What the Anti-Choice Right Doesn't Get about Planned Parenthood

The NH House went further than (4.00 / 3)

simply defunding Planned Parenthood. They passed a floor amendment to the bill that prohibits the state from entering into contracts with any entity that performs abortions, except to save the life of the mother. That pretty much leaves out any health care facility providing women's reproductive health care.

This is serious and outrageous. The floor amendment was sponsored by Speaker O'Brien and well as Rep. Groen, who thinks a woman or girl who becomes pregnant by a rape should have to go through with the pregnancy.

Rep. Pamela Tucker (R-Greenland) was the one who led the charge to overturn the Health and Human Services Committee recommendation to kill the original bill. It is so sad to see a woman intent on denying other women access to reproductive health care.

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by: Jennifer Daler @ Fri Feb 03, 2012 at 22:00:08 PM UTC

Thank you for pointing this out (0.00 / 0)

I forgot about that ugly floor amendment. As for Rep. Tucker, I have never understood women who have so little regard for other women, and I don't think I ever will.  

"We now know that government by organized money is just as dangerous as government by organized mob." - FDR

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by: Granite Gnome @ Fri Feb 03, 2012 at 22:57:05 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Choice (4.00 / 1)

I'm not sure why Republicans are so adamant about killing a woman's right to chose, since it's always a great tool to use to stir up the base and get them to the polls at election time.  I don't really think they give a damn when push comes to shove.  If they were ever successful in abolishing Roe, how would they get their base motivated?  It's politics as usual, a con game.

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by: mevansnh @ Sat Feb 04, 2012 at 09:48:20 AM UTC

It goes beyond that (4.00 / 7)

This goes beyond choice ( as important ad that is), there is an effort on the extreme right to undermine groups that empower women in any way. Look at the attacks on the Girl Scouts. Sadly some of the people leading the charge are women. And the unsuccessful effort to get JC Penney to fire Ellen Degeneres? Because she is a very popular woman who is a lesbian, the most threatening type of woman of all.

Empowering women threatens fundamentalists, whether here, in Afghanistan, or Israel.

Well, I've got news for them. We are not going back. The visceral outrage at Komen showed that.



"When you get to the end of your rope, tie a knot and hang on."  Franklin D. Roosevelt    

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by: Kathy Sullivan 2 @ Sat Feb 04, 2012 at 10:38:06 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

Presumably, they like agitating people and being the center (0.00 / 0)

of attention.
Their fixation on other people is deceptive. They're entirely self-centered--show offs. Since they have no talents, they have to be obnoxious.

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by: hannah @ Sat Feb 04, 2012 at 21:14:23 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

So what was Ari Fleisher's part in this (0.00 / 0)

I saw some news stories that said he and that anti abortion vice president at Komen planned this escapade. Can it be that anything that turns out this badly is actually "planned?"

Wearing a ring doesn't make you a bath tub.

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by: xteeth @ Sat Feb 04, 2012 at 12:49:28 PM UTC

Check out the story (0.00 / 0)

An article in yesterday's Huffington Post provides some details, including emails refuting SGK's assertion that conservative Republican board member Karen Handel had nothing to do with the decision.

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by: Lenore Patton @ Mon Feb 06, 2012 at 14:55:56 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Check out the story (0.00 / 0)

An article in yesterday's Huffington Post provides some details, including emails refuting SGK's assertion that conservative Republican board member Karen Handel had nothing to do with the decision.

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by: Lenore Patton @ Mon Feb 06, 2012 at 14:55:57 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Uppity Women!! (4.00 / 1)

We are coming up on the 100th anniversary of the 19th amendment to the US Constitution, women's right to full citizenship.  Men have been afraid of women since tribes gathered around fires in caves.  We reproduce, they can't.  Women's health, abortion, birth control, breast cancer screenings, child birth options all the health issues that are uniquely woman's health issues are targets for men who think that they should be able to control women.  That some women buy into this continues to be a mystery to me.

Women who choose to remain childless are often the subject of crude jokes and nasty comments in places where men feel like they can say whatever they want about women.  I would like to think it is getting better but the OWM (old white men) who cling to the illusion of their power will not give up that illusion easily.  Women united are a power that must be reckoned with as the Koman Foundation has learned to its sorrow.


