This is a great day for everyone, but especially for our GLBT friends and family. This is not the end of the struggle, but certainly the beginning of the end. There are no more logical reasons why gay people shouldn’t get married, and day by day less legal reasons why they shouldn’t. I am proud of our country today.
WOOO!!!!
At last! A judge ordered the FDA to allow the morning after pill, Plan B, to be available over the counter!
Hurrah!
Plan B is not my favorite pill to take, because it can be crampy and make you cranky, but seriously, the drug is as safe as anything and it’s important to have access to it.
Yay for sensibility taking over. No need to have be legislating sexual morality.
Today in at least it wasn’t all as bad as the media coverage of Steubenville, Hillary Clinton supports gay marriage!
Some days you just gotta take what you can get.
The cause of these welcome changes? Effective and widespread use of contraceptive. Suck it abstinence only education, only the widespread use of contraceptive has been shown to reduce both teen pregnancy, and abortion.
Teen birth rates have dropped yet again, reaching a historic low, and the number of babies being born early or with a low birth weight has also declined, a new U.S. government report shows.
Many factors may account for the improvement, experts say.
“We talk more about teen pregnancy, the responsibility of having a child and how difficult it is to be a teen mom. We also talk about contraception and abstinence more,” explained Dr. Jill Rabin, chief of ambulatory care, obstetrics and gynecology at Long Island Jewish Medical Center, in New Hyde Park, N.Y.
“Adults have to remember we’re fighting the adolescent sex drive that developed as a matter of survival of the species,” Rabin said. “It’s important to remember the three I’s when you’re working with teens. They think they’re immortal, invincible and infertile. We have to convince them otherwise and dispel the myths, and the message needs repetition.”
As for the decrease in preterm and low-birth-weight babies, Rabin noted that “prenatal care is getting better, and the message of the importance of prenatal care is getting out there.”(via)
After years of holding steady, new Center for Disease Control data shows that the United States abortion rate has fallen to an all-time low. It dropped 5 percent between 2008 and 2009, the most recent years for which data is available, the largest decline in the past decade.
The big question for public health researchers is: Why? What was different in 2008, that might have lead to this downtick in abortions?The answers seem to have less to do with economic trends, as some have suggested, and potentially more about the more effective contraceptives women are increasingly using.
The CDC data can tell us a bit of this story. Alongside the drop in the overall number of abortions, the agency also found a decline in the abortion ratio. That figure measures the number of pregnancies terminated for every 1,000 live births. That number dropped too, from 232 in 2008 down to 227 in 2009, a 2 percent decrease. That suggests that the story here isn’t just about fewer pregnancies. We can see in the data that the decisions women make after becoming pregnant are playing a role, with more deciding to continue with the pregnancy rather than terminate.(via)
What it is, why we shouldn’t do it, all in one awesome video.
The Freedom From Religion Foundation is taking the Internal Revenue Service to court over its failure to enforce electioneering restrictions against churches and religious organizations, calling it a violation of the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment and of FFRF’s equal protection rights. FFRF filed the lawsuit today in U.S. District Court for the Western District of Wisconsin. (View the lawsuit here.)
A widely circulated Bloomberg news article quoted Russell Renwicks, with the IRS’ Tax-Exempt and Government Entities division, saying the IRS has suspended tax audits of churches. Other sources claim the IRS hasn’t been auditing churches since 2009. (See AP Religion Writer Rachel Zoll’s story, “IRS Not Enforcing Rules on Churches and Politics.”) Although an IRS spokesman claimed Renwicks “misspoke,” there appears to be no evidence of IRS inquiries or action in the past three years.
As many as 1,500 clergy reportedly violated the electioneering restrictions on Sunday, Oct. 7, 2012, notes FFRF’s legal complaint. The complaint also references “blatantly political” full-page ads running in the three Sundays leading up to the presidential elections by the Billy Graham Evangelical Association.
FFRF, a state/church watchdog based in Madison, Wis., is asking the the federal court to enjoin IRS Commissioner Douglas Shulman from continuing “a policy of non-enforcement of the electioneering restrictions against churches and religious organizations.”
Additionally, FFRF seeks to order Shulman “to authorize a high-ranking official within the IRS to approve and initiate enforcement of the restrictions of §501(c)(3) against churches and religious organizations, including the electioneering restrictions, as required by law.”
FFRF has more than 19,000 members nationwide “who are opposed to government preferences and favoritism toward religion.” FFRF is regularly contacted by its members and members of the public over specific and general violations of church electioneering restrictions, and FFRF staff attorneys regularly ask the IRS to investigate such violations.
This non-enforcement “constitutes preferential treatment to churches and religious organizations that is not provided to other tax-exempt organizations, including FFRF,” the complaint notes. “Churches and religious organizations obtain a significant benefit as a result of being non-exempt from income taxation, while also being able to preferentially engage in electioneering, which is something secular tax-exempt organizations cannot do.”
This preferential tax exemption involves more than $100 billion annually in tax-free contributions to churches and religious organizations in the United States.
In addition to reporting the Graham ministry’s electioneering to the IRS, FFRF has sent letters of complaint to the IRS involving 27 other such violations so far this year. Recent complaints include:
• Green Bay Bishop David L. Ricken, who wrote an article on diocesan letterhead inserted in all parish bulletins about voting and choosing the president and other offices. Ricken warned that if Catholics vote for a party or candidate who supports abortion rights or marriage equality, “you could be morally ‘complicit’ with these choices which are intrinsically evil. This could put your own soul in jeopardy.” (Read full FFRF letter to IRS.)
