Bush vs Women

[Svenskaflicka]

From the homepage of RFSU, the Swedish organisation for sexual information.

”I will do everything in my power to restrict abortions.”
This is what George W. Bush said in The Dallas Morning News 1994. Ever since he became the president, he has done his best to fulfill that promise.

At the RFSU seminar about abortion today, Valerie DeFillipo, Senior Director at Planned Parenthood in USA, about the Bush administraion's war against women. The administration is against not only abortions, but also family planning, information and sex. Sex should only be had within a monogamous. heterosexual relationship.
The campaigns for abstaining from sex, who have a budget of $135.000.000, are forcing schools to inform their students that sex outside of marriage can be damaging to your health, physically and mentaly. When condoms are conderned, the discussion must only be about how common it is to fail with the use of condoms. In 35% of the American school districts student must only receive lections in abstaining from sex. The federal Health Department has been forced to change the information on theirwebsite and recommend abstaining from sex, instead of informing about the use of condoms.
More and more states are demanding that minors need parental approval in order to have contraceptives and the possibility to have an abortion.

The Bush administration is in many ways working to give the fetus the status of a person. For example, a fetus has right to state financed helath care, whereas the woman does not. A pregnant illegal immigrant woman has a right to receive medicine only if the medicine is to help the fetus, not if its sole purpose is to help the woman.

The budget proposal of 2004 suggests that federal funds shouldn't pay for abortions fo women in prisons, nor for women depending on federal health contribution, including poor women and federally employed women, for instance women in the military.

 

[Svenskaflicka]

Ever since Bush took power, he has done everything in his power to prevent women all over the world the right to decide over their own bodies.
Something they'd hardly dare to do on their own turf. [??? added by SF]

One of the first things Bush did was to bring back the so called gag-rule, which forbids all foreign organisations to talk about or perform abortions. If they do this, they'll lose american fundings. Those who have refused to accept this rule has had their fundings reduced, which has led to a shortage of medical supplies, a lack of condoms, and more unwwanted pregnancies.
At several UN-conferences, Bush representatives have allied with religious fundamentalists from the Vatikan, Sudan, Libya, ec. Their goal -to stop and hinder any further publishing regarding reproductive health.

Bush has also stopped the payment to the UN population fund, because of un-prooved theories about this UN-organ contributing to forced abortions in China.
Inside the circle closest to Bush, there are many known opponents of aboprtions, with connections to the christian right wing, and they have whipped their troups into voting for the president and other republicans.
One of them is John klink, former advisor to the Vatikan, who led the US delegation at the child top conference in May.
Another one is Carl Rove, the personal advisor for Bush. As a thanks to the christian right wing in USA, Bush is now making restrictions against the most poor women in the world, and their right to govern their own bodies and decide the numbers of pregnancies they want to go through.

The last attack was in the beginning of November, wen USA threatened to withdraw its support of the so called Cairo-convention. The latter was accepted at the population conference in 1994, and has been regarded as a mile stone and an international breakthrough regarding women's right to their own bodies.
So far, 179 nations has accepted this convention.

At a population conference in Bangkok in the beginning of November, USA announced that Washington will not continue to support the Cairo-convention unless there are certain changes to it. Bush wants to remove the words ”reproductive health services” which he believs are supporting free abortions.
The international family planning organisation IPPF is now encouraging al the governments and organisations in the world to mobilise in the fight for womens' rights.

The defeat in the election for congress has been another setback. The republicans are in power over the senate, and thereby they have the judicial power over the USA.
Principally, this means that they can appoint whatever judges they want. Since Bush became president, he has nominated several opponents of abortions and conservative christians to front positions, but so far, he has been met with massive criticism. A lot of people fear now that the possession of power by the republicans will grant opponents of abortions access to posts and courts that will make another therat against womens' rights. Both within USA and internationally.
This because of an election where only 30% of those allowed to vote, did so.
This is called "The Greatest Democracy On Earth".

