Ohh that's good stuff. You gotta hand it to the guy; he's willing to go where other comedians aren't, and he's damn good at making people look like idiots. Love it.

Fantastic! I'm amazed he still can get away with that stuff with a straight face then again I'm amazed the anti-choice people can do what they do and pretend they're trying to help with out smirking as well.

I laughed at Borat, but didn't really like it, and I laughed at this but didn't really like it either for the same basic reason.

As far as I could tell, those folks are just exercising their right to express a deeply held conviction, not harassing patients or blocking access. Speak and let speak. Demonstrate and let demonstrate.

I love that! I have marched for choice a few times in DC, and always wished I could get into it with some of the antichoicers. Go Ali G -- in this case, you are a force for good.

That's right, Chickens*itEagle, and Ali G is exercising his right to make fun of them.

SarahMC:

"...and Ali G is exercising his right to make fun of them."

No one challenged his right. But there's such a thing as making a fool of yourself when making fun of others.

Ali G is pretty good at making a fool of himself in the spirit of showing how foolish other people are. That's kind of the point, innit?

Hehe! I loved him beat-boxing to We Shall Overcome! Priceless!

But there's such a thing as making a fool of yourself when making fun of others.

The anti-choice crowd does a good job of that by themselves.

alexmlwallace:

"Ali G is pretty good at making a fool of himself in the spirit of showing how foolish other people are."

Okay, let's cut it a little finer -- the difference between playing the fool to make a point, and behaving like a jerk and losing your point. Obviously opinions will differ; that's mine.

I love the 'interview' that he had with Professor Sue Leece about feminism. Especially when he asks if girls should try feminism. Hilarious! And she handles his ridiculous comments and questions with grace.

The beatboxing was pretty amazing.

Okay, I will admit that a lot of this was really mean, but it was also fucking hilarious.

Also, the white woman singing "we shall overcome" as she protests to restrict women's freedoms (and let's not kid ourselves, if Roe was overturned, black women would be disproportionately affected) really creeped me out. Big time.

I loved that video! I HATE anti-choicers! I would like to see these assholes exposed publicly for all the lies, irrational perspectives, and completely insulting and outdated views they have about women cracked open so the mass public could see that theres not TWO sides to the issue, but only one. I dont think the mainstream is well informed about this issue, and should see what these anti-choicers have been doing, along with all their deceitful tactics to force their lies onto society.

Chickensh*tEagle, lighten up. My goodness.

The beatbox part was definitely the best.
GOOD STUFF! :)

Shorter Chickenshit: People yukking it just give the fun-killing urge.

Seriously, fuck the anti-choicers. They "just" want to take away people's basic human rights. I don't care if you're polite or impolite, but holding the belief in and of itself makes you an asshole and a righteous target for this crap.

I agree with Cara. No one is forcing anti choicers to have abortions. So what exactly do they need to overcome?

I'd just like to add: BOO-YUCKASHA MY SELECTA!!!!!

Seriously, fuck the anti-choicers. They "just" want to take away people's basic human rights. I don't care if you're polite or impolite, but holding the belief in and of itself makes you an asshole and a righteous target for this crap.

If by "anti-choicer," you mean your side, yeah....

"You will say, 'Well, we're not FOR abortion,' but have no idea what those words mean..."

Seems pretty straightforward to me. I'm not pro-abortion. I wish it didn't happen. And to achieve that I fight for wide access to contraceptives, comprehensive sex education, access to health insurance and medical care. But even with all of that, some women will choose to end their pregnancies. And I support their right to choose not to be pregnant. I support their right to choose not to become a parent. I support their right to choose not to carry their father's offspring. I support their right to make their own private reproductive decisions. Just because I don't personally love abortion, doesn't mean that I don't think it is an absolutely valid choice. It most certainly is. Stay out of my uterus and I'll stay out of yours.

So what you're saying, oenophile, is that a pre-sentient cluster of cells is worth more than a living, breathing woman.

Save your breath, Smartpatrol. Oenephile goes to the Church of Believe Everything the Bible Tells You, Even the Stuff that Contradicts the Other Stuff.
Actually, I shouldn't talk. I was recently saved...by the Flying Spaghetti Monster. he came floating on a celestial teapot and touched me with his noodley appendages. R'Amen!

Having been raised in a conservative Christian home, I grew up under the influence of the pro-life (or anti-choice) movement. However, upon entering the real-world where life isn't perfect, not everyone chooses to abstain, and children are born unwanted everyday...I came to the only logical conclusion that abortion should be available. People who support abortion do not hate life, we are just practical. Take the recent study by the WHO that states that the same number of abortions happen in countries regardless of whether they are legal, but the maternal mortality rate increases significantly in the countries where the procedure is illegal. Face it oenophile, abortions will happen whether or not you believe in the "sanctity of life." I would rather there be a safe and supportive environment for them to happen than have women's lives at stake.

