Seriously Perverted
Posted: February 18, 2012 Filed under: abortion rights, birth control, black women's reproductive health, religion, religious extremists, Reproductive Health, Reproductive Rights, Republican politics, War on Women, Women's Healthcare, Women's Rights | Tags: Republican obsession with sex 50 CommentsYou don’t really have to be a “birth control mom” to understand that the Republican and Red Beanie obsession with other people’s sex lives is just plain wrong. Trying to turn the reproductive
with apologies to R Crumb
health of women into a moral and religious freedom issue is one of the worst perversions of our time. I no longer require birth control but recognize the importance of birth control and abortion access as central to the recognition of women as a functioning adult capable of making moral decisions in a free and functioning democracy with constitutional rights. Women’s Reproductive Health is not a fucking political football.
Just a few weeks ago, the notion would have seemed far-fetched. The country is deeply divided on abortion, but not on contraception; the vast majority of American women have used it, and access hasn’t been a front-burner political issue since the Supreme Court decided Griswold v. Connecticut in 1965.
But then Rick Santorum said states ought to have the right to outlaw the sale of contraception.
And Susan G. Komen for the Cure yanked its funding for Planned Parenthood.
And the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops teed off on President Barack Obama’s contraception policy.
And House Republicans invited a panel of five men — and no women — to debate the issue.
And a prominent Santorum supporter pined for the days when “the gals” put aspirin “between their knees” to ward off pregnancy.
Democratic strategist Celinda Lake says it’s enough to “really irritate” independent suburban moms and “re-engage” young, single women who haven’t tuned into the campaign so far.
And, she says, the stakes are high: Women backed Barack Obama in big numbers in 2008 but then swung right in 2010. If the president is to win reelection in 2012, he’ll need to win women back — and Lake and other Democrats see the GOP push on contraception as a gift that will make that easier.
“I feel like the world is spinning backwards,” said former Rep. Patricia Schroeder, who has often related the troubles she has as a young married law student getting her birth control prescriptions filled in the early 1960s. “If you had told me when I was in law school that this would be a debate in 2012, I would have thought you were nuts … And everyone I talk to thinks so, too.”
Jennifer Lawless, director of the Women and Politics Institute at American University, also sees the chance of a huge female backlash if the Republicans overreach.
There are so many things about this article in Politico–by a woman–that piss me off that I hardly know where to start. The first is the bogus description of “deep division” in the country about abortion. The only deep division that I can see comes from the right wing continually pushing lies like the existence of abortion on demand hours before giving birth and bogus, nonexistent procedures like “partial birth abortion.”
The frustration of the right wing over their inability to control access to Plan B, hormonal birth control and first trimester abortions is at the root of all this. The push to force sonograms, invasive vaginal probes, and “life” begins at the moment of conception religous tropes is building to a crescendo. If only the red beanie set were this obsessed about ending world hunger or nuclear war or ensuring universal health care. The vast majority of women have basically had, are having, are using or will use all three of those things. To characterize normal reproductive health measures as murder and anti-religious is ridiculous. But I’d like to add this warning, if the political and punditry class on either side think they can turn us all into a new voting segment, I think they’re also going to learn the meaning of the word backlash. Women’s reproductive health shouldn’t be trapped in the land of political gamesmanship. Just who the hell are they to score political points with women’s lives??
Emily’s list is launching ads now. Do they think all women are taking Rick Santorum seriously or what? Do they think that all Catholics fear the Red Beanie Brigade?
The Democratic women’s group EMILY’s List is going on the air in three television markets with an ad raising the alarm about last week’s all-male congressional hearing on contraception, urging women to get engaged in the 2012 campaign and support female candidates, an EMILY’s List strategist told POLITICO.
The spot pieces together a montage of male voices on television talking about women’s issues — including contraception, breast cancer screenings and the Komen controversy — as a narrator begins: “On TV, men talking about women’s health issues. We heard them.”
It cuts to images of the male-dominated oversight hearing on contraceptive coverage, and shows New York Rep. Carolyn Maloney asking: “Where are the women?”
