In yesterday’s New York Times, Sheryl Gay Stolberg wrote about 80-year-old Representative Louise M. Slaughter—a Democrat from New York, staunch defender of abortion rights, and member of what NARAL’s Nancy Keenan calls “the menopausal militia”—who secretly helped her unmarried friend receive the procedure in the early 1950’s. According to her, the pain and secrecy of the experience was “seared into my mind,” no doubt helping to inform her pro-choice policy decisions since entering congress in 1986.
But in the 37 years since Roe v. Wade was decided—including the time in which my generation, the Millennials, has grown up—there has been fewer opportunities for pregnant women and their friends to have these kinds of scarring experiences. Instead, we’ve grown up during a time when abortion, while often expensive or difficult to come by, is at least a legal option. “The result is a generational divide,” writes Stolberg, “not because younger women are any less supportive of abortion rights than their elders, but because their frame of reference is different.” Ana Greenberg, a Democratic pollster who studies public attitude towards abortion, backs up this theory.
Here is a generation that has never known a time when abortion has been illegal…. For may of them , the daily experience is: It’s legal and if you really need one you can probably figure out how to get one. So when we send out e-mail alerts saying, "Oh my God, write to your senator," it’s hard for young people to have that same sense or urgency.
True, there has been no single event to inspire Millennials to fight for the right to abortion. But, as the Times points out—and as New York Magazine thoroughly covered—the other change for our generation has been the development of the sonogram.
As fetal ultrasound technology improved during the nineties, abortion providers, conditioned to reassure patients that the fetus was merely tissue, found it much harder to do so once their patients were staring at images that looked so lifelike. Banking on the emotional power of seeing a beating heart on a television screen—many in the pro-life movement refer to sonograms as “God’s window”—organizations like Focus on the Family began to use this technology to their advantage, sending ultrasound machines to Crisis Pregnancy Centers in an initiative taglined “Revealing Life to Save Life.”
So what does this mean for Millennials? First, it means that we need our theory and rhetoric to catch up with the technology, and quick—otherwise, Roe v. Wade may soon be as obsolete as the tape deck. While we shouldn’t abandon other, more modern issues—such as GLBTQ rights, a distant dream in the 1970s—we should find ways to update our arguments. On Wednesday, the Stop Stupak coalition will hold a “National Day of Action,” which will include a number of abortion rights advocacy groups hosting events and campaigns to inspire pro-choice Millennials to voice our support for pro-choice legislation. Our mothers and grandmothers fought hard to make sure that we could make decisions about our body, and now it’s the Millennial’s duty to ensure that abortion will be safe and legal for the next generation.
Maybe Stupak is just the galvanizing opponent we’ve been looking for.
]]>According to a report in the Baltimore Sun yesterday, legislators in Maryland are considering a bill that would require CPCs to post information regarding what kind of services they don’t offer. Namely, abortion.
“The legislation would affect four centers, two of which are funded by the Roman Catholic Church. The centers provide adoption information and counseling, but do not perform abortions or issue contraceptives.”
The bill was introduced by City Council President Stephanie C. Rawlings-Blake “at the bequest of Planned Parenthood,” though her reasoning is more about honest marketing than freedom of choice.
"This is a bill about truth in advertising," Rawlings-Blake said. "Crisis pregnancy centers provide good and charitable work. A simple sign insures everyone walking into a center knows what to expect."
If passed, this would be the first legislation of its kind, according to Baltimore’s local NBC affiliate WBAL. According to their report, supporters from NARAL are brushing off accusations that this bill is intended to create harassment for the four clinics in the city that would be affected.
"Using false advertising to get these women inside, they are able to use inaccurate information and scare tactics to take away the women's ability to make their own informed decisions about what is best for them," said NARAL investigator Audrey Gottheimer.
Anti-choice activists held a vigil yesterday to encourage the city council to turn down the measure. However, if this bill passes, it could set a president for other cities who are tired of CPCs strong arming women into pregnancy and adoption using fear tactics, instead of letting them have their right to choose for themselves.
