-Submitted by David Drumm (Nal), Guest Blogger
In a recent full-page paid advertisement in the Washington Post, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) and dozens of leaders of Catholic organizations voiced their opposition to the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) rule which they describe as forcing private health providers to provide “preventive services.” The HHS plan mandates, without charging a co-pay, co-insurance or a deductible, the provision of FDA-approved contraception methods. The advertisement claims these drugs may cause abortions which, by their definition, includes any single-celled fertilized egg that doesn’t implant.
The ad claims that following the HHS rule would violate their religious liberty and freedom of conscience.
Upon closer examination, their claims are based on dubious assumptions. Consider the claim that the rule would “forc[e] almost all private health plans” to provide a particular coverage. The implication is that the government would force private insurers to provide this coverage, against their will. I am skeptical that the USCCB has surveyed insurance providers to support this claim. It is reasonable that insurance providers would see preventative measures as a cost-effective tool to reduce payouts. Many more insurance providers would provide contraception coverage were it not for pressure brought by these organizations. The HHS rule would give those insurance providers, who want to provide contraception coverage, the freedom to do so without fear of harassment or boycott.
An employer who provides workplace health insurance can, based on religious beliefs, coerce female employees to sign up with an insurance plan that does not cover contraception. An employee, who may not share the employer’s religious beliefs, is denied her right to contraception as found in Griswold v. Connecticut and Eisenstadt v. Baird.
In a news release from HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, the state provides a compelling rationale for the rule:
Scientists have abundant evidence that birth control has significant health benefits for women and their families, it is documented to significantly reduce health costs, and is the most commonly taken drug in America by young and middle-aged women.
Health care providers have a professional responsibility to their patients that transcends personal convictions. The duties of a health care professional are based on the best available science and are not there to be molded to fit their personal preferences.
The HHS rule includes a waiver that allows certain nonprofit religious employers to opt-out of the preventative services requirement. Other nonprofit employers who, because of religious convictions, do not provide preventative services in their insurance plans will be given one year to comply with the new rule.
The war on contraception is, in fact, a war on a woman’s right to engage in nonprocreative sexual intercourse. Those who often decry governmental intrusion in our lives are the first to support governmental intrusion into our sexual choices.
H/T: Sarah Posner.
mike – you say “but I would hardly impose that belief on others”
Laws do impose.
In our evolution and genetics class, when informed that certain female birds can expel unwanted semen from their cloacal organs. The young girls exchanged approving glances.
Does anyone believe that most intercourse happens due to pro-creative reasons?
If so, then what do these males have to protect? Only during certain short periods can women conceive, and thus will not be impelled otherwise. Right?
Middle finger guy, no one is FOR abortion. Pro life or anti choice, I doubt you will find anyone who says “Oh yes, I like abortion.”
(1) 60% of Americans dislike abortions (http://www.gallup.com/poll/147734/Americans-Split-Along-Pro-Choice-Pro-Life-Lines.aspx)
I dislike abortion. Had the situation come up for me I would not have had one, unless medically necessary or rape/incest, but It is not my place to decide for someone else. So ask me, do you like abortion or dislike abortion? I dislike it.
Interesting – gallup reports “Majorities of adults under 55 call themselves “pro-choice,” while about half of those 55 and older are “pro-life.” In other words those who more probably will not have to face the situation anymore, due to age, are in the higher percentile of against.
BTW, you are wrong in saying most against,
Legal under any circumstance 27%
legal under certain (no specification what conditions) 50%
therefore 77% believe abortion should be legal.
illegal in all 22%
If you want to put it in negative light like your cnn click then yes 72% against but that makes less sense since the majority of that number says should be legal even if they would like parameters placed on it..
Most do not agree with you. period.
“Gene, please explain how people are not free from personal religious views in America.”
