Recently in Reproductive Rights Category

My friend Jess told me about this amazing organization called The Reproductive Health Access, Information and Services in Emergencies (RAISE), that is trying to establish reproductive rights as an essential part of emergency services. Traditionally, we think of food, water, shelter, and safety from violence as the only essential concerns in times of crisis, like genocide, natural disasters etc., but RAISE believes that:

High quality RH services are among the most basic of human needs. They are also among the most poorly addressed needs of displaced persons. Women are especially vulnerable to RH risks and emergencies, both in crisis and conflict settings and in general.

Access to comprehensive RH services and information is crucial to the wellbeing of populations that have been affected by humanitarian emergencies. When RH care is limited or absent, the toll - in terms of life-threatening medical emergencies; harm to women and their families; and the violation of human rights - is profound.

Check out more about their amazing work here.

A very honest (and, in my opinion, totally awesome) 23-year-old woman is blogging about her experiences with unwanted pregnancy and forthcoming abortion. I linked to her blog in the WFR this weekend, but wanted to highlight some of her thoughts -- because I think we get this perspective all too rarely:

Wed., Aug. 20:

Things I need to figure out:

1. Does my insurance cover abortions?

2. Is there a more pleasant, less politically charged term I can use than abortion?

3. How far along am I?

4. Can I just use the pill?

You might have missed this news, what with the political conventions, natural disasters and Beijing Olympics, but Ricky Martin just became the father of twins via surrogacy.

Just another one to file away under celebrity alternatives to traditional childbearing, along with Angelina Jolie's African adoption streak.

All of these alternatives to traditional childbearing have serious implications that unfortunately (and not surprisingly) the media is not covering when it talks about these celebrities.

Surrogacy is the process where another couples sperm and egg are implanted into the surrogate mother's womb and she carries and delivers the child. It could also be the surrogate's own eggs, depending on the situation. In most cases the surrogate is compensated for her participation, in addition to the medical expenses.

Surrogacy, particularly the rise in popularity of use of surrogates from India, raises a lot of questions about class, economics and choice. It also raises questions about the use of women's bodies to aid other couples own family creation. None of the articles I read about Ricky Martin even mentioned the surrogate mother, her situation, how she was compensated. It's almost as if she doesn't exist.

Samhita wrote recently about the rising trend in gay male couples using surrogates to make their families, but the practice raises a lot of questions for me and doesn't leave me with a warm fuzzy feeling.

I respect that the desire to parent is a huge one, and especially for queer or infertile couples many of these options (surrogacy, sperm donation, adoption) maybe their only way of creating a family. But there are still a lot of ethical questions that need to be answered around these processes and how we can make sure women aren't being exploited.

Cara had a great post last week on how annoyed she was that antichoicers were portraying Sarah Palin's child with Down's syndrome as a heroic choice on the part of the vice-presidential candidate. Cara writes,

You know, it's the anti-choicers who use "it's not a choice, it's a child" as a rallying cry to force women to give birth. And yet here I am, as pro-choice as can be, really fucking annoyed that conservative assholes are portraying this very real, actual child as a political choice rather than the human being that he is.

Now today comes the news that Palin's 17-year-old daughter, Bristol, is pregnant. In the news release, the McCain campaign made sure to state that:

Bristol Palin made the decision on her own to keep the baby, McCain aides said.

While it's obvious why they made this statement to assure the public that Bristol was not coerced into keeping the baby (after all, she does have a parent who is a staunch opponent of the right to choose and is currently on the Republican presidential ticket), as my significant other pointed out, there's some serious hypocrisy at play here. I mean, John McCain and Sarah Palin don't believe women have a right to choose. It's absolutely absurd for the campaign to emphasize the fact that Bristol "made this decision," and then push for policies that take away that choice.

