In Ohio, men tell women whether or not to have an abortion

... or so a new law would have it.

Thanks to the every informative @JereKeys of www.JereKeys.com (who will be leaving and I will be at a loss for good information sources once he is gone). I'm just going to quote straight from the story and not comment, because I think the Pam's House Blenders are doing a fine job:

Led by Rep. John Adams, a group of state legislators have submitted a bill that would give fathers of unborn children a final say in whether or not an abortion can take place.

It's a measure that, supporters say, would finally give fathers a choice.

"This is important because there are always two parents and fathers should have a say in the birth or the destruction of that child," said Adams, a Republican from Sidney. "I didn't bring it up to draw attention to myself or to be controversial. In most cases, when a child is born the father has financial responsibility for that child, so he should have a say."

As written, the bill would ban women from seeking an abortion without written consent from the father of the fetus. In cases where the identity of the father is unknown, women would be required to submit a list of possible fathers. The physician would be forced to conduct a paternity test from the provided list and then seek paternal permission to abort.

Claiming to not know the father's identity is not a viable excuse, according to the proposed legislation. Simply put: no father means no abortion.

I think there is a distinct sector of society that honestly believes that the only real people are those in long-term monogamous marriages, and that shotgun weddings are the answer to all of life's sexual problems.

So much for that whole sexual revolution, and woman's reproductive rights movement we had.

The Good and the Bad

I've been working for 24 hours, many apologies for not updating.

On the one hand, we have the very very good: 

The Nevada Senate has overridden Gov. Gibbon's veto 14-7 (exactly 2/3) of the state's domestic partner law. The bill now returns to the House to be voted on again. Hopes are high, lets hope the votes are, as well. Gov. Gibbons and others feel that, since you can get a lot of the same rights through private contracts, a DP law is unnecessary. In short: we're desperate for a reason that doesn't make us look like homophobic bigots and this the best we can come up with.

And then we have the very very bad:

Doctor George Tiller, a women's health physician in Wichita, Kansas who performed

abortions, was shot and killed this morning at his church while he was serving as usher. Tiller is no newbie to violence against abortion providers, having survived another shooting in 1993 and a bombing of his clinic in 1985. You know, it's funny because I don't think we've heard about this kind of out-and-out violence for a long time ... and it's also funny because I distinctly remember that Kansas was the closest place you could go for a late-term abortion when I worked at Planned Parenthood. Strange and disturbing.

I suppose assailants justify it by saying that they kill one, whilst the good Doc has "killed" so many. To quote Cider House Rules: "We deliver the mother or the child." 

Oh, and thanks to Timmy for this: this is the sixth anniversary of Eric Rudolph, who performed the Atlanta Olympic bombing as well as the bombings of several abortion clinics and bars throughout the late 1990s. Weird.

Anyways, thanks to JereKeys for reminding me to post these today.

MappingOurRights.org

Wolfie over at Back2Stonewall sent this to me via email...

A new website has popped up: MappingOurRights.org. Their stated purpose:

The seeds for this map were planted during discussions about the meaning of the Supreme Court decision Roe v. Wade to women of color at a spring 2005 meeting of the SisterSong Collective. Members discussed how a constitutional “right to choose” does not ensure discrimination-free access to health-care services. The privacy or “choice” arguments in Roe v. Wade carry little meaning for those whose options are restricted by race, gender, sexuality or income. Roe v. Wade simply does not guarantee a full range of sexual and reproductive rights for everyone.

Let me clarify: I am fiercely pro-choice. First, as a gay man, I will probably never be put into a place where I have to make this decision for people. Second, your health decisions... including whether or not to have a baby and/or anything related to reproduction... are extraordinarily personal and no one else's business. Third, it blows my mind that so many men can be so anti-choice and run "pro-life" organizations. (In my snarkier states, I would say... wouldn't you think they would be more willing to allow a woman's right to choose. Kinda gets some of them off the hook.)

More importantly, the site tracks other markers that directly affect me as a homosexual... for example, the status of equal marriage, hate crime statutes, and employment anti-discrimination laws. 

Where does the tristate fall?

• Ohio - 47 
• Indiana - 44
• Kentucky -- 51

Yes, kids. Kentucky comes in at a whopping 51, whereas Alabama clocks in at a measly 27, Texas at 33, and South Carolina at 29. Mississippi is down there with us, btw, at 45. 

Remarkably, Massachusetts and California are not numbers one and two. Top five states in regards to their laws around sexual and reproductive rights are:

1. New Mexico
2. Washington State
3. New Hampshire
4. (Tie for #5) Vermont, Hawai'i, and Oregon

I'll admit, I have a little problem understanding some of their rubric (in terms of the "penalty" points), but it's an interesting look over-all. 

