Abortion is a contentious issue in American society. Some regard it as an immoral abomination while others regard it as fundamental to reproductive liberty and privacy. Contraception is starting to be treated in a similar manner. It is, then, natural that there would be regular news stories involving abortion and contraceptives - what place do they have in society? Should they be legal and available?
Conservative Christians have been advocating the right of individuals to refuse to do their jobs when they have religious objections - for example, pharmacists should be able to refuse to dispense valid medication when they disagree with how the patient lives. I don't think that they expect this principle to end up being used against them, though.
For quite some time the Bush administration has been pushing abstinence-only education for schools. They aren't content with simply promoting abstinence alongside other birth-control methods just in case abstinence doesn't happen; no, they have to promote abstinence as the only option. Now, they are trying to do the same with adults: no sex until marriage (so no sex at all for gays).
Should religiously-motivated organizations, not just religious institutions like churches, be exempt from a requirement to provide health insurance that covers contraception? A New York state law said that religiously motivated organizations should not be exempt and they sued. The state's highest court disagreed and found in favor of the state.
Should laws against abortion contain provisions exempting cases where a woman's life is in danger? Even the most stringent anti-abortion laws in America have usually contained such an exemption. It's a way for anti-abortion zealots to pretend that they are moderately reasonable. Some, though, insist that no such provision is needed because pregnancy never poses any health risks to mothers.
The trend in America for pharmacists to refuse to do their job by refusing to dispense emergency contraception whenever it offends their religious sensibilities seems to be infecting Britain as well. A Muslim pharmacist wouldn't allow a woman to have emergency contraceptives prescribed by her physician because it was contrary to his religion for her to have such a thing.
The anti-choice movement has made great strides in America. Today it is focused entirely on abortion - the choice which they are determined to eliminate is the ability of women to choose to have an abortion. It is not, however, the only choice they are interested in ending. Logically, politically, and religiously they also seek to end other choices for women and couples in America.
Christian terrorism against abortion clinics and the people who work in them received a lot of publicity during the 1990s. One consequence of that attention was the passage of laws in a few states protecting abortion providers from harassment and other threatening behavior. Did it help? Apparently not - the risk of violence isn't any lower today than before.
Traditional tactics used by anti-abortion activists include protests, picket lines, and even attempts to intimidate workers from abortion clinics at their homes. Recently, though, a new tactic has been in development: buying up the property used by abortion clinics and then refusing to renew their leases. This gets rid of the clinic for good, whether they want to go or not.
I've written many times about the unprofessional and unethical behavior of pharmacists who try to deny emergency contraception to women on the basis of personal moral judgments rather than objective medical criteria. Unfortunately, pharmacists aren't the only ones infected by the disease of moral egotism and self-righteous superiority. Some hospitals and doctors are behaving just as badly.
In Davenport, Iowa, David McMenemy decided that it would be a good idea to destroy an abortion clinic. Lacking the ability or perhaps the time to construct a bomb, he seems to have decided to simply use his car, kamikazee-style, to ram the clinic and bring the place down. Killing the people who work there was probably a goal of his as well. Things didn't work out as planned, though.
The NYCLU and others have filed complaints against pharmacists in the Albany region for refusing to dispense emergency contraception with refills. Apparently these pharmacists didn't have a problem with women using it once, but they did object to women using it more than once.
Many liberals would like to see the development of a 'Religious Left' to counter the influence of the 'Religious Right' and demonstrate that religious (read: Christian) values can be used in defense of liberal social programs. Just how 'liberal' are the leaders of this movement, though? Maybe not as liberal and progressive as some believe - just find out what they really think about abortion.
Supporters of abortion rights have launched a week-long protest in Jackson, Mississippi to keep that state's last remaining abortion provider open. Those who want abortion to be criminalized are also protesting the clinic to get it shut down - they are anxious to see that no women in Mississippi are able to obtain abortions.
The Christian Right constantly harps on the importance of abstinence as the only reliable means for avoiding pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases. You might think that they do this out of the conviction that avoiding unwanted pregnancy and STDs is an important good, but you'd be wrong. Avoiding them is only secondary to the goal of not having sex.
There is a growing movement in the Christian Right to give pharmacists to ability to refuse to help customers obtain prescribed birth control medication. This is only the first step and their goal appears to be to get all levels of health care workers to be able to refuse to have anything to do with sexual and reproductive medicine which the Christian Right objects to. Some courts refuse to play.
The Republican war on science, facts, and reality continues: Rep. Mark Souder (R-Ind.) has intervened in a federal panel on sexually transmitted diseases to include two proponents of abstinence-only programs. These two were not vetted in any peer-reviewed or scientific process. They are there only because they promote the political ideology of Republican politicians.
