas. Click here for tickets!
One in 3 is a co-production of Project X Theatre, the Texas Equal Access Fund and One Mind Productions, Inc. in partnership with the National Network of Abortion Funds. (Please feel free to make a donation to the TEA Fund and/or the NNAF.)
*It's hard for me to NOT go into the politics on this issue. Maybe it's because I'm overly defensive; maybe it's because I know I'm right and I need to prove it to everyone. Either way, the first draft of this post got a little preachy... Hopefully this draft will keep the propaganda down to a minimum.
The website doesn't give much info about the "story" of the play, but that's because it's not really a linear-storyline kind of thing. It reminded me of The Vagina Monologues (PS - SMU and UNT are participating in V-Day, if you're interested), but ties together by a specific topic.
The play takes place in the waiting room of an abortion clinic. Through monologues, duets, and not-overdone use of multi-media, these series of open-ended vignettes give us glimpses into the lives of the women who walk into those clinics every day.
We don't follow each women through to find out how her story ends; we see her come in to the clinic, and through her interactions with the nurse and/or other patients or through flashback-type scenes we find out why the woman is there. The receptionist (Molly Milligan) breaks the fourth wall and shares a few statistics about abortion with us, for example that 49% of pregnancies in the US are unplanned. While not every unplanned pregnancy is going to be an unwanted pregnancy, "unplanned" is the first prerequisite for "unwanted."
At first it struck me that we did not find out what happened to the women after they walked out of the waiting room. "Dena," the receptionist, is the only character (and actress) who stays with us throughout the play; the other women come and go, and the actress returns as another character. The cast does an amazing job of playing such diverse roles, becoming each woman. Emily Ko goes from an uptight adult to a shy minor to a crunchy-granola EcoNazi; it was mesmerizing to see her body language change so completely for each role to accurately portray such diverse ages. Rhianna Mack also stands out in this area, first appearing as an African-American high school senior with full "street" attitude complete with Ebonics (I swear I had this student in class last semester; I had to resist the urge to write her an office referral), then appearing as the clinic counselor: warm, comforting, mature (and eloquent).
At first I wanted to know what happened to each woman. Some of them still seemed conflicted as they sat in the waiting room; some, I felt the counselor would not allow to have the procedure done because the women did not seem ready or sure about their choice. And, conditioned by Hollywood, I want everything to be tied up in a neat little package with a pretty pink bow on top and a happy ending spelled out for me. But then I got it -- that was not the point.
The point is to get people talking. To get people to realize that women have to deal with this. Pregnancy happens, whether you want it to or not. And it happens for a wide variety or reasons. In a perfect world, unwanted pregnancies would not happen. But the world is far from perfect. So let's deal with the reality, not the "shoulds."
The women portrayed in the play are real women. The writers spoke with several women who have had an abortion, and these characters evolved from those conversations. Also, they are not the stereotyped extreme: this is not a play about the thirteen-year-old who was raped by her father and how we need to keep abortion legal because of her. Yes, we do see the heroin junkie who's going in for her second abortion. Yes, we see the homeless woman who was raped.
But we also see the woman who just got a promotion at work and is not ready for a child right now, who does not want to condemn her child to be raised by a nanny because she's a "phantom mom." We see the girl who does have love and support from her family and the boyfriend, but she does not want to have a child right now.
We see women in so many different situations who make this decision for so many different reasons. Sometimes that reason is, "Because I cannot bring a child into this life right now -- that's not right for the potential child." And sometimes, that reason is "Because this is what I need to do, for me, at this point in my life."
I have SO much more to say about this, and I probably will say it. But I'll end this post here for now.
Please go see One in 3. The run has been extended through next weekend (it's been selling out, so they're doing something right).
The play is not propaganda. As the writers explain in the program,
"An anti-choice activist recently said, 'Our goal is to increase he social tension over abortion.' Our goal, very different, is tomove beyond political argument to the deep, private places where real women make complex choices. Our hope is to foster respect for the reproductive decisions every woman must make."For more info on the show and to buy tickets, please visit http://onein3.org/site/.
Showtimes are tonight (Sat) at 8:00 pm (this performance will be followed by a talkback, which I highly recommend), and next weekend, Friday (2/6) and Saturday (2/7) at 8:00 pm, at The Green Zone in Dallas. Click here for tickets!
One in 3 is a co-production of Project X Theatre, the Texas Equal Access Fund and One Mind Productions, Inc. in partnership with the National Network of Abortion Funds. (Please feel free to make a donation to the TEA Fund and/or the NNAF.)
