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How The "U-Word" Exposes the Anti-Choice Movement
Periodically in politics, there are events that create a dual reaction in all thinking people: 1) peals of laughter at the absurdity of it all and 2) the dreaded realization that many of our leaders are completely out of touch. Such was the dual reaction to the news that the Republican leadership of the Florida state legislature wishes to censor the word “uterus” from being said aloud in their chambers, in response to a Democrat making a joke about how his wife should incorporate her uterus if she wants to maintain her right to bodily autonomy. Obviously, the Republicans really just didn’t like the joke, which hit too close to home, and were looking for an excuse to condemn it. But the excuse was real life concern trolling, in the guise of claiming “uterus” was a dirty word, with a side helping of “think about the children!”
The internet responded with the requisite contempt to this censorship. The hashtag #uterus exploded, and the general sentiment was that people who can’t tolerate hearing the syllables you-ter-us spoken aloud should not be filing 18 separate bills aimed at snatching control of the organs away from the rightful owners. If you want to control something that badly, you should be able to say it out loud.
Among the "children" being invoked as a shield to protect anti-choice legislators from confronting their misogyny and hypocrisy were the congressional pages. I personally found this to be interesting, because pages are teenage kids. And teenagers are especially being targeted by anti-choicers, with parental notification laws and attempts to block sex education and contraception access. In other words, conservatives believe that a girl of 15, 16 or 17 is too young to hear the word “uterus,” but she’s plenty old enough to be forced to bear a child against her will. Which seems to bring up an interesting dilemma. How do Florida Republicans expect the young women who they would force to have babies to handle the prenatal care if they’re too young to hear the names of body parts spoken aloud? When a young woman is going through labor against her will, how do you shield her from the words and knowledge of what’s going on down there? Would they suggest we just sedate teenagers who are going through mandatory pregnancies throughout the process so their innocence isn’t destroyed by knowing what goes on during pregnancies they’re actually experiencing by government mandate?
I probably shouldn’t even mention this dilemma, because knowing how much the anti-choice movement likes to control what goes on in a doctor’s office---mandating ultrasounds, mandating unscientific scripts to be read aloud, mandating waiting periods---I wouldn’t put it past them to pass a law banning doctors from using scientifically accurate terms for body parts in front of teenage patients. Think of all the fun that the anti-choice legislators could have creating a list of approve euphemisms to use in front of teenage patients, both willing and unwilling to be giving birth. Or maybe just ban certain words from being said in front of female patients altogether. With all the waiting periods to “think it over” and mandated fake counseling that anti-choice lawmakers are passing, it’s clear they never think women are ever really grown up enough to make their own decisions. Surely, the child-brained female half of the race will never be grown up enough to hear the word “uterus” spoken aloud.
But while it’s aggravating that the same people who want to micromanage how women use their uteruses flinch at the word “uterus,” and falsely claim it’s a dirty word, it’s not really surprising, is it? It makes perfect sense that someone who flinches at the word “uterus” does so out of a combination of prudery and misogyny, which just happen to be the same two elements that form the anti-choice mentality. It also betrays a childish view of human sexuality, which is especially ironic as the people who are acting so immaturely in this situation think that it’s others that can’t be trusted with grown-up decisions. Projection, I suppose, but no matter---they should attend to themselves and their own issues before taking it out on strange women.
The larger question is this: How has it come to be that so much power has gone to a movement that is basically ruled by irrationality, misogyny, a childish view of sexuality and biology, and such over-the-top prudery? Most Americans simply don’t think this way. Which isn’t to say that Americans can’t be sexist and prudish, but even sexist and prudish Americans would be hard-pressed to actually act like they think “uterus” is a dirty word that can’t fall on the ears of young people who’ve gone through puberty and are working actual jobs in the adult world. Clearly, many people who are supporting the anti-choice movement through votes and dollars have no idea how ridiculous it all is, and I would hope they’d rethink it. In way, it even makes sense that this would happen. It’s so implausible that the leadership of an entire party in a statehouse would act like Dana Carvey’s church lady, that you wouldn’t believe it unless someone actually showed you the facts. Because of this, I imagine that many people who casually support social conservatism don’t realize what kind of stupidity they’re signing off on.
What this tells me is that there really is just an ignorance gap in the populace. I’m usually one to say that people vote for who and what they want, and I’m not usually one to suggest people are ignorant of what they’re buying when they support politicians, ideologies, or social movements. But in this case, it’s just too implausible that a significant percentage of the population could be so misogynist and so prudish that this behavior makes sense to them. The only question left, then, is how to expose these ugly realities to the casual supporters of the anti-choice movement?
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Show AllDear Florida State Legislature,
Uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, uterus, and finally, uterus!
Sincerely NC-Tom
P.S. Uterus!
