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"In my heart, I think a woman has two choices: either she's a feminist or a masochist." --Gloria Steinem
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Apr
11
Victims Don’t Owe You Anything
Filed Under International, human rights, misogyny, paternalism, patriarchy, pregnancy, reproductive justice, violence against women and girls | 9 Comments
A woman is being held in jail as a means to force testimony against her domestic abuser.
It gets worse: she’s pregnant.
And worse: her lawyer says that she is due to deliver every day.
And horridly ironic: one of the charges against her boyfriend is forcible confinement.
The victim, whose name I don’t feel it is appropriate to use (and in any case have seen spelled in no less than four different ways), did indeed testify today. She has said that she wants to raise her baby with her boyfriend and then she made up a highly transparent story about how the abuse didn’t happen, despite the mountain of physical evidence to the contrary. She has also vowed to never call the police again.
Popularity: 20% [?]
Apr
10
Because a Woman’s Free Will is of Their Utmost Concern
Filed Under Democrats, abortion, anti-choice extremism, legislation, misogyny, paternalism, patriarchy, politics, rape and sexual assault, reproductive justice | 4 Comments
I know that in crazy anti-choice wingnut land, logic isn’t exactly popular. But I do believe they’ve reached new heights of insult to basic reason. The Oklahoma Senate has passed a new bill that is more or less a hodgepodge of anti-abortion legislation. Take a look at the emphasized lines at the end of this excerpt.
SB 1878 combines various pieces of abortion legislation proposed this session.
One provision would require women who seek an abortion to undergo an ultrasound within one hour of the procedure.
Dr. Dana Stone, an Oklahoma City physician who is the chairwoman of the Oklahoma Section of the American College of Obstetrics and Gynecology, said the ultrasound legislation was of great concern to her because of its invasive nature early in pregnancy.
“The patient has no ability to opt out,” she said.
Lamb noted that the legislation does not require a woman to view the ultrasound images.
It does require that the images be displayed so the woman may see them. It also requires the examiner to give a medical description of the images, to include dimensions of the embryo or fetus and the presence of cardiac activity.
The bill also would require minors who seek abortions to provide written parental consent. Lamb said that is needed to ensure that minors aren’t coerced into ending pregnancy.
I reread those sentences several times, flabbergasted and convinced that I had interpreted them incorrectly. But no, I can still read. An author of the bill is actually arguing that requiring a minor to get written permission from her parents to have an abortion would ensure that she has not been coerced into ending a pregnancy.
Here is a list of anti-choice beliefs that one would have to buy into for this to make even a remote amount of sense:
- All men are sexual predators
- Therefore, women do not want abortions but are always pushed into them by their partners who want to continue having casual unprotected sex without consequences
- The decision to end a pregnancy is somehow fundamentally different from the decision to continue a pregnancy
- Until 18, all females are the property of their parents
- Until 18, one does not have a fundamental right to health care
- All parents are anti-choice, and none of them are abusive, which means that they could never be the ones who are coercing their daughter into an abortion
- Somehow, these anti-choice parents would never use the requirement of written permission to coerce her daughter out of an abortion, except . . .
- As stated, pregnant women are helpless and one could never actually want an abortions for her own reasons (like not wanting a baby). And if she does, she just needs to be talked down because all those baby-making hormones are making her a little irrational and unable to understand how very badly she really does want to become a mommy in several months. So allowing parents to force their daughters to give birth is a plus.
What really does scare me though is that 38 out of 48 legislators apparently bought into this argument. All who opposed the bill were Democrats, but 14 Democrats were in favor of it. And here is one of the fucking geniuses who OK Dems can count among their ranks.
Sen. Debbe Leftwich, D-Oklahoma City, voted for the measure but said she was concerned that it would require victims of rape and incest to view an ultrasound.
Well, it’s good to know that she had some concern for the extreme emotional distress that the bill could impose upon victims of rape and incest who are already going to be in the middle of an unthinkable experience . . . and then voted for it anyway.