At first, right-wing pharmacists only refused to dispense drugs they claimed caused abortions, and the government rolled over to allow them to do. Then the right-wing pharmacists refused to dispense contraceptives, and again the government rolled over. Now the right-wing pharmacists are refusing to dispense vitamins and antibiotics, if they are prescribed by the "wrong" people.
Most people who oppose legalized abortion are willing to make exceptions for cases of rape and/or incest. This is inconsistent with the principles of the anti-choice position, but the new South Dakota ban on abortions is consistent because it doesn't allow for such exceptions. Still, there may be times where the exception for saving the mother's life would still apply in the case of rape.
Why don't conservatives in America think that healthcare professionals should have to do their jobs? Because sometimes doing their jobs means participating in decisions which violates religious beliefs. This may include helping with abortions, helping with contraception, or simply treating queers. We can't have that, now can we?
In Shreveport, Louisiana, someone tried to firebomb an abortion clinic. Do you remember reading or hearing about this on the news? Probably not - despite the fact that it was likely an act of terrorism and the fact that it's been a while since anyone has attacked an abortion clinic, the media has remained largely silent on the story. Why?
In Illinois, Walgreen has suspended four pharmacists who refused to fill prescriptions for emergency contraception because of their religious objections to the medication. This violates Illinois law, not to mention the rights of the women with the prescriptions.
In Niles, Michigan, Amanda Blake visited a doctor in order to get a prescription for birth control pill. What the 18-year-old Wiccan received was not a medical examination nor even a prescription; instead, she received a lecture from the doctor on values, morality, and religion. Did she take a wrong turn and visit a church by mistake? No, just a bad doctor.
Religious conservatives have been putting a lot of effort into pushing 'fetal pain' laws designed to force abortion providers to tell patients that, after a certain stage, the fetus will experience pain from the abortion. Problem is, the standards being used are not based on science or medical evidence. It's one more example of ideology trumpeting reality.
Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney, often seen courting the Christian Right in an apparent preparation to run for president, has agreed to require all hospitals in the state to provide emergency contraception. He had been expected to grant Catholic hospitals a special exemption from the general regulation, but his lawyers convinced him not to.
Pharmacists are supposed to be medical professionals and, as such, they are supposed to take an oath before they can begin practicing. In all of the news stories about pharmacists refusing to do their job and dispense contraceptives if they religious objections to it, we don't hear about this oath and how these pharmacists aren't following it.
Many opponents of legalized abortion are willing to allow exceptions in cases of rape and incest - an incoherent position given the fact that their opposition to abortion is based on the premise that the fetus has a right to life. But what about cases of extreme disabilities?
As you may know, Target has decided to allow its pharmacists to refuse to fill prescriptions for emergency contraception. They claim that the law requires this sort of accommodation, but they also claim that this is the only product for which this sort of accommodation will be made. All other religious objections to any other product will be ignored.
Does Samuel Alito accept the existence of a right to an abortion or not? Evidence from 1985 job application suggests that he doesn't, but his defenders insist that this was a long time ago and things have changed. Wait, aren't these defenders the same ones who also argue that there isn't a right to an abortion? What's going on?
Religious conservatives are claiming a victory in their war on teen pregnancy. According to some, abstinence education has helped reduce teen pregnancies. At the same time, births to unwed mothers have increased - led by young unwed mothers. So what is going on?
A common claim from anti-choice activists is that abortion has a negative impact on women's mental health. It is surely true that some women regret abortions so much that they suffer from this - though it's hard to say how much of this is actually due to pressure from the anti-choice movement. A recent study, though, shows that abortion may make a women less likely to suffer from depression.
Most Latin American nations are bastions of conservative Catholicism, so it's not surprising that abortion is generally illegal - but that may be starting to change. Activism on behalf of legalized abortion is increasing, and so is public support for such changes.
In Tuscon, a rape victim was prevented from obtaining a 'morning after' pill to prevent conception by a Fry's pharmacist who has moral and religious objections to dispensing medication the pharmacy stocked. Unfortunately, Fry's was just about the only pharmacy in the area that did stock the medication.
Marie Bain, a drama teacher at a Scaramento Catholic school, was fired after administrators learned about her volunteer work at an abortion clinic. This may seem innocuous because such a decision follows logically from Catholic teachings. The problem is, Bain's volunteer work appears to have occurred before being hired by the school.
Religious conservatives have been working overtime to push the idea that people should be permitted to refuse to do routine aspects of their job if their religious forbids it. The primary target is getting pharmacists to be able to refuse to dispense whatever medication they want, but this won't be the last profession.
The Bush administration wants abstinence-only sex education so badly that they have tied federal funding to the existence of such programs in public schools. Maine, following Pennsylvania and California, has decided that it's better to lose this funding rather than create programs that do more harm than good.
