You are currently browsing the tag archive for the ‘Pro-Choice’ tag.
Considering the superheated stupid that regularly ejaculates from the rusty brainpan of this this individual should we be surprised when he comes out against female autonomy? The Guttamacher Institute summarizes his vapidly brainsick musings succinctly in a recent press release.
“Former Sen. Rick Santorum (R-PA) asserted earlier this week that Social Security’s future solvency is in jeopardy because of what he termed the U.S. “abortion culture.” Santorum is quoted by the Los Angeles Times as saying, “Well, a third of all the young people in America are not in America today because of abortion.”
Did he just scrape his brain out of a mint jelly jar? It is not fair to mint jelly, but Mr.Santorum might as well be saying we should ban cars because some 32,000 (2010) people die every year because of car accidents.
“More importantly, however, there are two main reasons why it is simply wrong to assume that every abortion reduces the U.S. population by one person: One, most women obtaining abortions are younger than 30 and are postponing childbearing. They typically want to wait to have children, or already have one child and don’t want another at that time. In either case, the abortion delays a birth, it does not eliminate it—and there is no impact on the overall population. Second, some abortions terminate pregnancies that would have ended in miscarriage, so again one cannot assume that every abortion would have otherwise resulted in a live birth.”
Enter the factual analysis of what is actually going on, Women planning their childbearing so they can best accommodate having and raising a child. Holy-responsible planning Batman! Forced birth advocates rarely seem to acknowledge that women *may* have a good idea when they are ready to accept the dangerous responsibility of giving birth and then the commitment needed to raise a child. It’s like their lady-brains are actually capable of evaluating when the time is right for us to do what we want for our selves and our bodies. Some pretty heavy radical shit, I know.
“But where Santorum really misses his mark is his failure to grasp a very simple idea: Most Americans want two children, and they try to time childbearing and space their births so that they have those children when they feel best capable of taking care of them. Overwhelmingly, this is accomplished through contraceptive use. When faced with an unwanted or mistimed pregnancy, some women decide to obtain an abortion. But the key point is that whatever demographic challenges Social Security may be facing, they are not due to abortion, but rather to the fact that most Americans desire—and generally achieve—small families.”
Interesting. Rick’s assertions really have no basis in reality then. The issue of course is those damn women and the rights they think they have to their bodies.
“The natural extension of Santorum’s purported solution for bolstering Social Security would be to require American women and couples to have more children than they want. Any possible scenario for achieving such a goal would be deeply disturbing—for example, banning both contraception and abortion, or trying to institute some form of mandatory three- or four-child policy through tax penalties or other punishments for those not complying.”
George W. Bush’s flatulence has more credibility than this turgid woman hating vomit stain of a human being. The next legislation from Mr.Santorum will be the banning of shoes from women so they can assume their rightful place in the kitchen, barefoot and pregnant until they die in childbirth or hit menopause.
“In essence, what underpins Santorum’s argument is a lack of support for the ability of women and their partners to decide for themselves when to have children and how many children to have.”
You know that Mr.Santorum is a huge free-market supporter and will trot out arguments for how great the market is because of choice people have while out of the other corner of his lick-spittle mouth will talk about stripping away bodily autonomy and reproductive choices for women. The best part of this is that this individual was actually elected to public office by people with the same sort of cracked world-view that he routinely barfs into the public arena.
It is nice to see the infringement on the rights of women abortion debate framed in such a succinct manner.
“As I’ve said before (and will almost certainly have occasion to say many times again, until everyone is yawning about what a goddamn broken record I am), the anti-choice position is inherently violent, no matter how politely it is stated. If anyone else suggested that I should be forced to submit my body against my will to nine months of potential discomfort and pain, followed by an act that might include the skin and muscle between my vagina and anus being torn open, I don’t think we’d mince words about whether they were using violent rhetoric. But because we can couch it in the bullshit terminology of “a pro-life position,” that’s supposed to be evidence of civility.
That’s supposed to evidence of an unyielding belief in the sanctity of human life.
LULZ.
I am a human. That does not in any way feel like a respect for the sanctity of my life, or the quality of my life, or the agency over my life to which I am meant to have a public (and, according to Huckabee’s own religion, divine) right.
No one can argue, with any honesty or credibility, that they give a fuck about the sanctity of life if they would force a woman to carry to term an unwanted or unviable pregnancy against her will. That is the opposite of a respect for life, if the definition of “life” is to have any meaning at all.”
Run along anti-choice zealots…run along.
Considering the usual abuse of logic and science on the behest of the fetus – fetish crowd, it is really quite unsurprising that on yet another of their talking points – The majority of women who have abortions are emotionally scarred for life – is bunk. The Guttmacher Institute sent this little gem out via email.
