Tag Archives: anti-choice

Pro-Choice Friday News Rundown

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  • plannedparenthoodactionorgSince it’s that time of the year again, let’s play a round of anti-choice March Madness! (Mother Jones)
  • The GOP might as well face the facts … They’ve lost women forever. (Salon)
  • Foolish parents continue to put their children at risk for cervical cancer. (RH Reality Check)
  • In honor of Women’s History Month, we present you with 50 women who shaped America’s health. (HuffPo)
  • When Women Have More Control Over Bearing Children, Their Lives Are Obviously Way Better — DUH! (Jezebel)
  • Salon expounds upon this less-than-shocking news. (Salon)
  • Unfortunately, doctors don’t prescribe long-acting contraception for adolescents very often. (Healio)
  • A whopping 233 million women may need contraception by 2015. (NBC News)
  • In case you weren’t aware, the Catholic Church has quite the costly stance on contraception. (MSNBC)
  • Completely disregarding the ruined life of the victim, CNN instead expressed grief that the guilty verdict ruined the “promising” lives of Steubenville rapists. Uggghhh. (Rawstory)

Pro-Choice Friday News Rundown

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  • Some nutjob doctor in Oklahoma is behind the state’s charge to allow employers to deny women contraceptive coverage because, according to him, “Part of their identity is the potential to be a mother. They are being asked to suppress and radically contradict part of their own identity, and if that wasn’t bad enough, they are being asked to poison their bodies.” UM, WHAT?!?! (Ms. Magazine)
  • The Hawaii State Senate has voted for a bill that would require hospital emergency departments to offer emergency contraception to victims of sexual assault. (Hawaii News Now)
  • Despite declining fertility, women over age 40 still require effective contraception if they wish to avoid pregnancy. (Science Daily)
  • Arkansas went ahead and banned abortions after 12 weeks, which, by the way, is 100 percent unconstitutional. (The Atlantic)
  • They may not get away with it though! (ABC News)
  • A new study highlights the educational and economic divide among the growing number of women who use Plan B pills. (Salon)
  • Here are two nifty charts showing where all 50 states stand on abortion. (WaPo)
  • Kansas just passed 70 pages of anti-choice BS. (RH Reality Check)

Pro-Choice Friday News Rundown

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  • Photo by Dave Bledsoe, made available under Creative Commons license.

    In a new push for the medically unnecessary and imbecilic concept of “personhood,” Arizona anti-choicers are pushing a bill to track every embryo ever. (RH Reality Check)
  • Asinine Arkansas just passed a bill outlawing abortions at 12 weeks — the most extreme abortion ban in the country. (CRR)
  • In case you weren’t aware, abortion providers risk their lives and property in the name of choice. (Truth-out)
  • Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo is putting the finishing touches on legislation that would guarantee women in New York the right to late-term abortions when their health is in danger or the fetus is not viable. (NYT)
  • Guess what, anti-choicers? Better Prenatal Testing Does Not Mean More Abortion. So get a friggen clue already. (The Atlantic)
  • In a thought-provoking piece, clinic workers answer tough questions on abortion. (Tres Sugar)
  • Surprisingly, German Bishops OK Contraception in Rape Cases (ABC News)
  • Two ultrasound bills are making their way through the Indiana legislature. And they both suck. (HuffPo)

The Birmingham Clinic Bombing and the Culture of Violence Against Reproductive Freedom

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After earning her nursing degree from the University of Alabama in 1977, Emily Lyons developed a suite of skills in a variety of health care settings, from in-home care to emergency services. She passed on much of her knowledge to future nurses when she taught at the University of Arkansas at Monticello, and by 1998, she had taken the helm as director of nursing at the New Woman All Women Health Care clinic in Birmingham, Alabama.

The 1990s were a time of numerous murders and attempted murders of reproductive health-care providers.

Lyons remembers little from January 29 of that year, a date 15 years ago today. She woke up earlier than she wanted but pushed herself through her morning routine, knowing she could look forward to a nap after work. She also looked forward to being home again with her husband, who was back from two weeks of business travel. But when she arrived at work, a devastating act of violence would ensure that nothing that ordinary would happen to her that day.

At 7:33 a.m., just as the clinic was opening, a bomb containing dynamite and nails exploded outside, killing security guard Robert Sanderson and critically injuring Emily Lyons. Although it was one of dozens of abortion clinic bombings that had occurred since abortion was legalized in 1973, the bombing of that Birmingham clinic was the first that resulted in a fatality. The five prior murders of reproductive health-care providers had been by gunshot.

Wounded in her face and legs, Lyons’ life was changed forever. After a long recovery, she was unable to resume her nursing career, but she became a spokesperson and activist for reproductive rights, receiving, among other honors, the Margaret Sanger Woman of Valor Award from Planned Parenthood. Continue reading →

Roe v. Wade at 40: Lost Ground and the Moment to Reclaim It

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As 2012 came to a close, one of the last attacks on reproductive freedom in Arizona was in the U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, where the state of Arizona fought to defund Planned Parenthood. The state was appealing an injunction against HB2800, a new measure that would strip funding for family planning services from any health care facility that provides abortions.

The 40th anniversary of Roe v. Wade should serve as a call to action to defend reproductive freedom.

