I dream that someday NARAL’s Blog for Choice Day will be a thing of the past, because the idea that a woman wouldn’t have absolute sovereignty over her own body will be laughable to the point of absurdity.
However, until that day comes, you can bet that I’ll be taking part and speaking out. The question this year is: Given the anti-choice gains in the states and Congress, are you concerned about choice in 2011?
I live in a New York state, which has great pro-choice representation in government, so I don’t have a strong reason to worry about my own rights on this front. But I am concerned. With the Republicans earning a majority in the House of Representatives, they’ve already decided to throw their weight around with symbolic-but-empty gestures like voting to repeal the health insurance reform bill. But they’ve got more dangerous and damaging plans, like H.R. 3, AKA the “Stupak On Steroids” Bill, which:
- bans coverage of abortion in the new health-care system and impose tax penalties on those with private insurance which does have abortion coverage;
- denies Medicaid coverage for abortion to survivors of statutory rape and any incest survivor who is 18 years of age or older;
- bans on Washington, D.C.’s use of local funds for abortion for low-income women;
- and denies women in the military access to abortion care at overseas military hospitals, even if they pay for the service with their own money.
Be concerned. Anti-choice shitwits are going to be fueled by the horror-story of “Dr.” Kermit Gosnell in Philadelphia, who was providing unsafe, unsanitary late-term abortions to women who were desperate. But here’s the deal: bills like “Stupak on Steroids” are going to make more women more desperate, and lead to more hideous abuses like Gosnell’s. Keeping abortion safe, legal, and accessible will lead to the best outcomes for the most people. And remember, eliminating abortion is just the first step: these jackwagons want your birth control and your sex life, too.
You can help. Speak out for Roe on your blog or your Facebook page. Write your government reps (look here). Give time or money to clinics in your area, or to Planned Parenthood, the Feminist Abortion Network, the National Network of Abortion Funds, or of course, to NARAL Pro-Choice America.
You bet I am. My state now has two anti-choice senators and an anti-choice governor. This business with Gosnell doesn’t concern me much-the antis already think that’s what goes on in every clinic, so I don’t see their rhetoric changing. But the overall picture is alarming.
How the Gosnell story can be seen as anything but an example of why we NEED access to safe, legal abortion services is beyond me. I honestly believe you’d have to be truly committed to the idea of harming women to see it as a reason to further restrict access to abortion. I don’t even know how I would speak to someone who thought that way, it’s just so far beyond any logic or reality I understand.
Now that I’m employed again I’m hoping to find money in the budget to support the National Network of Abortion Funds again. They do such needful, important work at the grassroots level.
I wrote a blog for choice post up over at the feminist librarian about the privilege of having real choices if anyone is interested. The day kinda snuck up on me this year, so it’s not the most coherent contribution I’ve ever made to blog for choice day. But it’s an issue that’s been really bugging me lately, so it felt good to get off the chest
.
And you bet I’m concerned.
I live in NJ and HELL YEAH I’m fed up. Chris Christie – aka That Asshole – and his appointed pals hate women as much as they do black bears.
He appoints a dude who’s fundie and against all BC, then cancels ALL – that’s right, 100 fucking percent – of women’s family planning and related health care programs in NJ. Even though that in turn cut off federal funds, and the funding was located to support these programs. He was too busy campaining in Disneyworld and getting that spot on his mantel ready for a bear cub head in order to give a rat’s ass about over half of his states citizens and voters (and our state’s kids, prenatal programs, you name it).
Living in a very Dem area of Jersey, and the state going more blue than red historically, this is fucking crushing. We do tons of campaigns rile everyone up to contact him and picket and you name it, and he ignores up anyways. Deep pockets from all those special interests he pretends he avoids.
Here’s more info: http://www.plannedparenthoodnj.org/whm/
Also, even if abortion is legal, as we saw with the murder of Dr. Tiller and the fight over online/phone Rx’s for abortives…and the lack of abortion services in most counties in this countries…we learned it’s so much hot air if we don’t have enough trained abortion providers spread around and not afraid for their lives. (Planned Parenthood of MN, for example, is also PP of SD. SD is hostile to abortion rights and providers.)
That’s why I donate to MEDICAL STUDENTS FOR CHOICE, and I encourage you to do the same:
“CREATING TOMORROW’S ABORTION PROVIDERS AND PRO-CHOICE PHYSICIANS:
Medical Students for Choice is an internationally recognized non-profit organization with a network of over 10,000 medical students and residents around the United States and Canada.”
http://www.ms4c.org/
87% of all U.S. counties – and ***98%*** of rural counties – have NO abortion provider in the U.S.!!!
Um, I live in Oklahoma. I got an IUD this year because at least that way I can pretend like I don’t actually use BC if the shit really hits the fan.
You can contact your local representatives through NARAL here: https://secure.prochoiceamerica.org/site/Advocacy?cmd=display&page=UserAction&id=4569
I don’t know about you, but form letters make it infinitely easier for me to express myself when I don’t have the time or mental energy to sit down and compose a strongly worded letter.
Thanks for the link, SomeFem! Better a form letter than no letter, for sure! I like to use the template and tailor it, too.
As one of the few democrats in South Carolina, I can tell you that I’m horribly concerned. Just the other day my campus paper put out a horrible article on how abortion should be banned completely, citing the Pennsylvania atrocities as examples of what abortion really is, (and what pro-choice activists wish upon poor opinionless pregnant women).