Tag Archives: Mike Pence

Pro-Choice Friday News Rundown

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  • Pride in Reykjavík. Photo: Dave

    I’m thrilled to start this edition of the rundown off with stellar news! On Wednesday, the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 prohibits employment discrimination against transgender people. It also held that employers may not use the Religious Freedom Restoration Act to justify discrimination against LGBTQ workers. (Slate)

  • It is beyond disheartening to witness what the Trump administration is doing to erode women’s access to affordable contraception. (NYT)
  • And it’s even more disheartening considering the positive outcome birth control has on women’s economic fortunes. Particularly women of color: 65 percent of black female and 64 percent of Latina small-business owners surveyed by Small Business Majority say that access to birth control, and the freedom to decide if and when to have children, has impacted their bottom lines as business owners. (Forbes)
  • The FDA continues to receive negative reports on the implanted birth control device Essure. It is so important for women to research and discuss all potential risks (for any medication or medical device) with their doctors. (Reuters)
  • A Trump-nominated judge has participated in a number of dangerous anti-choice panels, including one where she supported a doctor who claims “that women who take contraceptive pills are more likely to die violent deaths.” HA! WHAT?!? Oh, and she also left anti-abortion speeches she gave off her Senate disclosure form. (Vice)
  • Mississippi is trying to ban all abortions after 15 weeks. Which is the epitome of stupid, because courts across the country have ruled over and over that states cannot restrict abortion prior to fetal viability. But hey, since when do forced-birth advocates care about repeating their failures again and again? (CBS News)
  • The U.N. has advised that the teen pregnancy rate in Latin America, as well as the Caribbean, is “unacceptably high.” (Thompson Reuters)
  • Do birth control pills cause depression? Science says no. (Time)
  • Love this piece about the orgasm gap in heterosexual encounters and how it goes unaddressed in the realm of sex ed! (The Conversation)
  • Texas and the Catholic Church continue to be problematic as hell. Two lesbian college professors married to each other were told they could not foster a refugee child through Catholic Charities of Fort Worth because they did not “mirror a holy family,” according to a lawsuit filed in federal court on Tuesday. How can these entities purport to be pro-life when they stand in opposition of two seemingly good, earnest people trying to save a child’s life? (Fort Worth Star)
  • We are taking the midterm elections very seriously around here! Planned Parenthood is doing everything in our power to kick the GOP’s heinie/culo/derrière this November. (Slate)

Bros and Cons: A Glimpse into a Dystopic Present

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Must admit, upon first viewing the Saturday Night Live sketch about The Handmaid’s Tale, I found it appalling. OK, so I’m old, but I can’t believe how those guys got it on so easily with women. Sounds like one big party, with “epic blowouts” where people of both sexes hung out and had fun together naturally. In my time, you really had to work at meeting women, making the rounds of smoke-filled flesh palaces or joining some social club to feign shared interest, only to be shot down most of the time.

But what really got me was the utter cluelessness and insensitivity of the guys toward a member of the “girl squad” who just had her eye cut out for not playing by the rules. In their world of the not-too-distant American future — a dystopian society based on religion — women have lost all rights, including control of their own bodies, existing only to be impregnated like cattle by their owner-husbands. The hard-partying boys feign concern, offering lame suggestions and offers to help. But you know they won’t, for they don’t see a problem. Instead, they blame the woman, asking why she doesn’t just leave the guy if he’s so cruel to her, completely ignoring the fact that she can’t.

Thankfully, The Handmaids Tale is pure fantasy. It could never happen here. America is nothing like that. Unlike in Margaret Atwood’s book, women today hold down jobs and spend their own money. They can marry or not marry whomever they choose and have complete control of their bodies. Religion doesn’t tell us what to do. And don’t forget, women can vote now. Continue reading →

The Handmaid’s Tale: Dystopian Fiction or a Blueprint for the Future?