In reality, Bristol's actual "choice" was probably not whether to terminate the pregnancy or carry it to term, but whether raise the child herself or put it up for adoption. But the reason that the McCain campaign chose to emphasize Bristol's agency in this decision was to reassure the public that this pregnancy is not coercive. They know the public wants to feel secure in the knowledge that it was Bristol's choice to keep the pregnancy. And coming from the McCain campaign, which opposes a woman's right to choose, that statement is disgusting. As Kate Sheppard wrote in In These Times recently, during the 2000 primary McCain said that if his daughter got pregnant it would be a "family decision":

"The final decision would be made by Meghan with our advice and counsel," McCain said, referring to himself and his wife, Cindy. When reporters suggested that this view made him, in fact, pro-choice, McCain became irritated. "I don't think it is the pro-choice position to say that my daughter and my wife and I will discuss something that is a family matter that we have to decide."

In other words: My family and my daughter deserve a choice, but no other woman can be trusted with this decision. This fits nicely with the narrative on both Palin's decision to carry her Down's syndrome child to term and her daughter's decision to carry her own pregnancy to term. Their decisions are seen by the antichoice Republican base as affirmation that Palin shares their values. But the underlying message that each woman had a choice is a validation of pro-choice values.

This is a great question to keep asking John McCain and other anti-choicers:

Related:
Reclaiming the abortion debate
How much jail time should women get for having an abortion?
Thompson gives her jail time
McCain's long and ugly record on choice
More on McCain's dismal record on choice
McCain: Contra-contraception

Mexico's high court voted to uphold legalized abortion in Mexico City!

And yeah, it appear the Mexican court has its own version of Scalia:

Magistrate Mariano Azuela, who was one of two justices to speak against the law, declared that life begins at conception. "I feel that a woman in some way has to live with the phenomenon of becoming pregnant," he reportedly said. "When she does not want to keep the product of the pregnancy, she still has to suffer the effects during the whole period."

A pretty succinct summary of the view that women who dare to have sex should be "punished" with pregnancy.

Anyway, awesome news!

This one seems like a good news, sketchy news kind of situation to me.

The good news

Local researchers have found that mothers' views about premarital sex don't affect their decisions on whether their pre-teen or teenage daughters should get the vaccine against the sexually transmitted virus that causes cervical cancer.

The survey, by a team at the University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston, appears to refute the perception that mothers who opt against their daughters receiving the vaccine for the human papillomavirus do so because they oppose sex before marriage.

The study's lead author Susan Rosenthal said, "This is a decision about parenting, vulnerability and vaccine attitudes, not sexuality...Mothers who haven't had their daughter vaccinated yet most often said they want more time to learn about the vaccine."

The perhaps-sketch news

The study was in part funded by Merck, the vaccine's manufacturer.

Thoughts?

We've posted in detail about McCain's horrible history (and potential future) with reproductive justice issues. But there's always need for more reminders.

Dahlia Lithwick at Slate says McCain is trying to "pull a Jessica Seinfeld."

So the candidate is doing exactly what Mrs. Jerry Seinfeld did in her popular cookbook, Deceptively Delicious. He's sneaking a little of his bad-tasting reproductive rights stance into the meatloaf of his candidacy--not by hiding it, but by trading on his reputation as a maverick. Seinfeld's contention was that if your kids don't like asparagus, you should just whirl it up in the blender and bake it into some meatloaf. The children won't know the difference until it's too late.

Make sure to check out the whole piece. Even if it doesn't tell you anything you don't know about McCain and choice, it will make you hungry for meatloaf. (Okay, that's probably just me. But seriously, read it.)

The shit hath officially hit the fan. Yesterday, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services released their proposed regulations (you can read them here) to allow health care providers to refuse to perform abortions, or refer women to others who might.

While we've been anticipating this, that doesn't make it any less upsetting. The title of the HHS release is enough to make one fume: "Regulation Proposed to Help Protect Health Care Providers from Discrimination." That's right - Discrimination. And though the regulations don't define contraception as abortion, the ACLU thinks there could be some wiggle room.

HHS Secretary Mike Leavitt also blogged about the release yesterday as well, saying:

"This became a topical matter when the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG) issued guidelines that could shape board certification requirements and necessitate a doctor to perform abortions to be considered competent."

