(Nearly) open-thread Wednesday September 28 2011

What do look you for most in a review of a movie? What do you find most helpful? What do you find most annoying? And what do find least useful?

TIME SENSITIVE: Things you can do

From the Center for Reproductive Rights:

When Secretary Sebelius agreed that contraception should be covered under the new healthcare law, she included a proposed exemption in the guidelines that would allow religious institutions to choose whether or not to cover contraception services for their employees. The Bishops now want HHS to expand this exemption to include Catholic hospitals, schools, and a number of other entities.

TAKE ACTION NOW—Tell Secretary Kathleen Sebelius that all American women deserve access to contraception without worrying about co-pays

---

 

The Board Administration Team
(hapax, Kit Whitfield and mmy)



Comments

[Hashmir]

Ok, openish thread -- I have a request. See, 40 Days for Life is starting up at my college (Texas A&M), and this year, I'd like to run an information campaign of my own -- a sort of "40 Days of Look What You're Doing to People."

To that end, I would greatly appreciate any online resources anyone knows of that feature personal accounts regarding the harm caused by these pro-life demonstrations outside Planned Parenthood clinics. Normally, I get pretty angry over this stuff (for obvious reasons), but for this month or so, I just really want to show people who are neutral or uninformed why they are doing harm.

[MaryKaye]

TRIGGER WARNING: pregnancy problems, death of a wanted baby.

The killer article for me on this ran in Ms. Magazine maybe 5-6 years ago, and was a first-person account from someone whose baby died _in utero_ but who was unable to get an abortion--she was told, basically, that due to "pro-life" pressure there were no qualified providers who could do a late-term abortion. So she simply had to...wait.

Imagine the nightmare of carrying a baby you knew for a fact was dead.

Imagine having to risk your life--childbirth is significantly more risky than abortion--for a baby you knew for a fact was dead.

It was brilliantly written and very compelling. It may not be exactly what you want (if you are looking for stuff directly about the demonstrations) but the probable end result of pressuring Planned Parenthood is, exactly, the situation she found herself in.

[LMM]

I'd recommend running an information campaign featuring the following:

* the documentary "Abortion and the Law" (see here -- it's from the 1960s and is honest enough that you couldn't air it on TV today: the moral is, women are dying because abortion is illegal)

* Rachel Maddow's special report on the murder of Dr. George Tiller (it aired last year; I've got it on podcast but still haven't managed to get through it because I get so angry)

* pictures of Gerri Santoro (scroll down; warning: graphic)

* coat hangers planted into the lawn -- seriously

* quotes from "The Only Moral Abortion is My Abortion" (my favorite is the one about the campus "Right-to-Life" president)

Yes, this may seem aggressive -- but keep in mind that they see your side as wanting to kill babies. The only way to succeed is to reframe the discussion to be about dead *women* (the "Abortion and the Law" documentary does this quite well -- by the time you encounter a priest who insists the church has always been against abortion because it supports life (which isn't technically true (*)), the only thing you can think is *whose* life).

(*) Here's the deal: For a long time, "abortion" was a procedure that occurred after quickening. Before quickening, there wasn't technically a baby, so medicines that "restored menstruation" were common.

[Mmy]

@MaryKaye: Imagine the nightmare of carrying a baby you knew for a fact was dead.

Trigger warning: Death of a child

I have told this story before here....this happened in the US....a friend of mine and his wife were over the moon happy about her pregnancy. She had had problems with her first pregnancy (though it ended with a healthy child) and she and her doctor were watching things closely. Then came the horrible sonogram that showed that the child was dead. Both of them were devastated. She was fortunate enough to be able to go through the procedure to remove the dead fetus -- but every time I see pictures of protesters waving pictures of babies in front of women going into clinics I imagine that they are doing that to my friend and his wife.

Actually, I am not sure that given the ways things have changed in the last five years if she would still have access to that procedure.

[Firedrake]

Film reviews: I want to read about things the reviewer liked about the films and things ke didn't like. I'm not going to have the same likes and dislikes, so I need to know why the reviewer reacted the way ke did, rather than just "it's great" or "it's rubbish".

[Ross]

@hashmir: Mike The Mad Biologist has some good (and sourced) articles on the subject:

(TW: Pregnancy trauma; death of a wanted child)

http://mikethemadbiologist.com/2011/07/13/how_new_anti-abortion_laws_wil/
(Also speaks from a religious perspective - namely that risking the life of the mother when the child can't be saved is not permissible under Jewish law, despite the use of the prefix "Judeo-" when forced pregnancy advocates talk about the "Judeochristian moral basis for our laws")

And this one cites a speech by a minister calling abortion a blessing:
http://mikethemadbiologist.com/2011/05/24/refusing_to_cede_the_moral_hig/

(TW: Rape, abortion, tax audits)
http://mikethemadbiologist.com/2011/03/19/now_the_republican_party_wants/

(TW: Medical diagrams detailing a gynecological procedure, rape, forced medical procedures)
http://mikethemadbiologist.com/2011/03/07/the_gop_really_does_want_to_sh/

[Ross]

Okay. My mind is blown. Yesterday, I got capcha'd for a post with no links and no Dramatic Capitalization. Today, I post 4 links in a single post and it's fine with that.