“Who should be heard on women’s lives, on women’s health?” the narrator says. “You?”
The ad is going up in Chicago, San Francisco and Palm Beach County — Democratic-leaning or solidly liberal areas where there are women running in prominent races, and where the strategist said there’s been “strong support for women candidates and for EMILY’s List.” The total cost of the first, cable-based ads, plus related online advertising, runs to just under $100,000.
In a statement, EMILY’s List president Stephanie Schriock said the campaign highlights “radical, right-wing anti-women conservatives in Washington who are using their power to set women back decades.”
“Women are saying: enough,” Schriock said. “Women know what’s best for their health, and they know how to make sure their voices are heard – by electing prochoice Democratic women who will fight for the rights and opportunities women and their families need.”
Excuse me while I choke on that last statement about “electing prochoice Democratic women who will fight for the rights and opportunities women and their families”. Where the fuck was Emily’s list in 2008?
Also, I just have to juxtapost this to a NYT story today called “For Women Under 30, Most Births Occur Outside Marriage”. Let me just fess up to something. If I had it all do to over again, I would have the children and never ever have the husband. NEVER EVER. Perhaps, I’m not the best choice to discuss this all rationally, but my still married sister–when talking to me about issues we saw in my upcoming daughter’s nuptials which I’d frankly like to stop–said it only gets worse not better. No kidding cupcake. She just finally passed the 20 year endurance test–that I barely did–about a year ago. I couldn’t take it any more. I also found out that if you’re married, you, the kids and everything are still kind’ve implied property of husband. Unless you have a ton of money, a women’s right to anything is a hard battle to fight in court. So, here’s the NYT wringing its hands about women having children sans husbands who are more capable of supporting and caring for the babies than the men in their lives. Did it ever occur to them that having multiple babies in your life make things pretty awful? Having an actual baby is stressful enough.
This is all about control. Pure and simple.
It used to be called illegitimacy. Now it is the new normal. After steadily rising for five decades, the share of children born to unmarried women has crossed a threshold: more than half of births to American women under 30 occur outside marriage.
Once largely limited to poor women and minorities, motherhood without marriage has settled deeply into middle America. The fastest growth in the last two decades has occurred among white women in their 20s who have some college education but no four-year degree, according to Child Trends, a Washington research group that analyzed government data.
Among mothers of all ages, a majority — 59 percent in 2009 — are married when they have children. But the surge of births outside marriage among younger women — nearly two-thirds of children in the United States are born to mothers under 30 — is both a symbol of the transforming family and a hint of coming generational change.
One group still largely resists the trend: college graduates, who overwhelmingly marry before having children. That is turning family structure into a new class divide, with the economic and social rewards of marriage increasingly reserved for people with the most education.
“Marriage has become a luxury good,” said Frank Furstenberg, a sociologist at the University of Pennsylvania.
Feel the shame yet? If not, continue reading on where you find out how bad children will have it and how college educated women are still the ones to appreciate the worlds oldest social contract that came under the heading of passing property from one man to another. The weird thing about this trope is that the birth rate of teen age moms isn’t rising. Perhaps some of those studies need to separate results from immature teen moms from the moms that resemble these ‘tramps’ who just won’t go to the altar.
Almost all of the rise in nonmarital births has occurred among couples living together. While in some countries such relationships endure at rates that resemble marriages, in the United States they are more than twice as likely to dissolve than marriages. In a summary of research, Pamela Smock and Fiona Rose Greenland, both of the University of Michigan, reported that two-thirds of couples living together split up by the time their child turned 10.
In Lorain as elsewhere, explanations for marital decline start with home economics: men are worth less than they used to be. Among men with some college but no degrees, earnings have fallen 8 percent in the past 30 years, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, while the earnings of their female counterparts have risen by 8 percent.
“Women used to rely on men, but we don’t need to anymore,” said Teresa Fragoso, 25, a single mother in Lorain. “We support ourselves. We support our kids.”