 

[Svenskaflicka]

At the Fifth Asian and Pacific Population Conference (December 11-17, 2002) the U.S. delegation dominated negotiations with an agenda that ignored the health needs of women and girls, over the objections of every other country present. The Bush administration’s objective was to block reaffirmation of the 1994 International Conference on Population and Development’s Programme of Action, a landmark agreement in which the world’s governments committed to comprehensive actions for women’s health and rights. The U.S. delegation objected to the terms “reproductive health services” and “reproductive rights,” claiming that such phrases “promote abortion,” and stating that “the United States supports the sanctity of life from conception to natural death.” Sticking to an “abstinence-only” policy, it also tried to remove all language citing “consistent condom use” as a viable way of preventing HIV infection. In the end, the U.S. position was defeated by a vote of 32-1. This conference was the first in a series of regional meetings that will take place around the world between now and mid-2004, the tenth anniversary of the ICPD agreement.3

The marking of a sentence in red is my own. I just wanted to emphasize it. It is beautiful, isn't it, that it's more important to prevent people from using contraceptives than to stop he spreading of HIV?

 

[Svenskaflicka]

After the Bush administration notified the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations that ratification of the Convention to Eliminate All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) was “generally desirable and should be approved,” momentum to ratify it grew. But when conservatives complained that the treaty would undermine women’s femininity, the Bush administration tried to put the brakes on, informing the Committee that a new, “careful review is appropriate and necessary” and asking that it wait to vote until a review was complete. The Committee nevertheless voted 12-7 to send CEDAW to the full Senate for ratification on July 30, 2002. The Senate has yet to vote.6

It's FEMININE to be discriminated against!

 

[Svenskaflicka]

At an April 2003 meeting of the Commission on Human Rights in Geneva, the United States stood alone in opposing a resolution urging countries to commit to realizing the universal right to the highest attainable standards of physical and mental health. The resolution calls on countries to enhance their efforts to eliminate discrimination in health care, prevent violence, promote sexual and reproductive health, take steps to protect the fundamental right to health for their own citizens, and assist developing countries in achieving higher standards of health. Among the 43 countries voting, the United States was the only one to vote against the resolution.8

This is because the Bush administration believes that you should only have sex within a heterosexual marriage, and then ONLY in order to reproduce, not in order to enjoy it.

(Come on, people, sacrifice! Don't be selfish! I know you hate sex, but you have to put up with the horrible sex act in order to have children!)

 

[Svenskaflicka]

Long quote, but very interesting.

Criminalizing Abortion: The So-Called "Partial-Birth" Abortion Ban Act
On November 5, 2003, President Bush signed into law sweeping legislation limiting women's access to abortion—and enacted criminal penalties against doctors who perform them. The law refers to a nonexistent medical procedure: "Partial-birth abortion" is a political fabrication that has no medical referent, and is not, as some have incorrectly stated, the political term for a rare, late-term abortion procedure known as "intact dilation and extraction." The ban's language is so vague and unscientific that it could be construed to apply to many abortion procedures in any stage of pregnancy. Further, it contains no exception to protect the health of the woman. The bill also allows a husband to sue his wife for damages in a civil action unless she can prove he gave her permission to have the procedure (if the woman is under 18, her parents can sue her). After Bush signed the law, three suits were immediately filed challenging its constitutionality. In each case, judges have temporarily blocked implementation of the law.

Enforcement of the Abortion Ban: Adding Insult to Injury
Once the highly questionable “partial-birth” abortion ban was enacted, the Bush administration added insult to injury when Attorney General John Ashcroft decided that the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division, rather than its Criminal Division, would be responsible for enforcing the ban. In a letter to Ashcroft protesting this decision, Democrats on the House Judiciary Committee wrote: “t is ‘Orwellian’ that you would have the Civil Rights Division enforce a law which has been essentially found by the Supreme Court to violate the civil rights of millions of American women.” Additionally, the Administration continues to promote the so-called civil rights of fetuses over those of women, indicating its desire to undermine—if not overturn—Roe v. Wade. Although three federal judges have blocked enforcement of the law on the grounds that it is unconstitutional, the Justice Department has indicated that it will continue to devote all resources necessary to defend the abortion ban.

