If you’re a young woman of child bearing age, then Plan B is what you rely on if you’ve had unprotected sex.
That age group – young women – is where things get murky. Here’s why. Plan B is the morning after pill. It’s a hormonal contraceptive that has been shown to be 89 percent effective at safely preventing pregnancy if taken within 72 hours of having unprotected sex. The current law requires women ages 17 and older to ask a pharmacist for the pill. Women aged 16 and younger must obtain a doctor’s prescription to access Plan B. Reproductive health advocates contend that the law may make it logistically difficult for the age 16 and under group to prevent pregnancy.
After nearly a year of reviewing the evidence on Plan B, the FDA determined it should be made available to everyone over the counter. But here’s the shocker: Kathleen Sebelius, Obama’s U.S. Department Health and Human Services Secretary, vetoed the Plan B decision. Why? Because “adolescent girls may not have the behavioral maturity to understand how to use the morning after pill.”
Really? Adolescent girls are illiterate? Stupid? Can’t follow directions?
This is one of the lamest excuses I’ve ever heard for restrictions on a woman’s right to determined the fate of her own body. Nancy Keenan, president of the NARAl Pro-Choice America organization, said: “We had every confidence that this Bush-era policy would come to an end. The Obama administration has broken a key promise to the American people that it would base its decisions on sound science and what’s in the best interest of women’s health. In short, this is a failure to deliver change.”
But really, the bottom line is this: what gives the government the right to determine the decisions a woman makes about her own body? To my knowledge, there aren’t any such laws for men. And really, let’s get bottom line honest here. If men were the ones getting pregnant, giving birth, and nurturing the child in the subsequent year, Plan B wouldn’t even be an issue. Abortion wouldn’t be an issue.
Years ago, I had an English professor who actually indulged my ridiculous discussions about life, weirdness, and all the rest of it. Dr. Millett. He was thin, tall, a consummate communicator, and a fantastic teacher who made literature come alive. And one afternoon when we were sitting in his office, he said, he said, “Trish, here’s the secret. You women have all the power because you can give birth.”
These words were uttered with the utmost sincerity, but I burst out laughing. “Hey, Doc, we can be fertile, we can be ready or not. But without the guy, there’s no baby.”
He thought about this for a moment, then laughed, too. “I’d better inform all those male literary writers who believe otherwise.”
I believe this conversation took place round 1969. We’re now at the tail end of 2011.
I recently read a story about an Afghan woman who was sentenced to 12 years in prison after her cousin’s husband raped her. She’s now been released so she can marry her rapist. Sounds like something out of the Handmaid’s Tale, but set to Afghan standards.
In Saudi Arabia, considered to be among our staunchest allies, women aren’t allowed to drive and can’t even leave their homes unless accompanied by a male relative. Why not? How do women in burkas present any threat at all to men? Are men so hormonally ramped up that they would be tempted to do unspeakable things to a woman driving a car? Walking home alone through a neighborhood? What are these Saudi guys afraid of, anyway?
I don’t mean to make this post a feminist rant, but honestly, it wasn’t that long ago that women in the U.S. had the right to vote. We still have a male-dominated world, where war and aggression are business as usual, and where mostly male politicians are still trying to regulate what a woman does with her body.
Sorry, boys. Our bodies belong to us, not to you – Rick Santorum, Rick Perry, Ron Paul, Mitt Romney, John Huntsman, or hey, Newt Gingritch, you, too. Guys, go pound sand. You don’t own us or our bodies and never will.
Very synchronistic post for me. We have three granddaughters, ages 11, 13, and 15, all of whom began to have their cycles at age 10. Yesterday I had a verbal “debate” with a very, very, VERY Catholic brain-washed professional male who holds the dogmatic conviction that abortion for any reason in a mortal sin. He has a young daughter and six sons. I offered him a hypothesis. My granddaughter, or his daughter, both aged 11, are waiting at their schoolbus stop, are snatched by a predator pedophile, kidnapped, brutally beaten, viciously raped, their fragiles insides shredded by what to them would be a huge (because they are tiny) male organ, they are rescued, and subsequently discovered that the rape resulted in conception. Would he allow his daughter to experience the horrific trauma of carrying that pregnancy, in addition to the life-altering trauma already exerienced physically, mentally, emotionally, and even spiritually by her ordeal? His response? “God forbids abortion for ANY reason and if the child isn’t meant to be born a natural miscarriage will occur!” I was and am appalled.
So we see that it isn’t just our male-dominated society and world, but also the anti-abortion, pro-life people who oppose a woman’s (or parent’s in the case of very minor girls), or girl’s right to choose what happens to her body! After giving birth to three sons, years ago my OB told me I absolutely could not get pregnant again due to internal damage from infection. He said that either he could tie my tubes or hubby could have vasectomy. Hubby said “no way jose’ are you touching MY manhood”! So of course my tubes were tied, which was OK. But hubby’s remark is typical of a male reaction in such a circumstance. KEEP YOUR HANDS OFF MY ***********!!