NC-Tom,
I think you forgot uterus!
There just becomes a time when the discussion becomes so utterly childish that you can no longer even attempt to take it seriously, and that time has arrived. These people no longer deserve to be talked to, they just deserve to be mocked.
But you hit on the truth early on in your piece. It is just a ruse, an excuse to hamper debate. They don't like debate because they can't win an honest one.
Conservatives are persons who are convinced of their own moral superiority; this is the mortar of their make up. Facts would comprise the bricks in their make up -- however mortar is stronger than brick and in their mental bunkers, they are impervious even to nuclear strike. The only real way to defeat them is to render inert their moral claims. In Europe this was accomplished (to what degree it has been achieved) as a result of two world wars, and only because of those wars since this was the home turf of social Darwinism. The ruin of all those nations which were the site of battles rendered the claim that the poor and the sick were receiving their just deserts obviously untrue -- it was the innocent who endured the most suffering.
The strategy in dealing with the right is to provoke them to all out war. Regardless of who wins the war on the battlefield, the aftermath will abolish forever the pseudo-logic of conservative moral claims -- and so their cause will perish no matter whether they win or lose.
Double click error.
I've got the solution. Let's use the old Maine saying: "bun in the oven". Young lady, you've got a bun in your oven. I wil lleave it up to those "stupid & misogynist" folk to figure out what 'bun and 'oven' refer to. :))
Time to take a hard look at yourself, Kunsti. That's about as ranting, angry, crass, and misogynistic a response to an article on women's autonomy as has ever been hammered out. The trouble with hidebound misogynists is they never recognize the condition when it's within themselves.
A woman forced to carry a fetus to term is giving birth against her will. And pregnancy is not a punishment for having sex, or g-d forbid, pleasure. That attitude is an aspect of misogyny.
Just more of the same old stuff. I stand by my original objections, as you merely confirm them. I hope you feel better soon.
I, my fellow posters, found the ambiguity of that interpretation highly amusing.
You just don't get it, do you, Kuns?
Your statement, "Also, contrary to Amanda's slanted prose, a teenaged girl who gives birth is never doing so against her will in any meaningful sense of the phrase 'against her will'. She spread her legs and became pregnant knowing full well what the consequences might be, and any aversion on her part to bearing those consequences is, well, childish.
What if she was raped and didn't have a choice whether or not to "spread her legs"? To me, it's absolutely obvious that people who want to criminalize abortion are misogynous. How can any person who truly respects women and girls think that a 12-year-old girl who was raped by her father or her mother's boyfriend shouldn't have the right to terminate her pregnancy? I mean, come on! If people don't recognize that as misogyny, they are clueless about their own motives.
Look at the rate of violent crimes toward women in this country. Look at the way women's bodies serve as commodity for corporations and pimps who traffic teenage girls. Look at the gap between women's and men's salaries. Misogyny and patriarchy are alive and well in America, my friends.
It doesn't matter if she is raped or not. That is a red herring that the right wing misogynist bigots what you to get into. That is classic divide and conquer strategy.
Choosing to have sex != choosing to get pregnant.
"...angry, wrathful females..."
ooh yes ever so "wrathful"
I think this troll teleported from the 18th century! LOL
Alle Kunst ist umsonst, als Du, ein Drecktroll, zum Rühren brünzst.
LOL.
Kuns, I can't think of too many arguments and actions that go on in legislatures these days that AREN'T childish! Look what's going on is congress right now! And as far as your rejection of using the word misogyny -- perhaps if you were a woman you would understand the meaning. When it comes to protecting the "sanctity of life" women seem to be singled out as criminals for wanting freedom of choice -- you know, the freedom all males enjoy whether they impregnate a woman or not. Perhaps the men who put women in positions of having to decide whether or not to end a pregnancy should also have their rights taken away -- no male intercourse until the male is prepared to raise the child!
O.K., I guess there's no getting through to this person.
I agree. That K boy is trying to divide us feminists against one another as if we did not have that throbbing headache already.
You're right, there isn't: he's a classic troll.
Kunsthausman needs to confront his misogyny and hatred of women. For most of you lot, your motive is misogyny.
Still, Kunsthausman problem seems to be that he's blinded by his own enmity and spite for anyone who disagrees with his, no matter what their motives. Sure enough, his screed is larded with invective and namecalling just like his other half-educated rants. How little he understands that he caricatures his own self and everyone like him.
"Also, contrary to Amanda's slanted prose, a teenaged girl who gives birth is never doing so against her will in any meaningful sense of the phrase "against her will". She spread her legs and became pregnant knowing full well what the consequences might be, and any aversion on her part to bearing those consequences is, well, childish."
*rolls eyes*
Sex != choosing to want to be pregnatn.