The Christian Right likes to complain about sex in society and proclaim itself as the defenders of righteous sexual morality. For some strange reason, though, those areas of the country where the Christian Right is strongest are also those areas where teens are more likely to become mothers. Coincidence?
Experiments with RU-486, the abortion pill, are being launched in Italy and this has outraged the Vatican. L'Osservatore Romano, the Vatican's official newspaper, has condemned the experiments as an "act against life," but once again some Italians are wondering if the Vatican shouldn't keep out of Italian politics.
The Government Accountability Office is preparing a report on the FDA's actions when looking at whether to allow easier access to 'Plan B,' the emergency contraception treatment. According to what's been released so far, FDA officials weren't honest about what they were doing and why. The truth is that they held back approval on moral grounds, not health or scientific grounds.
A couple of days ago I wrote about a proposed bill that would ban non-sexual reproduction for unmarried women who don't have state authorization to use the artificial methods. A lot of negative publicity from a lot of sources occurred over the past few days and, as a consequence, the bill has been dropped. For now.
It has long been a basic principle of conservatism, and especially religious conservatism, that sex should only occur in the context of marriage and reproduction (and reproduction should only occur in the context of marriage). Scientific advances and shifting social norms have undermined all this, but some are doing what they can to reverse course.
The federal government has been doing a lot to push abstinence-only education. Responsible professionals denounce such programs as ineffective and dangerous, but that doesn't matter because the programs conform to the administration's favored religious ideology. Now, the ACLU is launching a coordinated effort to oppose them.
One of the recent legislative efforts of anti-choice activists has been to have abortion doctors tell patients that the fetus begins experiencing pain at a certain stage of pregnancy. They hope that this will discourage women from having abortions and the fact that they warnings bear little connection to reality just doesn't matter.
The Catholic Church is supposed to stay out of politics, but the Vatican has approved the creation of a new order of priests based in Texas that will not only engage in overt politics, but will reportedly endorse breaking the law in order to fight abortion.
What does the Christian Right really hope to achieve with abstinence-only education? If their goal is to reduce teen pregnancies, sexually-transmitted diseases, and sexual activity, then they will give up on the programs if they prove ineffective. Right?
In several states, minors who want abortions must either have parental permission or get a judge to approve. Some judges who disagree with abortion on moral grounds are refusing to even hear such cases. This may sound appropriate, but in fact these judges are violating their oaths to do their jobs and uphold the law.
The Christian Right likes to portray abortion as a selfish decision and women who have abortions as women who are making a selfish choice. Anti-choice partisans seem to want everyone to imagine that women have abortions in order to pursue careers, finish education, or just go on a skiing trip. The truth, however, is quite different...
The political push to allow pharmacists to refuse to do the job they were hired for whenever it suits them continues to grow. If they have their way, women will be denied access to birth control and emergency contraception - but that's just the beginning.
For moral and religious rather than scientific reasons, the Bush administration has been pushing abstinence as the solution for fighting AIDS - even to the point of under-emphasizing condom usage. This has led to increasing criticism around the world.
Anti-abortion activists who actually believe their rhetoric would have to support charging abortion doctors and women getting abortions with murder. Most don't, though, but a new law in Texas could lead to murder charges for certain abortion doctors in certain circumstances:
Susan Wood is, or was, an assistant FDA commissioner for women's health. She just resigned her post because she finally had enough of the Bush administrations' interference with science at the best of right-wing religious ideology. Plan B, the "morning after pill," has been delayed once again because the Christian Right doesn't like it.
Is abortion really murder? Anti-abortion activists like to say that it is and their rhetoric is very powerful, but for the most part that's all it is: rhetoric. They don't really believe what they are saying; if they did, they would oppose abortion even in cases of incest and rape. That they would make exceptions in such cases reveals a great deal.
If you are a woman in the military, the government will only provide medical coverage for an abortion if your life is in danger. It won't matter if the baby will be born dead or if it will be born with defects that will kill it in short order. It doesn't even matter if your pregnancy is due to rape. Why? Because of the military's interest in preserving life.
No, this isn't about me - I'm not doing anything to any pharmacists, though I've read about a few that I'd like to. Actually, the Austin City Council may become the first city in America to force pharmacies to provide access to birth control. This would be an important step forward in ensuring people's right to use contraception.
William Levada is currently prefect of the Vatican's Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, a post last held by Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger - now Pope Benedict XVI. While still Archbishop of Portland, Levada objected to paying support costs of a child fathered by a seminarian by arguing that the woman should have used birth control.
Mitt Romney, governor of Massachusetts, continues his move to the right - possibly in preparation to run for president. He vetoed a bill requiring hospitals to provide emergency contraception to rape victims, even though it can pass over his veto.
There is a growing movement in America to promote chastity and abstinence from sex among America's youth. No one disputes the fact that not having sex eliminates all of the risks of having sex, but is the elimination of all risks really worth the cost? Not many seem to think so, but that doesn't deter True Believers.
