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A Jobs Program and A Sales Program, All In One! (image: donkeyhotey/flickr)
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It has been fascinating, albeit in an unpleasant way, to watch the War On Women unfold this month. There’s more than a little irony that we are seeing this “war” take place in March when March is annually the month to celebrate Women’s History. That’s a problem as many of the battles that women have fought for over the years are being re-fought this year, so how can we celebrate them as history?
Actually, the best way I think to celebrate is to fight against the current iteration of the war. As I wrote a couple of years ago, I love strong women, but that gives me no more the right to tell any woman how she should live her life than the state has a right to do. Yet all over the country, we are seeing state and federal elected officials propose that a women considering abortion has to undergo an invasive, unnecessary procedure that’s only purpose is to attempt to intimidate a woman as if she has no will and awareness of her own.
The justifications for these proposed laws are about as patronizing and condescending as there is. The attempted obfuscations (“Religious Freedom!”) rival the worst of what we’ve seen. Really, about the only smoke screen we haven’t seen is someone trying to defend these attacks on women as a job creation effort.
Maybe they just haven’t thought of it before. They do manage to keep re-cycling the same standard activities and call them Jobs programs. Tax Cuts! = Jobs Programs. De-regulation = Jobs Program. Drill, Baby, Drill = Jobs Program.
I guess the only reason they may have not linked the War On Women to a Jobs Program is it really wouldn’t be a Jobs Program. The sad thing is, I would wager they could find thousands of people willing to volunteer as “Chief Busybody and Slut Shamer.” Do they understand that “The Handmaid’s Tale” is not really a “How-to” guide?
And because I can:
Cross posted from Just A Small Town Country Boy by Richard Taylor
34 Comments
Wow, does that song take me back! I was young enough when it came out to know that it was somehow empowering, but also to not have any idea what it meant.
Give them time and they’ll figure out a way to call it a Jobs Bill.
Vaginal probe = their version of “drill, baby, drill.
Heh!
DaKine, nice diary, thanks.
PW n MM . . . you chicks rawhk . . . (ok, women but still).
*G*
> The justifications for these proposed laws are about
> as patronizing and condescending as there is.
Wow, that sounds familiar.
sad but true
I doubt the sincerity of President Obama and the Democratic Party’s commitment for fighting for the rights of women. For years, they’ve been all too willing to throw women overboard (remember the Stupak Amendment to the health care monstrosity?) in a vain effort to attract a handful of mythical swing voters who might consider voting D in the next election cycle.
Oh, I in no way absolve the Ds from their complicity in all of this. They’ve pretty much never been adverse to throwing women’s issues under the bus at the slightest provocation. They do the same thing with just about every other interest group that leans D.
But with a few exceptions such as Stupak, most Ds seem to not want to continue to fight issues that were resolved back in ’60s.
Since it’s never mentioned, I’ll say it again, 100% of all pregnancies are caused by men.
dak – thanks, one of the nice things about FDL is how the men are so vocal in support of women, I think they write more of the lady parts posts than our writers with lady parts!
and wait ’til that changes ;)
” More people have died in the name of religion than any other disease known to mankind. ” Most of them have been women and children, too. What on earth and why on earth can’t people ” see ” the difference among church goin’, indoctrination and spiritualism? The Declaration of Independence and our Constitution were written by deists, agnostics and the deeply religious. Yet 240 years of discovery and scientific study of our planet’s origin has made America more churched and less intelligent in many instances. We’ve proven the Bible to be just a book. Women and children will continue to suffer horribly until we acknowledge the utter nonsense of choosing religion, any religion, over spiritualism. Heaven help us until that day comes.
Book Salon up with John Horgan’s The End of War hosted by Scott Horton
That may be a little unduly judgemental. One time my wife looked me right in the eye and said, “Let’s make another baby.” I guess (tehnically) I did cause it, but I don’t think I sould have to take all the blame.
&@dakine01: Some of the recent bills and proposed ammendments are outstanding jobs bills. Think of the force needed to enforce any of that silly shit. Make the TSA look puny. Don’t have a clue how a state legislature would come up with that kind of money.
It seems so clear to me that the reason so many things in our society are going wrong is because the men have practically eliminated the fair representation of women in the decision making process. I dream of a ground swell movement where everyone who ‘gets it” talks to others about it and insists on any decision making group having a 50/50 ratio of men and women. From the local scene to the national. If we need to vote for representatives then half should be men, half should be women. Change from the ground up and sit ins when the men object to this basic rule of going forward.
No. 100% of pregnancies (not rape) are allowed by women.
Take responsibility for yourself, women are gatekeepers not victims.
Uhh, where you been sweetheart? The women of South Australia won the right to stand for parliament in 1895, the first time on the planet. Women were granted the right to vote in Wyoming just after the Civil War, but it was soon repealed by Congress. It’s been an uphill battle all the way, but mostly going ahead. Two stps forward and one step back.