[Kirala]

(Also speaks from a religious perspective - namely that risking the life of the mother when the child can't be saved is not permissible under Jewish law, despite the use of the prefix "Judeo-" when forced pregnancy advocates talk about the "Judeochristian moral basis for our laws")

Seriously, I can't believe that's even an issue. If you believe that life begins at conception, I can see doing an awful lot to protect that life. But if life isn't there (or triage says the mother's life is salvageable but the fetus's isn't), there should be no ethical questions at all. It's like this case I remember from a decade or so ago where one newborn conjoined twin was keeping her sister alive, but both would die unless they were separated. It's heartbreaking to accept the loss, but I don't understand how there's any abstract ethical question about the right course of action.

[Lonespark]

Wow, that link with the Gerri Santoro photos is a very good, comprehensive overview of history and what's at stake.

[Ross]

(TW: Religious justifications for torture; pregnancy trauma)

@Kirala: I made the mistake of doing some googling a long time ago, and one thing I saw repeatedly was that it often came down to the "message it sends". Namely, even though it might technically not be a mortal sin to medically remove a dead fetus from a woman, because that procedure uses the same skillset as abortion, by allowing it, you are "giving money to an abortion doctor" and "sending the message that abortion is sometimes okay", and it is better for a woman to die of massive infections caused by carrying around a dead fetus until her body ejects it than to let those horrid abortionists get away with something.

The other thing that came up multiple times was a level of magical thinking that basically says "Even though medical science says the fetus is dead and in serious danger of damaging your internal organs, if you pray hard enough, god will do a miracle and you will give birth to a healthy baby. And if you die, it's because god wants you dead and who are we to interfere with that?"

The man who invents the Punch-Someone-Through-The-Internet Machine will be the richest man ever.

[Hashmir]

Thanks for the help, everyone. This whole thing is just impossibly frustrating. Goddamnit, I'm tired. I'm starting to feel like this.

[Kit Whitfield]

The man who invents the Punch-Someone-Through-The-Internet Machine will be the richest man ever.

Or woman. Let's have equal rights here. :-)

[Lonespark]

Yeah, I think if it gets invented it'll be in response to situations such as you describe, in which being invented by a woman is even higher than usual.

[Rowen]

I second the The Only Moral Abortion is My Abortion.

Here's a link to the article Mary Kaye was talking about:
(Um, lots of trigger warnings . . . )
http://www.msmagazine.com/summer2004/womanandherdoctor.asp

There's also an article that I can't remember for the life of me, and I thought it was the Only Moral Abortion, but it's not. It was another one like the Ms. Magazine that talked about a woman with an anacephalic baby who couldn't find any doctors.

[Kit Whitfield]

Um, lots of trigger warnings . . .

Could you be specific? 'Lots' is going to exclude anyone with any triggers, even if their particular trigger isn't present.

[Rowen]

Honestly, I'm not terribly sure what sort of things to say, based on some of the trigger warnings I've seen pop up on the internet.

MaryKaye gave a good and succinct description, so I guess. . . death of a wanted child, pregnancy trauma. . .

(Which. . . um, this is another one of those places where my privileges are showing, but in a thread like this, once we've established the nature of the discussion, do we still need the warnings on each post, cause it seems like if you gotten this far . . . or is it because this IS an open thread and could/will take a left hand turn into a Dr. Who discussion?)

[Michael I]

Ross@10:11 am 9/29

It occurs to me that the people who suggest the might-be-a-miracle possibility are showing a strange lack of faith in God's power. After all, if God really wanted a miracle to happen a miracle WOULD happen, regardless of what the doctor did. They aren't suggesting that a mere human could really overrule God's will, are they?

[Ruby]

TW: end of wanted pregnancy

@Michael and Ross--It's also a strange kind of miracle, isn't it? Why would God let the fetus die then bring it back to life? Wouldn't it be easier just to keep it alive?

Reminds me of the scene from Saved:

Roland (explaining why he's in a wheelchair): I fell out of a tree when I was nine. [My sister] Hilary Faye found me. She calls it "the miracle that saved my life."

Cassandra: The miracle you could have used would have been not falling out of the tree in the first place.

[Ross]

@Michael and Ross--It's also a strange kind of miracle, isn't it? Why would God let the fetus die then bring it back to life? Wouldn't it be easier just to keep it alive?