Should the decision to have an abortion be treated as a valid, moral, and even normal choice in a woman's life? Many people don't think so, and that includes people who are ostensibly supporters of legalized abortion - they may defend a woman's right to choose, but they don't think much of woman who actually do choose.
Rick Santorum, junior senator from Pennsylvania, is one of the most far-right politicians in the Republican Party. When it comes to personal sexual matters, he certainly doesn't follow the GOP script about "small government" and "limited government."
Many people who oppose abortion or who only weakly support abortion rights will often focus their objections on the idea of "abortion on demand." They see something wrong with abortion being readily available. But if abortion is not available "on demand," what is the point of it being legal?
There seems to be a common attitude shared even by abortion rights supporters that abortions shouldn't be too easy to obtain. People apparently feel that if abortions are easy to get, then they would be "abused" - as if women can't be trusted to use abortion "correctly" or as if the meaning of pregnancy would be diminished.
Fundamentalists and other religious conservatives often oppose many of the policies designed to halt the spread of AIDs - condom distribution, for example. For them, nothing short of abstinence is acceptable; as a consequence, AIDS may spread farther and faster.
Abortion has probably existed for as long as self-conscious animals have existed - pregnancy may be part of a species natural life cycle, but not every individual who becomes pregnant wants to remain that way and some will go to great lengths in order to end a pregnancy.
Medical professionals who actually deal with children have rejected the government's policy of promoting only abstinence in sex education. According to pediatricians, proper sex education should include information about and access to contraceptives.
In many areas, Wal-Mart is the primary source of goods - they are the largest and, at times, almost the only retailer around. They may also be the only pharmacy in reasonable distance, which means that if Wal-Mart refuses to stock something, it's effectively unavailable to women in rural areas. This includes emergency contraception.
Even many supporters of abortion rights denigrate the women who choose to have abortions. They may not realize it, but when they describe abortion as "horrible," they also insinuate by implication that women who get abortions are horrible (not to mention those who perform abortions).
Founded by Jerry Falwell, Liberty University is a conservative evangelical college in Virginia which has a long list of rules. Unlike any other college I've attended, though, the college will actually fine you for violating those rules. The varying levels of those fines can tell you something about what they really consider to be immoral behavior.
More and more we are hearing from medical professionals (mostly pharmacists) who assert that they should be allowed to refuse to do their normal job if doing so violates their personal conscience. Just how far can a person's conscience override their professional obligations, though?
As part of their ever-increasing effort to exert greater control over female sexuality, the Christian Right is now seeking to impose parental notification requirements on teens who want birth control pills.
Often ignored in the debates over whether pharmacists should be allowed to refuse to dispense prescribed medication because of personal ethical problems with that medication is the impact upon women's health generally. Pharmacists are part of a profession dedicated to help, not harm, health care.
Often ignored in the debates over whether pharmacists should be allowed to refuse to dispense prescribed medication because of personal ethical problems with that medication is the impact upon women's health generally. Pharmacists are part of a profession dedicated to help, not harm, health care.
In Tennessee, an unwed teenage girl appeared before Shelby County Circuit Court Judge Rita Stotts to get a judicial bypass in order to obtain an abortion - she couldn't or wouldn't, for whatever reason , get parental permission. Unfortunately, Stotts refused to believe that there was even such an option available for teens.
Pharmacists who object on moral grounds to dispensing emergency contraception argue that it prevents a fertilized egg from implanting, a form of abortion. Medically, though, that's not an abortion - an abortion only involves the removal of an implanted embryo. Even so, emergency contraception rarely even prevents implantation.
It was inevitable: pharmacist demands to refuse to dispense birth control and emergency contraception because of personal moral objections has been expanded. Pharmacists in some places are also refusing to dispense other medication, like psychotropics and even pain relievers. The ability of people to have access to proper medical care is being threatened.
One of the arguments used by religious conservatives against making "morning after" pills more widely available is that they will encourage more sex and more riskier sex. If women know that they can take a pill to prevent pregnancy, they won't be as careful when it comes to their sexual activity. Once again, though, reality contradicts religious faith.
In Texas, female bodies belong to the state rather than to the individual person - that lesson was learned by 15-year-old girl who was forced to undergo a pregnancy test merely because there was a rumor in school that she was pregnant.
Reliable, scientific, peer-reviewed studies have shown that teens who take virginity or abstinence pledges do not much reduce, over the long term, their risks of sexual activity, pregnancy, and sexually transmitted diseases. This conflicts with Christian Right ideology, so their solution is to find unreliable studies which say what they want.
It's becoming popular for Christian Right politicians to demand medical records from abortion clinics. They claim that they only want to make sure that abortions are performed in accordance with the law, but these fishing expeditions have women scared about where their private medical information will end up.