Which is actually anything but the truth - ACOG actually doesn't have the power to take away board certifications. But the HHS is using this to create the illusion that providers' rights are under vicious attack, when in reality the regulations are the offense, blatantly threatening our reproductive freedoms - particularly for uninsured and low-income women. Louise Melling, Director of the ACLU Reproductive Freedom Project made a statement in their press release:

"For years, federal law has carefully balanced protections for individual religious liberty and patients' access to reproductive health care. The proposed regulations appear to take patients' health needs out of the equation.

"At a time when more and more Americans are either uninsured or struggling with the soaring costs of health care, the federal government should be expanding, not hampering access to important health services."

Amen to that. Take action on these regulations by telling HHS and your members of Congress that women's access to reproductive health shouldn't be compromised.

Over at Feminocracy, earlgreyrooibos tackles the tough topic of universal health care, ensuring access to abortion and contraception, and the ways in which access is already limited:

Of course, as I've written elsewhere, there are many women who are already stuck. Those who live in rural areas may not be able to travel far enough to find a pro-choice doctor. They may not have a car. They may not be able to afford the abortion, and they may not have a pro-choice friend who is able to lend money. I know that the time in my life when I was most terrified of an accidental pregnancy was when I was a broke college student with no car and living 60 miles from the nearest abortion clinic. I admit that I was still better off than many women; I could have found a friend with a car to drive me, and I could have scraped together the money by borrowing from a wealthy friend or even taking out another student loan. But I still had that fear of whether or not I'd be able to find a ride or get the loan. Fortunately, my fears were never realized. Yet there are other women who are not going to be so lucky.

And so now I find myself in a different sort of planning mode. I can write letters and blog posts and sign petitions and protest and march in order to convince legislators and other relevant parties that abortion is not contraception, and that contraception should be available and affordable to all women who ask for it. But what happens if the worst case scenario comes through, and this legislation passes? What if women's access to contraception experiences yet another roadblock?

Read the rest.

So, after watching a few of the clips from the Obama and McCain appearance at an evangelist church, I am actually not sure why Obama agreed to doing this. Tactically, it appeared to be on McCain's home court and many have speculated that McCain had even heard the questions before hand while Obama was answering them. That said, I am concerned by the way that Obama answered the question on abortion (and I am not afraid to say it!).

Personally, I think he blew it. Now, I know many liberals have argued otherwise and while I hear the arguments, that Obama is more nuanced in his approach and was obviously playing with the idea of a "higher power," in his answer, I think he should have come out and said point blank, "I believe in the reproductive rights of families and women", instead of pandering to a crowd, he will never win over by trying to cater to their anti-abortion attitudes. It ain't gonna happen, at least not with the evangelists.

I know there is this fear about calling Obama out on his talking points because we don't want to give the right something to run with, but I do think we have to use the media to hold all our politicians accountable, now and after the election. It is clear that Obama's talking points on repro rights need to be fleshed out with regard to a conservative, evangelist audience, since most of us (on the supposed left) know where Obama stands on most issues of reproductive rights. As my coworker Karlos and I discussed on the train ride home from work yesterday, we understand why he couldn't explicitly say, "pro-choice" on the onset. I may not agree with that, but as a frame it is very difficult to push on this crowd. However if he had pushed reproductive rights as a human rights issue within the frame of reproductive justice and the responsibility of the state to protect and provide reproductive health services for everyone, mothers, babies, families, etc and then discussed how abstinence-only sex education has done absolutely nothing for the number of abortions in the last 4 years, it might have positioned him better on this issue.

As feminists we can't be afraid to demand what we want to hear from our politicians regarding abortion. There has been an assault on pro-choice and the language has been co-opted to make it look as though the pro-choice camp doesn't care about families, babies or mommies. And that couldn't be the furthest thing from the truth. It is the transparent and documented truth that access to reproductive health for women creates a healthier and happier society, is what motivates us to continue fighting for pro-choice legislation.

Note: I received this message from L (who preferred not to be named out of fear for her job), and I thought it was too important not to share. With her permission, I've posted her email below with the hope that the fabulous readers here can give L some advice about how to deal with this situation. I'd also like to say that L's story goes to show how despite laws and store policies, extremist pharmacists are still denying women access to legal contraceptives and medication.