*It's hard for me to NOT go into the politics on this issue. Maybe it's because I'm overly defensive; maybe it's because I know I'm right and I need to prove it to everyone. Either way, the first draft of this post got a little preachy... Hopefully this draft will keep the propaganda down to a minimum.
Tuesday, January 20, 2009
Mid-Life Crisis... at the tender age of 31
I have a lot of anger. And resentment. And anger.
I don't know exactly where it's all coming from, but it mostly gets taken out on my students.
A big chunk of the anger comes from them -- from the apathy running rampant through them. It kills me. I can't deal with it. I wish I could absorb it, at least a teeny, tiny part of it, so I could let so much of this slide off my back. Or over my head. Whichev.
The problem is I have a hard time understanding apathy. I care too much, that's usually been my problem. And when passion, enthusiasm, and energy meet with apathy... well, they get buried deep in the festering tar pit of apathy and eventually emerge, bubbling to the top, as boiling, bitter bile.
And anger and resentment.
There's anger and resentment about other things, too. Things that are over, but that doesn't mean that *poof* the resentment is gone.
Bush is gone. That's good. But he was bad. He did bad things. And stupid things. And, the worst part, is We The People let him do them.
Yes, we need to get over the past, because, as Mufasa says, "It doesn't mattah, it's in the past!" However, we can't just go, "Okeley-dokeley!" and walk away. We need to fix his screw-ups, and we need to remember what happened so we don't do it again. And we need to find a way to bring our schools back to passing, which at this point -- and no, this is not all Bush's and NCLB's fault, the system was ailing before they came along -- will require a complete overhaul. An education revolution.
Maybe tomorrow I'll wear my beret. And grow a beard. (Oh, wait -- I can't do that. What about growing my leg hair? Is that revolutionary enough? People probably won't want to depict that on t-shirts, though... and I can't say I blame them.)
...
This was supposed to be a cathartic blog post. It was supposed to bring me some sort of epiphany to help me get rid of the anger, so I could have a good day tomorrow. Instead, it turned into mumbled rambling... if I were not sick with The Sickness of Death, I might have been able to think more clearly and pull off this blog post.
I need a lead box. Where I can put the Apathy, so it will not affect me.
I need to let go of the anger and embrace the togetherness. The aisle-crossing. I need to be as big as the moment we lived today, the new era we are living. (I'm not feeling overly confident about my abilities.)
Or maybe I need some medication. Which is probably not a bad idea, but that takes time and money. Also, I deeply resent having to get on medication merely to deal with my job. There is something wrong with a profession that drives so many of its members to anti-depressants.
At least I know one thing: with a mid-life crisis at 31, I'm dying at 62. I don't have to stress out about having enough retirement funds.
I don't know exactly where it's all coming from, but it mostly gets taken out on my students.
A big chunk of the anger comes from them -- from the apathy running rampant through them. It kills me. I can't deal with it. I wish I could absorb it, at least a teeny, tiny part of it, so I could let so much of this slide off my back. Or over my head. Whichev.
The problem is I have a hard time understanding apathy. I care too much, that's usually been my problem. And when passion, enthusiasm, and energy meet with apathy... well, they get buried deep in the festering tar pit of apathy and eventually emerge, bubbling to the top, as boiling, bitter bile.
And anger and resentment.
There's anger and resentment about other things, too. Things that are over, but that doesn't mean that *poof* the resentment is gone.
Bush is gone. That's good. But he was bad. He did bad things. And stupid things. And, the worst part, is We The People let him do them.
Yes, we need to get over the past, because, as Mufasa says, "It doesn't mattah, it's in the past!" However, we can't just go, "Okeley-dokeley!" and walk away. We need to fix his screw-ups, and we need to remember what happened so we don't do it again. And we need to find a way to bring our schools back to passing, which at this point -- and no, this is not all Bush's and NCLB's fault, the system was ailing before they came along -- will require a complete overhaul. An education revolution.
Maybe tomorrow I'll wear my beret. And grow a beard. (Oh, wait -- I can't do that. What about growing my leg hair? Is that revolutionary enough? People probably won't want to depict that on t-shirts, though... and I can't say I blame them.)
...
This was supposed to be a cathartic blog post. It was supposed to bring me some sort of epiphany to help me get rid of the anger, so I could have a good day tomorrow. Instead, it turned into mumbled rambling... if I were not sick with The Sickness of Death, I might have been able to think more clearly and pull off this blog post.