Gov. Rod Blagojevich of Illinois issued a rule requiring all pharmacists to make contraceptives available to people with prescriptions "without delay." One pharmacist is suing because he regards the "morning after" pill to be an abortifacient, not a contraceptive.
A vote in Italy on changing the nation's fertility laws only drew about 25% of eligible voters, far short of the 50% needed to make the vote legitimate. Most of those voting favored changing the law, but that doesn't matter. This is being read as a victory for the Catholic Church which told people to stay home rather than vote.
As part of their effort to "defend" American families, the American Family Association has been attacking the airing of ads for condoms during television shows at night. The ads apparently say that abstinence is the only way to prevent STDs, but if one is going to have sex then they should be responsible and use condoms. Evidently, it's bad to tell people this.
Texas Governor Rick Perry has signed into law a measure that requires girls under 18 to get written permission from their parents before they can obtain an abortion. He also signed a proposition defining marriage as being between a man and a woman. All of this was done at a conservative Christian school, signaling that the laws are designed for the Christian Right.
Italians will be voting on a referendum to appeal restrictive laws on assisted fertility. A "yes" vote would lift the ban on embryo research, lift the ban on egg and sperm donors, and increase the number of eggs that can be fertilized in fertility efforts. Pope Benedict is urging Italians to not even show up to vote.
The Christian Right likes to promote abstinence-only sex education, but a recent study has proven that a "skills-based" sex education cuts the rates of sexually transmitted diseases. This involves practical training on diseases and their prevention - including the use of condoms.
In South Carolina, Gabriela Flores is in jail for taking a medication that induced an abortion. The immigrant farm worker faces more jail time, too, if she is convicted on all charges. What did she do wrong? She took the medication on her own rather than going to a doctor she couldn't afford. Prosecutors wanted to charge her with murder and possibly apply the death penalty. For an abortion.
The Silver Ring Thing is a federally-funded program that encourages abstinence to teens. It also apparently promotes evangelical Christianity and, because of that, the ACLU is challenging the USD $1 million it has received from the taxpayers.
The Christian Right has long waged a war against access to abortion; now they are targeting contraception. The Christian Right is a driving force behind the growth of abstinence-only education programs that are designed to mislead students about condoms and, as a consequence, they increase the chances of risky sexual behavior.
In Bozeman, Montana, the high school invited someone to speak about sex. What they got was Tina Marie Holewinski and the tales she told the students were so outrageous that one parent is suing. It's incredible that someone with her profound ignorance on simple matters can go around making speeches at schools.
In Montgomery, Alabama, Alysha Cosby was forbidden from participating in the graduation ceremonies at her Catholic high school because she was pregnant. What's interesting is that the school had no problem with letting the father of the child participate - and that didn't sit well with Cosby, so she took matters into her own hands.
Catholicism forbids "artificial" birth control, but a recent survey shows that Catholic doctors are almost as likely to prescribe birth control as non-Catholics. These doctors recognize that their moral and medical responsibility lied with helping their patients, not with enforcing Vatican doctrines.
It's bad enough that pharmacists are starting to refuse to fill prescriptions for contraceptives, but now there is evidence that many pharmacies aren't even bothering to stock emergency contraceptives, thus denying women the ability to stop a pregnancy before it occurs. Why? Perhaps they don't think women should have that much power over their bodies.
In Milwaukee, Wisconsin, a pharmacist pretending to be a medical professional refused to fill a woman's prescription for emergency contraception. Not satisfied with merely not doing his job, he then proceeded to call her a "baby-killer" and traumatized her to the point that she couldn't bear to go to another pharmacist. Eventually she had an abortion.
W. David Hager is a Kentucky obstetrician, member of the advisory committee of the FDA, evangelical Christian, and outspoken opponent of abortion, stem-cell research, and contraceptives. Good Housekeeping named him "among the best doctors for women in the nation." Reports from his ex-wife suggest that he raped her repeatedly over the years.
It might seem incredible, but apparently many anti-abortion women and activists have abortions. Why? There also appears to be a common rationalization that their situation is unique and justifies an abortion, but everyone else is a slut and therefore abortion should be illegal. Rational? No - but then, neither is the anti-choice movement in the first place.
Should a woman receive worse health care because she is ovulating? That's the standard being used in Catholic hospitals, at least those in Colorado. According to their procedures, rape victims who are thought to be ovulating are denied information about all their options, like emergency contraception.
The Christian Right has gotten a lot of milage out of the abortion debate, but could new debates over contraception derail things for them? It's easy to appear mainstream when opposing abortion, but not so when opposing contraceptives.
The Christian Right's push to ensure that pharmacists don't have to do their professional duty and fill all valid prescriptions seems to extend to the promotion of unethical conduct. In other words, they are willing to violate ethical principles in order to adhere to their consciences.