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Photo: Fiona

When Hulu announced Margaret Atwood’s dystopian classic The Handmaid’s Tale was being adapted for a TV series, so many people involved refused to call it a feminist story — even though the entire plot centers on a society that has stripped every right away from women. The book’s female characters are forced to take the name of the man who possesses them, changing it as they are passed between men. Their worth is based solely on their ability to produce children, having been turned into “hosts,” or breeding units for the elite. And if you think that terminology originated in Atwood’s head, you’d be wrong — that term wasn’t from the book or show. It was from Rep. Justin Humphrey of the Oklahoma House of Representatives, just last February.

If they can take away our agency over our bodies, the rest doesn’t matter.

Ms. Atwood has stated that nothing in the book is new. Every degradation, every dehumanization is something that has happened, or is currently happening, to women somewhere in the world. And many people were quick to point to the parallels between the dystopian society painted by Atwood decades ago and the vision of a society idealized by many of our most conservative lawmakers.

Case in point: The Republican Administration recently signed an executive order allowing states to deny funding to Planned Parenthood, which will make it difficult for many low-income women to access contraception — an invaluable tool in asserting control over one’s fertility and destiny. (Vice President Pence should have known better; after all, his home state of Indiana is still fighting one of the worst outbreaks of HIV in decades, which was caused in part by defunding a major provider of HIV testing and treatment.) And attacks on access to contraception are just the tip of the iceberg.

But still, this was not really something I was going to write about, until late last month when I was listening to NPR. They talked to a young woman who stated that if Planned Parenthood would “just stop giving abortions,” then they could keep their funding. Although she liked the health care that Planned Parenthood provided, she wondered, “at what cost?”

I am going to tell you the cost of not having access to the services Planned Parenthood provides — including contraception, screening for domestic violence, and, yes, abortion. Continue reading →

Mike Pence’s America

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mike-penceSince the election of Donald Trump in November, countless people have reveled in the hope that perhaps some obscure constitutional gambit or criminal indictment would take place preventing him from taking office on January 20.

Mike Pence’s legislative record stands in opposition to his self-proclaimed reverence for life.

The sentiment is understandable to those of us who abhor this man and all that he stands for, but such a scenario would present an awful alternative in the form of Vice President-elect Mike Pence, who would take Trump’s place in the Oval Office as our new president.

While Trump has spoken about his frightening and detestable political views, he has no legislative record to back them up. Former congressman and current Indiana governor, Mike Pence, however, has a lengthy one.