]]>According to an article in the Telegraph on Monday, the 21-year old defendant, Nick Walker, had gone out drinking with some friends from The Royal Academy of Dramatic Art. They all went back to a student apartment to crash on the living room floor. A girl, whose name hasn’t been released, told police that she’d felt a “weird sensation” and woke up.
“The woman, a student from Manchester on a weekend break, told jurors she found her pyjama bottoms and knickers yanked down and Mr. Walker having sex with her.”
She pulled up her pants and moved away from him, back onto some cushions as the Mail Online describes. He left early in the morning, without a word to her, and even tried to friend her on Facebook.
During the investigation, Walker told police that this had happened before with his girlfriend, (“We were both asleep and I cuddled up to her and it just went from there") though when he was questioned during the trial he said that it was the stress of the interrogation that caused him to say that.
This is obviously a nightmarish situation—to wake up with a stranger violating you must be an experience that’s hard to shake. But the story raises some questions, which Ami Angelowicz articulated today on The Frisky.
“Whether it was a conscious act or not, the fact remains that this poor girl was raped. Who pays for the crime? Is it fair that this guy should have been cleared of the rape charges?”
As one commenter on that site pointed out, part of a criminal act is the intent of committing that act. And since sleepwalkers cannot have conscious intent, it seems that he’s off the hook.
]]>But that was more than 40 years ago; since then, we’ve encountered the sexual revolution, the second wave of feminism, self-made female billionaires—even mannies.
And in a study to be released tomorrow, Kennedy’s niece, Maria Shriver—who worked in conjunction with the Center for American Progress—will release “The Shriver Report: A Woman’s Nation Changes Everything.” The 400-page report, according to an essay on the Women’s Media Center by feminist icon Gloria Steinem, “includes a national poll of changing attitudes among women and men, and two dozen essays from experts on various aspects of women's status, including Billie Jean King, Oprah and others who have lived it.”
Steinem went on to explain the study’s place within the larger discussion of women in the workplace and a “50/50 split.”
“At a minimum, it should end forever the debate about women's place in the labor force; women are the labor force. It also goes into such deeper places as the racial and economic disparities in women's health and the invisible and essential jobs done by immigrant women. It also exposes the frequent truth that women are better educated than men yet it doesn't afford them equal advancement, and critiques the media for portraying women as far more successful than they really are, thus creating the myth that no more progress is needed.”
In an article on TIME magazine’s website, Shriver explained how this study related back to her own family—specifically, her mother Eunice Kennedy.
]]>“I know for sure that if she were alive today, she'd say of this report, ‘It's about time!’ In articles published after her death, so many people were quoted as saying, ‘If only Eunice had been a man, she could have been President!’ ‘If only.’ My mother learned from that. Her message to women was ‘Don't let society tame you or contain you." Today she could run for President. And I believe she would win.”
For those of you who have missed it, here you go:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ggB6SsB4DgM
Except for the Alaska t-shirt and a muffled "How's the baby," many normal, non-news-junky Americans might have missed that this is Levi Johnston, the young man lucky enough to impregnate the governor's daughter--just before the governor became the vice-presidential nominee for the Republican party.
The UK's Telegraph had a blunt take on the last time he was on national television. As you may remember, things didn't go so well.
"He made an uncomfortable appearance alongside Bristol at the Republican convention in Minnesota as strategists sought to limit the damage to Mrs Palin's campaign from having an illegitimate grandchild."
And according to that paper, this isn't his only foray into the media spotlight since he and Bristol split last spring.
"In an interview with Vanity Fair last month he said that he would consider posing naked for Playgirl, the male equivalent of the adult magazine Playboy."
Looks like he's bounced back just fine.
