Bitter little pill

Is it the conservative campaign strategy this year to cause all sane women to lose their minds?  Because I am officially losing mine over the ridiculousness that is coming out of congress, nearly every state in the union and Rush Limbaugh's mouth.  First of all, it really goads me that we are once again in an election year and the focus is being steered away from the important issues.  The economy and gas prices are taking a back seat to non-issues like birth control and whether it should be a government concern or a moral value.  Since when do my lady parts matter more than creating jobs?  Sure, they serve a great distraction for a lot of politicians, but they shouldn't become public policy.

I am a woman and I take birth control.  Why do I take birth control?  Because I am a married woman who doesn't want nor can I afford children right now and I like to show my husband that I love him.  Put two and two together.  Does that make me a slut, Rush Limbaugh?  I am not a co-ed law student who wants the government to pay for my birth control but I do receive my birth control through my husband's insurance and ... he works for the state.  Yes!  I use birth control that is paid for by an insurance plan through the state of Connecticut.  Surely, I will burn in Hell for eternity.  But I don't feel like a prostitute and don't you dare say that I should be videotaped.

Rush Limbaugh has been married four times and he has no children.  Surely there was some kind of contraception involved in Rush's previous relationships.  Don't get me wrong, I understand Rush's argument.  He doesn't think it is okay for taxpayer money to support universal health care or birth control.  However, that same plan covers prescription painkillers. (Rush Limbaugh announced on his radio show in 2003 that he was addicted to painkillers.)  So that means half of the entertainment industry could literally feed their addiction on the government's dime but a woman who wants to protect herself from an unwanted pregnancy or treat a painful or life-threatening uteran condition is a drain?  Unreal.

Oh, wait, I forgot.  Rush Limbaugh is a lover of women, just not a lover of giving them equal rights.

"I'm a huge supporter of women. What I'm not is a supporter of liberalism. Feminism is what I oppose. Feminism has led women astray. I love the women's movement — especially when walking behind it." Rush Limbaugh, 2010

You walk behind Rush ... far behind because some day, one of those women is going to kick your ass.  That is the equivalent of saying "I support the fight against breast cancer because I love boobs."

What if the tables were turned?  What if the responsibility of contraception was left completely up to men?  I have a sneaking feeling that our world population would be a lot larger than it is right now.

I took Philosophy in college.  It was mostly a waste of my time, except for the all important abortion debate.  I had never witnessed a more polarized classroom full of slacker college students.  We had to read "The Famous Violinist" thought experiment written by Judith Jarvis Thomson:

You wake up in the morning and find yourself back to back, in bed, with an unconscious violinist. A famous unconscious violinist. He has been found to have a fatal kidney ailment, and the Society of Music Lovers has canvassed all the available medical records and found that you alone have the right blood type to help. They have therefore kidnapped you, and last night the violinist's circulatory system was plugged into yours, so that your kidneys can be used to extract poisons from his blood as well as your own. ... To unplug you would be to kill him. But never mind, it's only for nine months. By then he will have recovered from his ailment, and can safely be unplugged from you. 

Who is to say that the famous violinist's life is any more valuable than your own?  That is why this argument is brilliant because it encapsulates what it feels like to be a woman with an unwanted pregnancy.  Sometimes, no amount of "fibbing" or vaginal wand ultrasounds are going to make that woman want to sacrifice her body and let's face it, the rest of her life, for that child.  "Kidnapped" is a play on words because the woman is literally abducted by the child.  Everything a woman does for the nine months she is pregnant is for the benefit of the child.  The famous violinist will be back on their feet after nine months and will be gone with hopefully a "thank you."  Raising a child takes a lifetime. A woman who becomes pregnant either through a mistake or through brutal force, like rape, should have the freedom to choose whether they want to keep the child or not.

How about this scenario.  A woman, who could have taken birth control if only it were paid for through her insurance, becomes pregnant and then finds herself alone.  The person who impregnated her wants nothing to do with the child that she is about to have.  Once she gives birth, she is unable to support herself and her child financially; her job doesn't pay enough and she doesn't receive health insurance.  Also, daycare is far too expensive.  So now, it makes more sense for her to stay at home and take care of her child.  Instead, she receives support from the state and federal government.

I am not a mathematician but the money that her insurance could have paid for in birth control is probably (definitely) a lot less than what the state and federal government will end up paying for that child over the course of their lifetime.

What is the argument now?  Teach abstinence in schools so that young adults do not have sex before marriage.  After marriage people will most assuredly be able to pay for the children they have during their only pro-creation sex interludes.  Please.  Why do you think the Duggars have 20 children and allowed their life to be turned into a reality television show for TLC?  It's because they like to have sex and they need money to pay for their dozens of children. Sex is enjoyable and if people think that it should only be pro-creation then they are missing out.

So this is my message to conservatives: get off your high horses, mingle with the heathens and leave my lady parts alone!