"It is true that the law can't change the heart, but it can restrain the heartless."  Martin Luther King

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by: cyndychase @ Sat Feb 04, 2012 at 14:17:45 PM UTC

If Chris Christy or Bill O'Brien (4.00 / 3)

had been the Governor of NH in 1919, they would have wanted to put women's suffrage to referendum and one has to wonder how that would have turned out!!  Woman like Michele Bachmann or Sarah Palin, Phylis Shafley, or Jan Brewer would have been pushing for the failure of such a referendum, much like they do today regarding women's health issues.  I'll bet there are some women in the NH House who would be in that group even today.

I say, more power to the women and their enlightened male compatriots.  

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by: mevansnh @ Sat Feb 04, 2012 at 15:45:52 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

The victims of abuse are inclined to think that, if they just give in (0.00 / 0)

and do what the abuser wants, they'll be left alone. It's logical. The abuser asserts that he's punishing because the victim is bad.  So, the victim tries to be good. And the sadist gets his way.  That's why there has to be an intervention.

Consider that a vast number of Americans were in support of an intervention in Afghanistan because of the torture inflicted on women by the Taliban. While the legitimacy of that argument may be questioned, Americans were sincere in wanting to halt an abusive regime.  Ditto for Libya.  

If we don't our agents of government in the various legislatures setting up abusive policies, then we have to remove them from office. Pleading with them to change their mind does no good. One does not plead with abusers; it stokes their sadistic intent.

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by: hannah @ Sat Feb 04, 2012 at 21:22:48 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Historical Note on Women's Rights in NH (0.00 / 0)

The New Hampshire Senate ratified the 19th Amendment which granted women the vote in federal elections on Sept. 10, 1919. The vote in the Senate was 11-10. Nine Republican senators and one Democrat voted no. The House had approved the amendment earlier in the week 212-142.

The Boston Globe reported the next day that Mrs. Lillian C. Streeter of Concord, founder of the Women's Club of Concord and a noted reformer of that era, told the Senate:

New Hampshire politics had been a "circus" during the present year...but that it would be twice as much of a "circus" in the future with the injection into it of the "inexperienced, thoughtless and emotional" votes of women.

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by: Tim Ashwell @ Sun Feb 05, 2012 at 14:10:34 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Interesting. (4.00 / 1)

Isn't it interesting how women could have been so manipulated by the patriarchal system to believe they were lesser people; but then, there are some still today who believe that hogwash.  

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by: mevansnh @ Sun Feb 05, 2012 at 14:22:03 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

There are two issues that drive the right's fury on PP... (4.00 / 2)

First, if you just pay cursory attention to the speeches, workshops, or conventions of the religious right (pro-life meetings, christian home education conventions, etc), there is an oft-reperated meme that Planned Parenthood is an Abortion Provider.  Period.  And when you say something over and over, people simply assume its true, without questioning or even thinking to ask questions.  In snarkier moments, the right refers to PP as "Planned Barrenhood," drawing on  OT Biblical references.  (It does not help that Planned Parentood is a terribly outdated name, given the full spectrum of services provided.  I have often thought that PP should change their name to something that reflects womens and/or sexual health, but I digress...)

But the second issue is, I think, even more maddenning to the Right: throughout this legislative session, on issues from consent to education, we have seen the all-consuming spectre of "Parental Authority" (a euphemism for Control-Freakism by Those Stuck in 1950) raising its head.  Their real issue is the prospect that their 'children' will seek medical or health advice from someone else operating 'behind their back.'

Even worse is the prospect that their chidlren might be engaged in premarital sexual activity, in flagrant opposition to their lofty theological precepts - - even though they, themselves, in most cases, flagrantly violated these un-human precepts when they were their children's age.

And so, PP stands for absoluely everything they do not want to admit in themselves: Human Beings Are Sexual Creatures.  It's part of Life. It's Normal. It's Natural.  And that normalcy absolutely rocks their theological underpinnings.

