Tuesday 21 June 2011

WTF will it take?

. . . to get USian women into the streets?

Every day there are stories like this.
The first to defund Planned Parenthood, Indiana passed a law that cuts state and Medicaid funding to the organization’s 28 clinics in the state (only four of which provide abortion services). In effect since May 10, the law not only eliminates the clinics’ $1.3 million a year in Medicaid funds but also strips them of “roughly $150,000 in funding for prevention of sexually transmitted diseases.” While a record number of donations allowed clinics to continue services, that help ran out yesterday. Now, Indiana’s Planned Parenthood clinics are shutting down operations and leaving thousands of Hoosiers without access to health care:

– According to Indiana Planned Parenthood president Betty Cockrum, the clinics will stop treating Medicaid patients today. “Our 9,300 Medicaid patients, including those who had appointments Tuesday, are going to see their care disrupted.”

– Without the STD prevention funding, Planned Parenthood has to lay off two of their three intervention specialists, or “health workers who track down the partners of someone who tests positive for an STD and ensure they are tested and treated.” Planned Parenthood is now left with a single specialist to address STD testing and treatment for the entire state.

– To reduce costs, all 28 clinics will close tomorrow and employees will be sent home without pay. Only one clinic in Indianapolis will stay open Wednesday but will close Thursday.

– Should the law remain in place, Planned Parenthood stated that “it must close eight” of its clinics: “two Indianapolis locations and clinics in Bedford, Hammond, Michigan City, New Albany, Terre Haute and Muncie.” The shuttered clinics would significantly restrict help for the 85,000 Hoosiers the states’ clinics currently serve.

Hoosiers are not the only Americans feeling the full weight of the GOP’s anti-choice attack. Planned Parenthood in Minnesota announced yesterday that it will close six clinics of its 24 clinics because of budget cuts to Title X funding for low-income women and families. None of the six clinics perform abortions, “but provided services ranging from contraception to cervical cancer screenings to testing for sexually-transmitted diseases.”

I am totally baffled.

Oh sure, there are lawsuits, lots of lawsuits, but where is the action? Where is the organizing?

Here's another woman who shares my bafflement.
The war against women conducted by Republicans in Congress gives rise to many questions but the most puzzling are: Where is the outrage? Where are the demonstrations and protests? Where is a March for Women’s Lives? If we could get half of the women to show up for a protest in front of Congress that show up to buy new iPods, iPads, or even tickets for Lady Gaga, we could make a difference. For that matter, why aren’t the famously rebellious Madonna and Lady Gaga out there demanding that abortion be kept legal and safe? Why aren’t the mailboxes of the Members of Congress clogged with letters from women and those who care about them? Why aren’t they emailing, texting, or Tweeting their displeasure? Are they asleep? Unless they act soon, they’re going to wake up one day and find that they have little more freedom than women in other parts of the world who must keep all but their eyes covered. The time for distraction is past. Women must act now to save their hard-won civil liberties.

It's not just civil liberties, important as those are. Women's lives are at stake.

Are USian women in denial or do they really think this can't happen? Again.


3 comments:

Beijing York said...

That's sickening. I don't get what it will take but the USian love of celebrity is great and should Gaga, Pink or Beyonce jump on board and rally against these PP closures, maybe just maybe these draconian measure can be stopped or reversed. Remember the celebrity endorsed "Say No to H8" certainly got attention and support.

Niles said...

I don't think they're in denial. I think first, they're having information deliberately witheld from them by the freely available media options and second, the majority of women in the US have been successfully slut shamed.

The troll concern methods have worked. "Real" advocates for progressive measures don't take to the streets. "Serious" activists work within the system using the toolkit the great democratic system has given them.

Women, acting tchtch unladylike, by taking to protests in the streets and being emotional, shrill and hysterical (when they're taking time out from manipulating all of society so that women get all the perks their way and masculine men are left weeping in the cold ditch of Malebolgian abandonment because they will not feminize)are selfish little tramps who are getting worked up over nothing because there's nothing at risk and don't want personal responsibility and will never-achieve-anything-by-it-so-don't-even-start-because---BABY KILLERS!

Strip all the particulars off it and the entire thing reminds me of a domestic abuse profile where the State/s is the abuser. But I'd have to say the same abuse is rendered unto unions and other outliers threatening the patriarchy.

It's a successful dominating model. Incremental, isolating. Worked for eons now.

deBeauxOs said...

What Niles said.

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