posted October 15, 2004 01:56 AM              

Wednesday, October 13, 2004

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Mark Morford
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So there she was, the nation's most powerful and popular public female, kicking butt on a recent installment of her insanely beloved TV show with the help of celeb guests (Drew Barrymore, Cameron Diaz, P. Diddy, Christina Aguilera) and galvanizing stunned women across the nation to participate in this election, or else.

There was Oprah, doing what she does so freakishly well, cheerleading and extolling and impressing upon, getting women up and getting them angry and demanding that they exercise their hard-won right to vote and demanding that they quit dissing their feminist ancestors, the ones who worked so damn hard for suffrage and for freedom of choice and for the right to tell powerful sexist Republican men where they can shove their repressive sexist antichoice bigotry.

This was her fabulous, much-needed message: Take your rights for granted at your peril, ladies. Move, or else. Choose how you want the laws to treat and respect you and your body -- or someone else, someone who hasn't touched a vagina for 30 years and who thinks sex is only tolerable in the dark, fully clothed and with a respectable prostitute, will choose for you.

Sound like a cliché? Same ol' quasi-feminist rally message? Not exactly. Not this time. Just imagine this:

Imagine Bush filches another election in November. Nations mourn, black clouds gather, children cry, colons spasm, the remaining shreds of the American experiment wither and die.

And within a very short time, as many as 30 U.S. states have recriminalized abortion and made repressing women and hating sex fun again, as young American females everywhere who thought their right to choose was pretty much incontrovertible and indisputable and unfailing and who therefore didn't bother to vote in '00 or '04 suddenly go, oh holy freaking hell.

Hello, 1950s. Hello, coat-hanger surgery. Hello, millions of despondent daughters of uptight parents. Hello, dead or mutilated teenage girls who suffer botched procedures. Hello, a fresh national nightmare, revisited, regurgitated, reborn. And hello again to smug right-wing males who've wanted to put women back in their place for the past 50 years. Check that: 200 years. Check that: forever.

Just a silly nightmare? Utterly impossible? A ridiculous liberal daydream? Not even close, sweetheart.

It's all about the Supreme Court, of course. Fact is, our next president will almost surely get to appoint a number of new high-court justices to replace those who will likely retire after enduring Bush's toxic first term. They hung in there, these few -- especially stalwarts Sandra Day O'Connor and moderate, pro-choice John Paul Stevens -- hoping to disallow the nation's highest judiciary from becoming overly stacked with homophobic self-righteous right-wing neocon wingnuts (hi, Justice Scalia!) who would have us revert -- morally, sexually, spiritually, misogynistically -- to 1953. Check that: 1853. Check that: 1353.

With the exception of nearly useless neoconservative sycophant Clarence Thomas, not a single justice now serving on the court is under 65. Many insiders say Stevens, O'Connor and bitter old man William Rehnquist (almost 80) are all likely to retire before 2008. BushCo's chosen replacements could easily tip the scales of the court the other direction, from its very precarious 5-4 progressive tilt to a very sneering 6-3 conservative one, a court that would then very easily overturn parts or even all of Roe v. Wade. Talk about a malicious legacy.

It gets worse. It gets nastier, more widespread. Because should Shrub swipe another term, he will also be on his way to naming more federal trial and appeals judges -- hundreds, by most counts -- than either Clinton or Reagan, the last two-term presidents. Bush could, in short and for all intents and purposes, stack the nation's courts with enough neoconservative, antichoice, antiwomen crusaders to make Strom Thurmond giggle in his grave.

Which brings us straight back to Oprah. Say what you will about the often weirdly effusive and overtly gushy and often slightly smarmy woman who just gave away 276 Pontiacs to her entire studio audience (hard to tell if that was an act of astounding generosity and beneficence, or some sort of weird punishment -- I mean, they were Pontiacs), but the woman can electrify and inspire and educate her millions of devoted viewers like nobody's business.

And if there's one famously disenfranchised and alienated and apathetic voting bloc that needs to get off its collective yoga butt and stand up and make itself known this election lest it lose an even larger chunk of its basic human rights than it even realizes, it's youngish women.

This is, after all, what so many women don't seem to know. That the Bush administration has already, in just a few short years, managed to roll back a truly astounding number of their basic rights, making it more difficult, for example, for doctors to perform abortions, or making it illegal for schools to discuss contraception or for hospitals to discuss pregnancy-termination options.

