-Submitted by David Drumm (Nal), Guest Blogger
The push by Republicans to deny funding of Planned Parenthood has been justified by citing the abortion services provided by Planned Parenthood. However, the contraceptives provided by Planned Parenthood prevent abortions. Cutting funding for contraception would actually
increase abortions.
The Republicans have tried to frame the issue as a fight against abortion. We have discussed how Sen. Jon Kyl (R-AZ) took to the Senate floor to falsely claim that well over 90 percent of what Planned Parenthood provides is abortion services, here.
Rep. Steve King (R-IA) has let the cat out of the bag. It’s not about abortion, it’s about promiscuity.
“Planned Parenthood,” King said gravely, “is invested in promiscuity.”
At least he is honest enough to drop the pretense that the defunding of Planned Parenthood is about abortion.
There has always been a cognitive dissonance from the pro-life camp who see abortion as this great evil and also refuse to support contraception. It has always been about sex. That is the real reason that the pro-life crowd supports abstinence-only as the only form of birth control. It’s about control over a woman’s sexual persona.
It is ironic that the ones who so quickly condemn government intervention in its citizen’s private lives, can so readily support measures that would allow government intrusion in the most personal aspect of human existence.
H/T: Pema Levy, Political Correction.
@SM: That may be so, and I don’t keep up with the Pope’s edicts, but last I heard (from Catholic friends) contraceptives were still considered a sin by the Catholic Church.
I’m pretty sure most religious people are hypocrites on this matter and many others; they advocate publicly for policies they have no intention of following privately, even when they know full well this is the case. There’s always an excuse for why they are different, but we have to follow their rules.
http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/04/13/us-contraceptives-religion-idUSTRE73C7W020110413 Ninety -eight percent of catholic women have used contraceptives.
@tomdarch:
I am a social liberal. But the way I perceive Republicans, Planned Parenthood by its very nature seems unnatural and anti-religious. To them, pregnancy is something that happens naturally and is controlled by God. Preventing pregnancy is a sin, according to the Catholic Church.
Between the Bible, the Pope and the preachers, they just don’t like anything that remotely gives women a chance to have sex without risking the consequences of pregnancy. They are opposed to ANY form of birth control that isn’t abstinence: Condoms, the pill, abortion, sex education, whatever: If it means their daughter can have sex before she is married they hate it.
Essentially, they want to frighten their kids into abstinence, and all forms of birth control besides abstinence enable the sin of sex for fun, when sex is supposed to be reserved for a married man and woman.
I’ll take Self-Righteous Hypocrisy for a thousand
The answer is: Promiscuity
*Bing*
What are Republican politicians invested in?
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So, the Guttmacher Institute is the real deal – members of “the reality based community” and not likely to have to issues statements about “not intending to make factual statements.”
Their site if chock full of interesting research and results. I highly recommend checking it out and reading some of their “overview” papers/pages:
http://www.guttmacher.org
My non-exhaustive search of the site has failed to turn up either of the stats that “Lisa Nolin” made reference to. It seems plausible that mere availability of contraception may not strictly correlate with abortion rates, but I wasn’t able to find that data on the Guttmacher site. Also, I saw nothing on the site that reported data in the form of “the abortion rate … in NYC at 41%.” They tend to discuss “abortions per year per thousand women of a certain age range,” but not “rate in percent.” This causes me to have doubts about that “41%” claim as being actually sourced from Guttmacher – it’s possible, but I didn’t see any stats in that form.
(As an interesting aside – something that doesn’t seem to be discussed anywhere across the political spectrum: According to the Guttmacher research, more than half (about 60%) of all abortions in the US are obtained by women who already have at least one child.
Source Presentation: Trends in Abortion in the United States, 1973–2008)
That said, the Guttmacher research does point to why abortion rates in New York City might be higher than the national average. Rates of abortion correlate very strongly with poverty and black/Hispanic “race”. Again, why are Republicans frothing at the mouth about Planned Parenthood?
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0411/53367.html Christy Vilsack is likely to run against Steven King.
It is also interesting that the ones who find racism under every leaf, turn a blind eye to the massive evidence of racism of Planned Parenthood- watch the documentary Maafa21 for proof http://www.maafa21.com
Elaine,
You are right about the rhythm method. That is how the old joke got started. “what do you call people who use the rhythm method? …..Parents. 🙂
Elaine,
There are many paths to beauty. lol
Buddha,
Avocados? I assumed it was your intake of chlorophyll that gave you that green sheen.
😉
Elaine,
I too love the Haas avocado. How else do you think I maintain my boyishly green complexion? That Rudolf Haas was a genius!
Buddha,
🙂
That contraceptive method you wrote of–it must be about as effective as the “rhythm method.” I do love Haas avocados. I make a tasty guacamole with them.
Elaine asked, “Pray tell–what is ‘some form of contraceptives’ that those women were using when they got pregnant?”
It was the one where you chant “No baby! No baby! No baby!” over an avocado while burning incense made out of resin of the Eastern Yellow Pine before smashing the avocado with a croquet mallet and sending the bruised pit to the Pope via passenger pigeon.
This method ceased to be as effective in 1914 due to the extinction of passenger pigeons, but cheaper to implement with the advent of the Haas avocado in 1935.