Fifty years ago, researchers have found, as many as a third of American marriages were precipitated by a pregnancy, with couples marrying to maintain respectability. Ms. Strader’s mother was among them.
Today, neither of Ms. Strader’s pregnancies left her thinking she should marry to avoid stigma. Like other women interviewed here, she described her children as largely unplanned, a byproduct of uncommitted relationships.
Some unwed mothers cite the failures of their parents’ marriages as reasons to wait. Brittany Kidd was 13 when her father ran off with one of her mother’s friends, plunging her mother into depression and leaving the family financially unstable.
“Our family life was pretty perfect: a nice house, two cars, a dog and a cat,” she said. “That stability just got knocked out like a window; it shattered.”
Ms. Kidd, 21, said she could not imagine marrying her son’s father, even though she loves him. “I don’t want to wind up like my mom,” she said.
Others noted that if they married, their official household income would rise, which could cost them government benefits like food stamps and child care. W. Bradford Wilcox, a sociologist at the University of Virginia, said other government policies, like no-fault divorce, signaled that “marriage is not as fundamental to society” as it once was.
Even as many Americans withdraw from marriage, researchers say, they expect more from it: emotional fulfillment as opposed merely to practical support. “Family life is no longer about playing the social role of father or husband or wife, it’s more about individual satisfaction and self-development,” said Andrew Cherlin, a sociologist at Johns Hopkins University.
Okay, so this does look more complex, doesn’t it? Perhaps these women are smart not to commit to losers who would probably just drain assets away from the children.
So, riddle me this, at the same time all this people are harping on and on and on about nasty old birth control, how come we still get these tut-tut-tut articles about “out of wedlock” births?
Still, there are not only the Santorums that we have to think about when exercising our votes. It’s deranged Republican women. This brings me to the ban here at Sky Dancing on linking to or quoting those seriously deluded people that think electing any woman to office–no matter how stupid or insane they are–is better than a demonstrably pro choice man. (I mean that word DEMONSTRABLY too).
A New Hampshire lawmaker with a history of surprising statements suggested on Thursday that married couples who want to use contraception should practice abstinence instead of using birth control pills.
State Rep. Lynne Blankenbeker (R-Concord) made the claim — noting that abstinence is available “over the counter” along with condoms — during a legislative committee hearing on a resolution urging the Obama administration to drop the birth control requirement for religious organizations. Blankenbeker was trying to explain her position on why the administration’s requirement to provide insurance coverage for birth control should be overturned.
“People with or without insurance have two affordable choices, one being abstinence and the other being condoms, both of which you can get over the counter,” she said.
The comments came at the same hearing where state Rep. Jeanine Notter (R-Merrimack) claimed that birth control pills lead to prostate cancer. In an interview with Merrimack Patch, Notter said that she was referring to studies discussing potentially high levels of estrogen in the environment through birth control pills and a connection to prostate cancer.
Blankenbeker was engaged in a dialogue with Sylvia Kennedy, a New Hampshire doctor, who was testifying in support of Obama’s plan. Kennedy urged the coverage of birth control and responded to Blankenbeker that condoms are not a foolproof means of contraception, and also suggested that abstinence does not work all the time, a notion Blankenbeker disagreed with.
“Abstinence works 100 percent of the time,” she said.
Blankenbeker also asserted that condoms and abstinence offer married couples a wider range of family planning options than oral contraceptives.
“If you decide you want to get pregnant you can refrain from abstinence,” she said
Since I’m an economist and not a psychologist, I would seriously like to know exactly why so many people seem so concerned about other people’s sex lives and choices they make that impact no one but themselves? This is the same question I keep asking myself when it comes to the obsession that people like Rick Santorum and Michelle Bachmann have about gay sex. WTF does it have to do with them? It seems all the bumping and grinding that one or more people can do with their sex organs in the privacy of their homes is the national political obsession and each party appears to find a benefit in staking out its territory. Are they trying to resurrect the Victorian Age or the Spanish Inquisition or create some damned combination of both? Since there are really no commies to kick around any more, should we look for birth control packets under the bed instead?