I need a lead box. Where I can put the Apathy, so it will not affect me.
I need to let go of the anger and embrace the togetherness. The aisle-crossing. I need to be as big as the moment we lived today, the new era we are living. (I'm not feeling overly confident about my abilities.)
Or maybe I need some medication. Which is probably not a bad idea, but that takes time and money. Also, I deeply resent having to get on medication merely to deal with my job. There is something wrong with a profession that drives so many of its members to anti-depressants.
At least I know one thing: with a mid-life crisis at 31, I'm dying at 62. I don't have to stress out about having enough retirement funds.
Saturday, December 13, 2008
Friday, October 17, 2008
I wantz to haz it...
You know how babies will get so tired they can't go to sleep? They're sleepy and crying, but they work themselves into these fits where they're angry that they're tired, and because they're angry and throwing the tantrum they can't relax enough to go to sleep. That's kind of where I am right now.
Freddy's out of town, visiting his buddies in CA. So I'm home alone, which I'm sure is adding to the blahness. I do have the cats for company, which is nice... except when they're howling at each other because Gus wants to play and nobody else does. But that's another post.
I'm being overly-sensitive and overly-defensive online. I feel everything is a personal attack, to me personally. In a way, reproductive rights is an issue that affects me directly, and attacking my reproductive rights is an attack on my person, so I'm not being paranoid... but I should stop reading blogs and the news. There's nothing I can do about it now, so I need to remove that toxicity from my life. Ignorance is sanity.
I made a donation to Planned Parenthood yesterday. Among all the other donation information, they asked for my political affiliation. Usually, I check Democrat - no, I do not agree with Democrats on every issue, but I do agree with them on my two highest priorities and that's the party whose candidates have a chance to win in our two-party system. Yesterday, however, I checked Socialist.
I'm so sick of the state of affairs, I don't even want to pretend to be civilized anymore. If Anarchist had been an option, I might have checked that. But I knew Socialist would make the GOP mad enough (yes, because they DO care about the box I check on the form), so I went with that.
The cat door just swung. That might have been Gus, remembering how to use the cat door to escape to the magical realm beyond The Kitchen. I should go find him... he's too little to be out on his own. And he's not very bright, so he won't remember how the door works by the time he decides he wants to come back to the safety and comfort of The Kitchen.
After I retrieve him, I'm going to bed. Maybe he'll be kind enough to curl up next to me and purr me to sleep (and purrvana)... instead of jumping about my head and licking the tip of my nose with his scratchy, stinky kitten tongue.
Thursday, October 16, 2008
If you don't want to read the whole thing, at least watch the last video.
Dear Cristina,
I about fell out of my chair when I heard John McCain say this during the presidential debate last night:
What's really extreme here is that John McCain doesn't understand that women's health matters.
What John McCain said last night, in front of millions of viewers, was belittling to women. He not only mocked Barack Obama for supporting women's health, he mocked women across the country. The debate last night was just the most vivid example of what we've known all along: John McCain is out of touch on women's health.
The simple fact is that we need a president who wants to protect and promote women's health, not ridicule it. If John McCain doesn't understand that, then he's not prepared to govern this country.
Remember, this is not the only example where John McCain doesn't get it when it comes to women's health.
Just a couple months back, McCain had the deer-in-the-headlights look, and couldn't answer whether he thought it was fair that insurance companies that cover Viagra should also cover birth control.
And, remember the time when McCain was asked whether he thought condoms helped stopped the spread of HIV? McCain's response, "You've stumped me."
And there's more. Let's count the ways that John McCain is out of touch on women's health and women's rights:
The simple fact is that Barack Obama is a passionate advocate for women's rights, and has a long and consistent record of standing up for women's health care. As president, he will improve access to quality health care for women, support and protect a woman's right to choose, support comprehensive sex education to keep our young people healthy and safe, and invest in prevention programs, including family planning services and breast cancer screenings.
I've said it before, and I'll say it again: Women voting for John McCain is like chickens voting for Col. Sanders.
Watch McCain's statement during the debate here.
Please stay involved:
Send a voter-to-voter note right now. Take two minutes, right now, to write a short personal note to an undecided voter about why a McCain/Palin administration would be disastrous for women's health — we'll get to work on delivering it for you! Not sure how to get started? Don't worry, we've got a sample note for you to use.