Science: Basing Policy on Political Dogma, Not Research
The scientific community has repeatedly raised the concern that politics are driving the Bush administration’s science policy. For example, scientists applying for grants from the National Institutes of Health to study HIV/AIDS and other STDs have reported that their applications are less likely to be accepted if they contain terms that the HHS finds controversial, such as “sex workers” or “men who sleep with men”—even when the proposed research topics are about HIV prevention among prostitutes or HIV testing and gay men. In addition, scientists nominated to serve on federal research advisory committees that help decide science and health policy claim to have been screened for their political loyalty rather than their scientific credentials. Often bringing a moral or religious perspective to scientific issues, the Administration has taken a strong position against stem-cell research; distorted the science on abortion as a risk factor for breast cancer despite scientific consensus that it is not; and called into question the theory of evolution. For a detailed report investigating the Bush administration's promotion of ideology over science, visit http://www.house.gov/reform/min/politicsandscience.

State Child Health Insurance Plus: Coverage for Embryos, Not Women
The Administration issued a regulation extending coverage under SCHIP to "unborn children," so coverage extends from "conception up to age 19." For the first time, the United States is recognizing that a zygote, embryo, or fetus is a "person" eligible for government aid (October 2, 2002). Soon after this regulation was issued, the Bush administration withdrew its support for bipartisan legislation that added pregnant women to SCHIP, arguing that it was no longer needed now that coverage was being provided directly to the fetus. As a result, pregnant women will not be guaranteed the health care they need. Treatment for women who are hemorrhaging during birth, for example, is not covered by the regulation, but would be under the proposed legislation.

"Human Subjects": Separating the Rights of Mothers and Embryos
In another attempt to extend legal "personhood" to fetuses and embryos separate from the pregnant women who carry them, the Bush administration has written a new definition of "human research subjects" in the charter of the Secretary's Advisory Committee on Human Research Protections. The committee advises the government "on issues and topics pertaining to or associated with the protection of human research subjects." This new definition would extend the same rights to embryos and fetuses as human beings.

Abortion: Limiting Options
The President’s efforts to make abortion more difficult to obtain and rarer are focused on limiting pregnant women’s options rather than giving all women the services and information to make their own choices. Instead of supporting family planning services and emergency contraception, which dramatically reduce recourse to abortion, the Administration supports parental notification laws (even if parents are abusive), the abolition of so-called "partial-birth" abortion (see Criminalizing Abortion above), and 24-hour waiting periods.

Title X: Denying Funds for Women's Health
Had the Federal Family Planning Program (Title X) funding simply kept up with inflation since 1980 (which doesn’t take into account increases in the number of people in need of these services), it would now be at $590 million. The current funding level, however, is $273 million. President Bush’s FY 2003 budget request does not include any increase for this program, which provides contraceptive services; gynecological exams; pregnancy testing; screening for cervical and breast cancer; screening for high blood pressure, anemia, and diabetes; screening for STIs, including HIV; basic infertility services; health education; and referrals for other health and social services for low-income Americans.

Abstinence-Only Sex Education: Increasing Funds for Unproven Programs
President Bush's FY 2003 budget called for a $33 million increase in funding—and maintains that level in the FY 2004 budget request—for abstinence-until-marriage sex education programs. This request would bring total federal funding to $135 million. Such “abstinence-only” programs refrain from any discussion about the health benefits of contraception, including condoms, in preventing unintended pregnancy, sexually transmitted infections (STIs), and HIV/AIDS. Given the diversity of these programs, combined with few rigorous studies of their impact, there is as yet no compelling evidence that “abstinence-only” programs delay the initiation of sex or reduce teen pregnancy. Further, the “abstinence-only” approach has no value for adolescents who are already sexually active (two thirds of teenagers have sex before their 18th birthday). In contrast, strong evidence exists that young people who receive comprehensive sexuality education become sexually active later than other teens, have fewer partners, and are more likely to use contraceptives when they do have sex. Perhaps this is why 8 in 10 Americans favor comprehensive programs for adolescents over the abstinence-only approach.