So far I have not had to purchase or use Plan B for myself, so this story doesn't necessarily concern me, per se. However, I do work at a pharmacy, so maybe I can tell you what it's like from the front lines. I'll just come out and say that I work for Wal-Mart, and I always feel a sense of shame saying that. It's a long story as to why I continue to work there, but that's not really the point of all this anyway. Here's a bit of background: We have a male pharmacist who works at our store and he is a fundamentalist, Conservative (yes, with a capital 'C') Christian. We have 2 female pharmacists and our former manager was male. All of the pharmacy techs at our store are women, ranging in age from 25 to 45, most married/divorced with children.

When Plan B went over the counter a couple of years ago, the Conservative pharmacist brought in a couple of things he had found on 'pro-life' websites that said Plan B was an abortifacient. He had talked to our manager at the time about his feelings on the matter and the fact that he didn't want to dispense Plan B, citing his religious beliefs. The manager did not have a problem selling it, but he thought that the best thing to do would be to not stock it at all, that way the Conservative pharmacist wouldn't be put in a situation where he felt compromised. Wal-Mart's official policy, however, is that even if no one in the pharmacy wants to sell Plan B, we have to have it stocked on the shelf.

According to a new report from the report from the American Psychological Association, abortion does not pose a threat to women's mental health.

Via RMJ at the Community blog.

Babies have been sold on the black market for a long time and in highly impoverished areas it often seems like a good idea when you stand to gain thousands of dollars. But inevitably, when you are selling not only the product (a baby) but also hijacking the means of production (a woman's body), illegally, gender based human rights violations are pretty much inevitable.

Call it bizarre business, but the fact is that it is booming. It could be described as a baby factory where women who suffer disability in child bearing source babies. The proprietors are clever enough, as the homes are registered as non governmental organizations(NGOs). In the homes, the operators simply source teenage girls who are pregnant and not interested in keeping the babies. In some cases, some who are desperate to make money are lured into the business. They are taken into the homes where there are men ready to make sure that the girls become pregnant.

I find this last line particularly disturbing. How exactly do they make sure the girls become pregnant? How exactly does one "become" pregnant? Are they forced into having sex perhaps?

And to ascertain that the girls are healthy, HIV and AIDs tests are conducted on the girls before being admitted. The girls stay there until they give birth. Once they are through with this assignment, they are allowed sometime before they leave the homes. Depending on their ability to negotiate, the NGOs, according to our source, pay about N50,000 for the baby. In most cases, the girls do not see the babies they carried for nine months, as there is a ready market for them.

Wow, just wow. The police have been raiding homes and arresting the girls, such as this example where neighbors were complaining that the young women were being held hostage against their will. Yeah, that makes a lot of sense to me-arrest the girls. Also, Nigeria doesn't have the best track record in taking care of their mother's to be.

Via Kay Steiger at Pushback:

It looks like the Democratic Party dropped the "safe, legal and rare" part of its platform on choice. The new platform (PDF), which was just released, puts less of an emphasis on the controversial abortion reduction framework. The section on choice reads as follows:

"The Democratic Party strongly and unequivocally supports Roe v. Wade and a woman's right to choose a safe and legal abortion, regardless of ability to pay, and we oppose any and all efforts to weaken or undermine that right.

The Democratic Party also strongly supports access to affordable family planning services and comprehensive age-appropriate sex education which empowers people to make informed choices and live healthy lives. We also recognize that such health care and education help reduce the number of unintended pregnancies and thereby also reduce the need for abortions.

The Democratic Party also strongly supports a woman's decision to have a child by ensuring access to and availability of programs for pre- and post-natal health care, parenting skills, income support, and caring adoption programs."

I'm personally really excited to see them mention the ability to pay, since the Hyde Amendment has been such a huge barrier for low-income women and women of color. This is more progressive than I might have expected.

Dana Goldstein at TAPPED shares her thoughts about the changes to the platform this year and how it represents the needs of women, and could even be called feminist document.

