I’ve spent a lot of time daydreaming. Too much, I’m sure, and if I had some magical daydream calculator, I’d likely chastise myself for wasting so much of my life…
Lately, I’ve caught myself imagining more of a nightmare world where Republicans have the Presidency along with the majority of the House and Senate, and although “daydreaming” sounds all fluffy and cloud-like, these thoughts are dark and ominous and full of thunderclouds!
As I’ve probably mentioned before, I am a bit of a news junkie with “news” leaning almost exclusively towards national politics these last few months. I’ve watched the Republican Convention with curiosity, disgust, and anger as they lie, and deceive the public, while rights that women have owned over their bodies for decades dangle precariously by a thread from the wretched hands of the rich and “powerful” men who want to take over our country.
I was watching Rachel Maddow last night discuss the abortion views of prominent Republicans and I continue to be saddened and distraught about their consistent message of not tolerating abortion. “Period,” they say, as if we need more enunciation and might stop asking them about their stance! Some of them will allow for the “exceptions in the case of rape or incest”, and others will include “for the life of the mother,” but eventually, they just want to repeal Roe vs. Wade. If Romney gets elected, just one Supreme Court appointee may devolve us to that point when back alley abortions were the only options for women and when we’ll see many, many women die needlessly. This is NOT a test. This is the real deal!
I know that I don’t have to spell this out to y’all, as you are likely educated, mostly women, and keep abreast of these issues yourselves, but since I have daughters and a son who haven’t ever lived through a time when women were treated with so little respect and rights over their own lives, I have had to spell it out to them.
When I was a teenager, I knew I was a lesbian. I had a girlfriend in High School for most of that time. I never dated guys, never had to deal with the idea of accidental pregnancy, or think about what I’d do if I did get pregnant. Some of my friends and relatives who did have to worry about it, were forced to make some hard decisions when they got pregnant. Luckily, they had a legal choice to get an abortion, and in most cases, a parent was not even required to be notified, but before 1973, that was not the case.
Even Mitt Romney, who has vacillated on his views over the years since he ran for Governor in MA has now stated that even though he’s voiced a support for a women’s right to choose, (vehemently, I may add), he is now against abortion, and it’s unclear whether he would allow it in cases of rape, incest, and the “health and life of the mother. Isn’t “life” a part of “health?” So he’s now taken another stance and redefined his previous stance to say that he “mis-spoke.” What?!
Ok, here’s what I don’t get…First of all, I understand that “pro-life” means to choose life of the child over death – “death” being the state of the child/fetus as a result of abortion. I also understand that a woman who is pregnant is considered “alive,” at least that’s what they told me in my early science classes, and her heart is still beating. So if by choosing the life of the baby over the health and life of the mother, wouldn’t that be the opposite of pro-life? I sure I’m not the only one who sees the hypocrisy in this.
Now I know I may be getting paranoid here, but is it so outrageous to imagine that if this absurd doctrine is ever allowed to pass, there might come a time that the Republicans will enact another clause that allows for the life of the mother over the baby if the baby is a girl, but the life of the baby over the mother if the baby is a boy? Crazy, maybe, but it sounds to me like a WAR ON WOMEN if they would even consider allowing a woman to die in order to give birth to a child in ANY circumstance!
I saw a short clip of a new documentary by Al Jazeera called “The Abortion War” in which Jim Buchy, a Representative from Ohio who has proposed the so-called “Hearbeat Bill” defining life as “beginning at the onset of a baby’s heartbeat,” was asked, “what do you think makes a woman want an abortion?” He couldn’t answer the question and seemed stumped as he fumbled through an answer, and finally said “I’m not a woman…It’s a question I’ve never even thought about.” Wow! So, basically, women are only considered vessels to carry babies. We have no rights to personal liberties and men will choose what we can and can’t do with our bodies without even THINKING about how it might feel and WHY a woman would feel the need to do it?
If we imagine a law that requires these children to be born, shouldn’t the Republicans be required to fund their upbringing, care, schooling, etc? And for all of the mothers who don’t want these children but feel obligated to keep them, do we want more babies in this world who are not loved, or well-cared for, may have to live in poverty, may suffer abuse? Maybe these Republican dictators should really take the time to THINK about these things?!
Women have had time to think about it. It’s one of the hardest, most private and personal decisions that women do have to think about, and they should be allowed to make that decision based on who they are and what they are willing to do for this unborn child. By forcing any girl or woman to carry a baby to term is a form of enslavement and can not be tolerated.
My dream for this election, is that more and more women will come to realize what this agenda really means for them, their women friends, and their loved ones and take some action. My dream also includes many supportive, sane men in this country to stand with women and actually THINK about what this might mean for women. Seriously, women don’t get pregnant all by themselves! This is the time for all people, especially women to energize and come together with a tornado of force that together, no closed-minded, backwards-thinking, domineering, heavy-handed, discriminatory, and sick agenda by the Republican Right-Wing Tea Partiers can reckon with!
Rants and musings of a 50-something lesbian mom... 