What a proud day for democracy, both capital and lower D.
Popularity: 15% [?]
Apr
8
What’s at Risk in Kansas
Filed Under abortion, anti-choice extremism, courts gone crazy, misogyny, paternalism, patriarchy, politics, pregnancy, religious fanaticism, reproductive justice, social conservatives, women’s health | 7 Comments
Today the Kansas Supreme Court heard arguments in the case of whether or not embattled late-term abortion provider Dr. Tiller should be forced to turn over the medical records of 2,000 patients. This battle has been going on since 2006, but has been stalled and had verdicts flipped on technicalities. The women whose medical records are being used in a game of tug-of-war by the state had this to say:
The patients, using pseudonyms to protect their identity, argue that the subpoenas represent an unconstitutional intrusion into their privacy, and that the grand jury isn’t entitled to the records because there has been no finding that the documents contain evidence of a crime.
The records contain detailed medical information, including physical and mental health histories, of women who terminated their pregnancies, sometimes under tragic circumstances, attorneys representing the patients argued.
In some instances, the patient had an abortion after learning of a severe fetal anomaly, and the medical records often include photographs of the fetus taken after the abortion, they said.
“These photographs … may also include pictures of the fetus with baby clothes, stuffed animals or blankets that the parents had hoped to give their child.
“To have these personal histories paraded out before the members of the grand jury for their scrutiny and judgment is not only a gross intrusion on the patients’ privacy, it is cruel,” stated attorney Jim Lawing.
Of course, the anti-choicers who are responsible for this legal circus (they used an obscure Kansas law that allows citizen to petition for a grand jury investigation with little or no evidence), argue that all identifying information will be removed from the records. Unsurprisingly, this argument is rather disingenuous. While the possibility of abortion patients being “outed” is of grave concern, removing identifying information doesn’t solve the full problem. The fact that the patient’s identifying information will be removed doesn’t answer the question of privacy violation. Imagine a total stranger breaking into your house and going through your personal things — photo albums, prescriptions, bedside drawers, dirty laundry, your email, etc. — but somehow turns out to be the worst robber ever, and doesn’t manage to find any bills, letters, etc. that would provide identifying information. The fact that you don’t have to worry too much about identity theft will be some relief — but you’re still going to feel hugely violated.
Popularity: 15% [?]
Apr
7
Anti-Choicers Are Furious Because Obama Cares About His Daughters
Filed Under 2008 election, Democrats, abortion, anti-choice extremism, misogyny, parenthood, paternalism, patriarchy, politics, pregnancy, religious fanaticism, reproductive justice, sex and sexuality, sexism, slut-shaming, social conservatives, women’s health | 48 Comments
You’ve probably already read about Barack Obama’s statements regarding teen pregnancy and the outrage it has inspired in forced-birth proponents. Amanda has already wonderfully skewered the reaction. This is what Obama said:
“When it comes specifically to HIV/AIDS, the most important prevention is education, which should include — which should include abstinence education and teaching the children — teaching children, you know, that sex is not something casual. But it should also include — it should also include other, you know, information about contraception because, look, I’ve got two daughters. 9 years old and 6 years old. I am going to teach them first of all about values and morals. But if they make a mistake, I don’t want them punished with a baby. I don’t want them punished with an STD at the age of 16. You know, so it doesn’t make sense to not give them information.”
I mean, really, with all the talk about sex not being anything casual and engaging in sex is a “mistake,” it would seem that Obama is pandering enough to the religious right “sex-is-bad-mmkay?” crowd. But no, instead he has made them very, very angry. Honestly, I think they’re pissed because of his reasonable assertion that telling kids not to have sex doesn’t mean they’re going to listen. But in typical “the liberal made a reasonable point — quick, make everyone look over here!” fashion, they’re screaming and hollering about how Obama said that babies are punishment. They also claim that his comments were about abortion, which is blatantly false, even if the comments he made do easily carry over and most likely influence his pro-choice views.
Popularity: 21% [?]