The House of Representatives has passed a national "parental notification law" that will prevent young pregnant girls from getting an abortion without their parents' consent, even if they cross state lines to do it. The premise of such laws is that girls aren't mature enough to decide to have an abortion on their own - but if that's true, how are they mature enough to give birth and raise a child?
Much of the social agenda of the Christian Right turns on particular ideas about what men & women are and what sorts of social roles they are expected to have. It stands to reason, then, that one way to oppose their agenda is to be diligent in countering their efforts to define humanity.
The Christian Right has insisted on using the concept of "conscientious objector" to describe pharmacists who refuse dispense legal prescriptions on moral grounds. I'm not sure, however, if they really understand what the concept means and whether they would be willing to take it to its logical conclusion.
The Iranian parliament has approved a new law that would permit abortions during the first four months if the fetus shows signs of mental or physical handicaps. This law still has to be approved by the religious Guardian Council, but the fact that it has made it this far at all is a sign of just how far Iran has come.
Politicians want to protect the conscience of doctors who don't want to follow end-of-life directives or don't want to use treatments derived from stem-cell research. They also want to protect pharmacists who don't want to fill prescriptions for things like contraceptives. What about the consciences of the patients?
The "culture of life" ideology being promoted by the Christian Right is a cleverly packaged set of ideas which they hope to sell to the American public. This involves defining certain political goals but not others as part of the "culture of life." Recognizing how and why this occurs is very important.
A federal appeals court has rejected a challenge to Louisiana's law creating anti-abortion license plates. The court didn't address any of the constitutional questions, though. It merely decided that the fee for these plates is a "tax" and, therefore, the case belongs in state courts.
I've written many times about the growing debates over pharmacists who refuse to fill prescriptions for birth control pills. What's often missing in these debates is how important these pills can be can be to the women who take them.
Governor Bill Owens of Colorado vetoed a bill that would have required all hospitals to give information to rape victims about all their medical options - including emergency contraception. Catholic hospitals don't want to provide valid, standard medical information if it's about something that contradicts Catholic dogma.
The ability of Illinois pharmacists to ignore their professional obligations has been narrowed. Last week Governor Blagojevich issued an emergency rule requiring all pharmacies to fill prescriptions for contraceptives or to immediately transfer the prescription to another pharmacy.
There is a growing movement in America to allow pharmacists to ignore their professional obligation to fill the prescriptions written by doctors. They aren't seeking the power to refuse dangerous prescriptions; instead, they want the authority to refuse legal, valid prescriptions because they have religious objections to the drugs.
Humans are adept at creating abstract concepts that help categorize a wide array of concrete objects. Unfortunately, it's also common for the process to work in reverse: treating an abstract concept as if it were a real thing. When this happens, it's a sign of faulty reasoning.
One of the most vocal supports of the Shindlers, Terri Schiavo's parents, has been Father Frank Pavone, the national director of the anti-abortion group Priests for Life. If you pay close attention to his rhetoric, however, you'll find that his position would entail an authoritarian government where liberty is ignored.
Colorado's governor, a conservative Catholic Republican, is faced with a dilemma: should he sign a bill that would force hospitals to tell rape victims about emergency contraception? It doesn't require hospitals to dispense it, just give women the information. He and the Denver archdiocese oppose it, but it has some popular support.
About 100 people staged a protest outside a Chicago pharmacy where a pharmacist refuses to fill prescriptions for birth control pills. There's growing support for letting pharmacists get away with not doing their job and perhaps more public pressure like this will reverse the trend.
There's a new bill in Minnesota that would shift large amounts of money to anti-choice "pregnancy crisis centers." These places try to stop women from getting and abortion and don't explain to them all of their legal options.
Anti-choice activists like to use the language of abortion being murder, but when was the last time you saw someone really and consistently treating abortion as if it were murder? To what degree are the comparisons between abortion and infanticide merely offered for the sake of their emotional impact?
Anti-choice protesters try to make it difficult for Planned Parenthood clinics to stay open and provide services. They act as though abortion were the only thing going on, but what most people don't realize is that Planned Parenthood provides a wide range of medical and reproductive services - all of which are vital to the women who go there.
There is a growing movement of pharmacists who want the right to refuse filling prescriptions for birth control pills, arguing that the pills may "terminate pregnancies" and they don't want to be complicit in abortions. The problem is, though, that this requires a rhetorically useful but nevertheless dishonest change to the definition of "pregnancy."
Texas has a law criminalizing the killing of a fetus except in an abortion. This law is being used to prosecute a young man who, at the request of his girlfriend, tried to induce a miscarriage. Make sense? Not in the reality based world, but it makes perfect sense in the faith-based world where abortion is murder.
Why does the attorney general of Kansas want detailed records of women who have had a late-term abortion? It's claimed that he wants to search them for evidence of crimes.