The Free Exercise Clause of the 1st Amendment guarantees that a person can have their choice in religious beliefs. This includes the choice not to have any. The Establishment Clause prevents the government from endorsing religious beliefs via laws absent a secular purpose, such a law must neither advance nor inhibit any particular religion and such a law must avoid “excessive entanglement” with religion. Lemon v. Kurtzman, 403 U.S. 602 (1971). Trying to use the mechanisms of law to force your religious beliefs about contraception on others fails the Lemon test. There is no secular purpose in denying others the choice to use contraception or have abortions, trying to do so advances your religious choices and inhibits the religious choices of others and such a law would create excessive entanglement. Allowing others to have access and the freedom to make their own choices in health care based upon their own religious preferences or lack thereof does not prevent you from exercising your choices. Again, if you don’t like contraception, don’t use it, and if you don’t like abortions, don’t get one. No one is forcing their religious choices upon you. You, however, would seek to enforce your religious choices upon others by force of law by denying their rights to choose and access to health care options – health care options that when provided by government are required to be applied equally to all citizens no matter their 1st Amendment protected religious choices.
That’s unconstitutional.
It violates both the Establishment Clause and the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment.
The phrase:
was not intended to be “particularly useful or persuasive.”
It was intended to be accurate, concise, and provocative.
As to accuracy: a woman who is trying to conceive needs no contraception, a woman not engaged in sexual intercourse needs no contraception, therefore, only a woman engaged in sexual intercourse and doesn’t want to get pregnant needs contraception.
When you scrape off the flimsy veneer of religious arguments against contraception, this is the logical conclusion.
“But no, some people would rather see the government force someone to do something that is against their beliefs so that they themselves can get something a little easier at a little cheaper price.” (LibertyForAll)
Of course you missed the point because it interferes with your spin.
See Mike’s column today and then read the book.
Lottakatz,
“‘no sex for fun only”
One might surmise that any woman who is having intimate relations with Santorum ain’t having any fun…at all. In regard to Newt: I’d say his former mistress/present wife had to be titillated by bling from Tiffany’s.
😉
Blouise,
Yes, thank you for that. Where you stand I don’t know.
But that is part of many religions, but not all. Where does this idea originate? That striving against ones carnate needs, etc is reaching for a greater thing—-never defined except in mystical terms. Curiosly, forseeing the future, bending nature to our will, etc are all survival arts, and natural. But the urge to unite with God (what is that but a self-induced intoxication) through plaguing the body in a desert, on top of a pillar, etc. to me is bizarre. Today, the single man or the one without sons is a matter of ridicule in semitic tribes. Surely it must be pre-Platonic. Not well informed there. Even the young half-berber who became St Augustine prayed: “Make me chaste O God, but not now, not now.” Which would have forced him to leave his mistress of ten years.
Islam, which says that God created everything, and thus nothing in itself is evil, still wanders from the Prophet’s words that women are equal before Alllah, and thus certainly co-equal with men. Square that circle with today’s islamic culture. Their feer of idolization as proscribed by Moses, prevent all expression of praise of Allah through ornamenting Allah’s place of worship with literal praises through natural images. In reality there is one prominent one but not known to many.
More of your points, please. And pardon the wordiness here.
.
Middlefingerguy, Your posted reply to me has nothing to do with what I wrote. I challenged your statement
(To Nal) “When you write, The war on contraception is, in fact, a war on a woman’s right to engage in nonprocreative sexual intercourse. well that’s where I think you fail your reader and yourself.”
and used Santorum’s disdain for the possibility of sex for the sake of pleasure alone- non-reproductive based sex. I also stated that there were a number of twisted men just like himself running for office on the Republican platform. I didn’t say anything about abortion or use logic that implied 60% of the citizenry “were complete and utter assholes”.
So what’s the beef, are you a Santorum fan, a ‘no abortion no matter what’ adherent (22% of the population is) or what? Either all the guys running on the R ticket are pandering liars or they’re honestly and heavily into religion based control of women’s sexuality which ultimately devolves to ‘no sex for fun only’. Santorum just puts it into (in artful) words. Looks to me like they’re all of the same cloth.
If the Obama administration actually believed in contraceptive access, not only would they have let the approval for Plan B move forward, but they would be directing the FDA to give oral contraceptives to over-the-counter status, where they rightly belong.
Gene, please explain how people are not free from personal religious views in America.