In addition, pro-choicers also recognize that regardless of what we call ourselves (pro-choice), often an abortion is not a choice at all. It comes about because one feels there is no choice. Poverty, lack of information, and social stigma and lack of support for single mothers often results in women feeling there is no choice.

If the pro-lifers were smart they would begin to promote comprehensive sexual education and poor money in Planned Parenthood. Only 3% of the medical services provided by PP are abortions (look it up on their annual report). The other 97% is basic reproductive health and contraception. Planned Parenthood single handedly prevents millions of abortions a year.

You want to protect life oenophile? Start working with real people in the real world and leave your dogma that everyone will wait to have sex until marriage, want every child that is conceived, and share your same belief in the "right to life" for the "smallest and most vulnerable of humans." Really, it is just common sense. You want to stop abortions? Start comprehensively educating and you may have a start.

oops, I meant POUR money into Planned Parenthood, not poor

Regardless of your personal beliefs oenophile, you do not have the right to force your beliefs onto me, and have them effect the rest of my life. Babies arent fast-food. Care and consideration should be made when CHOOSING to have them, not just going along with it without the means and will to support it. You do not just passively go along with it because it happened accidentally. You DO NOT have the right to force pregnancy onto my life.
Surely you could see the fact that whatever YOUR personal beliefs about abortion is, it should not determine for me the choice I should make in my own life. Surely you dont believe you have the right over me to determine what I do with my own body, and consequently, my own life.
You cant be a feminist without being pro-choice.

"Oenephile goes to the Church of Believe Everything the Bible Tells You, Even the Stuff that Contradicts the Other Stuff."

This is not true. Oenophile has stated a few times that she is an atheist. Criticizing is fine -- but stick to valid criticisms.

For instance, this 50% statistic: it does not take into account that many people may speak against abortion in public, but vote against banning it when there's no one around to scowl at them -- witness what happened in Kansas.

Or that rhetoric about "choosing life" glosses over the fact that you can choose quantity of life or quality of life, but not both.

Every so often Oenophile flies off the handle and rants at us using language that is very similar to that of the "control women's sexuality" crowd, as when she referred to pro-choice feminists as "women who like to fuck but don't like to be pregnant". In other words, despite asking us to try to "get" where she's coming from, she refuses to consider that there is any moral position outside of abstinence (her own choice) or motherhood.

She also has not addressed the fact that women who want abortions can and do get them whether or not the procedure is legal; banning abortions really only prevents safe abortion.

She also, despite invitations to do so, has never made the case for how "pro-life" policies benefit women -- in particular, women who can't even afford a pregnancy, let alone another mouth to feed.

You will say, "Well, we're not FOR abortion," but have no idea what those words mean - you just know that you need to say them, lest you lose all political clout.

That part confused me the most. Are you implying that we secretly are FOR abortion, but are just too scared to say it? Because I know I'm not "for" abortion, but I'm in no way confused about what that means. Even though I want abortion to remain legal and believe in a woman's right to choose, I don't have a preference of what choice she should make.

Also, just because I'm pro-choice doesn't mean I LIKE abortion. I wish it didn't have to happen. I can't imagine being the person stuck in a situation where they have to make such a decision. However, I do understand that a pregnancy poses a more serious threat to a woman's life and health than a legal abortion. Shouldn't that give her a right to decide what she's willing to do?

It also doesn't take much research to find that more women die of abortions in countries where it isn't legal and safe. There was a post on here about how abortion rates are generally the same in every country, regardless if it's legal or not. According to the WHO, 1/3 of all deaths of pregnant women are due to unsafe and illegal abortions.

You said the right to life always wins. Given the previous information, I believe that means abortion should remain legal. In my opinion, the arguments against abortion can be irrational and woman-hating.

"women who like to fuck but don't like to be pregnant"

I love that argument. B/c there's no one on earth who's ever had sex just b/c it's fun without wanting to make a kid. That never happens in Christian or "pro-life" families. I also love that insinuates that there's something inherently wrong with women who don't want to be pregnant. Or with women who like to have sex.

This is not true. Oenophile has stated a few times that she is an atheist. Criticizing is fine -- but stick to valid criticisms.
I don't believe that. On numerous times, she's stated that the Bible says that you shouldn't kill and uses that as a justification for being anti choice. She's also identified as Christian before. I think you have her confused with someone else.

What I mean is, as an atheist, I would never use the Bible to back up an argument. You can't just pick and choose--"I'm an atheist today but I believe in the Bible."