From demeaning and ineffectual abstinence-only programs to biased counseling to cutting all funding for international women's health organizations that provide care to poor women in third-world nations (hell, Bush hacked that one away in his first month in office), Dubya has done more than any president in the last 100 years to smack women upside their sexually empowered heads.

Oh and by the way, that suggestion currently being floated by some in Congress that the Iraq war has become so nasty and desperate that we might very well need to reinstate the military draft? That draft includes young women. And oh yes, Bush has already upheld the ban on abortions for servicewomen stationed overseas, even if they were raped, even if they pay for it themselves. Feeling patriotic yet?

This has been the GOP's message to women since, well, forever: Be like Laura Bush -- submissive, matronly, heavily shellacked and ever flashing a disquieting mannequin grin, off in the corner reading stories to the kids and cutting lots of pretty ceremonial ribbons and keeping quiet about the Important Stuff and never having sex and always be standing just out of the spotlight, secondary and inferior and in the background. You know, right where you belong.

Truly and sadly, few indeed are the powerful and articulate public female voices in our major media to counter this ideological poison. Who, Barbara Walters? Not exactly hotly connected to youth and issues of the day. Katie Couric? About as female empowering as a terrier. Martha Stewart? Busy designing barbell cozies for the prison gym. The wholly queasy pseudo-feminists on the wholly awful "The View"? Please.

And while plethoric are the powerful women working behind the media scenes, execs and pundits and writers, senators and world leaders and even forthright, independent wives, and while there are plenty of strong-willed, outspoken female celebs making their voices known, in terms of visibility and raw power and sheer reach, nobody can touch Oprah. Which is exactly why her message was so wonderful.

Here's the bottom line: 50 million eligible women didn't vote in 2000, and 22 million of them were single and nearly every one of them probably thought their vote doesn't matter and it isn't really worth it and who cares anyway because no matter who wins, everything's still pretty much run by rich powerful men anyway. Which is, you know, sort of true. But not quite.

Because as Oprah knows, there are powerful men who get it and who love women and who understand their issues and who have cool articulate daughters and opinionated self-defined multilingual firebrand wives (Hi, Teresa), and there are aww-shucks antichoice Texans with lifeless token wives who think your body is government property and you should just pipe down and keep your damn legs closed and go pray to an angry Republican God to forgive your plentiful vagina-induced sins.

Hey, it's your choice. But not for long.

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posted October 15, 2004 01:11 PM            

When you are old, your kids...if you didn't abort them all, will be picking you up to shop, cleaning your house, picking you up to get your hair fixed and perhaps wiping the drool off your face.

When they have a so called doctor slip you a syringe of happy juice to ship you off this mortal coil, don't bit*h because you've already endorsed killing the innocent for convenience sake and you will most certainly become inconvenient at some point.
Maybe even sooner than you think

posted October 15, 2004 04:57 PM              

That is truly beyond disgusting and just goes to show how totally blinded you are to the freewill choice of others. My body is not YOUR issue thank God, and nor should it an issue for the goverment either. You may think that what you've written is slightly amusing, but I don't. If anything it makes women more alert to the situations we may be facing in the future. Since it takes two to tango, you guys might spend a few minutes thinking about it too!

As for the idea of people keeping both knees firmly pressed together, I think I'm inclined to agree that for some it was a great opportunity missed.

Gia

posted October 15, 2004 06:49 PM              

Another note, even if Bush gets to make it illegal, I don't believe it will last long. There will be other presidents who will fight for it on the other side. The war is not over, and until people realize that it is pointless to dictate what a person should do to their bodies, it will go on and on.

posted October 15, 2004 07:07 PM            

"The autonomic nervous system conveys sensory impulses from the blood vessels, the heart and all of the organs in the chest, abdomen and pelvis through nerves to other parts of the brain (mainly the medulla, pons and hypothalamus). These impulses often do not reach our consciousness, but elicit largely automatic or reflex responses through the efferent autonomic nerves, thereby eliciting appropriate reactions of the heart, the vascular system, and all the organs of the body to variations in environmental temperature, posture, food intake, stressful experiences and other changes to which all individuals are exposed." http://www.ndrf.org/ans.htm

You see, a response of the ANS does not, in itself, provide for the idea of a sentient being cried over by anti-choice folk.

sentience - The quality or state of being sentient; consciousness.

A fetal body is not necessarily conscious simply because it's ANS responds to external stimuli ... particulary when that ANS would cease to function if the connection to the mother would be severed.