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by: Tully Fitzsimmons @ Sat Feb 04, 2012 at 18:17:41 PM UTC

It's OK for men to be heterosexual beings among the fundies... (4.00 / 1)

note there is no call for health insurance not to cover Viagra, and there is a lot of rape and harassment denialism among the right, i.e. Herman Cain.  It's not OK for women to be sexual, especially if they refuse to be "owned" by a man.  It's "icky," as we hear.  Male homosexuality is terrifying to most of these men, because they see one of the men involved as playing the role of "woman," while female homosexuality rankles because there are women out there who choose not to be owned by men.

If you want to live a "normal" happy sexual life, live it among progressives.  You'll have a much better chance.

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by: Lucy Edwards @ Sat Feb 04, 2012 at 19:49:48 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Nowhere was that clearer than during the DADT debate. (0.00 / 0)

Red-Blooded American Sailors are 'expected' to 'sow their wild oats' when 'on leave' at post to 'eliminate tension.' Wink, wink.  That's why STDs are the number one medical condition treated among active military members.

But if we're talking that icky gay sex thing....well, "Sex has no place in the Military!"

Uh-huh.

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by: Tully Fitzsimmons @ Sat Feb 04, 2012 at 20:33:15 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Homophobia is a natural outgrowth of sexism. (0.00 / 0)

There is a great book on this topic: Homophobia: A Weapon of Sexism, by Suzanne Pharr. But I digress.

I would argue that male homosexuality is terrifying/enraging to fundie men not just because they perceive one of the men to be playing the role of "woman", but also because in their world, being a man means dominating a woman. Thus a gay man can never be a "real man".

Also, if straight men wore condoms every time they had sex, (unless, of course, they are trying to make the babiez) we could reduce abortion by about 90%, no coercion of women required. I am so sick of the total pass men get by the anti-choice movement.

"We now know that government by organized money is just as dangerous as government by organized mob." - FDR

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by: Granite Gnome @ Sun Feb 05, 2012 at 02:00:34 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

I'll go one step further... (4.00 / 1)

...Fundamentalist religious cults (and I choose that word purposefully) become a prime refuge to which men struggling with their sexuality flee.

Those who can not shove down those irrepressible same-sex feelings, and who do not want to accept them due to societal norms & their own fears, run to places where they can tell themselves over and over and over, and hear over and over and over, how evil homosexuality is - as if, by hearing it and saying it enough, their own urges will 'go away.'  It is an effort to use pure cerebral will-power to deny and avoid something much more primal.  And it doesn't work.

Been there, done that, bought the T-shirt, stayed for clean-up, and finally gave up....

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by: Tully Fitzsimmons @ Tue Feb 07, 2012 at 14:07:33 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Agree 100%, Tully. (0.00 / 0)

And may I say, I'm glad you finally gave up. I am sure you are a much happier man for it.  

"We now know that government by organized money is just as dangerous as government by organized mob." - FDR

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by: Granite Gnome @ Wed Feb 08, 2012 at 13:42:18 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Oh yes. It's Party Time in Keene... :-) LOL (4.00 / 1)

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by: Tully Fitzsimmons @ Wed Feb 08, 2012 at 14:40:20 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Well, there's also the deep-seated fear that if parents had planned (0.00 / 0)

way back when these people would never have been born. Who wants them? They don't even like themselves? It's an existential angst.

Why do we have a God, the father? Because many natural fathers are such a disappointment.

Just look at the Koch brothers. Yes, their father left them a fortune, but he made them do menial jobs while other kids played. He made them "earn" what they probably didn't even know they wanted and then they became obsessed--trying to "show" a father who was long dead.
And Willard!  What's he trying to prove?  That he can succeed where his dad failed?

SAD--self-awareness deficit.

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by: hannah @ Sat Feb 04, 2012 at 21:32:42 PM UTC

For the right, it's not just about abortion... (4.00 / 1)

...that's where the argument starts, for sure, but as we get deeper into the subject it's also about contraception.
A conspiracy-minded friend of mine states that the Right would really like to eliminate birth control altogether, because when one has a child to care for, it's much more difficult to climb out of poverty and challenge the "masters of the universe."
And given the Right's propensity toward "social engineering," my friend kinda has a point.....

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by: Icicle @ Sun Feb 05, 2012 at 06:11:12 AM UTC