Feeling Attacked? Let's Stop the War on Women

Feeling attacked? What is this business with seemingly reverting back 50 or so years and taking away the rights women for so long have fought to have? And, if taking away rights is not enough, calling us names seems to be another approach.


I've heard a number of people question why Rush Limbaugh is receiving so much flak, when Bill Maher did not. I would argue that Rush Limbaugh and Bill Maher hold very different positions in our society. One is a political figure, the other a comedian. Now, I'm not saying either of these men should degrade women--it's not acceptable in any form. But, I will say that I think this contributes to the varying responses they receive.


When I say I feel personally attacked, I mean, of course, as a woman. I cannot, for the life of me, figure out why certain changes are being made. Some proposed changes over the last year include:

• Federal funding of Planned Parenthood was threatened.
• Reproductive rights of women have been threatened (in many forms).
• Virginia is attempting to mandate women undergo an invasive procedure, the transvaginal ultrasound, before any abortion.
• Missouri and Washington, D.C. have proposed legislation that would allow employers to deny women birth control coverage (even though most employers provide coverage for such things as Viagra for men).
• Several states have proposed bills that would allow doctors who perform abortions to be murdered (South Dakota, Nebraska, Iowa).
• A Georgia State Representative introduced a bill that would make abortion illegal, in addition to making miscarriages illegal (what?!?!).
• The Texas State House of Representatives has passed the Sonogram Bill requiring women to get a sonogram before ending a pregnancy, forcing even victims of rape to have a sonogram at least 24 hours before the procedure. Gov. Rick Perry has signed the bill into law, which takes effect September 1, 2011. There are exceptions in cases of rape and incest. As Planned Parenthood reports: “While a woman can opt-out of seeing the sonogram image and hearing the heart tone, she cannot opt-out of a medically unnecessary sonogram, nor can she opt-out of the fetal description except within very narrow parameters for situations of rape, incest, judicial bypasses, and fetal anomalies.”
• Arizona passed a bill to allow doctors to lie to women to prevent abortions

What I've listed here speaks to reproductive rights specifically. However, in the U.S. and abroad, legislation to protect women against the violence and abuse from partners and family members fails to pass. Women are raped in war zones--and it's seemingly acceptable. Female babies are expendable and are disposed of with the trash. 

We must put a stop to this. We must speak up!

Many position the war on women in a political foundation. As a result, the following video was made:

Rick Santorum's message to victims of rape--Public Morality & Criminal Law

I was scrolling through the news today and came across a headline reading, "Rick Santorum: Rape victims 'should make the best of a bad situation' if they get pregnant and give birth to the 'gift from god'". I specifically looked for other articles about Santorum's stance and found article titles such as, "Rick Santorum: 'Make the best' of rape by rejecting abortion" and "Santorum to Rape Victims: 'Make the best Out of a Bad Situation". Appalling. I couldn't believe what I was reading.  Talk about retraumatizing. Not only is he telling victims how they should feel, but what they should do, also. I wanted to verify what was said, so found the following video.

Indeed, Rick Santorum states, "I believe and I think the right approach is to accept this horribly created--in the sense of rape--but nevertheless a gift in a very broken way, the gift of human life, and accept what God has given you." It seems Santorum has created a bit of a paradox. While he ends by identifying the product of a woman's rape as a "gift", he begins by calling it something "horribly created".

I am not debating the issue of abortion in this post. I've done that before and with politics on the board right now, I am sure you have been hearing many different perspectives. Instead, reading these articles about Santorum made me think about the lecture I just gave to my Criminology class. As an opener to the class, we talk about the definition of crime. I ask them what television shows they watch that tells them something, true or untrue, about crime. Law & Order,  CSI, Bones, The Sopranos, Criminal Minds...the list goes on and on. Literally, I think the entire 75 minutes could have been filled simply listing various types of entertainment that sends messages about crime. As we talk about these shows, I ask them what message is sent. What do we learn about victims from these shows? Who are they? What do they look like? What about offenders? What do we learn about various types of crime?  How is crime constructed in our society? How do we come to understand a behavior as criminal or not?

In preparation for the this lecture on defining crime, they read an article discussing public morality and criminal law. There are essentially two sides to the debate. The first argues that public morality should not control criminal law, but that criminal law should be created in correspondence with what causes direct harm to others. The law is viewed as an improper instrument for regulating one's private moral conduct. In contrast, the other side of this argument is that criminal law serves an important function in the facilitation of personal responsibility. Thus, criminal law serves as a fundamental means by which individuals learn personal responsibility.

I ask my students to consider two main questions.
1) Should the law control public morality?
2) Can the law control public morality?

Admittedly, I am quite frustrated by not only Santorum's position, but also his choice of words.  As I listened to him and his desire to make abortion illegal, I reran my lecture and the thoughtful, intelligent things my students had to say on the matter through my mind. Santorum, in my opinion, is suggesting he will aim to control my private morality through use of public criminal law. Am I okay with this? Is this what happens everyday, regardless of who the President is? Sadly, I'd say it likely is. And I tell my students that, too. So, we then transition to "Can the law control public morality?"

I've created two polls below to get your thoughts on these questions. Think about whatever issued you'd like. And, in addition to participation in the poll, comments are welcome and hoped for. My students and I engaged in a fantastic dialogue about issues of abortion, same-sex marriage, drug use, prostitution, etc. and the role private morality and public law play. I hope we can do the same here.






For full articles on Rick Santorum's position toward women who are victims of rape, you can click HERE, HERE, and HERE.

  

39th Anniversary of Roe v Wade

Today's post is brief. I've posted before about Roe v Wade and the debate still occuring around abortion, but today, the focus is a video of the facts. Regardless of your opinion, this video by Guttmacher provides basic facts about abortion, e.g., who is having them, religious affiliations, age, etc. In other words, we must remember that it is not simply those women who have abortions and those women that have babies. Check it out. I'd love feedback and thoughts. Did you learn something? Were you surprised? And, of course, I encourage you to pass this blog entry on to others so that they, too, can be educated about the hot topics in our society.