Where will you be June 7th?
Because the American Life League will be staging protests at “any clinics or facilities that distribute the birth control pill” to mark the 43rd anniversary of Griswold v. Connecticut, the Supreme Court case that recognized a couple’s right to privacy extended to the free purchase of birth control.
Predictably, their hip, youthful site is a wonderland of misinformation, but what irked me most was the rather lame assertion from the front page:
The constitutional right to privacy has nothing to do with birth control.
If not in a locked bedroom—hell, if not in an individual’s uterus—where exactly is one entitled to privacy?
Some of the science would be comical if it weren’t cited in earnest. Under the laundry list of ailments caused by the pill, they cite a study in which:
Researchers…found that caged adult [male] trout exposed to ethynylestradiol, a synthetic estrogen, were half as fertile as fish kept in clean water. The trout were exposed to the estrogen for two months, and then bred with a healthy female.Doug Myers, a wetlands and habitat specialist for the Puget Sound Action Team, said that scientists are “finding the presence of female hormones making the male species less male” in frogs, river otters and fish. “Scientists in western Washington found that synthetic estrogen – a common ingredient in oral contraceptives – drastically reduces the fertility of male rainbow trout.”
Because trout are interchangeable with human test subjects…or not. At least they picked a vertebrate.
Also, the trout used in the study were male. How many men do these people think are on the pill? Don’t answer that.
Under “How the Pill Kills,” they elaborate on the “abortifacient” capabilities of the pill, which:
Changes the lining of the uterus. This makes it difficult, if not impossible, for the five- to seven-day-old baby to attach to the lining, where he/she would receive the nourishment needed to grow. If the baby does not successfully attach to the lining, he/she dies and is expelled from the body during menstruation. This process is known as a chemical abortion.
But it’s not. The majority of conceptions, with or without the pill, naturally terminate before the zygote even attaches to the uterine wall. The site fails to mention this.
And, yes, there’s a Facebook group.
Dashaway
femmemeister
hahaha, 36 members…
(facebook reference)
As a Catholic, I should be against all abortion. However, I am considering the ethics of retroactive abortion as to those who kill the innocent.
James,
Well, first of all, (putting aside the rather pronounced creep-o factor), this post deals with the birth control pill–not surgical abortion. Would you consider all women who use the birth control pill to be “murderers” who deserve to be punished violently, as you suggest? That is millions upon millions of women you’re talking about here.
Abortion and birth control are very touchy subjects, and I sympathize with people who feel uncomfortable with one, or the other, or both. However, I will never be able to understand how people who call themselves “pro-life” can justify threatening violence against women who are making decisions about the right thing to do with their own bodies.
Of course, usually a “pro-life” person will turn around and claim that violence against an “innocent” (ie: unborn person) is murder, whereas violence against a woman who makes a decision to have an abortion is some form of justice.
HOWEVER, we have to keep in mind that women who use the birth control pill or women who have abortions (NOT the same thing, mind you!!!) are, well, people. They are human beings, with lives–not potential lives. I do not consider a fetus a “person” in that same sense–potential for life is not the same thing as life. (Have you ever heard Monty Python’s song “Every Sperm is Sacred”? It’s sort of like that!)
Of course, a “pro-lifer” would respond to that with the rather predictable and not particularly effective retort: “Well, would you have liked YOUR mother to have an abortion?”
However, had my mother decided to have an abortion, I would never have existed in the first place. That question is just as inane as, “Would you have liked it if your parents had headaches on the night of your conception?” Of course I am glad that I was conceived and carried to term. (I rather like myself, and I think it is pretty cool to exist!)
But, had I not been conceived, or had I not been carried to term, well, my life would never have happened. I would not have been murdered–I just never would have come into existence.
If potential lives were always the same as actual lives, then every moment that we’re not copulating is murder! (Quick everyone: save a life! Have some of “the sex” this instant!)
Perhaps I sound rather flippant–but in all seriousness, people who are pro-choice are not cold-hearted murderers. We are not trying to commit genocide, nor are we against babies. (If you saw me watching Huggies commercials, you would see how much I dig them!)
But, we do believe that no person should be forced to use their bodies for something that they do not want to do. Women’s bodies are their own, not the state’s. Having babies can be a wonderful and beautiful thing–as long as the woman is actively consenting in that practice. If she does not want babies now, or yet, or ever, then she should not be forced to do so. That makes motherhood into some sort of creepy slavery . . . and that is not good for anyone.
Oh, and if you were serious about wanting to reduce the number of abortions, how about joining us in subsidizing sex ed classes, making sure there is freely available and inexpensive birth control for anyone engaging in sexual activity, subsidized pre-natal care, paid maternity leave for all women, and insurance for all of our citizens, particularly children?
That might be more productive than veiled threats against college student bloggers, and it would certainly be less, well, creepy.
ZING! Thank you femme. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Your patience and way with words astounds me.
Commonsense prohibitions against murder aside, James, the Catholic Church also forbids capital punishment.