Just now we are in the throes of a reaction. But it’s a reaction to lots of things, not just feminism. It’s a reaction to the civil rights movement in many layers, and a reaction to the sexual revolution specifically the pill, a reaction to the loss of religious dominion, and just here a woman’s right to choose. It’s the Vatican’s last gasp. They’ve hung their hat on the job of getting the world’s most influential nation to stop allowing women to ignore the Churches dictates. It’s a bitch. But we need to hang in there.
That’s what women are trying to do with birth control yet for some reason, folks like you keep fighting the use of birth control as some unnecessary boondoggle that is to expensive (even though it is far cheaper than actually having a child)
Shooter, you know, you have a knack for pissing people off. I’m not exactly sure what’s wrong with this remark, but I’m pretty sure you are full of prunes. Women, like my wife can be gatekeepers, but that’s a hell of a long way from the whole story.
One time my fourteen year old cousin, who was in the habit of beating up on her little brothers decided she was gonna take down 11 year old RaggMopp. I popped her butt on the ground and then had to spend an hour begging her to stop crying and forgive me. Spent several days getting back in the good graces of Uncles, Aunts and Mom and Dad. “Jesus, son, don’t you know you can hurt a girl that way?”
Actually, and this was my secret, even at 11, I did. I had had a spasm of childish pride just then. I was probably showing off for her brothers. Never needed to have that issue explained again, but I think my point is well taken. It ain’t a fair fight.
Physical prowess is not a basis for setting human rights, but it is a basis for way too many human transactions.
Oh please, that’s not true and you know it.
No one is banning birth control, waging a war on women, or anything else of the sort. It is simply that the Catholic Church does not want to be a provider.
This is laughable. It is the basic tenet of liberalism that the state should have quite a bit to say about how people live their lives, especially those receiving benefits from the state.
You know something about shooter242 I don’t? Sounds like you got his number already. You go, girl!
Which part of “not rape” did you not understand?
In every voluntary relationship it is the woman that decides whether sex happens or not.
It is acceptable for the man to wear a condom and be responsible for the potential problem of course. In fact, as a gentleman, I insist on doing the honors for birth control.
if the woman is willing to have sex with me, the least I can do is provide the ‘coverage’
I know I provided links to you where the counsel for the USCCB stated flat out that banning contraception availability was precisely the point. I recall your response was to try to deflect that it was the lawyer and not the Bishops making that statement (technically true but I do find it laughable at the thought that a lead Counsel for something like the USCCB would make such a statement without having cleared it all the way up org chart first)
Oh, and it is NOT liberals that are telling women they have to have an invasive, non-medically necessary procedure before they can have an abortion. It is R lead state legislatures (I assume you do recognize that the various states do have a level of Big Brother powers.
And of course, the woman then has to pay for said invasive procedure herself, not the state lege demanding it.
That’s very gentlemanly of you, but it’s beside the point.
In a voluntary relationship the woman decides whether sex happens, and as a result, decide by design or neglect whether pregnancy happens.
You’ve got that right buster and don’t forget it. We are fighting to remain responsible gatekeepers.
Your partner’s reproductive freedoms dictate your own sexual freedom.
As I don’t usually engage trolls. This is the end of it.
and that’s my point. I can take action to assure pregnancy does not occur so I am just as responsible as the women.
But you know all of this, it just isn’t convenient for your talking points
Youn gotta be shittin’. Jesus Christ, shooter! You don’t appear to know a goddamned thing. The crime of forcible rape can stretch across a panoply of options, but that only begins to cover the range of coersive possibilities, which range moves quickly out of the realm of criminal presecution, and that’s outside marriage. Do you have any clue as to the range of “voluntary” relationships? I’m gonna allow incest or Church authority into your definition of rape, and you’re still in the dark. Ever hear of alcohol? You remind me of a maiden aunt: You can condemn anything by the simple expedient of slamming your mind shut when it looks like you are about to face a dilemma.
See what I mean? You’ve got me raving when I know that you are just an agent provocateur for the Bishop of Rome.
You’re making women sound like idiots.
No, you are making men seem like hapless and helpless fools.
I would wager that you also believe there shouldn’t be any child support enforcement laws since “woman decides whether sex happens, and as a result, decide by design or neglect whether pregnancy happens.”
Oops. “You go, girl!” Don’t ask me how I forgot that you’re a guy. Just over enthusiasm I guess.
Oh please. Men just want to get laid, they don’t care much about what happens after that. Some 40% of births are illegitimate, with the accompanying propensity for poverty and behavior problems. Do you think that’s a good thing? I personally think marriage is a better institution than child support laws, but it seems both are optional these days.
Considering women get the baby and the bills, while the men move on, who ends up being responsible for birth control?
It isn’t the men.
Gosh, shooter, I wish somebody had told me that before I had a wife and a house full of kids to raise.
But really of all the moralistic SOB’s in cyberspace, you take the cake. “Men just want to get laid.” You said that, you troll.