Before I get into this remember I am neither a Democrat nor a Republican. I am a registered Independent bleeding heart liberal.
Every time a conservative says something akin to the phrase "progress for the sake of progress is a bad thing" or "things were better the way they were before Roe v Wade," I think of the scene towards the beginning of Harry Potter & the Order of the Phoenix, (yeah, I'm a geek, deal with it) where Umbridge is introducing herself to the students & staff &, although very thinly veiled, lets everyone know that the Minister of Magic, (: ie the government) are monitoring & soon will take over at Hogwarts. For the benefit of the students of course. That's who they really care about. Never mind that Umbridge actually hates kids. Mostly because she can't control them. At least not without torturing them first. At this time in history, GOP members ARE the Umbridges in the US. With Mitch McConnell channeling her so perfectly I'm surprised he doesn't wear little pink suits. This means they have got to stop using that 'we believe in less government' & 'we're the party of the people' bullshit. This directly translates to "I don't want the government to interfere with MY business interests & screw up my ability to fuck over the little guy & hide my money overseas so they can't take it away from me via taxes." They don't care about government involvement unless it affects them. When it comes to controlling women they are all over government involvement. They don't give a shit about anyone but themselves. And no I don't believe the democrats are innocent of this same corruption but the GOP isn't even trying to hide it anymore & yet a large number of their constituents still support them.
Me: You are right they don't have to raise the child. But they still have to pay thousands of dollars for the pregnancy & delivery.
Me: I would also ask you, what about the woman who truly cannot afford to have that baby right now, one day sure, but right now, no. The GOP is going to FORCE her to endure pregnancy & childbirth, but she truly can't afford it, the only option she has left is to give up her baby, a baby she loves that she would love to keep & care for but truly cannot. That is cruel & inhumane. I would also ask you if you are so sure you have the solution to abortion & that it is adoption, how many of those 400000+ babies that are in the foster system have you personally adopted? Or plan to adopt? Now tell me how adoption is a better option than abortion.
Every time a conservative says something akin to the phrase "progress for the sake of progress is a bad thing" or "things were better the way they were before Roe v Wade," I think of the scene towards the beginning of Harry Potter & the Order of the Phoenix, (yeah, I'm a geek, deal with it) where Umbridge is introducing herself to the students & staff &, although very thinly veiled, lets everyone know that the Minister of Magic, (: ie the government) are monitoring & soon will take over at Hogwarts. For the benefit of the students of course. That's who they really care about. Never mind that Umbridge actually hates kids. Mostly because she can't control them. At least not without torturing them first. At this time in history, GOP members ARE the Umbridges in the US. With Mitch McConnell channeling her so perfectly I'm surprised he doesn't wear little pink suits. This means they have got to stop using that 'we believe in less government' & 'we're the party of the people' bullshit. This directly translates to "I don't want the government to interfere with MY business interests & screw up my ability to fuck over the little guy & hide my money overseas so they can't take it away from me via taxes." They don't care about government involvement unless it affects them. When it comes to controlling women they are all over government involvement. They don't give a shit about anyone but themselves. And no I don't believe the democrats are innocent of this same corruption but the GOP isn't even trying to hide it anymore & yet a large number of their constituents still support them.
It used to be that we lived side by side accepting that we had fundamental differences in our ideologies but we still worked together & were able to be friends. Since Obama ran for office, the GOP has made this more & more increasingly difficult by constantly trying & now succeeding in taking away our basic human rights because of their deeply held religious beliefs, or rather the deeply held religious beliefs of their constituents. Because I don't believe a single one of the GOP actually believes in anything but themselves, money, & power.
It's hard to work next to, let alone with someone who is trying to force you to abide by "their" beliefs. I'm Christian myself but am not an Evangelical, Orthodox, or Christian Nationalist. My beliefs are; that people are free to make whatever choice they want, as long as it doesn't infringe upon or affect my rights. My rights, or agency, include my right as a human being, to choose what I do or don't do with my body. Believe whatever you want but when you then try to force your philosophical or religious beliefs onto me yeah I get angry & frustrated & I am going to fight you as much as I would if you were trying to abduct me.
I don't believe that an embryo's life is more important than that of the woman carrying it. That embryo, or cluster of cells, is a parasite living off of that woman's body, using her as its 'host' body. Without that woman, the embryo couldn't survive. However, a woman is a completely formed living, breathing, heart beating human being. She is not a host body! No matter what the patriarchy tells us, women are not broodmares. It is not our job to just pump out babies like a factory. Not only are we able to survive on our own but we're able to make more human beings by using our fully-formed bodies. A woman's life is more viable & therefore more important than the cluster of cells she carries. Hell, a corpse has more rights than a woman if the GOP gets their way. When you are dying no one is allowed to take any of your organs for donation without your express written, signed, & witnessed consent. If the GOP gets its way they will take away her fundamental right as to what is happening with her body, by FORCING her to give birth against her will or they'll prosecute her, for murder in some states, & anyone that helped her. Not even allowing her a say if she has been raped, or endured incest. The law doesn't even offer her the option to abort if she has an ectopic pregnancy, which if she does try to carry to term will most definitely kill the baby & herself. Using GOP logic & reasoning skills, does that mean that when the mother dies because of the forced ectopic pregnancy, her family can then sue the government for murder?