This weekend is our big push for on-the-ground volunteers. Join us in your own community to educate voters during our Mobilization Weekend.
Help us continue to educate voters in battleground states about how out of touch Sen. McCain and Gov. Palin are on issues that matter to women. Watch our video, make a donation, and pass it on!
Forward this email to everyone you know who cares about women's health.
Thank you again.
Cecile Richards, President
Planned Parenthood Action Fund
I about fell out of my chair when I heard John McCain say this during the presidential debate last night:
"Just again, the example of the eloquence of Sen. Obama. He'sSince when did women's health become extreme?
'health for the mother.' You know, that's been stretched by the pro-abortion movement in America to mean almost anything. That's the extreme pro-abortion position, quote, 'health.'"— Sen. John McCain, during presidential debate
What's really extreme here is that John McCain doesn't understand that women's health matters.
What John McCain said last night, in front of millions of viewers, was belittling to women. He not only mocked Barack Obama for supporting women's health, he mocked women across the country. The debate last night was just the most vivid example of what we've known all along: John McCain is out of touch on women's health.
The simple fact is that we need a president who wants to protect and promote women's health, not ridicule it. If John McCain doesn't understand that, then he's not prepared to govern this country.
Remember, this is not the only example where John McCain doesn't get it when it comes to women's health.
Just a couple months back, McCain had the deer-in-the-headlights look, and couldn't answer whether he thought it was fair that insurance companies that cover Viagra should also cover birth control.
And, remember the time when McCain was asked whether he thought condoms helped stopped the spread of HIV? McCain's response, "You've stumped me."
And there's more. Let's count the ways that John McCain is out of touch on women's health and women's rights:
- He's voted 125 times against women's health.He wants to overturn Roe v. Wade.
- He opposes funding to prevent unintended and teen pregnancies.
- He opposes requiring health care plans to cover birth control.
- He opposes equal pay legislation, saying it wouldn't do "anything to help the rights of women."
- He's proposed a health care plan that will be worse for women.
The simple fact is that Barack Obama is a passionate advocate for women's rights, and has a long and consistent record of standing up for women's health care. As president, he will improve access to quality health care for women, support and protect a woman's right to choose, support comprehensive sex education to keep our young people healthy and safe, and invest in prevention programs, including family planning services and breast cancer screenings.
I've said it before, and I'll say it again: Women voting for John McCain is like chickens voting for Col. Sanders.
Watch McCain's statement during the debate here.
Please stay involved:
Send a voter-to-voter note right now. Take two minutes, right now, to write a short personal note to an undecided voter about why a McCain/Palin administration would be disastrous for women's health — we'll get to work on delivering it for you! Not sure how to get started? Don't worry, we've got a sample note for you to use.
This weekend is our big push for on-the-ground volunteers. Join us in your own community to educate voters during our Mobilization Weekend.
Help us continue to educate voters in battleground states about how out of touch Sen. McCain and Gov. Palin are on issues that matter to women. Watch our video, make a donation, and pass it on!
Forward this email to everyone you know who cares about women's health.
Thank you again.
Cecile Richards, President
Planned Parenthood Action Fund
Monday, October 13, 2008
Seriously, people - remember the "Love one another as I have loved you" part?
Slowly clearing out my Google Reader backlog, I came across this post on The Swivet, regarding Prop 8 in California. I couldn't have said it better myself, so I won't try (aren't you relieved?) But I wil quote:
Why is this so hard to understand?
Let me be perfectly clear: Nobody who would truly claim to be a Christian
would ever support such a proposition. Why? Because it's not something that
Jesus Christ himself ever would have supported. The dude was a radical,
remember? He partied with whores and tax collectors and slept with twelve other
men for three years. I'd say he was pretty much okay with the whole same-sex
thing, wouldn't you???
Why is this so hard to understand?
Saturday, September 20, 2008
Tuesday, September 02, 2008
Palin, unplanned pregnancies, Planned Parenthood, and plans
I got a text message this afternoon from a friend - a young, unmarried friend - letting me know she's (unplannedly) pregnant.
This the day after McCain's brilliant choice for VP announced her seventeen-year-old daughter is also unplannedly pregnant. And, of course, just a few days before that, McCain announced that, as his VP, he had chosen a woman who had (unplannedly) had her fifth child at age 44, while serving her first year as governor of Alaska.