How do you scientifically and factually prove consciousness in a fetus?

"There is no scientific consensus as to when human life begins, a point made by such institutions as the National Academy of Sciences and the American Medical Association. These scientists say that the point at which a new person comes into existence cannot be scientifically discovered; it is a matter of philosophic opinion or religious belief, not scientific fact. It requires a judgment of what we consider a human being to be. For instance, does a human being consist of genetic information, or a disembodied soul, or a consciousness in a body? Or is it a separate, social being who has been born?" http://www.geocities.com/evolvedthinking/Abortion.htm

But, whatever, that is just my personal view of the matter. Thankfully, it is still legal to choose to have an abortion, or birth control pills for that matter. Frankly, if someone feels that abortions are wrong, well, then, they shouldn't have one.

The whole adoption as an alternative issue is just strange to me. It's not okay to terminate a pregnancy, but it is okay to have a child that you don't want and give it up so that you don't have to "deal" with your "irresponsibility"? Yeah, that doesn't seem too responsible to me.
Don't get me wrong. A child born into this world deserves a loving family and if their birth parents desert them then another loving family should be able to raise them. My parents were foster parents for a long time before they conceived and would have adopted if their foster kids had not been able to return to their biological mother. I think adoption is certainly a much better choice for couples suffering from sterility/infertility problems than invitro fertilization or surrogate mothers, etc. Just my opinion, of course. Still, there are thousands and thousands of children up for adoption already and I frankly don't see all the anti-choicers in-line to adopt these kids in order to support their "better alternative" to abortion.

posted October 15, 2004 07:07 PM            

fetus - In humans, the unborn young from the end of the eighth week after conception to the moment of birth, as distinguished from the earlier embryo.

Okay, so we have embryos and fetuses. Baby can apply to either an unborn child or a born child ... ah, there's that sticky difference again, born or unborn.

born - Brought into life by birth.

unborn - \Un*born"\, a. Not born; not yet brought into life; being still to appear; future.

Some people are so paranoid ... I actual had some ignoramus say that I was "trying to desensitize people to murder" by using the word fetus instead of the word baby. Get a clue.

Besides, I know a number of women who had abortions in their youth who went on to have children later. But wait, maybe they should've had the child and then abandoned it, excuse me, put it up for adoption so someone else could care for it if they felt like it, or they could have had the child and been so very supported in their need for welfare and food stamps and medicaid in order to support the child that they didn't plan for. Because, after all, we know exactly how much these same anti-choice "conservatives" just love to support welfare and food stamps and medicaid.

posted October 15, 2004 07:10 PM            

BTW, assuming you do have a child, when you want and are ready for one and you raise that child lovingly and help him/her grow into a responsible adult ... there is still the very good chance that in your old age, you'll find yourself in a nursing home, carefully selected of course, by your loving child, and perhaps he or she will visit you on occasion, too. Wouldn't that be lovely?

OH, almost forgot, do you realize that some groups are now trying to charge women with murder if they have a miscarriage? The argument in these cases, which I must look up again, is that the women had miscarriages due to them not following their doctor's advice. However, most doctor's will admit that there is no way to know for sure, 100%, if any fetus will survive until birth. Still, these women are being accused of murder. Of course, all the women who have followed their doctor's orders and yet still had miscarriages or even stillbirths should be charging their doctors with murder ala medical malpractice, or at the very least, the doctors should be charged as accomplices to the "murder" since it was under their care that this "murder" occurred ... oh yes, and let's not forget the partners of these women who stood by and allowed these "murders" to take place. Of course, we will have a whole lot of "murderers" running around free because they are not aware that they or their partners or their patients had early trimester miscarriages which are very common, usually without the woman knowing she was ever pregnant. Oh, the horror! "Murderers" running amok!

