First, it was politicians trying to completely defund Planned Parenthood at the federal level. Because, ya know, Planned Parenthood is building an “$8 million abortion complex” according to Rep. John Fleming (R), of Louisiana. Too bad he believes everything he reads, as this was a well known story from the parody news site, The Onion.
Next thing you know, The Susan G. Komen for the Cure charity made a big mistake that is still haunting them today. They decided to stop funding breast cancer screenings at Planned Parenthood because they also perform abortions. This made women come out in droves – denying poor & uninsured women free early detection breast cancer screenings just because PP performs abortions (only 3%, not the 90% proclaimed by Sen. Jon Kyl of Arizona) – was seen by many as a political move. After complaints were delivered to Komen from around the world, they changed their mind, and the woman who had the not-so-bright idea resigned, but the damage done still lingers today.
Currently, there are so many bills circulating around the country that seek to: shut down abortion clinics through so called “TRAP” laws, make women wait ridiculous amounts of time before obtaining an abortion, force women to undergo mandatory ultrasounds (regular & transvaginal) that are not medically necessary before obtaining an abortion, make restrictions on the ‘morning after pill’, and really, too many things to even list here. Let’s begin with the worst offender as of late: Texas.
Texas has completely defunded Planned Parenthood thanks to Gov. Rick Perry. Because he defunded PP from the state’s Medicaid Women’s Health Program, the (federal) US Department of Health and Human Services also cut off all Medicaid funding for Family Planning to Texas. 130,000 poor & uninsured women lost comprehensive women’s health care because of this. No more free cancer screenings, pap smears, or contraception for the women of Texas, who need the help desperately. To add insult to injury, before women can get an abortion in the Lone Star state, they must must undergo state mandated “slut shaming” that includes:
(1) Undergoing a medically unnecessary transvaginal ultrasound, against her will (state sponsored rape, IMO).
(2) Be forced to listen to a description and see the ultrasound, and watch while the doctor points out the body of the fetus.
(3) Listen to the fetus’ heartbeat (again, forced).
(4) Be given a lecture by the doctor & materials containing unproven scientific information to take home with her.
(5) Sign a document stating she understands everything that was told to her by the doctor.
Not being humiliated enough, she is then sent home to wait 24 hours before the actual abortion can be performed. But, oh no, that’s not slut shaming those hussies enough according to Texas Republican House Member Bill Zedler, who tried to pass a law to obtain personal information about each woman obtaining an abortion. Since his bill failed, he did what all politicians do – pulled a sneak attack and asked the Texas Department of State Health Services to do it for him – and apparently – DSHS is happy to oblige. There’s just so much wrong about this – read more about the issue here.
Image via @Maddow Blog (The Rachel Maddow Show).
No War on Women, huh? Check out the graphic above, courtesy of The Maddow Blog. From the graph, it appears that 2010 had 30 abortion restrictions. What’s that number for 2011? That appears to be right at 90. That’s double the number in less than a year. 2012 promises to give us an even higher number of proposed bills. But there’s no war on women, right, Reince Priebus, Mitch McConnell, Emanuel Cleaver, and Rick Santorum? I know a few Republican women who happen to disagree with you, gentlemen. Most notably, Alaska Senator Linda Murkowski, the retiring-because-she’s-tired-of-the-crazy-antics Maine Senator Olympia Snowe and Texas Senator Kay Bailey-Hutchinson. Which, by the way, you might actually want to ASK them about their opinions before putting words in their mouth, Mr. McConnell.
Who could forget the Virginia fiasco where they wanted women to undergo a forced transvaginal ultrasound before obtaining an abortion? A watered down (but still medically unnecessary) ultrasound bill was passed (without the transvaginal part) after the country pitched a collective hissy fit that included exceptions for rape and incest, as long as it was reported to the police. The Virginia house also passed HB 1 – A “Personhood” bill, but it appears the Virginia Senate has continued the bill to 2013.
Let’s talk about my home state, Alabama. Oh, boy. As of the date of this posting, there are 6 abortion related bills currently in the Alabama State House. Just two months ago, a determined group of women across Alabama came together to protest Alabama SB-12, which would have forced transvaginal ultrasounds on women, just as Texas does. Not only was it a moot point (Alabama already forces ultrasounds before obtaining an abortion), but so much brou-ha-ha about “state sanctioned rape” was brought up, that the the chicken farmer (yes, seriously) from north Alabama dropped the bill. We’re not out of the woods yet in Alabama – up for discussion is a Personhood bill, a TRAP bill, a “Right of Conscious” (aka refusal of services) bill, and other bills to prevent insurance companies from covering abortion in their policies. You can see all the bills here in once place on the Team Uterati Alabama State Wiki page.