This woman, by the way, is supposed to be the female vote's consolation prize for losing Hillary. Regardless of the very obvious fact that this woman stands for the exact opposite of everything Hillary stands for - but that's a minor detail. Hillary and Palin both have vaginas and boobies (skip to 3:00), so they must be the same, right?
My friend said she skipped a couple months of birth control because she couldn't afford to pay for it. I can't argue with her on that; I've taken months off because I couldn't pay the $40+ my insurance charged me per month for the NuvaRing - and I'm a fully grown, adult woman with a full-time, full-paying job. She's a starving student how can she afford to play full price for birth control?
My first thought, when she told me she couldn't afford birth control, was DID YOU TRY PLANNED PARENTHOOD??? They charge for their services on a sliding scale, so people on low incomes (including students) can afford birth control. I used to get my pills for $10 a pack, if not less (they also allowed you to get several packs at once - I think they give you a discount if you buy "in bulk," and could get a whole year in one visit, so you don't have to worry about running out or having to find time in your schedule to get to a pharmacy or PP during their working hours, which always tend to coincide perfectly with my working hours).
I didn't voice that thought, because that little nugget of information was not going to help her in the least at this point in time. But I was filled with rage that the information was not so blatantly obvious to her when the information would have been helpful.
Why is this info not common knowledge for all young women?
Thanks to men like John McCain and women like Palin.
When you say "Planned Parenthood," there are people who hear "ABORTION." I don't have a number on this, but all the Planned Parenthood locations I have been to (in three different cities), none of them perform abortions. The only PP clinics that perform abortions are those in areas where there is no other abortion provider.
Planned Parenthood provides counseling on ALL the options available to you when you face an unplanned pregnancy. When I walked into my PP clinic, my mind was fully made up. I asked for information on getting an abortion, because that is what I had decided to do. I specifically asked for information on getting an abortion. They took me into a room, and the lady talked to me about ALL the options available to me. She told me about adoption services. She told me about government aid programs, to help single mothers. She made me take the information home. I almost felt that she was arguing with me, trying to convince me to change my mind and carry the pregnancy to term - I did not walk in undecided and receive information on ALL my options, I walked in FULLY DECIDED, specifically asked for information about the option I had already chosen, but they showed me ALL my options anyway. They made sure I had ALL the information.
Planned Parenthood also provides pre-natal care to millions of low-income women. This is pretty much the only medical care some of these women receive.
There is nothing "anti-life" about Planned Parenthood. They do a heck of a lot to improve and maintain the lives of women and children. How is that not "pro" life?
Birth control is a good thing. It is more than a good thing - it should be a damned right for every woman in this country. Every woman should have information and access to birth control - money should not be an obstacle to this aspect of basic woman's health care.
Sarah Palin is an adult woman. If she chooses not to use birth control (which I am extrapolating from the fact that her first three children are close in age, which would suggest they were planned; 6-7 years later, she has another child, randomly, and another 6-7 years later, when she is well past recommended child-bearing age AND during her first year in her first term as governor - a job that does not easily allow for maternity leave - she gets pregnant again, and then chooses to hide this fact from her constituency until the very last minute... does that seemed planned to you?), then that's her business and I have no right to say peep about it. I assume, because she is a 44-year-old adult, that she has the necessary information to make an informed decision on whether or not she wants to use birth control - if I personally disagree with her decision, who cares.
However, her poor planning resulted in the birth of a child. Another human being. (It also resulted in this pregnancy and birth taking place during her first year as Governor - if I were one of her constituents, I think I'd have a few choice words to say about her negligence. How well can you run the state when you're getting up 2-3 hours a night, for months on end, to feed your baby?) And neither she nor her husband have - from what I have seen, and I've been looking - taken responsibility for their action. She gave birth to the child, and now she's committing to running for Vice-President, and extremely time-consuming and stressful job. Who's left taking care of the baby?
Big Sis Bristol!
Which, as it turns out, might be a good thing - it's giving her some great training for her own child, which shall be arriving in about four months. It's almost too good to be true for Palin - since little Bristol will be home anyway, taking care of her own baby, Palin can go ahead and leave li'l Trig with Bristol and not even worry about day care! Now that's what I can some great social conservative family values.
Bristol's only 17. This child needed to be told about birth control. She needed to have a way to access information and acquire pills, condoms, Rings, whatever she wanted.
Instead, she was fed abstinence-only "education." Well, we can see how well that works!