“It's national Sex Education Week and 10 Senate Republicans, as well as 2 Democrats, approved an amendment to restore funding to ineffective, dangerous abstinence-only programs,” she wrote. “If you're an Arkansas resident, call Sen. Lincoln (202 224-4843...) and tell her you DON'T approve of her vote last night. North Dakota residents, do the same (202 224-2043) for Senator Conrad.”
No such luck. However, I did find Accidentally on Purpose on CBS, the story of Billie, (Jenna Elfman) a movie critic who has a fling with the young, handsome, unstable Zach (Jon Foster).
She quickly becomes pregnant. They decide not to be together, but to raise the baby while living in the same home. He drinks beer and plays video games. She goes to premiers and dinner parties. Just as she loses her temper at his dude-bro antics, he goes ahead and redeems himself. They hug. Thank you, CBS.
Anyway, notice that I didn't say she chooses to keep the baby.
What I mean is her options were never discussed. CBS, it seems, will air unprotected sex before abortion talk. Throughout the show I was waiting for them to bring it up-there were plenty of cougar jokes to fill the space-but the
credits started rolling before there was so much as a suggestion of any option other than baby.
So I was pleased to find an essay on Double X today by Mary Pals, the "real life" Billie, who reviews films for Time and MSN, and wrote a book called Accidentally on Purpose, on which this show is based.
Apparently, she did contemplate having an abortion, but
because of the circumstance-her age-she thought it might be the last time she
could conceive.
"Sitcom-me is not as ancient as reality me, in part because Elfman is 37, about to turn 38. But I would also guess that 39 is an unappealing number for the networks.... And my sitcom lover is younger as well: only 22. What's ironic about that age change is that if I had been 37 and had
drunken, unprotected sex with a 22 year-old like Zach, I would have taken the morning-after pill. I'm not saying that would have been the right choice, only that I needed to be at the brink of the 40-something cliff in order to jump off
it."
While I don't know what it's like to face an unplanned
pregnancy at 40-I'm only 22, myself-I do know the thought of having only one shot at motherhood must be daunting. It's disappointing, though that someone thought it was necessary to throw that part out of the show. For a single woman with a consuming career in a large city to not have the thought cross her mind doesn't seem plausible. But, as Pals later points out in her essay, there's still a possibility it will come up. Lets just see if the show stays on long enough to discuss the option.
"Unless put on hold, the new law takes effect at 12:01 a.m. on Sept. 30. Gov. Jan Brewer signed the law on July 13, and the lawsuits were filed two months later on Sept. 14." Both state and federal judges have scheduled hearings for next Tuesday to discuss the laws' constitutionality.
According to the Phoenix Business Journal, the laws, which were vetoed by former Arizona Gov. Janet Napolitano, require: "That only physicians can perform surgical abortions. The law prohibits nurses from performing the procedure; That women receive certain information, including information on fetal pain, from a doctor in person 24 hours before her abortion; That parental consent forms be notarized." One of the laws also restricts late term abortions. Planned Parenthood, one of the organizations suing to stop these laws from going into effect, believes that this puts unnecessary steps between the woman and the procedure.
"This law puts the health and well being of more than half of our state's residents at risk by restricting women's access to comprehensive care," said Bryan Howard, president and CEO of Planned Parenthood Arizona in a statement. "We believe the regulations should not be put into place until the court rules on the legality of this onerous law."
But according to LifeNews.com, anti-choice advocates have jumped to protect the laws since the suits were filed last week.
"Two Arizona legislators together with pro-life physicians and organizations filed motions Tuesday through their attorneys with the Alliance Defense Fund to support an Arizona abortion law. They want to intervene to protect the laws limiting abortions that Planned Parenthood wants to overturn."
]]>The Guardian reported totay that the study, published in BJOG: An International Journal of Obstetrics and Gynaecology, found that woman who have had an abortion may be at a greater risk for complications.
"The study found that women who had an abortion in the first or second trimester had a 35% increased risk of a low birth weight baby and a 36% raised risk of a pre-term baby in later pregnancies."