Frankly, I feel like a damn voyeur and I’m a tired of it. I am tired of other people’s superstition playing back into the legal realm after we worked so hard to start getting these folks noses out of it about 50 years ago. So, now we’re at this point where a bunch of old ‘celibate’ men who enable pedophiles and get away with crimes, a bunch of old men who enable stealing homes out from under people and get away with crimes, and a bunch of politicians that enable political donors to shower them with cash and get away with crimes get to dictate what women can and can not do with their bodies. Is this a perverse country or what? Frankly, I think they all act like they’ve never really been laid with the kind of sex that would actually get them some satisfaction.
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I thought this was an interesting comment by one of the Bishops’ spokespersons:
“I don’t want to overstate or understate our level of concern,” said McQuade, the Catholic bishops’ spokesperson. “We consider [birth control] an elective drug. Married women can practice periodic abstinence. Other women can abstain altogether. Not having sex doesn’t make you sick.”
I see. From the same group that turned their eyes away from depraved priests who molested children, who put more value on reputation than ruined young lives, we get a lecture on what women should and should not do.
And the men? Will they abstain, too? Hahahaha!
Sorry, but the Church lost all moral authority to preach on anyone’s sexual behavior. With or without birth control.
As for the morally reptilian Santorum, he’s now expressed his opposition to prenatal care because . . . drum roll, please . . . it leads to abortion and is a way of culling the herd of the disabled.
Is the man dense or simply playing for applause among a community of ignorant supporters? Prenatal care, which is all about the mother’s health, this too should be stricken from any healthcare consideration.
I don’t think the GOP wants to win an election. Because none of this makes sense. And the polls among women show this position as a huge loser. They should have listened to their small but still existent Pro-choice Republican contingent–this issue is suicidal.
I shall not weep a single tear!
Do you have a link for Santorum’s opposition to prenatal care?
Picked it up here, BB:
http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-503544_162-57380887-503544/santorum-attacks-obama-on-prenatal-screening/
Incredible!
Oops! Should have scrolled down. You already have it from northwestrain.
Btw, Dak. I agree. There’s something wrong with the man and those who support him. Particularly women supporters. I don’t know how you explain your way out of this one. Come on! Prenatal care. What’s next? We’re not allowed a doctor or midwife? He’s trying to out do himself with insane comments. Forget the ‘aspirin between the knees’ comment. This time, the craziness came from his own mouth.
Doctor Daughter has had a number of her poor patients get caught off from prenatal care in Nebraska. This is an issue because so many young women now have weight issues and it automatically puts them in the high risk category. Many have diabetes, etc. It’s awful.
http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-503544_162-57380887-503544/santorum-attacks-obama-on-prenatal-screening/
Oh Jeez, what a load from that nut job …
There is seriously something wrong with Santorum. I have no idea what mental illness it is, but there is something SERIOUSLY wrong with him. He just makes things up. No sane person could possibly say stuff that’s so obviously disconnected from reality and not be insane.
I’m confused. When men who have sworn their lives to God and proclaimed, before their god, to abstain from any sexual activity, cannot keep their vows, yet these so-called holy men who are aware that these most devout among them cannot keep their sacred vows, how the hell do they expect the average, everyday, flawed, not as devout followers to practice abstinence? Isn’t this just another case of “do as I say, not as I do?”
To me, all of this smacks of the renunciation of Nature. Humans are animals too. Survival of the species in inherent and the driving force in all animals. With that comes the urge to procreate, fueled by hormones. I tried to explain this to my anti-choice, cat rescuer friend in terms she would understand. Female cats come into season and actively pursue copulation. Yet, what she, the female cat, is facing is painful copulation. The male cat’s penis is barbed, much like a cactus. When he withdraws those barbs extend and cause the female a great deal of pain and causes her to release eggs to be fertilized. The difference between human sex & non-human animal sex is that non-humans “breed” only during the female’s “season”, or as we would call it, her menstrual cycle. They practice abstinence the rest of the time. Our evolution took us in a bit of a different direction.