Not to be out-crazied by Alabama, Arizona wants to pass a law banning abortion at 18 weeks. UPDATE: Governor Jan Brewer of Arizona has SIGNED the controversial law. That’s right – 18 weeks. There are exceptions for the health of the mother, but no exceptions of the fetus is deformed & will not be viable even if naturally born, such was the horribly heartbreaking case of Danielle Deaver of Nebraska. She was forced to deliver naturally at 22 weeks, only to watch her deformed daughter die within 15 minutes. There are also no exceptions for rape or incest in the proposed Arizona law. It will also force a woman to undergo a medically unnecessary ultrasound, have the doctor show her the ultrasound, force her to hear an description of the fetus given to her verbally, and be provided with an unwanted/unneeded photo of the fetus. And to top that off, a woman will have to wait an additional 24 hours to actually undergo the perfectly legal procedure. In addition, to this terrible new law requires that doctors prescribing medications for non-surgical abortions must have hospital admitting privileges within 30 miles of where the procedure takes place. These medicine induced abortions usually take place at the woman’s home (she deserves privacy) or in a clinic. Elizabeth Nash of the Guttmacher Institute says this will effectively be a “shutdown” of medication induced abortions. The new law also requires schools to teach birth and adoption as a priority. If that’s not far reaching enough, the state health department’s website will be promoting abortion alternatives and displaying images of fetuses – along with posting signs in healthcare facilities about “abortion coercion”. WTF? Let’s also not forget the case of Arizona State Republican Representative Debbie Lasko, who tried to pass a bill giving employers the right to fire women if they take “whore pills” unless they were taking them for “non-sexual reasons”. Thank goodness THAT failed.
Georgia recently passed HB-954, which outlaws abortion after 20 weeks, and gives no exception in the cases of rape or incest. Georgia ladies had the lovely distinction of being compared to livestock by a Georgia Republican Representative named Terry England.
Mississippi was smart enough to reject a “Personhood” Amendment when they let the people vote on it. However; apparently that’s not enough for Mississippi politicians. HB 1390, a so called “TRAP” bill, is poised to close the only abortion clinic in the state once it gets to Gov. Phil Bryant. No “war on women”, you say?
New Hampshire has decided to jump on the bandwagon, too. They’ve already passed a Texas style defunding of Planned Parenthood, and now they want to implement 24 hour waiting period in which the woman is made to listen to information about the fetus, then is subject to erroneous information & is persuaded to keep her fetus. They also want to ban on abortions after 20 weeks. In addition, the state also wants to collect private information about women getting abortions, and other restrictions on minors, ect.
Alaska Republican State Representative Alan Dick wanted women to obtain a “permission slip” from the father of the child before the woman could obtain an abortion. There’s so much stupidity in this that it makes my head spin. What if the woman was raped? A victim of incest? Thank goodness smarter heads prevailed, and his patriarchal view was never taken seriously by anyone.
And don’t forget, it was Wisconsin Republican Teaparty Senator Ron Johnson claiming that women that can’t afford birth control should just “Google it”. What the what-what? Google has free birth control?!? I love my free Google Documents & gmail, I had no idea they gave away free birth control pills, too! /sarcasm
More craziness from Wisconsin: Rep. Don Pridemore wanted to introduce a bill to penalize single mothers for not being married because single parenting is ‘child abuse’, and suggested that women in abusive relationships “try to remember the good times” because he doesn’t think divorce is acceptable. I wish I was kidding.
We won’t even discuss Rush Limbaugh going on a tirade about Sandra Fluke for weeks, calling her a slut and demanding sex videos from her, even though it wasn’t HER need of birth control pills she spoke about. She spoke about a friend that needed birth control pills to prevent cancer. Not for unmarried sexy times – BUT TO PREVENT CYSTS ON HER OVARIES THAT COULD LEAD TO CANCER. (Read her entire transcript at the link.) How disgusting can you get?
There are many more bills making their rounds in the United States of America – so many that I could still be writing about this subject for the next two days, non-stop. But there’s no “war on women”, right? None at all. I just wrote all the paragraphs above off the top of my little lady brains because I was bored.
PS – If you want to get involved in keeping track of crazy bills, lawmakers, and states that are trying to repeal Roe vs. Wade bit by bit, please consider joining the Team Uterati Wiki. Don’t forget about the Unite Against the War on Women marches that will be held all over the country on April 28, 2012. See you there!
(Updated Arizona info on 4/13/12)
Girl In The 'Gump 
It is particularly fascinating to see conservatives react in shock and discuss that this trend would be considered a war on women while somehow expecting a free pass on their own hyperbolic rhetoric. These actions have real victims, they create conditions which will genuinely harm women in various palces and under various circumstances. But much of teh right expects us to treat this as a philosophical difference.
I cannot help but think there is some catastrophic failure of teh imagination at work here, as if so many conservatives are simply unable to discern the difference between imaginary harms (the destruction of the family caused by gay marriage) and real damage (this or that woman suffering medical complications because she had to undergo some completely unnecessary procedure).
My sister-in-law has a twin sister who just gave birth to a child without a brain, a deformed leg, and a cleft pallet. She gave birth to this child, who lived only a few minutes, not because of HER misguided notion that all life is precious, but because of the State’s. Apparently, the law in the state she lives in says abortions can only be performed up through a certain period. I’m not a supporter of abortion normally, but making her go through to term and the pains of labor just so she could have her baby die in her arms is beyond cruel.
As I said, I’m usually not a supporter of abortion, but as a man, who am I to tell a woman what she can or cannot do with her body? In fact, who am I to tell ANYONE what they can or cannot do with their body? I think it’s completely stupid. After all, if I were to want to have elective surgery and get my nuts cut off, the only person who give a damn is my wife.