"Finally, let's change the spelling of the scary word. Since the Latin word, uterus, is not pronounced with a 'y' sound, as in English, and since the tradition of pronouncing uterus as if it did have a y is firmly fixed, let's try ooterus. The first two vowels are pronounced like oo in took and look. So, the title of Amanda's essay becomes..."
Finally, how unsurprising that a right wing libertarian defends those who want to impose their will on the bodies of women. I am shocked.
Controlling other people's bodies and lives is decidedly not libertarian.
Exactly.
Yet, notice how the neoliberal libertarians like Kunsthaussman want to control the bodies of women, with the power of Evil Big Government?
To Kunsthausmann,
You are obviously a Reichwing Moron whom seems to think that keeping the legs closed is the responsibility of the girl. Well, it is also the RESPONSIBILITY OF THE PARENTS TO TEACH THEIR BOYS NOT TO HAVE SEX AS WELL!!!!!!!
You obviously are still living in the Stone Age, just like your Reichwing buddies and can't stand the sound of UTERUS....I would like to think you are a intelligent person whom maybe took some biology in school.....Nah, someone with your attitude I don't think so!!!!!
I mean, I know fathers love to ask their sons if they had sex or not considering that is what makes them a MAN no matter what age they are....That the Girls are just an after thought even though there is a risk of getting pregnant!
Yeah, I suppose you and the rest of the male population will probably think that what I said wasn't nice, but, ya know what, just look at what was expose this week at Yale University.
It hasn't changed !!
Ivygate Sexism on Campus
http://news.yahoo.com/video/us-15749625/ivygate-sexism-on-campus-24789647
Reichwing Neanderthal
P.S. UTERUS!!!
KUNTS: Whomever it was that taught you to deflect the crux of an argument to the tactic of diminishing the WORTH and INTEGRITY of the speaker to whom you are responding, conveyed a tool of evil. Given the fate of so many women, any man who argues against women's rights at this particular point in time IS clearly wounded in all the wrong places. In every one of your repugnant, self-righteous, niggardly posts, you sought to slime the person you were responding to; and then had the audacity to invert your motive by projecting it onto that same poster. YOU are the one using countless ad hominems; and I have experienced precisely this same M.O. on far too many occasions. Whether it was you, under a different screen name or one of your paid cronies, the tactic IS transparent. It's based on blaming the person who speaks out for social justice linked with genuine equality as the one guilty of misandry. The person who calls "Fire!" in the theater is NOT the arsonist! Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck, and the other penis envy boys would be proud of you. Your convoluted arguments are right up their dark alleys.
Why is it that slime like you show up in forums like this? Are you that sick that even with the right wing controlling so much of the American debacle, you still feel the need to undermine whatever intelligent conversations might get underway, those intent upon carving out paths towards OTHER than the social, moral, ecological, and economic decay abundantly underway.
*yawn*
Your reply to the author was full of ad hominem rants. So spare me the pathetic whine about you being the subject of ad hominem rants
"Relax, the right wing couldn't be fully in control of "the American debacle" until, at minimum, all welfare statist programs were eliminated and every public university defunded and its charter revoked. That would be a real step in the direction of social justice. Say, I have an idea concering public universities"
So. At the same time the courts are shut down. The police shut down. Let's see who will protect your precious right to property.
"That author is incapable of intelligent conversation. Go read her website. It's all shrill, superficial drivel, just like your own histrionic response.
"
Right wing Randian libertarians are incapable of intelligent conversation. Go read any of your posts.
"What do you know about economics? In fact, you probably think that labor theories
of value are just swell.
"
You probably think that capitalism can function without government, and that property rights can work without government.
"The pattern of history is clear. Collectivism is a harbinger of the destruction of nature. It was so in the Roman republic and empire. It was so in the USSR. The pattern is painfully obvious in China. And the pattern is evident in N. America. Nevertheless, Siouxrose, you refuse to learn and so remain an advocate and defender of collectivism.
"
So, you are willing to live in a cave?
"Unfortunately, it is not under any serious threat anywhere in the world. Well, not yet, anyway, but a few folks are working hard to change that. In addition to the elimination of the welfare state and the warfare state, there are emerging movements to abolish the banking cartel (another prized piece of regressivism and collectivism) and even to denationalize money. The latter might also be called the free money movement or the movement for free trade in money. In other words, the government's near monopoly in money is to be broken and the power to coin money withdrawn from it. Yet nationalized money, too, is a prized piece of collectivist politics, and the projects I mention are far from developing the traction they need to succeed.
"
LOL. ROPML.
Dr Evil right ??
HA HA HA (... seriously, are you auditioning for a new Austin Powers movie?!) hilarious!
And what's with the quote by quote critique? A very lazy (and disingenuous) way of responding if ever i saw one. Take a breath. You are not proof reading other people's thought processes. You are (or at least we hope you are) trying to constructively engage with the poster's central meaning and intent. Stripping quotes of their context and smugly rubbishing or discarding them isn't smart, it's just banal.