This one is a doozy. Via RH Reality Check, we find that the American Pregnancy Association is not only linked to crisis pregnancy centers (CPCs), but was originally one itself. Heather Corinna of Scarleteen did the research:

According to the 1999 site archive, the Helpline was established by Mike and Anne Sheaffer in 1995. The couple advertised their desire to adopt a baby on two billboards in Dallas and set up a hotline to respond to the calls from pregnant women the billboards provoked. . . The Schaeffers started the CPC called America's Crisis Pregnancy Helpline in 1995; that CPC was later renamed America's Pregnancy Helpline. In 2003, that organization spawned the American Pregnancy Association. Both the Helpline and the APA continued to exist, ostensibly as separate entities; in reality, at one call center, at the same address.(Emphasis mine)

Corinna discovered this when she unknowingly referred an inquiring teen to the APA's American Pregnancy Helpline and later did some digging only to find more than enough information to link them to anti-choice resources. The sites themselves are suspect enough, using language like "partial birth abortion" and giving implications that breast cancer and infertility could be side effects. And calling the Helpline resulted in the anticipated result; the operator refused to give a Scarleteen volunteer any referrals to abortion services, but gave her a number to a local CPC.

The scariest thing about this is that the reproductive health community at large has been in the dark about this, with many reproductive rights organizations linking to APA on their websites obviously without knowledge of its history, including the popular Medline Plus, which is a project of the National Library of Medicine. The thing is that at first glance, the website offers all accurate information; it's the most insidious of efforts I've seen from a CPC. And I don't doubt we will only find more.

This isn't much of a surprise, considering what we know about the politics of the pharmaceutical industry. From an article in Time:

With the cost of new-drug development hovering in the hundreds of millions of dollars, the pharmaceutical industry decided there wasn't enough of a market to make male hormonal contraceptives worthwhile. The German drug giant Schering halted its development program in 2006 (after its high-profile acquisition by Bayer), and other drug companies quickly followed suit, abandoning several projects that were -- at least by the researchers' accounts -- on the verge of success.

According to Kirsten Thompson, director of the Male Contraception Coalition, if Phase III clinical trials were to begin tomorrow on some of those discarded drugs, men would probably have their pick of contraceptive gels or implants -- just like women -- within five years.

That the burden of controlling fertility falls primarily on women is not really a surprise, and reflects existing misogyny. What is most frustrating about this is who is making these decisions, and furthering limiting our individual reproductive health options.

Transcript below the jump.

The real question is, will Sarah Haskins be my best friend? And will someone put this lady on The Daily Show already? Seriously.

(Also, is that MobLogic host Lindsay Campbell in the first commercial?!)

Check out this spoken word performance from Sonya Renee; towards the end my jaw was dropped and I was near tears. (And I'm not that big of a softie, believe me.) Just amazing.

Via KaeLyn at Feministe.

UPDATE: Get the transcript here.

Community blogger Nell (also of Abortion Clinic Days - a blog of abortion providers telling their stories) asks readers, "What makes for a good abortion?"

We often share your stories with our own patients. Hearing that someone else has walked that path with strength and grace--and that they're not afraid to tell their story--our patients describe as the most precious gift they can receive from the women in their community. The abortion stories women provide that describe isolation, suffering or painful rumination--those teach us something too. We should be listening to these women to understand the qualities that contribute to their suffering so that no woman has to describe her pregnancy or abortion experience in this way.

So how can you help the women you love to have positive memories of their abortions? I would love to hear from readers about the factors that made a difference in their abortions being positive or negative memories.

If you have a story to share, or would like to comment, please do so on Nell's post.

Also, I'd just like to say thanks to all of the abortion providers out there who literally risk their lives to bring compassionate reproductive health care to women - you are amazing.

Senator Clinton has a guest post up at RH Reality Check on Bush's last-ditch efforts to make a rule that defines "abortion" so broadly that it would apply to birth control and emergency contraception.

Oh South Dakota. You never cease to amaze.

Starting Friday, doctors in South Dakota must tell women seeking abortions that the procedure ends a human life and may cause them psychological harm, the state attorney general said.