Remember, this is the same god who heard Rick Perry's prayers for rain in texas, and hit the east coast with Irene, who hates gays and so sent Katrina to destroy New Orleans but left the French Quarter largely intact. God has lousy aim.

[Ross]

(But seriously, I think the "miracle" claim is that the fetus isn't "really" dead after all and medical science is just wrong. Related to anti-science-ism: "How dare that doctor think all his book-larnin' means he's more qualified than I am to determine whether a fetus is dead or alive".

)

[Mmy]

Speaking as an non-American (and not wanted to offend any American in this community) but does it strike anyone else that the US is moving backwards in time when in comes to the rights of women and minorities? Some of the bills that are being proposed in various state legislatures strike deeply at the very "personhood" of women. Yes, I know that those are the expressions of particular individuals but the fact that "playing along" with those people/groups does not forever cast a politician out of the pool of those who can get election is bone-chilling to me.

[JK]

That's federalism for you. When certain elements manage to work their way into state and local legislatures, it's difficult to really stop them; the main argument that they use is that, "If you don't like it, move", which is fine if you're talking about annoying home-owners' associations and not so fine if you're talking about fundamental civil rights violations conducted under the aegis of 'state's rights'.

At the same time that the federal government is making mammograms, pap tests, birth control, STD screening and treatment, and domestic violence screening and treatment free of charge for women, state legislatures throughout the country are subverting women's rights to control their own bodies by manipulating health regulations to make access to abortion a practical impossibility. We got rid of DADT and New York and D.C. recently legalized same-sex marriage, but the vast majority of states either have laws or -- worse -- constitutional amendments prohibiting same-sex marriages, and it will probably take many more months of litigation before the test case in California makes it through the circuit courts.

Rights for transgender people are similarly bleak; I think only about twenty states actually extend equal protection under anti-discrimination laws. One of few good news on the front that I've heard about "recently" (read: about five years ago) was that DHS and the immigration tribunals now consider being a transgendered person to be a valid criteria for asylum in the US.

I wish we could catch up with Canada on these (and other) issues. It's still in an uphill battle and we've lost a lot of ground but hopefully next year's elections will be better than 2010's/

[MercuryBlue]

New York and D.C. recently legalized same-sex marriage

My Family Law teacher says not. Not using the word 'marriage', anyway. She set us an extra-credit assignment to find that out for ourselves. I can't wait to see her reaction to the onslaught of emails explaining about New York and wherever else.

"A MARRIAGE THAT IS OTHERWISE VALID SHALL BE VALID REGARDLESS OF WHETHER THE PARTIES TO THE MARRIAGE ARE OF THE SAME OR DIFFERENT SEX."

[sarah]

"A MARRIAGE THAT IS OTHERWISE VALID SHALL BE VALID REGARDLESS OF WHETHER THE PARTIES TO THE MARRIAGE ARE OF THE SAME OR DIFFERENT SEX."

That is some legalese, right there.

[ShifterCat]

Hashmir: I've got some for you.

(TW: physical trauma, medical squick) Repairing the Damage Before Roe A doctor recalls dealing with the results of self-inflicted abortion attempts.

(TW: physical trauma, medical squick, description of terrorist attacks) Why I Am an Abortion Doctor Similar to the above, and this doctor also notes that some hospitals used to have an entire ward devoted to septic complications of pregnancy.

(TW: brief discussion of anti-abortion terrorism and unpleasant anti-choice lies) Why I Will Provide Abortions

(TW: description of the loss of a wanted pregnancy) My "Health" Story and (also TW: medical squick) My Late-Term Abortion are personal stories from women who had late-term abortions due to fetal non-viability. A Heartbreaking Choice is an entire blog devoted to this.

If anyone's passing around "aborted fetus" photos, you might want to print out some of these: (TW: serious medical squick, details of miscarriages) Are the pictures real? (Short answer: No.)

Also, here's an Abortion Myths blog and an analysis of a manual for anti-abortion protesters.

[ShifterCat]

Ok, WTF? I've posted a comment about three times, and it still doesn't show.

[Mmy]

@ShifterCat: Ok, WTF? I've posted a comment about three times, and it still doesn't show

I have no idea why but TypePad has, of late, been rather heavy handed with marking things as spam. I had it happen to me the other day with only two links. The only reason why I can think of this happening is that the board is being inundated right now. When I look in the spam trap I find ShifterCat'a several posts and oodles of others that have hit the board in the last few hours.

If it happens to anyone else -- try dropping us an email at slackmods at gmail dot com. We can unspam you.

Shiftercat -- in order to keep you from being entered into the database by TypePad as a spambot I am going to unspam your posts, publish them and then delete.

[ShifterCat]

Thank you, mmy. Could I possibly get you to delete the html-less one, also? It doesn't seem necessary now.

Done :)