However, the author of the study, Dr. Prakesh Shah, insisted that there may be other factors that could contribute to these findings, such as damage to the cervix or uterus during the procedure. (He noted that certain drugs are now used to "ripen" the cervix, thus lessening the risk of damage.)
Dr. Shah, however, seemed more worried about how some voices in the abortion debate might distort this information to further their anti-choice cause.
"I think it should not be used as a way of saying, this is bad and we should not be doing this kind of thing. There is an association which we should be aware of, and we should let mothers be aware. I don't want unintended pregnancies to increase."
]]>Her evidence: an anecdote about a 28 year-old woman, Patti Kelly of Austin, Texas, who woke up one morning with a shortness of breath. Later that day, at the urging of her mother, a nurse, she checked herself into the ER. The doctor found multiple blood clots in her lungs and said had they not been found when they were, she could have died.
Ms. Brown is quick to jump to the conclusion that the failure in this case should be placed squarely on the shoulders of her birth control. What about Patti's mother, a nurse who had blood clots when she was younger, and neglected to tell her daughter about them, even when Patti was taking daily pills that clearly warned they could cause blood clots? (Ms. Brown explains that, "it just wasn't anything they talked about." No excuse, especially for a nurse.) Or the doctor who prescribed to her the pill; is it not standard procedure to monitor and observe a person on medication?
No, lets not blame negligent parents or medical providers-the liberal media is obviously the one who's at fault. Again.
"It would seem that whether the story is about a woman who almost died from a side effect of the pill or a group of 1,300 women who participated in a clinical study, the majority of America's secular media is reticent when it comes to publicizing negative findings about the use of birth control chemicals."
It's true that birth control comes with risks, but these risks should be explained--and weighed against the benefits--before a woman decides to get the prescription. Birth control is neither part of a secular conspiracy, nor an affront to God. It's just an option for some women who are willing to risk some things, in order to protect themselves from others. Freedom of choice is freedom of choice, and a responsible woman on birth control should be monitoring her health with her doctor. Moreover, the relative risks of birth control are far outweighed by the relative risks of unintended pregnancy and other complications of unprotected sex. Not all risks are born equal.
Don't blame the pill for human inadequacies.
]]>"The guidelines, scheduled to be released by UNESCO in a new draft next week, would be distributed to education ministries, school systems and teachers around the world to help guide teachers in what to teach young people about their bodies, sex, relationships and sexually transmitted diseases," the New York Times reported. "They would address four different age groups."
Not surprisingly, Fox had a different take. But one criticism in particular seems most ludicrous: "The
U.N. insists the program is ‘age appropriate,' but critics say it's exposing kids to sex far too early, and offers up abstract ideas - like ‘transphobia' - they might not even understand." I'm sorry, what was that? How is transphobia
any different from other abstract ideas that we teach children? Like racism, or sexism? Or math?
Looking over a June draft, it seems that the worst that
could happen is these kids would grow up to be healthy, educated adults in functional relationships. Acutally, I could see how this might be a problem for the GOP.
Piazza, who spoke with 100 Kenyan women and 25 medical
professionals during her stay in the port city of Mombasa, found that women are resorting to clandestine measures in order to regulate their number of children.
"Dr. Stephen Mwange of the Kinango District Hospital works as OB-GYN, general practitioner, oncologist, and pediatrician in the understaffed medical center outside of Mombasa. He says that in the past year, the number of women who have come to him to ask about contraception, without
their husband's knowledge, has increased from around 100 a year to 100 a month.
In the past, he said, a wife was afraid to use contraception unless her mwenye, or husband, agreed. But now ‘what they are starting to realize is that what the mwenye doesn't know cannot hurt him,' Dr. Mwange explained."
While more and more women are opting for regulating their
families with the help of birth control, many men see government-funded family planning initiatives as a way of destroying Kenyan culture. Piazza points out the similarities between the attitudes of contemporary Kenyan men and
African-American men in the 1960s and 70s.