And it is positively horrifying. Continue reading →

Pro-Choice Friday News Rundown

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  • orange-kool-aid-man-205As all of us know by now, the moronic stooges of the incoming administration pose a serious threat to our reproductive rights. Trump’s pick for HHS secretary, Tom Price, has twice co-sponsored federal legislation that would define fertilized human eggs as legal persons. Vice President-elect Pence co-sponsored these legislative attempts. Paul Ryan has supported such legislation as well! Is it realistic that the push to legally recognize an egg as a “person” could succeed? Could stem cell research lose federal funding? Could Price make it easy for insurance companies to stop covering birth control? Yes to all of the above. (Scientific American)
  • There has been a lot of chatter about “faithless electors” refusing to grant their states’ electoral votes to Donald Trump next week. Personally speaking, I’m keeping my expectations low and preparing for the orange version of the Kool-Aid man to be in office come January 20, 2017. (Time)
  • Did you know that the fear-mongering weasels in Texas drafted a cockamamie booklet full of idiotic, disproven lies called “A Woman’s Right To Know” that is required to be given to women seeking abortions? Of the many blatant falsehoods cited in the book, they try to scare women into thinking having an abortion increases one’s risk of breast cancer. Fun fact: it doesn’t. (Huffington Post)
  • Republican legislators in Ohio, completely IGNORING the fact that federal courts have previously deemed such laws unconstitutional, advanced a law to outlaw abortion as early as six weeks into a pregnancy. Which is before most women even show signs of being pregnant. Infamously anti-choice Gov. John Kasich vetoed this bill and instead passed a 20-week ban based on the notion that this is when a fetus can feel “pain.” (NBC News)
  • Notably, the American Medical Association concluded more than a decade ago that fetal perception of pain is “unlikely before the third trimester.” They concluded that the capacity for pain probably does not even exist before 29 or 30 weeks. (Fact Check)
  • Various Arizona artists are planning a “Nasty Women” art exhibit in downtown Phoenix January 14 to 20, and they’re donating the proceeds to Planned Parenthood Arizona! (Phoenix New Times)
  • Our Knight in Shining Brown Armor, Barack Obama, just made it super hard for individual states to defund Planned Parenthood! (NY Times)
  • Donald Trump doesn’t have time to be bothered with daily intelligence briefings, but he does have time to meet with rappers. #Priorities (Rolling Stone)
  • 30 million people will lose their insurance if Obamacare is repealed. Thirty million. (NBC News)
  • Maybe this scathing Trump op-ed in Teen Vogue will make you optimistic about the next generation. (Teen Vogue)
  • Ya know what I don’t wanna see when I walk into a public restroom at a restaurant, bar, hospital, hotel, or school? Anti-abortion graffiti propaganda written all over the damn wall. Well, Oklahoma passed an atrociously asinine law requiring anti-abortion rhetoric to be posted on bathroom walls in public restrooms. And business owners would have to pay the costs for this nonsense! The state claims it wants to achieve an “abortion-free society.” Wow. That sounds amazing. Know what will help get us there? Widespread access to affordable birth control and comprehensive sex education in all schools. Oklahoma notoriously does not support either of those initiatives, though. (NY Mag)
  • Speaking of Oklahoma, they lost a battle in the TRAP war. (Slate)
  • Roe v. Wade will be fine (according to this optimistic writer, who is banking on the longevity of the very old liberal members of SCOTUS). (Slate)
  • In my last rundown I shared the news of Texas trying to force the burial of fetal remains (only the ones resultant from abortion, not miscarriage — cause apparently those are less sacred and valued to legislators). Well that’s canceled. For now. (Texas Tribune)
  • Guess what? Abortion does not harm women’s mental health. The medical field has spoken. Definitively. (NY Times)

Pro-Choice Friday News Rundown

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Won the popular vote by more than 2 million. Just sayin'.

Won the popular vote by more than 2 million. Just sayin’.

I hate being the bearer of bad news. Unfortunately, it feels like I’ll be showering our dear readers with doom and gloom for the next month, as well as the full 208 weeks of Donald Trump’s presidency.

First, let’s get the worst out of the way:

  • We at Planned Parenthood are now in grave danger of being defunded. The president-elect has promised this and the Republican-controlled Congress will likely be more than gung-ho to gut us once and for all. I don’t shill for donations often (at all, really) on this blog, but if you can find it in your heart (and wallet) to help us, we and the millions of women we serve would be so thankful. (NY Mag)
  • Trump’s pick for secretary of health and human services, Tom Price, is a creep who espouses radical beliefs about “personhood,” thinks women should have no control over their bodies, doesn’t support insurance coverage of birth control, and is on the “defund Planned Parenthood” train. (The Daily Beast)
  • He’s also a Lying McLiarFace who asserts that “not one woman” ever struggled to afford birth control. (The Atlantic)
  • As of now, Hillary Clinton has trumped The Donald in total votes by more than 2 million (and counting). That isn’t a small margin. It’s “YUGE” and “bigly” (as the president-elect would say). Our soon-to-be commander in chief is not taking kindly to the news that he LOST the popular vote by such a large margin: The reckless, thin-skinned toddler in a 70-year-old body hopped on Twitter (his favorite platform) to assert that, had “millions” of people not voted illegally, he would have won the popular vote.