For instance, this 50% statistic: it does not take into account that many people may speak against abortion in public, but vote against banning it when there's no one around to scowl at them

It also doesn't take into account that many people are undecided. It also excludes those who openly say they believe abortion is wrong, but also say they feel that it shouldn't be illegal. It also fails to mention how some people make exceptions for when abortion is acceptable or not. For example, someone might believe abortion is a right, but only in the first trimester.

It also fails to mention all the people that protest at clinics, but then take their daughter or themselves in through the back door, b/c their abortion is a moral abortion.

when she referred to pro-choice feminists as "women who like to fuck but don't like to be pregnant".

Hee. Like that's a bad thing. I mean, yep. Lots of women like to fuck but don't like to be pregnant. I am often one of them. Am I supposed to feel bad about that?

You know what? I'll take the heat. I'm pro-abortion. I'm for abortion. If a woman is pregnant and she does not wish to carry on with that pregnancy, then abortion is a wonderful thing. I'm not going to let the right turn the discourse to the point that something that's vital for women's freedom has to be talked about as a necessary evil. Without abortion, women's and girls' lives would be infinitely more restricted, and their sexuality would involve infinitely greater fear and anxiety. I'm grateful for abortion. It means that I can use my preferred method of contraception, condoms, secure in the knowledge that if they fail, I have a back-up plan. It means that I don't have to be tied to a man for life just because I fucked him. I'm pro-abortion in exactly the same way that I'm pro-contraception.

Forced-birthers have this weird fantasy that the pro-choice side is full of secret pro-forced-abortion advocates. That's a classic case of projection: they want to force women to endure pregnancy and childbirth against their will, so they assume that we want to force women to endure abortions against their will. But that's nonsense.

All that said, I hate Sascha Baron Cohen. I just find his humor mean-spirited, even when it's directed at people I loathe.

I'm not going to let the right turn the discourse to the point that something that's vital for women's freedom has to be talked about as a necessary evil.

Amen to that!! EG, I am with you. I will also name myself as being "pro-abortion." we should work to ensure that abortions are rare! Um, no. *I* think we should work to make sure that abortions are legal, safe, accessible, and affordable for every woman who wants one whenever and why-ever she wants one. And if that makes me pro-abortion...I don't have any problem with that.

OT: God-damn, that part about Burger King made me laugh.

Angie, those two aren't mutually exclusive. I think a woman should be able to have an abortion whenever and why-ever she wants one, too. But I also think it'd be even better if she had safe, legal, accessible, and affordable contraceptives and health care available first. And if that fails, then I don't care if she wants one b/c it's going to interfere with her ability to fit into the jeans she just bought. Her business, she should be able to get one without having to drive to the next county, without having to wait 24 hours, without having to be offered anesthesia for the fetus, without having to shell out hundreds and hundreds of dollars, without having to track down the father, without having to ask anyone's permission, etc., etc. That doesn't mean that people who want abortions to be safe, legal, and to make their necessity rare, are any less prochoice.

I loves me some SBC...especially when he takes on groups like this and govn't.

No, I totally agree, kissmypineapple, and it's absolutely not about "I am MOAR pro-choice than YOU, look at my shiny button!!"

I should have been clearer: I hate being made to feel, as EG stated, that if I support a woman's right to choose I should then follow it up with, "rare! very rare! last choice!" JUST IN CASE some anti-choice zealot or, heck, Republican Presidential candidate seizes upon the statement and says, See? They're PRO-ABORTION! They LOVE abortion!

I don't get that vibe here, of course, but it comes up (for me) a lot when I am talking about this issue with my circle of friends and acquaintances, or better still when I am trying to have a political conversation with someone. And it DEFINITELY comes up whenever anyone asks one of the (Democratic, anyway) presidential candidates about their views on abortion.

It's all about people trying to twist the phrasing and terminology, so when I hear the word rare...it just makes my "concern troll" bells ding. (or whatever the real world version of that is, lol.)

I hope that clarified my comment a little.

You know, I wish I *could* actually believe there are some anti-choicers who sincerely believe that the fetus is a baby, and it is wrong to take human life, and that's all there is to it. But whenever people who propose that argument turn up, they also say things like "Women who like to fuck but don't like to be pregnant", as if there's something *wrong* with enjoying a pleasureable bonding experience with a person you care for but not wanting it to result in a 9-month medical condition which will make you piss your pants, destroy your physical sense of balance, could permanently damage your health, and will leave you responsible for another human life for 18 years. I mean, seriously, there are people who love babies out there, but does anyone want to be *pregnant*?

This is kind of like saying "people who like to ski but don't like to break their leg", or "people who like to drive cars but don't like to be in accidents", or, to be more charitable, "people who like a job that involves travel but don't like to have to move to another state to keep that job." I mean, some people *do* like to move. Some people voluntarily choose to move. But just liking a job that involves travel doesn't imply that you would like to have to move.

