Comments on: Are women citizens of this republic?

By: Jeff

Jeff — Sat, 27 Jun 2009 14:15:57 +0000

The issue here is personal responsibility. It has nothing to do with judging people for their personal choices. This is about what the government should be allowed to force everyone to pay for, not religion or sexual habits. Do you want to be forced to donate to a cause you don’t believe in?

Family planning should be handled by individuals/ families. I don’t need the government intruding into my life any more than it does. That said, if groups of people want to donate to organizations that provide free, effective, and safe contraception, more power to them. The whole country need not chip in for something that again, should be the responsibility of individuals.

By: cgeye

cgeye — Fri, 30 Jan 2009 16:35:33 +0000

thefrogprincess, it’s that the Reps get the support of the most wealthy churches worldwide — Mormon, Catholic, megachurch Protestant — if they hardline at birth control. Nuance doesn’t get them donations from church leaders, does it?

By: Obama Signs Equal Pay Act & Other Feminist Goings On « Like a Whisper

Obama Signs Equal Pay Act & Other Feminist Goings On « Like a Whisper — Fri, 30 Jan 2009 15:02:55 +0000

[...] when Obama is not acting unilaterally, his commitment to women’s issues seems to waiver. As historiann reported earlier this week, Obama decided to cut $330 million in funding for women’s reproductive [...]

By: Knitting Clio

Knitting Clio — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 21:01:35 +0000

P.S. If the line is busy, you can go to NOW’s website and send an email instead. Go ahead, load up the inbox!

By: thefrogprincess

thefrogprincess — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 20:36:34 +0000

“The flaw in this plan, from the point of view of right-wing Republicans, is that interfering at all with reproduction is immoral. (Even protestant evangelicals have taken on the Pope’s viewpoint on this.)”

Here’s what I’ve never understood about the Republican position, Historiann. I don’t think there is any one position among protestant evangelicals on birth control. In fact, the relative smallness of families at the Southern Baptist church I attended growing up (a church of about 2-4,000 people) suggests that birth control was in fact being used, especially when you compare to Mormon families or Catholic families. I’m hard-pressed to think of a single family that had more than three children and my church was not a liberal outpost. Some of the pastors’ families may have had four but even that was a rarity. Plus I had conversations about the specific issue of birth control with various mentors, all of whom were extremely conservative women and they all supported birth control. So I don’t think it’s the birth control itself; I think there’s a longstanding association between the buzzwords “family planning” and “abortion” that makes evangelicals suspicious of these kinds of measures and organizations, even if they use birth control in their personal lives.

By: “Radical” feminism: Groundhog Day? : Historiann : History and sexual politics, 1492 to the present

Thu, 29 Jan 2009 19:41:21 +0000

[...] still at the point where a Democratic president who was elected because women showed up to vote bargains away Medicaid funding for contraception in exchange for…nothing. We’re still at the point where it feels like progress that women are actually permitted [...]

By: Erica

Erica — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 19:30:58 +0000

@ej — You’re revealing conservatives’ ignorance, not your own In their world, ANY sex which doesn’t intend to create a baby is done only for pleasure, and is naughty.

You’d think the out-of-wedlock births in their own conservative communities would teach them that, even if people AGREES sex is naughty, they end up doing it anyway. There’s a big logical disconnect between reality and the moral stance they want to impose by discouraging contraception.

By: Feminist Law Professors » Blog Archive » Democratic Congress, Democratic President, so what’s the deal…

Thu, 29 Jan 2009 19:30:22 +0000

[...] With this? Historiann asks: Are women citizens of this republic? [...]

By: Fratguy

Fratguy — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 18:01:09 +0000

“Fool me once, shame on, shame on you….you fooled me, you can’t get fooled again.”

Give him credit, at least the pretender from Texas only talked like a dupe when he dealt with Congress.

By: Historiann

Historiann — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 17:50:35 +0000

The flaw in this plan, from the point of view of right-wing Republicans, is that interfering at all with reproduction is immoral. (Even protestant evangelicals have taken on the Pope’s viewpoint on this.)

The flaw in this plan, from the point of view of men like Obama and many congressional dems, is that it’s perceived to benefit women mostly or only, so it’s OK to throw under the bus.

Again I ask: Does Obama know who elected him President? Do Dems understand who their constitutency is? Are women citizens?