...The 2005 law requires doctors to tell women "that the abortion will terminate the life of a whole, separate, unique, living human being." Women also would have to be told they have a right to continue a pregnancy and that abortion may cause them psychological harm, including thoughts of suicide.

So basically, they have to provide patients with false information. Nice. Planned Parenthood Minnesota, North Dakota, South Dakota is fighting back. "We remain optimistic that, in time, the court will find that the law is unconstitutional," says PPMNS President and CEO Sarah Stoesz.

To find out how to get involved and counter the anti-choice agenda in South Dakota, check out PPMNS's action page.

Related: Ann blogged about the politics of "informed consent" when the court decision came down last month.

NARAL has an action alert up about that proposed new Bush administration rule I blogged about on Tuesday. In case you missed it, a refresher:

The Bush administration wants to require all recipients of aid under federal health programs to certify that they will not refuse to hire nurses and other providers who object to abortion and even certain types of birth control.

Click here to tell your members of Congress not to "protect" anti-choice medical professionals at the expense of low-income and uninsured women.

You might think Bush has done all the damage he possibly can to reproductive rights. But he's not done yet:

The Bush administration wants to require all recipients of aid under federal health programs to certify that they will not refuse to hire nurses and other providers who object to abortion and even certain types of birth control.

Under the draft of a proposed rule, hospitals, clinics, researchers and medical schools would have to sign "written certifications" as a prerequisite to getting money under any program run by the Department of Health and Human Services.

The rule defines "abortion" so broadly that it could also apply to birth control pills and emergency contraception. And because the rule would apply to federal health programs, low-income and uninsured women will be most affected.

Sam at Lazy Circles summarizes:

So, the inner city women's clinic employee who refuses to talk to patients about birth control? Can't touch her. The hospital pharmacist who refuses to fill prescriptions for birth control? She can't be fired or disciplined. The doctor who refuses to give emergency contraception to a rape victim for "religious reasons?" Give that man a promotion.

He also points out that the Bush administration is interested in preventing "discrimination" against anti-choice health care providers, but is a-OK with discrimination against gay people. Sigh. Only 188 days left. Count 'em down.

Family planning is a human right. This is the message that the UNFPA is sending out today for World Population Day, which is pretty damn important considering the fact that the Bush administration has -- for the 7th consecutive year -- blocked UNFPA funding for millions of women in the world who need family planning services.

Check out the UNFPA's release statement commemorating the day.

You know that scene in Juno where Ellen Page's character takes pregnancy test after pregnancy test at her local convenience store? Over on the community blog, Aly tells us how the reality can be quite different. She and her friend, both 15-year-olds, went through quite the ordeal trying to buy a simple over-the-counter pregnancy test.

We're in CVS, searching for a pregnancy test. ["Shouldn't they be over here?" "I can't find them! Are they by the tampons?" "Nah, if you're pregnant, you don't need those anymore." "Fuck, should we ask someone?" "Wait, no, I think I found them! No, shit, that's a yeast infection thing." "Aly!" "Sorry! They both make you have to pee on them, I think!" "No, you stick the yeast infection one up your snatch." "Ew, seriously? Sick." "This is not the time for commentary on the world of yeast infections!"]

As you can see, it was quite an adventure.

We finally find them in a small little corner marked 'Family Planning', and we search for the right one. An EPT boasts TWO FOR THE PRICE OF ONE! for thirteen dollars, so we grab that one: two tests means extra reassurance. C.'s hands are shaking so hard that the box is rattling, so I take it away from her and go up to the counter.

The woman in front of us has practically done her grocery shopping here, and is paying in dimes and quarters. We wait for five minutes, Courtney watching the door for my mom.[who is in the car, innocently thinking we are getting pads.] Finally the woman is done, and I plop the pregnancy test on the counter. The clerk is in her late forties, and looks at me, pops her gum, and says, "I'm gonna have to see some ID."

Read the rest. (It's official: I'm in love with our community bloggers.)

So does he not know that he voted against requiring insurance companies to cover birth control for women? Or does he just not want to talk about it?