Prescription Drugs: Denying Coverage for Contraception
Since 1998, Congress has required health plans participating in the Federal Employees Health Benefits (FEHB) program that cover prescription drugs to include coverage for prescription contraceptives. In President Bush’s first budget request he proposed eliminating this coverage, even after the Office of Personnel Management, which administers the FEHB program, reported that this coverage did not add any cost to the FEHB premiums. Congress did not accept the proposal.

CDC: Gagging Scientists and Doctors
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), defined as "the lead federal agency for protecting health and safety of people-at home and abroad," has recently altered information on its web site to promote the Bush administration's preference for abstinence-only sex education. The first item to disappear was "Programs that Work," a resource for educators that described sexuality education curricula that have been effective in reducing risky behavior among adolescents. The second was "Facts about Condoms and their Use in Preventing HIV Infection," removed from the CDC web site for several weeks and then re-posted with substantial changes. The original fact sheet described how to use condoms properly and discussed the efficacy of different kinds of condoms. In the new version, this information has been replaced with several paragraphs that promote abstinence only and simply discuss condoms' failure rates.

NCI: Censoring Government Websites
On November 25, 2002, the National Cancer Institute (NCI) posted "Early Reproductive Events and Breast Cancer," a fact sheet intended to replace "Abortion and Breast Cancer," which had disappeared from the NCI's web site several weeks earlier. The original fact sheet, based on a critical analysis of a number of different studies, debunked the myth that spontaneous or induced abortions increase women's risk of developing breast cancer. By contrast, the new fact sheet states that studies are "inconsistent," failing to mention that early studies suggesting a link between abortion and breast cancer were found to be scientifically unsound, and that larger, better designed studies (including one published in the New England Journal of Medicine) found no link whatsoever between abortion and breast cancer. On December 18, 2002 a bipartisan group of congressional representatives wrote to HHS secretary Tommy Thompson asking for an explanation, calling the whole debacle "nothing more than the political creation of scientific uncertainty." The NCI's Board of Scientific Advisors and Board of Scientific Counselors concluded on March 3, 2003 that there is no evidence that having an abortion increases the risk of breast cancer.

HHS: Harrassing Grantees
The Department of Heath and Human Services (HHS) appears to be using selective and repeated financial audits to harass non-profit grantees that provide comprehensive education on STI and pregnancy prevention, but do not adhere to the Administration’s position that the only acceptable means of achieving this goal is to urge abstinence. The HHS inspector general is also investigating at least eight AIDS prevention and awareness programs to see if their content is "too sexually explicit" or "promotes sexual activity." In one case, Centers for Disease Control Director Dr. Julie Gerberding contradicted the HHS inspector general's report, finding instead that "the design and delivery of Stop AIDS prevention activities was based on current accepted behavioral science theories in the area of health promotion." Beyond indicating the Administration’s willingness to promote politics over public health, the harassment requires non-profits to waste valuable resources to respond to these charges time and again. No violations have been found.

Title IX: Trying to Weaken Equality in School Athletics
Title IX is the landmark federal law that prohibits sex discrimination in education, best known for opening the doors of opportunity in sports participation and scholarships for millions of young women and girls. In response to criticism that men's sports programs were being cut, the Bush administration established a Commission on Opportunity in Athletics to review Title IX and propose changes. In February 2003, the Commission submitted a series of recommendations for adoption by the Secretary of Education. Taken together, these recommendations would have weakened the law's equality requirements to the point of meaninglessness. Following intense bipartisan pressure from organizations and individuals, on July 11, 2003 the Bush administration backed down, leaving Title IX intact.

Now, if any other country than USA had a government that was trying to force the people to not have abortions as an option, to force official websites to edit their content to the likings of the government, and tell schools and doctors what to say to their students/patients... then we would call it a dictatorship.

 

[Svenskaflicka]

GREAT NEWS! The Bible cures PMS!!!

The Bush administration has placed yet another opponent of abortion on an important position regarding womens' rights. In spite of masive protests from members of the parlament and womens' organisations, dr W David Hager, and three other conservative doctors, have been elected into the committe of reproductive medicine. USA. Together with his wife Linda, dr Hager has written a book where they suggest prayers or bible studies as a cure for PMS and headache.
Dr Joseph B Stanford has also been elected into the committee. He refuses to prescribe contraceptives of any kind, and regarsd the pill as a method of abortion, according to News, News, News.