Following a year that saw more state-level legislation to restrict abortion access than any year in the last three decades, 2012 saw no reprieve. Besides HB2800, Arizona lawmakers voted on bills that barred employer coverage for birth control and access to medically necessary abortions. In response to part of the latter bill, the Arizona Department of Health Service’s website added a new section on abortion, which made its debut late last year, called “A Woman’s Right to Know” — a guide that employed scare tactics and other manipulation to deter women from seeking abortions.

Arizona reflected what was happening nationally. According to a recent study by the Guttmacher Institute, Arizona has joined a new majority of states that are “solidly hostile to abortion rights.” In 2000, a third of women of reproductive age lived in such states. Today, more than half do. Since 2000, the number of states considered hostile to abortion doubled from 13 to 26. Continue reading →

Pro-Choice Friday News Rundown

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  • Better late than never: Pregnant women in the military who were victims of rape will now have access to abortion. (HuffPo)
  • A new condom, which delivers an anti-HIV drug and dissolves after use, is being developed! (i09)
  • Ireland is finally going to legalize life-saving abortions after their complicity in the death of a 31-year-old woman. (ABC News)
  • The Washington Post is dropping knowledge on how Planned Parenthood rocked the 2012 elections. (WaPo)
  • What happens to women who are denied abortions? Nothing good. (i09)
  • Deaths related to unsafe abortions and abortion bans around the world are wildly underestimated. (Salon)
  • Further proving they could give a damn about post-born children, Michigan lawmakers eliminate tax credit for children, prefer tax credit for fetuses. (Jezebel)
  • Pediatrics Group Calls for Easier Access to Emergency Contraception (ABC News)
  • Mississippi’s sole abortion clinic lives to fight another day. (CRR)
  • Another day, another moron talking out of his keister about rape — this time it’s a California judge who says that a woman’s body can shut down to prevent itself from being raped. (Guardian)
  • Our beloved home, Arizona, has launched a manipulative government website to shame women out of getting abortions. (Jezebel)
  • A new study shows women who waited 15 years after their first period to have children had 60 percent less chance of developing an aggressive form of breast cancer. (The Atlantic)
  • Dear guy who founded Domino’s: Your religious beliefs should have no impact on the reproductive health of your female employees. Oh, and another thing — your pizza sucks. (The Daily Meal)
  • Petty, imbecilic Karen Handel, formerly of Susan G. Komen for the Cure, wants the world to know that Planned Parenthood hijacked the color pink from them. They owned the color, after all. (Feministe)

Pro-Choice Friday News Rundown

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  • In a spectacular win for our collective uteruses (uteri?), President Obama has won re-election. He’s got a lot of single women to thank for that victory, too! (Today)
  • Also, he’s probably pretty thankful to “Jenni.” (Bloomberg Businessweek)
  • Hopefully with the loss of the election, the GOP has taken away a valuable lesson from their war on women. (Daily Beast)
  • Arizona might be on the losing end of their intended 20-week abortion ban. *crossing fingers* (RH Reality Check)
  • The folks who champion “illegitimate” and “unforcible” rape over a woman’s right to choose didn’t do so well in Tuesday’s election. Boo friggity hoo. (Jezebel)
  • Ever wonder why this country is still hung up on the abortion debate? This blog has an explanation from a bioethics perspective. (i09)
  • Montana just became the 38th state to pass a parental consent law for underage abortions. This is not a good thing. At all. (One News Now)
  • Birth control pills already do something awesome — prevent pregnancy! — but could they also prevent Alzheimer’s Disease? (Medical Daily)
  • Ohio anti-choicers just won’t let the “heartbeat bill” go. (Think Progress)

Pro-Choice Friday News Rundown

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  • Another day, another moronic member of the GOP telling us that rape, in some way or another, isn’t all that bad for women. Maybe a pregnancy resulting from it was even “intended by God.” #Facepalm (HuffPo)
  • Joe Walsh, yet another imbecilic dunce from the GOP (they just keep crawling out of the woodwork, don’t they? Like termites!) says that advances in medicine have made pregnancy-related deaths obsolete and, thus, there’s never a need for abortions solely for the health of the mother. (Jezebel)
  • And if you thought it couldn’t get any worse than that, you’re sadly mistaken. Pennsylvania is considering a bill that would reduce welfare benefits for women who cannot prove their child was conceived from a rape. Nothing like dooming a woman and her offspring to abject poverty if she can’t prove her child was conceived without her consent. #GOPValues (Think Progress)
  • A sobering, fact-filled piece on rape being used as a political tool by Republican men in the debate over reproductive rights. (RH Reality Check)
  • President Obama wishes politicians would stay out of women’s health care. So do we, sir. (Politico)
  • Texas has won a court battle to exclude Planned Parenthood from the state health care program that provides services to low-income women. (Business Week)
  • Arizona and Indiana can forget about defunding Planned Parenthood, though, says the judicial system. (AP)
  • Meanwhile, in France, lawmakers passed a bill allowing free abortions for all women and free contraception for girls ages 15 to 18. (Global Post)
  • Somebody alert the rest of the media and call a press conference: Free birth control leads to fewer abortions. (South Florida Times)