Think Progress has more.

This is rich:

Carly Fiorina, the former Hewlett-Packard chief who is now the Republican National Committee's "Victory Chairman," was discussing consumer-driven health insurance at a breakfast with reporters when she proposed "a real, live example which I've been hearing a lot about from women: There are many health insurance plans that will cover Viagra but won't cover birth-control medication. Those women would like a choice." For effect, the woman frequently mentioned as a possible McCain running mate repeated: "Those women would like a choice."

Apparently Fiorina didn't get the memo that McCain has voted against requiring insurance companies to cover birth control. And if I were her, I wouldn't repeat that "women would like a choice" line when she's stumping for a candidate who is blatantly anti-choice.

This is only the second time in history that Planned Parenthood Action Fund has endorsed a presidential candidate. Check out endorsement statement by President Cecile Richards and clip of Obama below.

Many of you have probably heard about Obama's interview with a Christian magazine last week where he said he said that "mental distress" is not a sufficient exception to bans against late-term abortions. He later clarified his statement:

"My only point is this-historically I have been a strong believer in a women's right to choose with her doctor, her pastor and her family, I have consistently been saying that you have to have a health exception on many significant restrictions or bans on abortions, including late-term abortions.

In the past, there has been some fear on the part of people who--not only people who are anti-abortion, but people who may be in the middle--that that means that if a woman just doesn't feel good then that is an exception. That's never been the case. I don't think that is how it has been interpreted. My only point is that in an area like partial birth abortion having a mental, having a health exception can be defined rigorously. . .

It can be defined through physical health. It can be defined by serious clinical mental health diseases. It is not just a matter of feeling blue. I don't think that's how pro-choice folks have interpreted it. I don't think that's how the courts have interpreted it and I think that's important to emphasize and understand."

His clarification has still, nonetheless, brought up questions of whether Obama would support narrowing abortion rights. We thought we'd open this up for discussion. People's thoughts?

Check out more coverage on this.

Remember how Henry Morgentaler, Canada's best-known abortion-rights crusader was to the Order of Canada? Apparently some folks aren't too happy about it.

A Calgary-based activist group has filed an official request to the Governor General, asking that she strip abortion crusader Dr. Henry Morgentaler of his membership in the Order of Canada.

..."Henry Morgentaler's conduct is unbecoming that of a member of the Order of Canada and thereby tarnishes all recipients of this tremendous award," the coalition wrote in its letter to the Order of Canada advisory committee.

Yes, supporting women's rights is pretty "unbecoming." Sigh.

Are we really surprised?

Planned Parenthood of Central Washington was scheduled to hold an event at a local Wal-Mart on National HIV Testing Day where their Teen Council were simply going to stand outside of the store and hand out information about HIV prevention and testing. But the American Life League got a tip on the event, and urged their supporters to call and complain to the store, after which Wal-Mart succumbed and canceled the event.

You know, because handing out preventative information that saves people's lives is just so not okay. American Life League's statement is horrific, and conveniently makes no mention of what the event was actually for:

“Planned Parenthood is now in such desperate need of customers it’s willing to do anything – even stand outside shopping centers to lure young people into its clinics,” said Marie Hahnenberg, a researcher for American Life League.

"They’re pushing pornography and contraception onto young children – beginning in kindergarten. Now parents aren’t even safe to go shopping without worrying Planned Parenthood will pressure their kids into promiscuous lifestyles that will increase their bloated birth control and abortion profits,” Hahnenberg said.

I just love it when they equate pro-choicers with pushers and pimps. (And on 5 year olds, no less. They're big money, I tell ya!) This is the kind of shit that reminds me just how fucking insane these people are. Their supporters who called Walmart - and Walmart itself - should be ashamed that they believed these horrid lies and, in Planned Parenthood's words, "put the wishes of extremists ahead of crucial community health information that empowers people to make responsible choices."

Call Walmart at 509-628-8420 and let them know just how wrong they were.

I'll be honest, I didn't know what the Order of Canada was - but apparently it's very shmancy.

Henry Morgentaler, the country's best-known abortion-rights crusader, has been named to the Order of Canada, the country's highest honour.