Just one other thought – in other mammals, the “father” plays little or no part in raising the offspring that result from their sexual encounter. I’ve never encountered any discussion of this or the other points above in any studies/literature. If any of you have, please point me in their direction.
Exactly! The disconnect from being an Earthling is what makes many people crazy and, imo, is the foundation of all patriarchal religions. They renounce the Earth because they cannot compete with the Earth – what does their philosophy offer that the Earth does not? For me, the answer is nothing.
Some male animals do participate in rearing the young – penguins, wolves, swans, geese; probably those animals that mate for life. But certainly, there are many others in which the males only play the part of sperm donors. Nothing wrong with either way – Nature always offer a choice, unlike some human cultures.
Politico sez:
Izzat so, Politico? Then how come I couldn’t get birth control from the Harvard Health Plan in 1967? Griswold only applied to married people. Birth control was a huge issue in Massachusetts in the late ’60s.
But no, I never expected it to be an issue again in 2012.
Bill Baird applauds decision on contraception.
Birth Control access has been problematic all along. I could get it from my student health services at university of NE in the late 70s but the minute I got out of university it became a difficult commodity to get. My insurance never cover it and I soon found out what it meant to go from 1.10 a month to 43.00 and back then, that was a hell of a lot of money
Why Bill Baird matters
http://www.umass.edu/menacetosociety/biography.html
1972!!!!
Thank goodness for people like him!!! We need more of them.
He is a true hero. He held demonstrations in Boston where he handed out condoms. He was arrested and jailed for that!
I met him back in the early 1980s. He was amazing. I did a lot of fundraising for Planned Parenthood at the time and he was always there to raise funds with a great speech. His stories just amazed me.
Rich shouldn’t have to pay taxes, Santorum backer says
If you think Foster Friess is a worthless piece of shit because of his “aspirin between the knees” comment, just read this Reuters interview for a fuller exposition!
I don’t think this is really OT because I smell the flow of big money running through all those media stories about “religious freedom” and out of wedlock births etc. The MSM will stand on it’s head to give the 1% the coverage and stories they want published. 2012 is going to be a tough year for us all.
Gag!
I think you’re right, Ralph.
barf.
Thanks for this article. It nails the people who need to be nailed. Too many totally spot-on points to respond to.
But, in response to your question about Emily’s List, I would just say Hell Yeah! Where were they in 2008? Their concern about women’s rights was in the same location as that of NOW – stuck firmly up Barack’s rear-end.
Secondly, to the dumb ass who pined for the days women held an aspirin between their knees to avoid pregnancy – I have another suggestion about where you need to put that aspirin. S tuff that aspirin where the sun don’t shine, and get the hell out of the way of women who actually give a shit about protecting their rights, their bodies, their dignity, and who are fighting to retain the few rights the good ole boys have granted us.
I know this is not a popular view among some groups who supported Hillary, but IMO, each and every woman in this country who opposes women’s rights – especially reproductive rights – bears some responsibility for the growing climate of oppression, disregard, and violence with which women in this country must contend. As for as I’m concerned, there’s no room left in the fight for equal rights for those women who say they support women – except when it comes to reproductive rights. If they ain’t for us – they’re against us.
I don’t know why that wouldn’t be a good view. Sure seems reasonable.
NARAL was the worst one. Emily’s List’s President stood up for her but she seemed to be fighting an uphill battle. They didn’t completely cave until after the primary in June. NARAL was the worst.
Yes, I remember the outrage and sense of betrayal over NARAL. You’re right. Some of the other groups did not publicly support Barack until after Hillary suspended her campaign. And, while some of them did (weakly) protest the sexist treatment Hillary received from MSM, they certainly little to defend her or her female supporters against the sexist attacks of Obama and his supporters. IMO, their silence in the face of the campaign Obama waged spoke volumes.
just to hit at Emily’s list again (via Reclusive Leftist)
I thought Emily’s List supported Hillary until the end or near it but, like always, I could be wrong. I thought NOW bolted earlier?