When are you people going to wake up and realize that the kids who are going to have sex, are going to have sex whether we tell them about it or not. They're not waiting for our "permission." And, PLEASE, giving them information is NOT giving them "permission." It's giving them INFORMATION.
I have to admit I am disproportionately angry about these unplanned pregnancies. I should not care this much. It's not my problem, I should move on.
So why am I writing this eternally long blog post about it?
I have been waiting for a very long time to have a child. I have had several opportunities to get off birth control and get pregnant (and, at times, I have had to go through great pains to make sure I didn't get pregnant, because I could not access or afford birth control). But I have waited.
I've been waiting for so long, I'm getting pretty darn close to missing my chance (unlike certain people, I had comprehensive sex ed in school, and I realize that the older a woman is when she conceives the higher the risks of birth defects - such as Down's Syndrome - are, and I don't want to put my potential baby in that risk).
I also grew up with a mother who works with abused and abandoned children. I am too aware of what happens to unwanted pregnancies (not all unplanned pregnancies are unwanted, but all unwanted pregnancies were unplanned). I am too aware of the hoards of children out there waiting for a home.
The world is overpopulated as it is, and we're working so hard to deplete the resources we have left. So many people are bringing children into this world without thinking, why would I want to add to the insanity?
This is what I was thinking as I was driving home from work today, still texting with my friend. There are too many kids in the world already, I don't even want to be a part of that anymore.
Birthing and raising a child are hard. Part of me is thinking, with the excess of children already in the world, why do I want to go through all that work just to aggravate the problem?
What do I do with my students for the six weeks I'll be out on maternity leave (I wish I could take the full 12 weeks, but there's no way I can be out for two-thirds of the semester). Would I be able to breastfeed after I went back to work? Is there any way I could pump at work? (Yeah, that's going to work in a classroom of high-school boys...)
Part of me wants to give up on the dream I've had since I've been old enough to understand the concept. It's just too much. I can't deal with the irresponsible parenting, and I don't want to be a part of it.
But then, part of me want to scream, "When the fuck is it my turn, you damned people?"
How come everybody else gets away with it, and I'm sitting here, like an idiot, waiting until I'm in the right relationship and have my debt under control. Why am I still waiting? Is there even a point?
Unplanned pregnancies can work out. My sister did it. I don't know how; she has a strength I never knew, and I admire. She got pregnant in college, yet she gave birth and graduated without missing a beat. She was in a bad marriage, but she had the strength to get herself and her toddler daughter out of it. She's currently putting herself through law school as a single parent, and her daughter is one of the most well-put-together, smart, confident, well-behaved, mature kids I know. I don't know how she did it - how she does it. I'm in awe of her.
Hopefully things will work out that well for my friend. At least, unlike poor Bristol, my friend (and her parents) are smart enough to not aggravate an unplanned pregnancy by forcing her into a bad marriage, but the dad is going to be involved (so he says, now. Hopefully he'll be a man of his word, and one worth having involved).
It still makes me mad.
It can be avoided so easily. All we need is information - clear and accurate information - and a little bit of tolerance (yes, I recognize the hypocrisy of me asking for tolerance when I have been so intolerant in this post. But who ever said I was any sort of role model?)
Don't agree with abortion? Then don't have one. Also, give people birth control, so there won't be an unwanted pregnancy to abort.
Nobody wants to have an abortion. It is the lesser evil. Let's find a way to reach our common goal of no unwanted pregnancies.
This the day after McCain's brilliant choice for VP announced her seventeen-year-old daughter is also unplannedly pregnant. And, of course, just a few days before that, McCain announced that, as his VP, he had chosen a woman who had (unplannedly) had her fifth child at age 44, while serving her first year as governor of Alaska.
This woman, by the way, is supposed to be the female vote's consolation prize for losing Hillary. Regardless of the very obvious fact that this woman stands for the exact opposite of everything Hillary stands for - but that's a minor detail. Hillary and Palin both have vaginas and boobies (skip to 3:00), so they must be the same, right?
My friend said she skipped a couple months of birth control because she couldn't afford to pay for it. I can't argue with her on that; I've taken months off because I couldn't pay the $40+ my insurance charged me per month for the NuvaRing - and I'm a fully grown, adult woman with a full-time, full-paying job. She's a starving student how can she afford to play full price for birth control?
