In defense of the sanctimonious women's studies set || First feminist blog on the internet

Month: May 2009

Bristol Palin: Teen Pregnancy Warning Sign?

I love Cristina Page and think she’s brilliant — her book How the Pro-Choice Movement Saved America is a must-read — but I’m not sure she gets in right in this article about how Bristol and Levi could be the teen pregnancy spokespeople we’ve all been waiting for. She writes about Bristol’s work for The Candie’s Foundation, which focuses on lowering the teen pregnancy rate, and argues that Bristol is an effective spokeswoman when it comes to the message that you don’t want to be a teen parent:

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The downside of the Obama budget

He slashed abstinence-only education, which is fantastic, but unfortunately did not strike governmental restrictions on abortion as hoped. The Center for Reproductive Rights has more:

The Hyde Amendment bans federal funding for abortion in the Medicaid program except under extremely limited circumstances. The President’s budget abandons the millions of women who rely on Medicaid and other federal programs for health services, including federal employees and their spouses and dependents, women served by Indian Health Service, women in the Peace Corps and in federal prisons. It appears to clear the way for the District of Columbia to use its public funds for abortion.

“At a time in our nation’s history when Americans at every income level are losing their jobs and their health benefits, guaranteeing access to affordable, quality healthcare, including reproductive healthcare, is imperative,” stated Nancy Northup, president of the Center for Reproductive Rights, responding to the abortion funding restrictions maintained in the budget. “For millions of women, federal programs are their only means of getting healthcare. Abortion is the only medically necessary health service excluded from Medicaid coverage. Failure to provide that service—a service that only women need—is discrimination.”

Northup continued, “President Obama made clear during the election that he opposes the Hyde Amendment. And for good reason—over a third of women who rely on Medicaid and are seeking an abortion have been prevented from exercising their constitutional right to an abortion. Hyde unjustly impedes women’s access to timely, quality healthcare and disproportionately harms those women who already face significant barriers to obtaining services. Sound public health policy means protecting the wellbeing of all women.”

The Center is calling on Congress to step up and eliminate all restrictions on abortion funding, which would demonstrate much needed U.S. leadership and commitment to the human rights principles at the heart of reproductive rights – dignity, equality, and the ability to make reproductive decisions freely, without coercion or discrimination.

Contact your Congressperson and urge them to eliminate restrictions on abortion funding.

Buh-bye, abstinence-only education

Good news: President Obama has eliminated abstinence-only education funding in his 2010 budget. Joe at Amplify Your Voice writes:

Not only are all of the abstinence-only funds eliminated, but $173 million dollars will now be going to teen pregnancy prevention programs around the country that don’t have to adhere to the ridiculous standards that were there before.

While we can celebrate this news for now, we aren’t quite out of the woods yet. A door is still open for Congress to sneak these funds back in if we don’t put enough pressure on them.

Of the $110 million that are going to state-based teen pregnancy prevention programs, 75% are going to “evidence-based” programs, while 25% are going “new models” which aren’t explicitly defined. The danger here is that Congress might still try to slip abstinence-only programs into the budget during the appropriations process. David Obey, the Democratic chair of the Appropriations Committee, has tried to increase funding for abstinence-only programs in the past, and we need to make sure that he and his colleagues don’t allow this to happen now.

He’s right that we should stay vigilant on this one, but it is great news. Now drop a note to your Congressperson and tell them to make sure inaccurate, dangerous abstinence-only ed stays in the trash bin where it belongs.

Wesleyan women’s rights activist shot and killed

Johanna Justin-Jinich, a Wesleyan student, was shot and killed yesterday by Stephen Morgan, a man who had been harassing and possibly stalking her. He walked into the bookstore where she worked and shot her. He has not yet been apprehended, and may be targeting Jewish communities.

Justin-Jinich was a Planned Parenthood volunteer whose passions included writing and her work in public health and women’s issues; she was supposed to work in DC this summer for a women’s rights organization.

She sounds like she was an amazing young woman who will be very missed.

Thanks to Matt for the link.

This makes me want to get married in a church. In a white dress. Ideally “with child.”

I’m not sure I’m really the marrying kind (and I’m almost surely not the church-marrying kind), but this article makes me want a big church wedding. And it makes me want to wear Stephanie Seymour’s dress from this, but with more cleavage. (If only I had legs like Stephanie Seymour. Also boobs).

The article, titled “How Brides Should Dress,” is a missive by Father Edward McNamara, professor of liturgy at the Regina Apostolorum Pontifical University. Here’s part of what he says:

A reader from Westminster, in England, points out that white is the usual color in the Western world because it usually signified the bride’s virginity. For this reason, in most Western cultures, a widow entering a second marriage would almost invariably eschew the formal bridal gown for simpler attire.

Our reader points out that in today’s world: “many brides come to the altar after a long period of cohabitation, often after bearing children.” The reader thus recommends that priests should encourage brides who arrive at marriage in this state to choose a less formal dress “out of modesty and honesty for herself, and through charity to those brides who approach their marriages in a pure state, that their traditional symbolic dress may not be debased or usurped.”

I certainly agree in principle and indeed numerous dioceses and parishes have regulations regarding couples who ask for marriage in irregular situations. Dioceses and parishes often recommend that the couples prefer a less solemn wedding celebration both out of respect for Church teaching and as a gesture of penance for their failings.

Call me immature, but I would totally favor debasing and usurping the dress of sanctimonious pricks who think that the only moral and “pure” women are ones with intact hymens. Especially if they think that a wedding should be an opportunity for a bride to pay penance for her slutitude.