“An authoritative new study from researchers in Denmark, noteworthy for its exceptionally strong methodology, confirms what the best scientific evidence has long shown—that there is no causal link between abortion and mental health problems. The new study, “Induced First-Trimester Abortion and Risk of Mental Disorder,” by Trine Munk-Olsen and colleagues, was published in the January 27, 2011, issue of the New England Journal of Medicine.”
The study succeeds in addressing several critical limitations that have afflicted some other studies that purport to show causation between abortion and subsequent mental health problems. It can be viewed as unusually rigorous for this type of research for several reasons.”
Wow, correlation does not equal causation. The review of the study continues:
• The sample was very large, comprising 84,620 women who had first-time, first-trimester abortions between 1995 and 2007.
• It did not rely on retrospective self-reports from women, who typically underreport abortions. Instead, it was based on complete patient medical registries, which include virtually all mental health disorders, births and abortions experienced by the Danish population: the Danish Psychiatric Central Register and the Danish National Register of Patients.
• The study has strong controls for women’s mental health prior to abortion, a critical factor that many other studies do not control for sufficiently, if at all.
The study found no higher rate of mental health problems among Danish women in the 12 months following an abortion than in the nine months prior to the procedure.
So, yet another talking point dispatched. Score another for science and truth.
“Not all studies on the mental health impact of abortion are created equal. In fact, according to the American Psychological Association, methodological flaws are “pervasive in the literature on abortion and mental health.” Antiabortion activists often attempt to capitalize on the fact that the public and many policymakers cannot distinguish between studies that allow legitimate conclusions to be drawn about the effects of abortion and those that show only associations between abortion and mental health outcomes.”
The forced birthers not being academically or scientifically honest? Admittedly, there are not many other options to take considering the frail house of cards most anti-choice positions are built on.
“Antiabortion activists have relied on questionable science in their efforts to push inclusion of the concept of “postabortion syndrome” in both clinical practice and law. This latest study strongly confirms the existing body of methodologically sound evidence in clearly refuting the idea that abortion causes harm to women’s mental health. The body of evidence is now so robust that researchers should consider shifting their focus to related issues that might be more valuable to explore, such as the factors that cause women to experience mental health problems in the first place.
Of course, the anti-choicers won’t, as the health and welfare of women are secondary to their mendaciously insipid assault on women’s rights.
It is nice to see a video not made by the fetus-fetish crowd. Who thought that bodily autonomy for women would be such a radical idea?
Wow, if you ever need to get your blood pressure up just look up the abortion tag in wordpress. The amount of anti-woman propaganda that is out there is deeply depressing. Thankfully the Abortion Rights Coalition of Canada has a nice mission statement summarizing why abortion is necessary:
Our Mission
Our Mission: To ensure women’s reproductive freedom by protecting and advancing access to abortion and quality reproductive health care.
Our Vision
The ARCC is “pro-choice” and affirms the following:
* To achieve equality, all women must have the right to decide for themselves whether and when they will bear children, and how many. Without control of their fertility, women cannot have autonomy over their lives and cannot play a full and equal role in society.
* Women have a constitutionally-based right to unrestricted, fully-funded abortion, without legal or other barriers or discrimination due to gender, class, ethnicity, race, age, location/region (or area of residence), or any other characteristic, including reasons for choosing an abortion. The rights of pregnant women must not be abridged—a pregnant woman is “one person” under the constitution.
* Women have the right to receive a full range of reproductive healthcare options, services, and information, including (but not limited to) medical and surgical abortion, contraception, family planning services, and comprehensive sexual health education.
* Women have the right to access reproductive healthcare services safely and in a timely manner, in an atmosphere of dignity, privacy, respect, trust, and compassion.
* All abortions are medically required—not “elective”—and fall under the protection of the Canada Health Act (just like all childbirths). The delivery and funding of abortion and other medically required reproductive healthcare services must meet the Act’s five principles.
* Providers of reproductive health care services have the right to deliver such services free of discrimination, harassment, and violence.
The RCC. Always open, always deluded and always anti-woman.
The Catholic Church is mired in yet another anti-woman scandal.
via NBC – “PHOENIX – A nun and administrator at a Catholic hospital in Phoenix has been reassigned and rebuked by the local bishop for agreeing that a severely ill woman needed an abortion to survive.
Sister Margaret McBride was on an ethics committee that included doctors that consulted with a young woman who was 11 weeks pregnant late last year, The Arizona Republic newspaper reported on its website Saturday. The woman was suffering from a life-threatening condition that likely would have caused her death if she hadn’t had the abortion at St. Joseph’s Hospital and Medical Center.”
Wow, do we need another reason to shit-can the mystical bullshit that pervades our society? Yet another case of backward, unhinged, delusional thinking attempting to corrupt and trump reality in the 21st century. The Nun in question, followed her own personal ethics, as opposed to the rancid 2000 year old wisdom of burning bushes and talking snakes. She made the correct evidence based decision. Her commitment to reason is to be commended, and of course free thinking in the musty halls of religion gets you punished:
“Bishop Thomas J. Olmsted, head of the Phoenix Diocese, indicated in a statement that the Roman Catholic involved was “automatically excommunicated” because of the action. The Catholic Church allows the termination of a pregnancy only as a secondary effect of other treatments, such as radiation of a cancerous uterus.”