...Dr. Morgentaler was appointed a Member of the Order of Canada. He was awarded "for his commitment to increased health care options for women, his determined efforts to influence Canadian public policy and his leadership in humanist and civil liberties organization," the Governor General said in a press release.

Nice.

UN Dispatch covers the fact that this is the seventh consecutive year that the Bush administration has denied funding to the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), which provides reproductive health services for women around the globe.

Tamara Kreinin, the Executive Director of the Women and Population program at the United Nations Foundation, says:

"The UN Foundation is looking forward to working with the next administration to restore funding for UNFPA and to strengthen the U.S.'s role as a global health leader. During the 2000 UN Millennium Summit, the United States pledged to work to respond to the world's most pressing development challenges, including poverty, gender inequality and disease. It is past time that the administration acknowledges how fundamental UNFPA is to addressing these global challenges and that the U.S. funds UNFPA's work."

As long as John McCain is not in office; he already voted to defund UNFPA in the past.

I'm in shock. TIME magazine followed up their original story about the pregnant teens of Gloucester, but now suggesting that the girls' decision is not just one of personal choice, but one of rejecting abortion and "taking responsibility." And the credit is partly given to crisis pregnancy centers (CPCs).

You must read the whole piece, which reeks of anti-choice language, but the last paragraph really says it all:

Whether a girl--or a woman--decides to end a pregnancy or see it through is as complex an emotional and moral and medical calculation as she ever faces. But I wonder if some soft message has taken hold when the data suggest that more women facing hard choices are deciding to carry the child to term. This has been the mission of the crisis-pregnancy-center movement, the more than 4,000 centers and hotlines and support groups around the country that aim to talk women out of having abortions and offer whatever support they can. If not in Hollywood, then certainly in Gloucester, teen parents and their babies face long odds against success in life. Surely they deserve more sympathy and support than shame and derision, if the trend that they reflect is not a typical teenager's inclination to have sex but rather a willingness to take responsibility for the consequences. (Emphasis mine)

Now, we obviously know these girls shouldn't be shamed in any way regarding their decision to have sex or to go full term with their pregnancies. But to imply that it's more responsible to have a child than to have an abortion is just ridiculous. And I won't even get into the fact that the piece blatantly lauds crisis pregnancy centers and the "support" they apparently give women. If by "support," she means deceiving and misleading women to believe they're giving them all of their options - sure. "Support."

And it's not surprising considering the author; Nancy Gibbs wrote an article in TIME last year all about how CPCs help women titled, "The Grassroots Abortion War", with headline conveniently placed over an image of a crib. Send a letter to the editor and let Gibbs and TIME know they're promoting deceiving organizations.

Today the 8th Circuit Court of Appeals overturned a lower court injunction, allowing South Dakota's "informed consent" legislation to take effect. The legislation requires doctors to inform women seeking abortions that the procedure "ends a human life." Because, you know, women are stupid and are just getting abortions willy-nilly, without thinking about it much. We need to be told "the truth," because clearly no woman is aware that carrying a pregnancy to term is an option.

Last April, Sarah Blustain wrote about this case and other "informed consent" laws for the Prospect:

This line of thinking makes clear that women are too ignorant to realize that they are carrying some sort of nascent life in them, and too weak to possibly decide for themselves whether to have an abortion. Even worse, drafters of the South Dakota law do not think women are competent to state whether they have absorbed all of this helpful state information properly: The law would require the doctor to certify, in writing, that he "believes she [the pregnant woman] understands the information imparted."

"Informed consent is good," says Yale's Reva Siegel (who wrote about these issues with me in TAP last year), "but not if the only abortion decision the movement recognizes as 'informed' is the decision to carry a pregnancy to term; if this is the premise on which the regulation and litigation rests, then the law is premised on an offensive view of women seeking abortion -- weak and confused and failing to conform to their natural role as mothers -- and will function to pressure and intimidate those women."

Ugh. The case is now headed back to the lower court.

Related:
The politics of "informed consent"
Mandatory ultrasounds and "informed consent"