My first thought, when she told me she couldn't afford birth control, was DID YOU TRY PLANNED PARENTHOOD??? They charge for their services on a sliding scale, so people on low incomes (including students) can afford birth control. I used to get my pills for $10 a pack, if not less (they also allowed you to get several packs at once - I think they give you a discount if you buy "in bulk," and could get a whole year in one visit, so you don't have to worry about running out or having to find time in your schedule to get to a pharmacy or PP during their working hours, which always tend to coincide perfectly with my working hours).
I didn't voice that thought, because that little nugget of information was not going to help her in the least at this point in time. But I was filled with rage that the information was not so blatantly obvious to her when the information would have been helpful.
Why is this info not common knowledge for all young women?
Thanks to men like John McCain and women like Palin.
When you say "Planned Parenthood," there are people who hear "ABORTION." I don't have a number on this, but all the Planned Parenthood locations I have been to (in three different cities), none of them perform abortions. The only PP clinics that perform abortions are those in areas where there is no other abortion provider.
Planned Parenthood provides counseling on ALL the options available to you when you face an unplanned pregnancy. When I walked into my PP clinic, my mind was fully made up. I asked for information on getting an abortion, because that is what I had decided to do. I specifically asked for information on getting an abortion. They took me into a room, and the lady talked to me about ALL the options available to me. She told me about adoption services. She told me about government aid programs, to help single mothers. She made me take the information home. I almost felt that she was arguing with me, trying to convince me to change my mind and carry the pregnancy to term - I did not walk in undecided and receive information on ALL my options, I walked in FULLY DECIDED, specifically asked for information about the option I had already chosen, but they showed me ALL my options anyway. They made sure I had ALL the information.
Planned Parenthood also provides pre-natal care to millions of low-income women. This is pretty much the only medical care some of these women receive.
There is nothing "anti-life" about Planned Parenthood. They do a heck of a lot to improve and maintain the lives of women and children. How is that not "pro" life?
Birth control is a good thing. It is more than a good thing - it should be a damned right for every woman in this country. Every woman should have information and access to birth control - money should not be an obstacle to this aspect of basic woman's health care.
Sarah Palin is an adult woman. If she chooses not to use birth control (which I am extrapolating from the fact that her first three children are close in age, which would suggest they were planned; 6-7 years later, she has another child, randomly, and another 6-7 years later, when she is well past recommended child-bearing age AND during her first year in her first term as governor - a job that does not easily allow for maternity leave - she gets pregnant again, and then chooses to hide this fact from her constituency until the very last minute... does that seemed planned to you?), then that's her business and I have no right to say peep about it. I assume, because she is a 44-year-old adult, that she has the necessary information to make an informed decision on whether or not she wants to use birth control - if I personally disagree with her decision, who cares.
However, her poor planning resulted in the birth of a child. Another human being. (It also resulted in this pregnancy and birth taking place during her first year as Governor - if I were one of her constituents, I think I'd have a few choice words to say about her negligence. How well can you run the state when you're getting up 2-3 hours a night, for months on end, to feed your baby?) And neither she nor her husband have - from what I have seen, and I've been looking - taken responsibility for their action. She gave birth to the child, and now she's committing to running for Vice-President, and extremely time-consuming and stressful job. Who's left taking care of the baby?
Big Sis Bristol!
Which, as it turns out, might be a good thing - it's giving her some great training for her own child, which shall be arriving in about four months. It's almost too good to be true for Palin - since little Bristol will be home anyway, taking care of her own baby, Palin can go ahead and leave li'l Trig with Bristol and not even worry about day care! Now that's what I can some great social conservative family values.
Bristol's only 17. This child needed to be told about birth control. She needed to have a way to access information and acquire pills, condoms, Rings, whatever she wanted.
Instead, she was fed abstinence-only "education." Well, we can see how well that works!
When are you people going to wake up and realize that the kids who are going to have sex, are going to have sex whether we tell them about it or not. They're not waiting for our "permission." And, PLEASE, giving them information is NOT giving them "permission." It's giving them INFORMATION.
I have to admit I am disproportionately angry about these unplanned pregnancies. I should not care this much. It's not my problem, I should move on.
So why am I writing this eternally long blog post about it?
I have been waiting for a very long time to have a child. I have had several opportunities to get off birth control and get pregnant (and, at times, I have had to go through great pains to make sure I didn't get pregnant, because I could not access or afford birth control). But I have waited.
I've been waiting for so long, I'm getting pretty darn close to missing my chance (unlike certain people, I had comprehensive sex ed in school, and I realize that the older a woman is when she conceives the higher the risks of birth defects - such as Down's Syndrome - are, and I don't want to put my potential baby in that risk).
