The House of Representatives has just voted to defund Planned Parenthood for an entire year.
That’s right, ladies. We are under attack.
The group of people who are supposed to be representing the entirety of our nation has decided that it’s their privilege to make decisions about women's health and reproductive rights.
So basically, the House has just said, “LOL your uteruses belong to us.”
A divided house voted to block aid to Planned Parenthood in an attempt to thwart a GOP face-off with President Obama, which could have resulted in a federal government shutdown. In other words, this is political bullsh*t and has nothing to do with the thousands upon thousands of women who rely on the reproductive health care provided by Planned Parenthood.
This incredibly disheartening decision strongly smells of ignorance and sexism, and I am sick and tired of the regressive opinions of our nation’s leaders.
Let’s make one fact explicitly clear: The abortions conducted by Planned Parenthood are funded entirely by private funds. Federal funding is not allocated to any abortion that Planned Parenthood facilitates.
In fact, abortions only make up 3% of the services provided to women all over the country. The remaining 97% goes towards basic women’s health, a topic that absolutely, positively, irrevocably does not need to be voted on.
What other services does Planned Parenthood provide? Things like cancer screenings, affordable birth control, STD testing, pap smears, vaginal and urinary tract infection treatments, colposcopies and HIV testing, just to name a few.
But sure, let’s focus on only one thing and shut it down because we don’t like that one thing. That makes sense.
I don’t like men with hairy backs, so I guess that means I should pass legislation to wax them all because telling men they don't have the right to control their bodies is LOGICAL!
Thank you, House of Representatives, for voting to cut off funding to cancer screening programs just to prove that you're pro-life.
On August 3rd, the Republicans in the Senate attempted to make the same decision that the House just passed, but were quickly shot down by Senate Democrats.
Senator Elizabeth Warren said it perfectly,
Do you have any idea what year it is? Did you fall down, hit your head and think you woke up in the 1950s? Or the 1890s? Should we call for a doctor? Because I simply cannot believe that in the year 2015, the United States Senate would be spending its time trying to defund women’s healthcare centers.
What do you mean, Liz? What do you mean that I should have the right to make decisions about my own body? I DON’T GET IT. IT DOESN’T MAKE SENSE.
What do you mean women aren't just supposed to wear bonnets and stitch decorative pillows?!
We were created to be cum receptacles and human cradles for the sole purpose of birthing babies!!! Has history taught you nothing, Liz?!
It is common sense to any progressive individual that a woman should have the right to make decisions about her own body. My body is my body. No one else has any say in the matter.
There shouldn't be any government interference on this subject, and there shouldn’t be any debate on the issue.
Yet, here we are.
Besides all of the medical danger that Republicans have just put thousands of women in, what gets me the most is the sexism laced throughout this entire debate.
We are in the year 2015, yet it is a still a widely held view that women are not allowed to take control of their own bodies -- even as we support those who decide to make other bodily changes.
Apparently, everything is fair game unless it has to do with childbirth. Bruce Jenner can transition into Caitlyn Jenner and receive awards for her courage, yet all other women in this country aren’t allowed to make equally important decisions about their own bodies? Please show me the reasoning here, because I seem to be missing something.
How is the decision to not have a baby any less significant than any other life-changing decision?
Why are women consistently and incessantly discriminated against for being able to carry children? Why are women treated with such little human dignity?
Have republicans actually forgotten that we’re human beings, too? Because it kind of feels like this is the case.
We’re told that we shouldn’t be allowed to have an abortion, but then we’re provided little to no help once we actually decide to take the leap and keep the baby.
Today’s decision makes it abundantly clear House Republicans give zero f*cks about women. The pro-lifers in the House stop caring as soon as they get what they want.
How inspiring.
Planned Parenthood, quite literally, saves thousands of women’s lives each year. And the House of Representatives has violated our basic human rights by deciding that we have no agency to access these life-saving resources.
If this passes past the House of Representatives (which is hopefully unlikely), this could quickly become the next big Supreme Court case.
But we already had a big Supreme Court case: Roe v. Wade decided that a woman has the right to an abortion under certain circumstances.
By voting to defund Planned Parenthood and attempting to put an end to safe, medically sound abortions, the Republican party is effectively throwing Roe v. Wade out the window.
Sure, they’re not explicitly saying that we can’t have an abortion by passing this bill, but they are saying that they’ll cut us off at the source by getting rid of any healthy facilitator of these procedures.
Clearly, Roe vs. Wade no longer holds any weight in the eyes of sexist, misogynist, right wing Republicans.
I spy with my little eye...political grandstanding on behalf of ignorant politicians with no regard for human decency.
Goodnight, everyone. And good luck on your next trip to Planned Parenthood.