Apr
2
Zombie SD Abortion Ban Done with Legislators, Moving on to Citizens’ Brains
Filed Under abortion, anti-choice extremism, assholes, misogyny, paternalism, patriarchy, rape and sexual assault, religious fanaticism, reproductive justice, slut-shaming, social conservatives, violence against women and girls, women’s health | 17 Comments
Dear Leslee Unruh,
Why, exactly, do you hate women so much? What did a vagina, yours or someone else’s, ever do to you? Did your uterus really piss you off at some point? Did some lady give you a nasty look as a child? What is it about the XX chromosome that makes you want to punish as many human beings carrying it around as you possibly can?
No, really, I have to know. What is it about yourself and the rest of us that makes you spend your every waking moment, every single breath you get on this earth, trying to make sure that people with similar biological makeup live a miserable, oppressed, torturous existence?
What is it? And once you figure it out, please get yourself some fucking therapy and leave the rest of us alone.
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I’ve written about the zombie South Dakota abortion ban before. For those of you out there who think that maybe, just maybe, Leslee Unruh actually does think that she’s doing something good, that she really is stupid enough to believe that making the autonomous decision to have an abortion is more damaging to a woman than forcing her to give birth to an infant she does not want or cannot afford, for those of you who think that she’s just a woman ridiculous enough to think that an embryo deserves more rights than the born human being carrying it, and really she just loves embryo-babies so much that she can’t control herself . . . you’re wrong. This woman hates women. I don’t know how she feels about babies. I have an inkling that she couldn’t give a shit less about them, but maybe she loves them and even intends to start adopting them from the orphanages she sees as a fair “compromise” on abortion for everyone involved. It doesn’t matter. Because the fact remains that she hates women, and so does her ilk.
How do I know that? Because I’ve read the text of the new abortion ban legislation she’s gleefully shoving on the South Dakota ballot this November (pdf).
Popularity: 17% [?]
Mar
5
Not the Kind of Consent I Support
Filed Under abortion, anti-choice extremism, assholes, courts gone crazy, discrimination, legislation, misogyny, paternalism, patriarchy, reproductive justice, sex and sexuality, slut-shaming, social conservatives, women’s health | 5 Comments
Arizona, apparently discontented with simply attempting to strip pregnant drug addicts of their human and civil rights, has now decided to work on destroying any rights that pregnant teenagers in the state may have left. A new bill would mandate that the only way a teenage girl can get a court waiver for an abortion without parental consent is to prove that she is mature enough to make the decision. Sound kind of vague? It is. And that’s precisely the point.
A minor would have to prove by clear and convincing evidence that she is mature enough to get an abortion without her parents’ consent, under a bill passed Tuesday by the House of Representatives.
Supporters say that HB 2263 just codifies a 2003 ruling on the existing parental-consent law by the Arizona Court of Appeals, in which the court specified criteria that can be used to determine if a minor is mature enough to make the decision to have an abortion.
Under the bill, the court could consider factors, including whether the minor has traveled on her own, handled her own finances, lived outside her parents’ home and made other significant decisions.
The measure also requires the court to weigh whether she has considered all her options and the potential consequences.
You know, the standard “a teenage girl who can’t confide in her daddy about an abortion needs her legislators and judges to take his place, and a daddy’s job is to restrict his daughter’s life no matter what the consequences” kind of fare. But what the hell does “mature enough” mean? Does anyone know? And what teenage girl handles her finances while living outside of the home before age 17? A few, certainly, but come on, now.
In this article we get a vague but somewhat more reliable description of how “mature enough” will actually be interpreted:
Popularity: 22% [?]
Mar
3
Pregnant Women and Drug Addicts: They’re People, Too.
Filed Under WOC issues, abortion, class and economics, discrimination, human rights, legislation, misogyny, paternalism, patriarchy, pregnancy, race and racism, reproductive justice, women’s health | 6 Comments
Last week, reader Jessica sent me a link to a story about new legislation being considered in her state that would forcibly imprison pregnant women suspected of being addicted to methamphetamine, sending them to drug treatment facilities against their will. The Arizona bill is, of course, designed to protect fetuses, not women.