I also grew up with a mother who works with abused and abandoned children. I am too aware of what happens to unwanted pregnancies (not all unplanned pregnancies are unwanted, but all unwanted pregnancies were unplanned). I am too aware of the hoards of children out there waiting for a home.
The world is overpopulated as it is, and we're working so hard to deplete the resources we have left. So many people are bringing children into this world without thinking, why would I want to add to the insanity?
This is what I was thinking as I was driving home from work today, still texting with my friend. There are too many kids in the world already, I don't even want to be a part of that anymore.
Birthing and raising a child are hard. Part of me is thinking, with the excess of children already in the world, why do I want to go through all that work just to aggravate the problem?
What do I do with my students for the six weeks I'll be out on maternity leave (I wish I could take the full 12 weeks, but there's no way I can be out for two-thirds of the semester). Would I be able to breastfeed after I went back to work? Is there any way I could pump at work? (Yeah, that's going to work in a classroom of high-school boys...)
Part of me wants to give up on the dream I've had since I've been old enough to understand the concept. It's just too much. I can't deal with the irresponsible parenting, and I don't want to be a part of it.
But then, part of me want to scream, "When the fuck is it my turn, you damned people?"
How come everybody else gets away with it, and I'm sitting here, like an idiot, waiting until I'm in the right relationship and have my debt under control. Why am I still waiting? Is there even a point?
Unplanned pregnancies can work out. My sister did it. I don't know how; she has a strength I never knew, and I admire. She got pregnant in college, yet she gave birth and graduated without missing a beat. She was in a bad marriage, but she had the strength to get herself and her toddler daughter out of it. She's currently putting herself through law school as a single parent, and her daughter is one of the most well-put-together, smart, confident, well-behaved, mature kids I know. I don't know how she did it - how she does it. I'm in awe of her.
Hopefully things will work out that well for my friend. At least, unlike poor Bristol, my friend (and her parents) are smart enough to not aggravate an unplanned pregnancy by forcing her into a bad marriage, but the dad is going to be involved (so he says, now. Hopefully he'll be a man of his word, and one worth having involved).
It still makes me mad.
It can be avoided so easily. All we need is information - clear and accurate information - and a little bit of tolerance (yes, I recognize the hypocrisy of me asking for tolerance when I have been so intolerant in this post. But who ever said I was any sort of role model?)
Don't agree with abortion? Then don't have one. Also, give people birth control, so there won't be an unwanted pregnancy to abort.
Nobody wants to have an abortion. It is the lesser evil. Let's find a way to reach our common goal of no unwanted pregnancies.
Monday, September 01, 2008
Own Your Failure
I owned my failure. What about you?
In related news, I'll leave you with this video (stolen from this brilliant blog). I'll address this later on, once I figure out how to load the audio files I need onto Blackboard so my students can access them.
In related news, I'll leave you with this video (stolen from this brilliant blog). I'll address this later on, once I figure out how to load the audio files I need onto Blackboard so my students can access them.
Tuesday, June 10, 2008
Repairing the Damage, Before Roe (NYT essay)
"It is important to remember that Roe v. Wade did not mean that abortions could be performed. They have always been done, dating from ancient Greek days.
What Roe said was that ending a pregnancy could be carried out by medical personnel, in a medically accepted setting, thus conferring on women, finally, the full rights of first-class citizens — and freeing their doctors to treat them as such."
Waldo L. Fielding, retired obstetrician and gynecologist, from his essay published in the New York Times June 3, 2008.
Please read the full essay here.
I don't have much to add. He said it. Making abortion illegal will not stop abortion (again, does making rape illegal stop rape?), it will just put women at the mercy of hacks and coathangers.
I could ramble on, as I so often do, but I'll let the essay speak for itself. It does a pretty darned good job.
What Roe said was that ending a pregnancy could be carried out by medical personnel, in a medically accepted setting, thus conferring on women, finally, the full rights of first-class citizens — and freeing their doctors to treat them as such."
Waldo L. Fielding, retired obstetrician and gynecologist, from his essay published in the New York Times June 3, 2008.
Please read the full essay here.
I don't have much to add. He said it. Making abortion illegal will not stop abortion (again, does making rape illegal stop rape?), it will just put women at the mercy of hacks and coathangers.
I could ramble on, as I so often do, but I'll let the essay speak for itself. It does a pretty darned good job.
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