It's interesting how often conservative critics link complaints about abortion and evolution. There is no inherent connection, but there seems to be in the critics' minds. This helps demonstrate, I think, that their complaints are based primarily on religious dogma rather than reason, logic, or common sense.
The South Dakota House of Representatives has passed a law that would make abortion a felony in all cases except those to save the life of the mother. Not even rape, incest, or other health considerations would be valid exceptions. This law will only take effect if Roe v. Wade is overturned and states get the right to criminalize abortion.
A couple is suing a fertility clinic that accidentally destroyed a healthy embryo of theirs. They are calling it "wrongful death" and because a judge has ruled that the suit can go forward, it looks like the embryo will be treated as a person under the law. The implications for such a decision should be obvious.
In Florida, a school's "career day" exhibition turned into an anti-abortion exhibition when the Pregnancy Center of Pinellas County booth presented models of fetuses at different stages of development and anti-abortion pamphlets. Were they looking for recruits for abortion-center protests?
Does the right to have an abortion really matter much? Some might not think so, imagining that now that it exists it's safe or, even worse, that it's ultimately irrelevant whether abortion is legal or not. These positions seem to be based upon complete ignorance of what life was like for women before they could obtain safe, legal abortions.
Crist Mortuary in Boulder, Colorado, has been taking the ashes from cremated fetuses and giving them to a local Catholic Church. On the 32nd anniversary of Roe v. Wade, the church buried the remains in a grand ceremony. I wonder why the transfer of the ashes has been kept quite from everyone else, especially the abortion clinic that they were obtained from?
The 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that South Carolina's "Choose Life" license plates were unconstitutional because they endorsed one side of the abortion debate and didn't provide a forum for the other side. The Supreme Court has let that ruling stand, a decision that could affect similar programs elsewhere.
Many states have "parental notification" laws making it illegal for a minor to get an abortion without parental consent or a judicial waiver. Even many defenders of abortion rights tend to agree that such laws are reasonable, but people need to understand that they can be abused by conservative judges.
In Olympia, Washington, an abortion clinic was severely damaged in a fire that investigators say was deliberately set. The close proximity of the anniversary of Roe v. Wade probably isn't a coincidence in this latest example of domestic, Christian terrorism.
In what many will perceive as a sign of the growing lunacy of the Christian Right, Delegate John Cosgrove has introduced a bill in Virginia that would require all women to report a miscarriage within 12 hours or risk 12 months in jail and a USD $2,500 fine. Lunacy? No, it's quite consistent and expected within the Christian Right's war on abortion.
There are 13 states with "Choose Life" license plates that benefit anti-abortion groups. In a couple of cases abortion rights groups have successfully sued, arguing that the state can't privilege one viewpoint like that. A request was sent to New York for such a plate, but it was denied - now there is a lawsuit over that.
The U.S. Department of Justice has finally released guidelines on the medical treatment of victims of sexual assault - their first ever. One thing missing from the guidelines, though, is any mention of emergency contraception. Because it doesn't work? No, because of politics.
A Court of Queen's Bench judge in Manitoba has ruled that the province must pay for all therapeutic abortions and that it violated Canada's Charter of Rights and Freedoms when it refused to do so for two women who then had to pay for private abortions.
It seems like Mississippi is one of the toughest, if not the toughest, state for women to get an abortion in. The legislature hasn't seen an anti-abortion measure that it doesn't like and there is a single abortion clinic for the entire population. Could this be where the majority of the nation is headed? Some hope so.
Van Golden is a Christian anti-abortion activist from Texas. He is also an anti-abortion voter who has sold his home and moved to China so he can be treated for spine damage suffered from an auto accident. The treatment: cells from aborted fetuses.
A provision in a federal spending bill requires states to exempt health care providers and insurers from any state laws that would force them to provide abortions, make abortion referrals, or pay for abortions. California Attorney General Bill Lockyer is suing over this, saying that it undermines California's protections of women's rights.
Republican efforts to end abortion have already begun. Inserted in a recent spending bill was the non-spending provision that would invalidate state laws requiring hospitals to provide abortion services.
Religious conservatives like to complain about "judicial activism," claiming that judges should "interpret" the law rather than "make" it. Experience teaches, however, that what religious conservatives really mean by "judicial activism" tends to boil down to simply "any decision I don't like." It's not a legal principle, it's a rhetorical device to mask their political agenda.
For a while now anti-abortion activists have relied upon dubious links between abortion and breast cancer to try to dissuade women from aborting. They've even had some success in getting state regulations to force doctors to inform women about the "risk." The fact that the best scientific data available refutes such claims just doesn't matter.