    First of all — this is a highly dangerous statement as there is literally ZERO evidence of “millions” of people voting illegally. However, if there were even the slightest possibility this could be true (it isn’t), how in THE WORLD can he take the giant leap to posit that everyone voting illegally voted for Hillary Clinton? Couldn’t it be equally possible that these millions of (non-existent) fraudulent voters voted for him, which calls into question whether he REALLY won the election? Funny how he only tosses out accusations of widespread voter fraud when it threatens his ability to claim victory and deem himself the winner. (NBC News)

  • Hillary Clinton wasn’t just failed by the Electoral College. Widespread voter suppression tactics (enacted by Republicans in 2010, right after Barack Obama’s history-making win — coincidence, I’m sure!) closed down at least 868 polling places nationwide and kept potentially millions of people (mostly minorities … probably another coincidence!) from voting. (WaPo)
  • Texas: Epicenter of anti-choice, anti-woman malarkey. They stay on the front lines of the War on Women! The abhorrent legislators there have decided that beginning December 19, all fetuses surgically aborted must be buried or cremated, regardless of gestational stage. Gov. Greg Abbott is claiming this measure is being taken for the “enhanced protection of the health and safety of the public.” Yet this mandate doesn’t apply to women who have miscarried in their own homes? How is this related to health and safety, then? Jeez … I’m sure their aim is not to SHAME women or make them suffer for choosing to abort, right? And I’m sure it’s definitely NOT meant to make abortion providers jump through potentially insurmountable obstacles in finding nearby funeral homes willing to provide fetus funeral services, which can cost upward of $2,000? Oh, and I must mention, Mike Pence did this in Indiana during his tenure as governor. (Broadly)
  • Speaking of vice president-elect Bad Hombre, he is practically dancing on Fidel Castro’s grave and had the gall to refer to him as a “tyrant.” Friendly reminder — Gov. Pence is the man who supported putting a woman in jail for having a miscarriage. #PotMeetKettle (ITV)
  • Could the orange menace known as Donald Trump ax our copay-free birth control unilaterally with no help from Congress? Unfortunately, yes. (Vox)
  • The megalomaniac in chief’s ultra-petty Twitter account is a frightening death spiral into madness. This man is not OK mentally, and that should terrify us all. (Mother Jones)
  • And his cabinet is a crapshow too! It’s shaping up to be the most conservative in decades. (Politico)

Speaking of Trump’s cabinet, I can’t “get the worst out of the way” until I introduce you to our future attorney general: Continue reading →

Post-Election News Rundown

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hangers-croppedIt would be an understatement to simply say we’re all reeling from last week’s election.

Ironically, in a nation where only 1.2 percent of the population are actual “real Americans” who are natives to this country, a swath of angry, non-native voters, with the intention of “taking their country back” (from whom is still a mystery) chose to pull the proverbial lever for a self-serving, authoritarian, demagogic, misogynistic, race-baiting, ego-maniacal, predatory, pathological liar.

Thanks to the 46,000 (and counting!) folks donating to Planned Parenthood in Mike Pence’s name.

The fact that hate speech and fear-mongering triumphed is truly frightening and demoralizing.

Most disappointing to many of us is the stunning betrayal we are realizing has been perpetrated by white female voters — 53 percent of whom voted for Donald Trump. #InsertFrownyFaceEmojiHere

Sorry to shatter your dream of a sisterhood! White ladies decided not to support a woman who has a long and storied history of advocating for children, affordable health care, equal pay, family leave, and women’s health and reproductive rights. Sadly, a majority of white women proved they would rather cast a vote for an openly cruel and vindictive man who doesn’t care about consent or gender equality, and publicly assigns and strips women of their value and humanity solely based on their appearance, and bullies female journalists and other women in the public sphere for his own entertainment.

Oh, and he blatantly and outlandishly lies about abortion. A procedure that one in three women has undergone.

Fairly certainly from a statistical standpoint, many of them were Trump voters.

I guess his statement that women who have abortions should be “punished” didn’t bother them.

In other harrowing news: Continue reading →