Blousie says her daughter’s insurance company has never covered birth control. Well, my insurance doesn’t even cover fillings for my teeth. Is she claiming that no insurance companies cover Bc? If not, what is her point? Get insurance that covers it if you want it covered. Or simply go buy a box of condoms and some foam. But no, some people would rather see the government force someone to do something that is against their beliefs so that they themselves can get something a little easier at a little cheaper price.
“The freedom to associate, conduct business, and abide within our own personal religious views is at the very heart of the first amendment.”
So is the right to be free from your personal religious views. The 1st Amendment guarantees both Free Exercise and freedom from Establishment. The answer here is simple. If you don’t like contraception, don’t use it. If you don’t like abortions, don’t get one. No one is forcing you to do either. However, your beliefs don’t entitle you to use the force of law to keep others who don’t share in your beliefs to adopt your practices.
One more bit of mockery to those less, uhmm, endowed.
“Poor, poor insurance companies. Forced to….. whatever!:
It isn’t enough that we have to pay taxes, provide fire-safe hygenic working conditions which are forced on us, we’re even forced to pay minimum wages—-even to illegal immigrants who are willing to work for half that, not to speak of their kids who do our internal post system for nothing, …….
Sniff, sniff. Waaahhhh! Woe is me and my bonus.”
You enjoy the benefits and you pay the price. How equally is another question.
This is supposed to be a nation of laws. If the government can dictate to businesses which services it must or must not provide to customers, then we are all subject to the whims of the tyrant in power at any given time. The fruit is currently ripe on the tree for nal and those like him who support contraception. But when another tyrant attempts to enforce the opposite political position based on his/her perceived authority to dictate the business practices of insurance companies, then these same people will suddenly be singing a different tune. You had better hope that Santorum isn’t made HHS secretary. He might dictate to insurance Providers that they must cease all coverage of contraception. If it were to happen, you can blame yourselves for supporting the legal grounds he stands on. This article is so blatantly anti-constitutional, anti-liberty, and pro-tyranny I am surprised Jonathan even posted it. The law is there to protect us from tyrannical whims of politicians. Respect it or you will be the next one to get burned. The freedom to associate, conduct business, and abide within our own personal religious views is at the very heart of the first amendment.
So instead, you’d rather live under the Dominance of the Damn Catholic church, right? Well here’s what I say……. F-U-C-K you Catholic church, with every fibre of my soul…………
“If we were to admit the sense of nature’s genetic requirements, then our culture would be far more productive and harmonious. I hope this point of view encourages speculation on how it could be formed.” (idealist707)
Simple yet so very complicated … the sticky part lies within the first few words “If we were to admit the sense of nature’s genetic requirements …” For many, denying that sense is part and parcel of holiness.
The Right’s real religion is to keep women under male control.
raff,
My daughters’ insurance companies (they each have a different provider ) have never covered birth control. Organized religion has “controlled” this issues for decades.
That the government should cease allowing that control to continue is the issue.
You saw the spin puzzling used … it was a great example of the spin organized religion has encouraged its followers to employ.
Government is trying to control your life and you all know its best if we, your chosen religion, controls everybody’s life.
Gee whiz, where to start.
Let’s put politics and releigion aside. They’re just human constructs and are motivatied only by power needs, not humantarian ones.
Take nature: Let start with a counter assertion to an expected critticism: “do you want to be like the apes”; to which I reply; preferably that than where we have come now.
Examples.
Here is a stat for a point made earlier above. Twenty-five percent of all attached fertilized eggs (= persons?) are spontaneously aborted by the body during the first trimester. Does anybody fault God for that? Or nature for that matter?
We are servants of our genes, as Dawkins pointed out. A woman spreads her risk by mating with as many gene carrriers as possible, to improve her chance of passing on her genes. Does she make that choice? No, her genes do. And makes it pleasurable as a necessary inducement.
But men desire exclusivity, again for their genes sake—-and through chattelizing women to the level of a possession, they kept that right, well into the 20th century.
If we were to admit the sense of nature’s genetic requirements, then our culture would be far more productive and harmonious. I hope this point of view encourages speculation on how it could be formed.
puzzling,
Nice spin … but spin, never-the-less. The trick to not getting dizzy is keeping one’s eye on a fixed point …
This is why separation of church and state is so vital to our continued freedoms.