Yet they tell us what we must do with ours! And hey, I’ve not had any wine, Terri, so go ahead and join me in this rant!!
As Lauren hinted, there is a political /economic factor to this issue. Having worked at a woman’s clinic in a college town, I learned early on that the “women’s right to choose” had been co-opted by class-ism. These decisions to prevent women from having a choice ensure poverty. It’s really about class. The politicians making the decisions are wealthy. The women they are controlling are impoverished. Often, having children will further impoverish them. It’s an uneven playing field.
It’s disheartening to see America moving backwards in some ways.
I get it. We seem to be moving more backward than forward.
Yea Trish – Rant on!!! Rant on!!
🙂
Thanks Trish.
Recently I’ve been working on an article about why the Goddess, as archetype and paradigm, matters. And even as I wrote, the trivializing voice in recesses of my mind was apologizing, even as you, making such an important point, felt you had to add: ”
I don’t mean to make this post a feminist rant, but …………..We still have a male-dominated world, where war and aggression are business as usual, and where mostly male politicians are still trying to regulate what a woman does with her body.”
We all need to stop apologizing for speaking for a equitable world. Actually, the regulation of what a woman does with her body, or rather, what men do with her body, and her “ownership” is the basis of patriarchal paradigm, along with glorification of war, conquest and “mastery” and the trivialization of all things “feminine”, things like birth, childbearing, cooperation, and often, our relationship to nature. The awful story of a young woman imprisoned for having been raped, and then “forgiven” if she will marry her rapist is an extreme example – Kathleen Sebelius blocking young women from birth control (and hence ensuring generations of young welfare mothers who might otherwise have time to sort out their young lives and pursue a career)……is a less extreme example, but no less insidious and ubiquitous. And yes, women can embody patriarchal control values as much as men.
It’s really everywhere. Go to Blockbuster, and take a look at the endless war movies to see how deeply entrenched this is. We call movies about love and relationships “chick flicks”, emphasizing once again the trivialization of human values. Why do our religions in the west have such a preoccupation with “virgins” ….. because a virgin was “untouched goods”, which was important to a patriarchal ownership system. I’m a great fan of the Virgin Mary and her fabulous cathedrals, but prefer the earlier Sophia, Goddess of Wisdom, the Feminine side of the divine.
You right about all of it, Lauren.
This has been a controversial subject in the UK as well.
Quote: “The British Pregnancy Advisory Service has said that it will provide the morning after pill in advance over Christmas when pharmacies are closed. They will give it out in response to telephone requests.”
So for the Christmas break girls/women can obtain the morning after pill in advance – just in case they do have unprotected sex.
Interesting! I’m always curious about the laws in other countries. The UK sounds much more humane and reasonable about this.
Oops, some glitch there. Here’s my reply: Interesting! I’m always curious about the laws in other countries. The UK sounds much more humane and reasonable about this.
Great post Trish.I couldn’t agree more.
Yesterday I was watching the “South Park” episode from season 12 where Obama had just won the election and everyone was celebrating that change had finally come after the Bush regime were outed,but the plan was that McCain would lose the election to Obama so that Palin,McCain and Obama and Co. could steel the Hope diamond Ala “Ocean’s 11”, from the Smithsonian while the people were celebrating Obama’s win.
I don’t think the boys at “South Park” could have expressed it any better.
Ever since Kennedy,the elections have been bought buy Wall Street and the guys in so called “power” just dance to the Banksters tune.
Both parties are owned by the Wall Street in my opinion.
It’s the same in our country,I’m a Labour party voter (which would be like your Democrat party) but the reality is that the Labour Party are just puppets of the Banksters.Make no mistake,this is a world wide thing happening here…and time is running out fast.Soon freedom will be gone if things keep rolling along like this.
Politics is a joke on a world wide scale.
I agree. Both parties ARE owned by wall street. It’s sad.
As a mother of four daughters, these rants are always welcome!!! When I consider all the FDA approved chemicals on the shelves in everything from children’s cereal to diet pills to antihistamines it boggles my mind that Plan B requires a doctors approval if the girl is under 17. The addition of a doctor visit, and the cost to see one, prohibits the potential of a Plan B for the young and unemployed girls even if they know it’s possible.
There’s no power in giving birth, it is a biological process. Parenting is entirely different. Now those male literary writers are a different kettle of fish as they explore their themes of womanhood without ever asking for a woman’s viewpoint.
The issue with the patriarchal society is the desire for power and the illusion that those that claim power are admired. Which is a strange in the Afghan culture since all the male power they claim is dissolved at the glimpse of a feminine earlobe or ankle.
I could easily go into my own rant but this is your blog and I’ve already had a glass of wine so my rant is best put to bed.
Even a walk-in clinic costs a minimum of a hundred bucks, way too much a teenager. Good points, Terri.