The Senate Judiciary Committee took the first steps toward approving SB 1500 Monday, mandating that state Child Protective Services workers go to court if they know or have reasonable grounds to believe a mother-to-be is using meth and is not getting voluntary treatment.
That order would require the mother to cooperate.
The legislation would let CPS ask a judge to have sheriff’s deputies actually pick up the woman and bring her to a facility for treatment.
Sen. Pamela Gorman, R-Anthem, said she’s not normally a proponent of government intervention into private lives.
“But I do think that the state has some very specific roles,” she said. “And one of them is to protect people from harm from other people.”
Indeed: the state has a specific role to protect people from harm, so long as the person isn’t a pregnant woman being harmed by the government who thinks that pregnancy gives them total control over her body.
The bill would expand the child abuse statutes to include methamphetamine use during pregnancy — essentially, defining child abuse as something a woman does to harm herself, intentionally or unintentionally, while carrying a fetus. It seems that all legislators opposed to the bill are doing so on the basis that it challenges abortion rights, or at least presents a slippery slope for challenges later on down the line.
Critics of the proposal are concerned that Gorman is trying to give the measure some teeth by extending the definition of what now constitutes “child abuse” to fetuses.
Sen. Ken Cheuvront, D-Phoenix, pointed out the existing definition of child abuse includes acts that endanger the life of a child. He said Gorman’s bill could be interpreted as prohibiting abortion.
From a practical standpoint, Cheuvront said he doubts that Gov. Janet Napolitano would sign any bill she believes interferes with the right of a woman to terminate her pregnancy.
Gorman said that wasn’t her intent.
But committee members refused to remove that language.
While I thank Cheuvront for opposing the bill and hope that he and other legislators continue to vocally do so, I think that his reasons are troubling and just plain off the mark. The problem is that, regardless of what Cheuvront actually feels, this kind of argument suggests that if it were possible to pass the legislation without putting abortion rights in any sort of danger, there would not be a problem.
I’m naturally wary of slippery slope arguments. They are often valid, but they often aren’t. Even when the slippery slope is a very real possibility, I think that this is just a shitty way to make your case. Okay, so the bill could potentially be used as a basis for anti-abortion legislation in the future. This is bad. But if it’s capable of doing this, there has to be a problem with the bill right now, a reason why this legislation is a bad idea for what it is and not what it could later encourage.
Luckily, there is such an argument, and it’s one that I’m actually far more concerned with at the moment.
Popularity: 24% [?]
Feb
26
If Anti-Choicers Want Women to Know Their Rights, I’ve Got an Offer They Can’t Refuse
Filed Under abortion, anti-choice extremism, assholes, legislation, misogyny, paternalism, patriarchy, pregnancy, religious fanaticism, reproductive justice, slut-shaming, women’s health | 20 Comments
Following in the great misogynist leader South Dakota’s footsteps, anti-choice havens Kansas and Missouri are working on new legislation to restrict abortion, burden providers, condescend to patients, and all around cause more hardship and pain to any woman unfortunate enough to be pregnant and not jumping for joy over it.
Of course, they’re not going phrase it like that. (Would you be so delusional that you’d accuse an anti-choice legislator of intellectual honesty?) No, the Republicans are going to ride in on their white horses to protect women from being coerced and forced into abortions.
The stated aim of the proposed requirements is to ensure that women are not coerced into undergoing abortions. In Kansas, the new restrictions would apply only to abortions after the 22nd week of development, while most of the Missouri proposals would apply to all abortions performed in the state.
In both states, legislation would require doctors to provide the woman with the opportunity to view a sonogram of the embryo or fetus or listen to the heartbeat before performing the surgery. Abortion offices would be required to have a prominent sign stating that no one can force a woman to have an abortion.
In Missouri, two bills would require women seeking abortions to be shown brochures or a video developed by the state Health Department providing a description of the developing embryo or fetus. The materials would include “color photographs or images of the developing unborn child at two-week gestational increments” from conception to full term.