******

Note, to those of you thinking that my use of the word "abandon" is improper I'd like to point out that every single kid I've ever known who's been put up for adoption has told me that they felt, upon discovery of their adoption, that they were "abandoned". Not only that, the few women I've known who have chosen adoption for their children have also told me they wrestled with the idea of "abandoning" their child before doing so. Furthermore, the use of the word "abandon" in relation to adoption is not quite as extreme as the use of the word "murder" in relation to abortion. I really hope no one was offended by it because that was not my intent.

posted October 15, 2004 08:29 PM            

Did I say women should stop having abortions? No

Did I say you were establishing a concept that it's OK to kill innocent life because it's inconvenient for someone? Yes

Did I say that concept can be carried further...and it will most surely be carried further? Yes

Did I suggest you should not complain when inconvenience is used against you to legally end your life? Yes

Did I give you the number one most effective and safe birth control method in history? Yes, and it's absolutely free too.

posted October 15, 2004 11:33 PM              

- Rape victims.

posted October 16, 2004 12:55 AM              

Everlong, I second what you said. When we do away with rape and abuse completely, maybe the issue can be revisited. But as it stands right now, I'm sorry, but to me, the rights of the women who have had pregnancy forced upon them comes way waaaay above the 'rights' of any foetus that may be in their bodies.
Secondly, what with us being the land of the free and so on, I believe that people should have the choice with what to do with their bodies. Pro-choicers aren't trying to force pro-lifers to have abortions. So why should pro-lifers try to force pro-choicers to not have abortions? Abortion is a personal choice!!!

posted October 16, 2004 09:16 AM              

Gia

I'm off to have some kool aid.

posted October 16, 2004 02:02 PM            

That's always the way those in favor of abortion react, projecting the exceptions as the justification rather than the general, the general being the inconvenience of having and caring for a baby. It is estimated that more than 90% of all abortions fall into the inconvenience category and less than 10% into the category of rape, incest and health of the mother, which are the exception.

Next fall back position is Linda Goodman says........

Gia, enjoy your Kool-Aid. BTW just be sure it isn't Kerry Kool-Aid. You know what happened to the Jim Jones brand Kool-Aid drinkers.

Perhaps I should run for elected office Gia. Guess I would start with County Dog/Cat Catcher...I do love animals.

posted October 16, 2004 02:40 PM              

However, that comes from my own conscience, those are my personal beliefs and morals. I do not believe in forcing my beliefs or morals onto any other woman. Each woman, indeed, each human being has to follow their own conscience. A person's conscience is sacred and should not be violated by government legislation or any other person. It's between the person and God and no one has the right to interfere with that.

The government is not in the business of dictating morals through legislation. Morals are not the governments concern. Morals are formed through religious teachings and prayer and that is the concern of the various churches and each individual. Because when the government gets into the business of legislating morals whose morals are they basing that legislation on if not their own?

I personally will form my own conscience and my own morals and do want the government legislating to me what my morals should be as that directly interferes with my conscience and my personal relationship with God through prayer. I don't care what G W Bush and the Religious Right deem right and wrong. It isn't necessarily what my conscience or anyone else's conscience sees as right or wrong.

The world is not black and white. There are all kinds of grey areas thrown in there. Right and wrong is not black and white. It too is shaded. To inforce your morals onto someone else goes against everything that religion teaches. To judge others because they do not live up to your own personal moral standards or because the choices they make are different from the choices you would make is a definite no no in Christianity.

posted October 16, 2004 11:30 PM            

I don't mind the fact that my beliefs come from myS-elf, of course. If I happen to agree with any of the other humans who've come to similar conclusions about anything at all, be they Jesus or Linda or Ghandi or Buddha or Joe down the street is only secondary. But, then again, I never took well to having religious dogma and tenets spoon fed to me, even as a child.

As for abortion, the fact remains that you cannot scientifically verify when Life actually begins. It's a matter of religious/spiritual/philosophic consideration for each individual. Unfortunately, there seem to be some people who think only they are right and that only their take on the matter should be respected. I'm for choices. It's funny that anti-choice people call themselves "pro-life" ... especially "conservatives" who don't mind innocent casualties of war (you know, the innocent men, women, and children who were inconveniently at the wrong place at the wrong time for an attack) and some even support the death penalty. Yeah, the 10% guesstimate of wrongly accused who die don't matter too much, either, I suppose.

Perhaps the only truly Pro-Life people are the immortals. Oh, no, geez, some more Linda Goodman related stuff has dared to creep up, of all places, on a Linda Goodman tribute site. Whatever shall we do?

posted October 17, 2004 01:09 AM              

Last time I noticed it takes two to conceive a child. What about all the men who are not responsible for the child they fathered? Most men take off when they find out the woman is pregnant and then don't fulfill their obligations of child support. Even in divorce that is the case in a large percentage of males. To tell a woman to just say no or keep her legs together is a sexist remark because it implies a pregnancy is always the womans fault. Boys will be boys and all that garbage. What about the guy keeping his pants zipped up? And he can just say no too.