"In a 1971 cover story for Ebony, journalist Dick Gregory wrote, ‘First the white man tells me to sit in the back of the bus. ... Now that we've got a little taste of power, white folks want us to call a moratorium on having children.'
Much as Kenyan women do today, black women in the United States saw the issue differently then: A 1970 survey in Chicago found that 80 percent of African-American women
supported contraceptive use and 75 percent used birth control."
Perhaps it will take longer for men than for women to accept
family planning measures as steps to assist the Kenyan family, not destroy it. But until then, it seems women will continue taking Chaguo Langu (Swahili for "My Choice") without their husbands'knowledge.
According to the article, the track and field star is being publicly humiliated--forced to undergo "gender testing" to determine whether or not her genetic makeup is that of a female. This, as the authors point out, is shameful enough.
But what's interesting is they made the leap to discuss the fact that the condition of being "intersex" -- not having the usual XX or XY chromosomal makeup -- is surprisingly common.
Many of these "intersex" individuals, estimated at one birth in every 1,666 in the United States alone, are legally operated on by surgeons who force traditional norms of genitalia on newborn infants. In what some doctors consider a psychosocial emergency, thousands of healthy babies are effectively subject to clitorectomies if a clitoris is 'too large' or castrations if a penis is 'too small' (evidently penises are never considered 'too big').
Not to say that Semenya is intersexed--there is absolutely no evidence that she is--but it shouldn't matter either way. It seems to me a person has lived her entire life as a female, she would be entirely entitled to participate in women's sports.
]]>
And in England, women have embraced a new way to cut costs.
According to an article in The Sun, discount pregnancy tests are gaining a
better reputation as women look to lower expenses.
“Cut-price baby test kits hit the headlines this week after
one costing just 99p went on sale at a bargain store in Crawley, West Sussex.”
When the tests first hit the market, many women were afraid that they would not
be as reliable as their brand-name counterparts, usually retailing for around
15£.
“But a nationwide probe by
medical products watchdog the MHRA has proved that the bargain pregnancy tests
are accurate.While investigators found
slight flaws with the labels on some of the cheaper products, the actual
testing devices were fine.”
The Family Planning Association
is promoting the bargain tests as well, because their affordability might
encourage women to find out if they are pregnant, sooner.
“FPA spokesman Adam Stevens
said: "These cheaper kits are a good idea and they can help many women to
find out that they are pregnant early on.”
This all seems well and good
for the Brits, and if a 75¢ pregnancy test his stores here—I still might be
skeptical.
Daley began by laying into
former President Clinton's catch-phrase of making abortion "safe, legal, and
rare." Those who "vehemently oppose" abortion as he does, he says, were never
satisfied with his actions, and don't have high hopes about the Obama
administration.
"President Obama has attempted to echo
[President Clinton's] sentiment, but his walk, unfortunately, has not matched
his talk. Consider the comments he made during his commencement address at the University
of Notre Dame in May:‘So let's work together to reduce the number
of women seeking abortions by reducing unintended pregnancies, and making
adoption more available, and providing care and support for women who do carry
their child to term.'"
It's right about here that Daley loses me,
though. Wouldn't it make more sense to focus on that first clause, the "reducing
unintended pregnancies" one? Hasn't all this talk of the healthcare system,
diabetes and obesity convinced the American public that preventative healthcare is the key?
Apparently Daley missed the boat on this one.
He goes on to say how the key to reducing abortions is extensive
adoption programs and unconstitutional laws that require women to see a sonogram before they authorize the
procedure.
Not surprisingly, Focus
on the Family doesn't support the one thing that would help reduce the number
of abortions in this country - comprehensive sex education. No, instead they
clearly state on their website that they support "abstinence-until-marriage
education in the public schools because it is God's expected standard as
communicated in Scripture."
Don't tell women how they might get pregnant,
and then punish her when she learns the hard way? It would be too
much to ask, I suppose, for the leader of a global Christian ministry to show a little empathy.
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