Imagine the effect this will have on the medical industry...

 

[Pure]

These are scarey things, SF, esp. the elimination of condom information (opposed by evangelicals and r. catholics who'd rather see teens get sick or die). Esp. condom information by international agencies to African countries with lots of AIDS.

 

[Svenskaflicka]

So, you gather a bunch of horny, hormone-ridden teenagers, and tell them: "Don't have sex until your weddingnight!"


Yeah, that oughtta work...

 

[Colleen Thomas]

I suppose the next thing on the Bush/Asscroft agenda willbe female circumcision, to protect our femininity

-Colly

 

[Svenskaflicka]

In my old neighborhood, it wasn't uncommon for kids to break all Lit-rules and have sex a lot earlier than 18 - and I mean A LOT earlier. Like, at-that-age-I-was-still-playing-with-Barbie-dolls.
They confided in me sometimes. I did tell them "you know, you actually shouldn't have sex at your age, it's not legal until you're 15", but I also gave them little tips and advice, and sold them condoms.
I know teenagers. And I'd rather know that they're having pre-mature safe sex than ending up as another number in teen pregnancy statistics.

 

[Svenskaflicka]

I suppose the next thing on the Bush/Asscroft agenda willbe female circumcision, to protect our femininity

-Colly

Well, some conservative doctors HAVE suggested it, in order to prevent teen pregnancies.

 

[CharleyH]

For some reason I was thinking this was the shave vs. not shave thread . . . I see that I'm kind of correct, but not quite in the correct way.

And if I was more creative today - blah - then I would actually be able to come up with something as assinine as Bush. Need to depart to boring thread . . . .

 

[Colleen Thomas]

Well, some conservative doctors HAVE suggested it, in order to prevent teen pregnancies.

If I ever run into one I'l suggest forcepts....to get his balls out of his throat after I kick him hard enough to put them there inthe first place.

-Colly

 

[Svenskaflicka]

Ofcourse, this must be seen in perspective, Colly. The important thing isn't to stop white, christian tennage girls from middle-income families and richer to get knocked up early in life, they just have to marry them off quickly to make nice housewifes and mothers.

What's important is to stop all non-whites from reproducing, and this can be accomplished by such great tactics as no healthcare for poor women (who often are non-white), so that they will become sick and more likely to die young, or by not giving any money to the research about breast cancer or fistula repair, or other non-important womens' issue.

By discouraging black, asian, and hispanic teen girls to have sex, while encouraging white girls to "do their racial duty", the christian right may one day reach its glorious goal:

To go back to the 18th century.

 

[Guest]

You are insightful, Flicka (as well as inciteful, haha); look at how long and hard Africa has been struggling to get affordable AIDS drugs.

 

[Svenskaflicka]

And that's why abstinence is so important - so that HIV-infected men can find virgins to sleep with, and thereby cure their disease!

 

[quietlyHot]

It sounds like "The Handmaid's Tale". He will get his way because he will be relected by all the warmongers (patriots) who think he did the right thing in Iraq and Afganistan. This is a dangerous man who should not be allowed to continue his tyrade against humanity.

 

[quietlyHot]

Originally posted by Svenskaflicka
Well, some conservative doctors HAVE suggested it, in order to prevent teen pregnancies.

Apparently these doctors don't understand the reproductive system.

 

[Colleen Thomas]

Apparently these doctors don't understand the reproductive system.

One can only hope that is the case.

-Colly

 

[Svenskaflicka]

Apparently these doctors don't understand the reproductive system.

Well, in a way... you won't have many teenage girls spreading their legs if their pussies hurt like hell and they have an opening the size of a pencil.

 

[shereads]

GWB is makes me want to legalize retroactive abortion.

 

[Svenskaflicka]

Exactly. Imagine what a great world this would have been if there had been free abortion in the days before Dubya's father was born!