• Peoria Bishop Daniel R. Jenky, who, in an April homily, sharply criticized President Obama, referencing the 2012 presidential election, saying Obama was “following a similar path” as Hitler and Stalin. Jenky said “every practicing Catholic must vote, and must vote their Catholic consciences. . .” (Read full FFRF letter to IRS.)
• Bishop Robert Morlino of Madison, Wis., who wrote a Nov. 1 article, “Official guidelines for forming a Catholic conscience in the Diocese of Madison,” published in the Catholic Herald, spelling out “non-negotiable” political areas. “No Catholic may, in good conscience, vote for ‘pro-choice’ candidates [or] . . . for candidates who promote ‘same-sex marriage.’ ” (Read full FFRF letter to IRS.)
The lawsuit, FFRF v. IRS, (12-cv-818), was filed by attorney Richard L. Bolton on behalf of FFRF.
Click here to request information about FFRF.
The Freedom From Religion Foundation, based in Madison, Wis., a 501(c)(3) nonprofit educational charity, is the nation’s largest association of freethinkers (atheists, agnostics), and has been working since 1978 to keep religion and government separate.
Since women kind of cleaned house last night in the elections and Akin and Murdock so didn’t win, I’m feeling a wave of relief I had been waiting for.
Jaded as I am, it’s time to take a minute to celebrate these victories and the small steps forward we are taking as a nation. We voted, and we said no thanks to all the men saying ridiculous horribleness about women’s bodies, rape, abortion. And I actually think young generations have some progress to look forward to. We aren’t going to outlaw gay marriage forever and ever off into the sunset. It just won’t happen. We are moving on.
We elected the first openly gay Senator! Oh Tammy Baldwin! In a lot of ways, I was more excited about that than any other aspect of the election. We are over it enough to elect a lesbian. That is a step. Seriously.
Plus, the voters all did right given the choice on gay rights:
Maine legalized gay marriage!
Washington upheld gay marriage!
Maryland upheld gay marriage!
Minnesota voted to not change the constitution to ban gay marriage.
And for a breakdown, here is my new favorite graphic for gay rights state by state. Slowly but surely!
YAY!
It’s really hard to argue with this beautious infographic on why we need sex education.
I often blame my poor introduction to sexuality on my poor sexual education. Our health teacher literally used to say “down there” to us. When oh when do we get to stand up and shout “this is unacceptable! We deserve better!”
There is nothing more obvious than the importance of teaching kids how to be healthy about sex. And occasionally, there is nothing more helpful than a visual guide for why something is a good idea.
Check it:
Exciting new development on the Plan B front! It seems that New York City is going to pioneer this badass new program in which girls as young as 14 will have access to over the counter emergency contraception from school nurses.
They have so far been sneaky about revealing plans and testing out the pilot program, but if it goes well I think it’s going to be an amazing start to a future where the kids who really need it get access to the birth control they really need! (Birth control in the non-emergency form will be/has also been made available).
All ye non-believers out there: I have argued again and again that kids are having sex anyway – the availability isn’t going to make them have more sex. It’s just going to make it easier to do it safely. Hurrah!
Okay this shit is getting really fucking ridiculous. I keep having these waves of anger about politics that make me forget we are talking about rape for a minute.
I really don’t usually listen to the “regular” news, like the ABC, NBC, Fox, CNN sorta news. Mostly I just read the paper. But I fascinated by the politicking in the Todd Akin rape conversation. I went so far as to listen to Hannity interview him.
So yeah, all those major republicans from Romney to Ashcroft to asked him to get out of the race. It’s fascinating that he is hella set on running, saying that the people voted for him and they want him, so he’s going to stick to it and run. If he loses, republicans may not have control of the senate. Which is exactly why they want to distance themselves. They don’t actually believe anything different, they just need to win that seat so they have control.
But the thing is, it’s kind of brilliant that he said it. It’s like one of those brief glimpses into the true psyche of someone who thinks we still live in the 1950’s. It doesn’t matter that he’s since apologized and said that he was in fact medically incorrect when he said a legitimate rape wouldn’t produce a baby. He slipped and said something that people actually think. I kind of love when that happens. Better we know now than when he already was in office. Terrifying, but fascinating. And now all those dudes who totally secretly agree with him, at least in some way are having to denounce what he said.
But just yesterday, the Republican party drafted a platform that includes anti-abortion legislation so strict that exceptions would not be made in the case of rape or incest.
So yeah, the republicans have to distance themselves from him because there has been such a backlash regarding what he said. You know it’s real bad when even Rush Limbaugh says it’s stupid. But it’s all about the politics of it. They just want that seat. They don’t care a hoot about actually protecting a mother who would have the trauma of carrying a baby born out of a rape. A baby is a baby is a baby, and they think that baby should just get born.
To make you feel a little less horrible about the hoopla this week, there is feminist obabma and a beautiful song on how to know it’s legit rape. Okay and here is a clip of true emotion from Biden earlier this year on rape.
Just like when Obama said “rape is rape” and I felt it was real and good to hear, I really like what Biden says here.
I don’t care that he’s a dude and he’s “in charge” or any of that shit. He actually gets that you can’t just go around saying there are levels of rape. One rape isn’t worse or more rape than another rape. It’s just all around fucked up. Hopefully this will help us understand that.