“I am gravely concerned by the fact that an abortion was performed several months ago in a Catholic hospital in this diocese,” Olmsted said in a statement sent to The Arizona Republic. “I am further concerned by the hospital’s statement that the termination of a human life was necessary to treat the mother’s underlying medical condition.”
Ah yes, because of your funny hat and the rotten sepulchre of a religion that supports your fantasy based point of view enables you to punish people for saving lives. The Bishop of Bullshit continues:
“An unborn child is not a disease. While medical professionals should certainly try to save a pregnant mother’s life, the means by which they do it can never be by directly killing her unborn child. The end does not justify the means.”
Huh, well if then this is not a pillar for Catholic women to frakking rally around then let us distill it down a bit further to ‘clarify the message’.
“If a woman grows weary and at last dies from childbearing, it matters not. Let her die from bearing, she is there to do it.” –Martin Luther.
Now this is a quote that women can get behind. All aboard the train straight back into the shitz and giggles known as the Dark Ages! We need to get back to a time where Bishop Frothing in the Mouth Crazy has some real power. The malodorous drivel oozing from this rectal polyp of human being is matched only by the unctuous waves of support for his position wafting through the spinelessly uncritical anti-choice wankosphere . Okay okay, I digress. Back to the real world where evidence does matter…
“The patient, who hasn’t been identified, was seriously ill with pulmonary hypertension. The condition limits the ability of the heart and lungs to function and is made worse, possibly even fatal, by pregnancy.
“This decision was made after consultation with the patient, her family, her physicians, and in consultation with the Ethics Committee, of which Sr. Margaret McBride is a member,” the hospital said in a statement issued Friday.”
Thank you medical science, thank you rationality, for showing us the correct solution in this case. We need to banish the fucking voodoo magical crap that masquerades in our society as religion. This case finely illustrates how morally bankrupt the RCC is and how out to lunch religion is in general.
H/T to Pharyngula.
Women having rights to their own bodies, radical I know.
It is nice to see that women are being treated more like human beings in Ethiopia. Reproductive freedom is a cornerstone of womens rights and needs to be fostered and protected wherever possible. The Guttmacher Institute has just publicized a study done in Ethiopia. It is still not a completley rosy picture over there however:
“Only 14% of Ethiopian women of reproductive age use contraceptives. The low level of contraceptive use leads to high levels of unintended pregnancy, the root cause of abortion: Some 42% of all pregnancies are unintended. The study also found that the majority of women seeking treatment for complications of unsafe abortion—81%—were married. By contrast, only 46% of women seeking induced abortions were married. The vast majority of both groups—92% of women seeking postabortion care and 79% of women who had abortions—were mothers. The average age among both groups was 28.”
Funny how facts actually dispel the tripe anti-choice activists like to throw around. Darn irresponsible women (already mothers) just doing it because they can.
“The study estimates that, in 2008, 382,500 abortions were performed in Ethiopia, for an annual rate of 23 per 1,000 women aged 15–44. Despite women’s expanded legal access to abortion, only 27% of these—103,000—were legal and safe procedures performed in health facilities.
The study also found that, in 2008, 58,600 women were treated for abortion-related complications, primarily resulting from unsafe procedures. Among these, 100 women died from their complications, and many more suffered from related injuries or illnesses. Four out of 10 women showed signs of infection or invasive injuries when they arrived at health facilities for postabortion care. Many women with complications never reach health care facilities, because they live too far from services, they avoid seeking help because of fear and stigma, or they die before reaching a facility.”
The negative consequences of not having access to reproductive health services is quite clear. So when you hear the fetus fetishists go on about how women are ‘just fine’ once stripped of their reproductive rights, you know it is pure bull-cookery.
“Global data show that expanding legal abortion access reduces death and illness from unsafe abortion. For example, South Africa saw abortion-related maternal mortality decline by more than 50% after expanding access in 1997. Many stakeholders throughout the region are looking to Ethiopia as a model for addressing a crisis in maternal mortality. The current study will serve as a baseline for assessing the country’s progress in reducing maternal deaths as the government continues to expand services.”
A big thanks to the Guttmacher Institute for reporting on such important issues.
I had the intention of making this a post about how to diffuse some of the arguments anti-choice people make. The quoted bits are good examples that take down some of the toxic memes that have formed around the debate. I swear though, if I hear what about the baaaaaaaby one more time I will blow a lobe because that is not arguing, but rather, a complete denial of the woman in the whole process of reproduction. Women are not mere vessels meant only for reproduction, but fully autonomous beings that have the right to determine what goes on in their body.
bleatmop
Mystro
Dead Wild Roses 
Your opinions…