Conscience Clause to End

Obama's administration taking the first steps for, well, common sense. Thank god we're done talking about the stimulus and we can talk about things that matter -- you know, abortion and religion. No pitfalls there.

From the Washington Post:

The Obama administration has begun the process of rescinding sweeping new federal protections that were granted in December to health care workers who refuse to provide care that violates their personal, moral or religious beliefs.

The Office of Management and Budget announced this morning that it was reviewing a proposal to lift the controversial "conscience" regulation, the first step toward reversing the policy. Once the OMB has reviewed the proposal it will published in Federal Register for a 30-day public comment period.

"We are proposing rescinding the Bush rule," said an official of the Health and Human Services Department, which drafted the rule change.

The administration took the step because the regulation was so broadly written that it could provide protections not only to health care workers who object to abortion but also to a wide range of health care services, said the HHS official, who asked not to be named because the process had just begun.

"We've been concerned that the way the Bush rule is written it could make it harder for women to get the care they need. It is so worded so vaguely written that some have argued it could limit family planning counseling and even potentially blood transfusions and end-of-life care," the official said.

We are taught, in nursing school, that our personal feelings don't matter, that it's the patient that matters... that we serve the sick regardless and provide compassionate care for all of our patients.

When it comes to abortion, to cite Cider House Rules, we should deliver the mother or deliver the child.

Apparently, the docs who have adviced our former President forgot about determinism and free will, or, rather, twisted it so much to forget that they don't matter when it comes to caring for other people.

ND WTF

So, a few day after they protect the rights of LGBT people, the legislature of North Dakota has decided, in all its wisdom, to give the full rights of humanity to another underrepresented group of people: the unborn. 

Seriously. 

The House voted 51-41 this afternoon to declare that a fertilized egg has all the rights of any person.

That means a fetus could not be legally aborted without the procedure being considered murder.

ND goes back into my list of "crazy places that I'd like to drive through."

In all my life, I never thought I'd spend this much time thinking about North Dakota outside of our need for wheat, or, perhaps, wonder what it's like to be buried under seventeen feet of snow for three months.

Oh, and I think it's clear there are no good web designers in the whole state -- WTF up with that website?

Octuplets a Problem for Pro-Lifers

Maliyah Suleman, one of the octuplets whose pictures were just released -- this picture from this website.

I think it's special that, between Roberto Alomar and the Suleman octuplets, that sexual health is in the news in a big big big way these days.

I have nothing new to add to the discussion; I am oscillating my own opinion between one of outrage at the situation Ms. Suleman has put her family in, as well as the cost put on the state, and a feeling of uncaring... because it's really not our business. Why are we so furious about one woman, who clearly loves her children, and the women who have babies because they are lonely, or because they are, indeed, merely golddiggers? (Wanna challenge me on it? Yea. Please do. Especially since just yesterday I had a patient admit to wanting a child so that she'll get government support and the man will have to always pay her child support. I happens, and I think more commonly than us liberals would like to admit. But this is not the point. I remember my first positive pregnancy test I gave to someone: when asked why she was pregnant at 14, she told me, "So my mom will pay attention to me." Uh-huh.)

But this is all besides the point...

My question is this: the doctor fertilized Ms. Suleman with eight (maybe six) eggs. With in vitro fertilization, I believe, this is pretty standard to fertilize many eggs at once and then use them as back up in case the first don't "take." Ms. Suleman decided she wanted all of them. Per the pro-lifers viewpoint, all of these fertilized eggs are lives, since life begins at conception.

We now come to an interesting question: if we destroyed the remaining embryos, had Ms. Suleman only had one or two implants, wouldn't that be considered abortion? Now, however, she's decided to "choose life," resulting in eight healthy babies, it appears she is going to be a drain on the public welfare system. And, since family law in this country almost universally sides with the birth mother, we know it's going to be impossible to separate her from those children outside of cases of abuse, neglect, or failure to thrive...

...what should we have done in the first place?

And I challenge the conservatives who are screaming "break up the family and adopt those children out!" Will you be one of the first ones begging to adopt the Suleman children? So, what, you're not only going to break up the longest-living set of octuplets, and take on all the medical costs, you probably won't even offer to adopt them yourself?

Please, we have so many children in the foster care system and just waiting to be adopted -- many of them children of color because people want to adopt children that look like them, unless they are from Vietnam -- if we have a mother who loves her children and can take of them, albeit through the welfare state, shouldn't we take a moment to really look at ways we can improve the US adoption process?

Oh, and fuck you, Angelina Jolie.

I just had to say it.

I just realized that some of my "asides" (the italicized bits at the end of each post) are often longer than the post itself.

International Wire Hanger Trade Ends

Thank goodness for our President.

President Obama signed an executive order Friday striking down a rule that prohibits U.S. money from funding international family-planning clinics that promote abortion or provide counseling or referrals about abortion services.

Welcome back to the 21st century, America.