The future of legal abortions in America is very much in doubt. There is every reason to believe that, during his second term, George W. Bush will appoint enough justices to the Supreme Court that Roe v. Wade can be overturned the next time it comes up. What will a post-Roe America look like? What are people doing to prepare themselves?
Poland's anti-abortion laws are so strict that many are forced to seek illegal and unsafe procedures. Poland currently have a leftist government that would like to revise the laws, but the penetration of strict Catholicism throughout Polish society makes it difficult and they hope that recent UN comments on the laws may help them.
Scientists at the University of Louisville have created a means to restore the vision to at least some blind people. The cost, however, is that they must use of eye cells removed from an aborted fetus. For some that will be a cost that is too high to accept personally; for others it is a cost too high to allow to happen at all.
For a short time Planned Parenthood sold t-shirts that stated openly and unapologetically "I had an abortion." PP was savagely attacked for this on the assumption that there is something so shameful about having an abortion that no decent person should be encouraged to say so publicly. You can't stigmatize abortion, though, without stigmatizing the women who have had abortions.
If the Roe v. Wade decision that legalized abortion were overturned, abortion would become illegal in at least 30 sates, some immediately and some a bit later on. In most of America, then, a safe and legal abortion would become unavailable because of the dominance of religious conservatives.
The other day I wrote about a Dutch "abortion ship" traveling to Portugal in order to offer abortion pills. Portugal, which has Europe's toughest ant-abortion laws, will refuse to allow the ship to enter its territorial waters.
A Mexican woman deported by the U.S. government and who is 8-months pregnant is hoping that the courts will order her return. She argues that her fetus was viable at the time of deportation, making it a U.S. citizen and that it has a right to the better healthcare available in America. If the argument works it could cause political problems for everyone.
No, this isn't a personal apology from me. This is a about a newly created campaign about abortion: instead being ashamed of having had an abortion, women who have undergone the procedure and are happier because of it are being encouraged to speak out, speak up, and make it known that abortion can be a positive choice.
Because so many countries have strict laws against abortion, a group of people have created a ship which is capable of going around the world and providing abortion medication off-shore where it is legal. Now, that ship will be visiting Portugal which has Europe's toughest anti-abortion laws.
The Christian Right's war on abortion is having the effect of reducing women's choices even though abortion is legal because fewer and fewer doctors learn how to or are willing to perform the procedure - especially dialations and extractions (intact D&Es), labeled "partial-birth abortions" by opponents, even though they are needed for women whose fetuses have died.
The traditional assumption is that if a person is opposed to abortion they should vote for the candidate who is most likely to criminalize abortion. But what if that is wrong? The number of abortions has increased dramatically under President Bush, so perhaps the policies of abortion opponents are not the best way to eliminate abortion after all.
One of the complaints often raised by anti-abortion activists is the fact that abortion was legalized through a decision of the Supreme Court rather than through an act of Congress or various state government. Thus, they contend, abortion is legal solely through un- and anti-democratic means. This is supposed to taint abortion generally, somehow.
A 14-year-old student in Florida wanted to distribute anti-abortion pamphlets in school but administrators refused to allow it. She took the school to court and a federal judge sided with the administrators, ruling that the district's policy is reasonable and justified.
Abortion is legal in Nepal, but difficult to obtain - it is estimated that Nepalese women get around 57,000 unsafe abortions every year. The first government hospital offering free abortions has opened and large numbers of women are seeking out the service.
William A. Graham, an anti-abortion activist in Louisiana, has been accused of creating the 'Causeway Center for Women' as a means to prevent women from getting abortions. Apparently he advertised himself as an 'abortion provider' and then just strung women along until it was too late for them to get a legal abortion.
I noted a few days ago that Rush Limbaugh is getting divorced. This is posing a bit of a problem for some social and religious conservatives because Rush is "one of them,"? but divorce is also contrary to the moral principles they typically promote. Some are blaming his divorce on the assumption that he used contraception.
The debate over giving communion to pro-choice Democrats has raised questions about whether the Democratic Party has room for pro-life candidates or if it imposes a pro-choice orthodoxy. One example used to support this claim is the experience of former Pennsylvania Governor Bob Casey during the 1992 convention - was he denied the chance to speak because he was pro-life?
Although it's gotten a lot of attention and support in America, there doesn't seem to be as much interest in Europe for giving a fetus the same right to life as an adult human being. The European Court has recent ruled that no such right exists and there has no been outcry against the decision.
One argument in defense of abortion which does not dispute the pro-life position that the fetus might have a right to live is the idea that such a right to life does not include a right to use the mother's womb. Because of this, abortion is still licit and ethical, regardless of the moral status of the fetus. Some, though, disagree with this.
Although most people aren't aware of it yet, the fight against abortion also includes a fight against all forms of contraception, including The Pill. This connection is being made increasingly evident by the numbers of doctors and pharmacists who refuse to prescribe or distribute contraceptives.
