Two New York City Police Officers Acquitted of Rape - NYTimes.com
wow, NYT… really? could you be ANY worse at covering rape stories?
(via zaftiggles)As usual, NYPD sexual/violence unpunished and terrible media coverage of it.
(via lynylfysh)
Who are the women who obtain abortions in the United States? Why do they decide to end a pregnancy? What are their social and economic circumstances? Check out this short animated video that was created by the Guttmacher Institute, a leading research and policy organization on sexual and reproductive health. http://guttmacher.org
April 11, 2011 | 3:01 pm
Speaking at the Iowa Family Leader’s presidential lecture series in Sioux City, Paul, an obstetrician and a Christian, explained that he disagreed with the popular belief that to be a Libertarian means having a laissez faire attitude of “it’s the woman’s body; she can do whatever she wants.” “Life comes from our creator, not our government,” Politico reported Paul as saying. “Liberty comes from our creator, not from government. Therefore, the purpose, if there is to be a purpose, for government is to protect life and liberty.” Read more at the Los Angeles Times…Ron Paul, the conservative congressman from Texas known for his small-government beliefs rooted in Libertarianism, told an audience Monday in Iowa that government should dictate what happens in the womb of pregnant women.
Source: prolifehypocrisy@ItsKatie73 on Twitter posted a link to this blog post about anti-abortion activists outing abortion providers under the guise of “prayer requests”.
I had an abortion at 16. My mother would not consent to me obtaining birth control although I was already a teen mother of a son through incest, and a college freshman thousands of miles away from home. I was lucky – abortion had been legalized in Washington, DC in 1970, the year I desperately needed one, so I avoided the back alley even before Roe v. Wade. I had a safe and legal saline abortion at Washington Hospital Center. I aborted twins. I do not, in any way, regret my decision because becoming a mother of three children at age 16 was totally unacceptable. My older sister had to forge my mother’s signature on the consent form because, of course, if my mother did not believe in birth control, she also didn’t believe in abortion. She had a weird “sex-as-women’s-punishment” thing going on in her head after birthing 8 kids! Her answer to my pregnancy was to advise me to drop out of college and come home. Go figure! Anyway, my son is now 42 and a father in his own right. I’m proud of him and my grandson, but what happened to me – rape, incest, parental blocking – should not happen to any other girl and I’m proud to be a feminist fighting for all women’s human rights!
Loretta J. Ross, Atlanta GA
I’ve had three abortions.
I feel so empowered when I say that. Although I’ve had three abortions I am also a single parent of three children. Each time I got pregnant it was an unplanned pregnancy. Unfortunately, each time I didn’t have the opportunity to make the choice by myself. Being a parent is not easy at all and when you get pregnant making the decision to have an abortion isn’t easy either. I remember having to take every dollar I had even the money I was supposed to use to buy Pampers with to have an abortion. When women get pregnant, they should have the right to choose whether they want to parent a child. The reality is although it takes a man to get pregnant, they also have the option to leave without any repercussions.
Like I previously stated, I am a parent and I’ve multiple abortions. I don’t have any regrets at all. I am an pro-choice advocate today because I was able to make that choice. I want to make sure that all women can make that choice as well!
Dashaya Craig, Chicago IL
By Rob Stein, Wednesday, March 30, 12:40 PM
“A conservative activist group seeking to discredit the Planned Parenthood Federation of America released audio tapes Wednesday that it said contradicts claims the organization made that it provides mammograms.
A spokesman for Planned Parenthood, however, immediately denied that the group claimed to provide mammograms and released the transcript of a television interview with the group’s president it said showed her statements were taken out of context.
The dispute comes as Planned Parenthood tries to fight off efforts in Congress to cut off the group’s funding.
Rep. Jackie Speier (D-Cal.) in an email to MoJo’s Kate Sheppard. After attempting to strip all funding from Planned Parenthood (citing, among other things, fiscal discipline), some House Republicans want to pour federal dollars into “crisis pregnancy centers,” which tell women that abortion can cause breast cancer and suicidal tendencies.
To recap: Taxpayer funding for an organization that provides accurate information and valuable resources to women: bad! Taxpayer funding for organizations that provide false and misleading information, to advance an often undisclosed religious agenda, with little regard for actual health issues involved: good!
(via motherjones)
Reposted from Feministing:President Obama’s face used on most recent anti-choice billboard campaign March 28, 2011
Just when you think they couldn’t stoop any lower.
This is the image that, according to the Huffington Post, is set to appear on 30 billboards in the South side of Chicago, President Obama’s political home.
There are so many huge issues facing our world today that could be addressed with the thousands of dollars going into these billboards. Maternal mortality. Fetal mortality. Appallingly high rates of incarceration. Poverty. Violence. Environmental disasters. War. Focusing so exclusively on the choices of women is appallingly misogynist, and their focus on the choices of black women is appallingly racist.
For background on the movement behind these billboards, check out my article for Colorlines.