It's a moral judgment. You are not supposed to like sex unless you want to have a child. Never mind that this is insane and violates every precept of biology. Humans are not mice; we do not fuck just because our hormones tell us we're fertile. We have much more in common with the bonobo, who fucks to say "hi", to bond the group together, to express friendliness and promote solidarity. Bonobos, BTW, do not get together in bands and go out marauding and killing other bonobos. Chimpanzees, who don't fuck for fun nearly as much as bonobos do, do do these things. So if we look to our close cousins for a model and not some book written to control the behavior of desert sheep-herders 3000 years ago, it is obvious that what we need is *more* sex, not less.

And given that pregnancy is uniquely awful for human beings, due to our huge baby heads, total helplessness as infants, rotated birth canal and narrow upright-balancing pelvises, humans have an *obligation* to use our intellect to prevent pregnancy except when the end result of a baby is actively desired. But since we are designed not just to enjoy sex, but to be better, friendlier people when we are having sex, using our intellect to solve the problem of pregnancy by not having sex results in nasty, moralistic judgmental assholes who sniff other people's panties until they get caught soliciting cops for sex in the men's room.

My feeling about abortion is that it is not nearly as good an alternative as using birth control to prevent conception would have been. Yes, I do think a fetus is alive. Yes, I think you're killing a living thing. I also think that if a human being miniaturized himself to the size of a fetus and attached himself to your bloodstream because it's the only way he can survive, you'd be in your rights to kill him. No one has the right to use your body without your consent, and given that sex is used by humans for bonding, pleasure and love and that the vast, vast majority of sex acts do not result in a child, no, simply having sex is not tacit consent to making a baby. Consenting to making a baby is consenting to making a baby, nothing else, and if a baby is growing in you and you didn't consent to have them there, yes, you have the right to protect yourself by removing that baby. If the only way to do that is to kill it, c'est la vie. No human has the right to feed on another human being or live inside their body without consent.

I totally respect the choice of a person to not have sex. I do not respect their moralizing attitude that this makes them a better person. There is nothing wrong with sex. It's good for you *and* it's good for your partner. Sex in the context of love or like (which, all the rhetoric about emotionless fucking to the contrary, is where it usually is even for casual sex; few women, at least, fuck people they actively don't like, and simply the choice to have sex with someone often promotes you liking them) is a wonderful thing. The fact that pregnancy is so destructive to female humans is a massive design flaw, especially given that we were also designed to (as a species -- individuals vary) need plenty of sex for proper emotional health, and so *I'm* led to the conclusion from studying the design that if there was a Designer, the will of the Designer was that humans use their brains to prevent pregnancy except when they want a kid. Because either it's that, or the Designer is a misogynistic sadist, and I'm just not buying that.

I also have to say that the only anti-choicer I'd be willing to even give the time of day to is one who was a mother. Nulliparous women and men do not know from personal experience the devastation that pregnancy can wreak on your body. We would be outraged (and in fact so would most anti-choicers) if we were told you cannot kill a person to save yourself from rape, or you cannot kill a person to save yourself from being beaten senseless by them, or you cannot kill a person to keep them from injecting you with a disease that could destroy your immune system, cause you great pain, and eventually hasten your death. We believe in killing when it is the only way to save yourself from imminent harm inflicted by another person, even if that person is innocent (say, a man with a mental age of 3 but the body of a grown adult is trying to rape you, and the only way to stop him is to kill him.) To argue that you do not have the right to save yourself from the harm that a fetus can cause your body, as long as said fetus won't kill you, is to argue that you can't protect yourself from rape with lethal force even if that's the only way, and it's better to let yourself be raped than to take the rapist's life. If that's your opinion, OK, but don't try to lock up women who murder would-be rapists because of *your* beliefs.

FEmily!: Chickensh*tEagle, lighten up. My goodness.

Amanda Marcotte: Shorter Chickenshit: People yukking it just give the fun-killing urge.

Oh, not really. Depends on my sense of appropriateness for the venue and the subject at hand. In this instance, I thought Ali G's performance didn't make it. For some online forums, however... ;-)

Angie, yeah, I get it now. Thanks for the clearing up. :-)

Love your comment Alara, but ot to forget, that if human sex were ONLY for procreation then human females would come into heat, making it quite obvious when it's time to get to the baby making.

But we don't. And that's what upsets me when the evangelical anti-choice crowd starts going on and on about how sex is only for procreation and to have sex for pleasure makes us no better than the "animals". One, we ARE animals and two, as I said, if nature intended human sex to be solely for procreation then our asses would still swell up and turn red and men would chase us down the street like dogs chase females in heat.

Human female's fertility is hidden for a specific reason and we're one of few species who can have sex any time we want, regardless of fertility. I think we should take as much advantage of that as possible:) And if you don't want to get pregnant, fine and if you do, fine. No one has the right to tell you otherwise.