They supported her early on in 2007. There was a key Obama supporter–Steve Hildebrand–that helped to mute some of the enthusiasm as 2008 wore on. NARAL bolted first and some of Emily’s list criticized that, yes. Actually, I think it was primarily Malcom.
Thanks.
She is just truly amazing. If the future is anything like the past with male historians dominating the conversation, it may take 100 years for Hillary to receive the recognition she so truly deserves.
Sarah Kliff at Wonkblog
Roe V. Wade relies heavily on the differences in trimesters since the third trimester is the only one where the fetus actually is a viable life. I shiver at the idea that the justices could start tearing down that definition which is based on medical science and not superstition. I keep saying this, but Ob/GYN doctor daughter likes to remind me that the medical profession considers third trimester “situations” as always being deliveries. They don’t consider anything happening in the third trimester as an abortion.
Oh Dak, this is a wonderful article.
I am always getting emails from Emily’s List and just hit the delete button. Like you said, where were they in 2008…
Yes, that was disappointing, and still I don’t see coverage of how upsetting it would to us…
My new laptop keeps auto typing for me and if I don’t check it puts in the words.
‘was’ not would…
Hey, check this out: Sunday Talk Shows Exclude Women. Again. | Care2 Causes
Rick Santorum Says He’d Criminally Charge Abortion Providers | The Jane Dough | News and Opinion on Women in Business
arghhhhh! and I suppose he cares nothing for the constitution and the Supreme Court Rulings?
Santorum thinks that as president he could overturn SCOTUS decisions. Remember?
http://current.com/community/93663026_santorum-i-would-overturn-any-supreme-court-ruling-same-sex-marriage-legal.htm
Commemorative Bob McDonnell vaginal ultrasound probes!
http://maddowblog.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/02/16/10421869-commemorative-bob-mcdonnell-vaginal-ultrasound-probes
For a break, here’s a slideshow of the Morning Glory cloud formations over Northern Australia. They’re simply gorgeous and happen only there.
That picture with the series of clouds is amazing. Thanks for the link Ralph…
dak, what I find missing from this discussion of single women choosing to have a child out of wedlock is that it isn’t always her choice. It’s not like all women decide they want a child & they can simply ask a man to marry them. And is it always a choice not to have a man in their life? Our culture, maybe not to the extent it was in the 60s & earlier, tells women that if they don’t have a boyfriend/husband that there is something wrong with them. Or that they aren’t complete as a person without a man. Some percentage of these single mothers may very well want to get married but no man has proposed. Should we return to the times of the shotgun wedding, where daddy tells the guy to marry my daughter, make an honest woman of her, or I use this double barreled shotgun on you? I’m just not sure it’s fair to characterize this as ALL single mothers are rejecting marriage.
You bring up an interesting point. We know there are a number of “:deadbeat dads” out there. I have to wonder how many women had a sexual relationship thnking the relationship would lead to a monogamous marital relationship only to see it disintergrate when put to a test like the responsibility of raising a child.
Disclaimer: I actually fit the criteria for as one of the women who did not marry her sexual partner after creating offspring. I had a child out of wedlock. I think the article may oversimplify things a bit. There are alot of factors that may play in the decision.
I agree that a certain percentage of women choose to have a child without getting married. I think that should be broken down by age and income, since many women over 30 choose to do this since they haven’t gotten married yet & want a child. And then the ones who expected their partner to marry them & that didn’t happen. But what bothers me about the “marriage” discussion out there is that it’s not like a woman has control over whether or not she gets married. They are at the mercy of a man. Funny thing that!
Clearly Santorum is still driven by guilt – but then the Catholic church is based on inflicting guilt – otherwise why on earth would he be so obsessed with abortion? Unfortunately he is in a position to try to articulate to millions his crazy making beliefs.
Again, I say – until he can become preggers he has no right to comment on what we do with our bodies.
He is also obsessed with sex between men.
odd that!!!! 🙄
I’m still convinced he was a victim of a pedophile priest when he was an altar boy.