I have never been in a position where I had to make the most painful, terrifying decision I imagine a woman could possibly face. Whether or not to terminate a pregnancy. I have, however, had several miscarriages, one of which was incomplete, leading me to have to endure a ("d&c") Dilation & Curettage. This is the same procedure used for early abortions, in order to clean my uterus of the dead tissue of the twins I carried within before they further decomposed & killed me. Even better I had pneumonia at the time, making it impossible to knock me out for the procedure because it was too dangerous for my lungs. So I got an epidural & a twilight drug cocktail of versed & fentanyl to provide conscious sedation so I wouldn't be aware & wouldn't remember the procedure. This was 3 days after Christmas. I can tell you the process is embarrassing, painful, & depressing. And I was only removing already dead tissue. I imagine it is 1000 times worse for a woman going in for an actual abortion. Even more terrifying for a young girl to have to endure it. But even more traumatic for all of these hypothetical women would be not just the physical but emotional & mental trauma they'd endure at forced birth. An abortion is short-lived physically. Whereas a pregnancy lasts for 40 weeks, plus an additional 6 weeks afterward when the hormones are dropping drastically. What took 9 months to grow, depletes in 6 weeks. God help her if she suffers from postpartum syndrome. But even more than that, studies have shown that it takes the human body at least 2 years to completely recover from the physical trauma pregnancy & childbirth cause. That's not including the cost of all the prenatal care, the actual giving birth in the hospital, or the professionals who would have to come to your home for a home birth. Nor does it include the cost of raising said child.
Let's do this in a conversational format...
You: But what about Adoption?!?! They can just put the baby up for adoption. Then they don't have to raise the child & they don't need an abortion.
Me: You are right they don't have to raise the child. But they still have to pay thousands of dollars for the pregnancy & delivery.
You: Not if the adopting parents cover all those costs!
Me: What about the babies that don't get adoptive parents from the get-go? According to the Adoption Network's statistics, only 62% of kids are adopted within the first month. Meanwhile, there are over 400,000 children in the foster care system, already awaiting adoption. Furthermore, State and federal expenditures for foster care administrative costs (placing and monitoring children in foster care) totaled $4.3 billion. The number of children entering foster care or in care totaled 679,191. Thus, the average administrative cost per child served per year was $6,675.
Me: I would also ask you, what about the woman who truly cannot afford to have that baby right now, one day sure, but right now, no. The GOP is going to FORCE her to endure pregnancy & childbirth, but she truly can't afford it, the only option she has left is to give up her baby, a baby she loves that she would love to keep & care for but truly cannot. That is cruel & inhumane. I would also ask you if you are so sure you have the solution to abortion & that it is adoption, how many of those 400000+ babies that are in the foster system have you personally adopted? Or plan to adopt? Now tell me how adoption is a better option than abortion.
Back to the regular format...
Even if adoption was more readily available & more successful at placing kids more efficiently, you are still talking about FORCING a woman to carry an embryo to term & then FORCING her to give birth to said child. I don't know about you but I was ecstatic to have my babies. I have always wanted to be a mom. But I KNOW not all women want children. I KNOW there are some women who can't even stand kids in general & therefore have never had even an inkling of wanting to be a mom. Now when I gave birth all 4 times it was extraordinarily painful, scary, exhausting & I wanted my kids. I was in labor with my first child for 25 hours, all of it back labor, & 3 hours of pushing & then had a 4th-degree tear. Remember I WANTED my kids. The GOP is going to force a woman to endure all that, one who never even wanted kids. That IS TORTURE! Pure & simple.
The Democrats have their own issues. Ladies & gents of the Democratic party, get your shit together, please?!?! You can't keep bitching about the Republicans & blaming them for everything when you have yet to come up with any good ideas of your own not to mention getting all of your people to get on board to push those ideas forward. It's not the GOP's fault that they got their shit together to do evil. Get yourself some ideas, get your members to get on board & work together as a cohesive team, I'm talking to you Manchin & Sinema, you corrupt bought & paid for pieces of garbage! I hope you both get ousted by Dems who actually want to follow the will of the people regarding the filibuster & any other really good plans for the country even if they don't benefit their pockets like you two do regularly!
To all of the people who are not conservative, GOP, MAGA followers, if you want things to actually get done you have to get out there & VOTE BLUE! I know the Dems aren't great but they're our best shot for the future. We have got to get Republicans out of the way of progress for this country. We need to get organized & use our American & human rights to vote them out of office. The freedoms we have will disappear one after another if we do not do better. It is up to us, you & me, to make this country what it could be & should be. This includes the small towns, the county, the city, and the state voting. You can't just vote every 4 years for Pres but not pay any attention to the other voting opportunities & then complain when your town, city, &/or state are being run by crooked leaders of either party. Stop the bad leaders on a small level so they don't get to the higher level of politics. If you live in a state that has enacted restrictive voting laws find out how you can help get people to the polls to vote.
As for SCOTUS? I miss RBG. And I am terrified for the future laws in this country with such conservative judges. Personally, I never liked Clarence Thomas, I watched his hearings when he was first picked. My mom & I believed Anita Hill then & still do today. With that said, knowing what we do about his wife, he should be recalled. And knowing that Gorsuch, Kavanaugh, & Barrett all blatantly lied, under oath, in their hearings about their views on Roe they should have to step down as well. But I'm realistic enough to know that isn't going to happen. That leaves us with only one choice it is time to add more justices & expand the court. It is the only way we'll have any chance to protect the rights of all Americans.
I have more to speak on but it will have to wait for another post...
Have the day you deserve....I'm gonna let karma sort that shit out.
Jes
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