The woman would be given a list of adoption agencies and maternity homes that could assist her in maintaining her pregnancy. She also would be given a statement that she would be eligible for child-support payments if she carried the child to term.
The doctor would have to provide a list of potential medical complications from abortion and discuss theories about whether a fetus can feel pain.
Planned Parenthood, in its weekly newsletter, criticized the bills, calling them a “convoluted checklist of bills (that) demonstrates a lack of understanding of how professional abortion care is provided.” It said the bills’ requirements were burdensome and interfered with a woman’s rights to determine when an abortion is appropriate.
Supporters said the legislation was intended to ensure women are fully informed about the risks and consequences of abortion — something already required, but with less detail, by Missouri law.
Let me just say first of all that I get a lot news from the Kansas City Star about anti-choice activities. And believe me, they are far from perfect. I do, however, think that they have a higher degree of integrity on reproductive rights issues than most newspapers, and they actually tend to do a decent job of clarifying the facts against the rhetoric. Like here: anti-choice legislators claim that they are concerned about women and want them to know the risk, but the fact of the matter is that this is already required.
Popularity: 24% [?]
Feb
22
South Dakota Brings Back That Woman-Hating Feeling
Filed Under abortion, anti-choice extremism, legislation, misogyny, paternalism, politics, pregnancy, reproductive justice, slut-shaming, social conservatives, women’s health | 1 Comment
A new anti-choice bill has just been passed in South Dakota and is now awaiting the inevitable signature of the state’s anti-choice governor. It will require OB/GYNs who perform abortions (not “abortion doctors,” as the article calls them) to ask their patients if they would like to view the ultrasound images of their fetus prior to an abortion. No, they won’t force her to look at the ultrasound, but the legislators behind the bill are pretty damn upfront about their goal.
Doctors already do sonograms to determine the stage of pregnancy and protect themselves from malpractice lawsuits, said Rep. Roger Hunt, R-Brandon. Women who get abortions pay for those sonograms and should be asked if they want to see them, he said.
Asking women if they would like to see sonograms may cause more of them to change their minds about abortions, Hunt added.
“All that this does is require that doctor performing the abortion to fully inform the woman of all of the same medical information that that abortion doctor has access to,” he said.
“All we’re doing is wanting to make sure that the woman who is making a decision about her unborn child is fully informed,” Hunt said.
Aw, thanks Captain Paternalism! Aren’t we ladies lucky to have nice daddy legislators looking out for us?
Popularity: 21% [?]
Feb
13
Who wants their tween traumatized and brainwashed? I know just the school.
Filed Under abortion, anti-choice extremism, education and schools, misogyny, paternalism, pregnancy, reproductive justice, women’s health | 40 Comments
You know, with all of the horrible, incomprehensible shit I’ve written about this week, in addition to that I’ve read but haven’t found the time to post on, I can’t exactly get myself into a truly righteous outrage over this relatively minor incident. But I do find it interesting and mildly amusing that just a couple of days after mentioning the infamous but rarely relevant anti-choice propaganda film The Silent Scream, we find out that some moron teacher screened the film to his 8th grade science classes.
Popularity: 18% [?]
Feb
1
Judge Exhibits “Supreme” Stupidity
Filed Under WOC issues, assholes, courts gone crazy, discrimination, gender, misogyny, paternalism, race and racism, sexism, stereotypes, work | 3 Comments
Pardon the pun (come on, sometimes it’s just too easy), but I’m wagering that once you read this, you’ll pretty much forget about anything stupid that I’ve said:
A county judge was reprimanded for calling three black female lawyers “the Supremes” in court and advising the defendant to get “an experienced male attorney.”
Talk about value! Judge Boone’s court apparently runs a two for one special: for a limited time only, come for the racism and get the sexism for free! Sale ends temporarily when a judicial commission calls him out on his shit.
The most unbelievable thing of all, though, is that it gets worse