On the Friday before International Women's Day, Lyn and Ani return our attention to the war on women.
Both consevatives and liberals (mostly white and straight, often male) have called for an end to "divisive identity politics", so that we can get "back" to a sense of American unity. Since we don't believe that there has ever been a true "American unity" since the invention of this country, we hear this for what it is-- a call for women, people of color, and queer people to shut up and to be satisfied with our lot in life.
This becomes especially poignant when we look at statistics of racially motivated hate crimes and gender based violence.
While people are busy distracting themselves with transpeople using public bathrooms, since January 1st, six trans women have been murdered in the U.$. Five of the women were Black, the sixth woman was Native American. What does this say about the intersection of race, and gender identity?
What's going on with funding for reproductive health care? Check out S. 241, that was introduced and referred to committee on January 30th, 2017. It's called the "Protect Funding for Women's Health Care Act" and yet it prohibits funding for Planned Parenthood, and instead notes that many state, county, and community health care clinics provide a range of services including: cervical and breast cancer screenings, well-child care, family planning services including contraceptives, and STD testing. The bill does state that funds that would have gone to Planned Parenthood would be made available to other eligible entities that provide women's health care services (no mention of providing abortion services, though-- even though, if one is honest about it, it is a significant part of family planning. The more honestly named, H.B. 354, The Defund Planned Parenthood Act of 2017, follows the general spirit of S 241.
There is also H.B. Heartbeat Protection Act of 2017, which was introduced on Janurary 12, 2017, which mandates checking for fetal heartbeat prior to abortion services, and also prohibits abortion be used to terminate a pregnancy if a fetal heartbeat is detected. And H.B. 36 Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act, which prohibits abortions on fetuses 20 weeks or more, except for cases where carrying the pregnancy to term is a clear threat to the woman's physical health, or the pregnancy resulted from rape or incest, with some further details about how the woman would have to report said rape in order for that exception to be granted.
So much to talk about, so little time.
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Photo credit to Sarah Mirk, used under Attribution lisence 2.0 "Hello Feminism" click here to get to the original, and Sarah Mirk's Flickr pages.
- KBOO