Never mind that the anti-choice Christians mostly with their rosary line up outside the planned parenthood harassing the patients going into the clinic.Many anti-choice protesters carry pictures of an embryo inside a uterus. Many Catholic school children are present. Just as this is a way of circumventing democracy and keeping people from getting help with reproductive health care the de-funding of planned parenthood is the anti-choice way of forcing abstinence for low income young sexually active people. Only the "haves" can have sex in America where a culture of free sex surrounds them.
They should ask themselves, "Without a uterus, where would I be?" And we should remind them that Mother's Day is only a month away. It was a uterus that is responsible for her getting those roses.
I hear the Florida lege is also passing a law denying the issuance of birth certificates for babies named "Mulva".
And hey, I may as well use this bully pulpit to recycle a recent sermon:
Yes indeed, paternalistic male legislators' morbid obsession with politicizing reproductive rights is a hunk of burnin' psychopathology.
It's a many-splendored thing!
Of course, fetish-fetishizing and coercing economically-disadvantaged women to straddle the horns of the dilemma of involuntary abstinence or compulsory childbirth is a win-win situation for reactionary demagogues: it not only gratifies their personal abiding impulse for abusive, sadistic control, but sublimated violence disguised as moral high-mindedness also plays well with the most ignorant, superstitious, and piously self-righteous elements of their constituency.
And if being "good politics" isn't enough, concentrating on becoming a whited sepulcher on two legs is a good way to seem Diligent and Responsible when you're unwilling or unable to tackle substantive problems and issues.
Huffing and puffing over manufactured issues of moral turpitude, and mounting moral crusades to clean up Sodom and Gomorrah so it's fitten for Decent Family Folk is a fine way to seem important and trustworthy, and distract the credulous and unwary masses from noticing that you've been sodomizing them all along, and picking their pockets in the bargain.
O.S. among those who use prose you would be a rose.
"---I wouldn’t put it past them to pass a law banning doctors from using scientifically accurate terms for body parts in front of teenage patients. "
The Indiana legislature is on the verge of passing a bill requiring that a woman seeking an abortion be shown an ultrasound of the fetus and be told a number of things about it. An amendment requiring that those "things" be scientifically accurate was defeated.
But regarding the reason for the misogyny, it is just a result of attitudes that have always been prevalent. In colonial America, married women had no rights. Widows and single women could own property, but married women could not. None of them could vote, of course. Pregnant women could not be treated by a doctor (not that a doctor could do any better than a midwife, of course). And, if I remember correctly, married women in general could not be treated for anything by a doctor.
In fact, in colonial America, women were treated about the same as women are treated in Afghanistan today. So it should not be surprising that some of these attitudes have persisted.
I used to have a book written by a doctor for women in the 1800s, and it was so benign I wondered how on earth a women would have known what body part was being referred to. It is their intent to get us back to that time.
When I first read about the Indiana Legislature thing, I was wondering if a part of the bill would also require the woman's eyes to be taped open during the ultrasound to make certain she watched it.
The time is coming when women are going to have to stand together and fight this push to get us back to where our great great great grandmothers were.
It should be more than obvious by now that unlike Europe where women are not only free to care for themselves but that governments generally provide quality care for women, feminism in the USA is DEAD. The fact that both parties are shamelessly playing around with the word "uterus" is Exhibit "pick your letter" !
The people who colonized America were Europeans, who brought the local customs with them. In the next 200 years, the Europeans have changed, whereas many Americans are still immersed in 17th century thinking about women.
Jennifer, You keep repeating this right wing meme and it is either a lie, or inaccurate. Feminism is not dead. Would you say Labor or Labor Unions are dead? Would you say Progressivism is dead? The same machinations that control media are making certain voices, solutions, perspectives, and enlightened positions invisible... that is NOT the same thing as these items being dead; nor does their absence in mainstream media suggest any TRUE lack of interest.
Please do not confuse the effect with the cause!
Intelligent posts: Rfloh, Obedient Servant, Red Balloon (thank you for saving me the trouble) and Sing for Peace.
When I said that feminism is dead in the USA, I was comparing the status of feminism in this nation to other nations where I had noticed its live status. I am not making judgments based on what the M$M is throwing at us. I apologize if this might sound as if it were some "rightwing meme". However, I can agree that it may be inaccurate and as some have mentioned, a more accurate status would be that feminism is on life support. I am glad that you have been fortunate to witness the rise and success of feminism in the 1960s and its peak in the 70s but I was not. I was born in 1981 when feminism had gone past its peak in the 1970s and I have lived out here in the heartland USA where women are treated as second class citizens in so many ways. Please understand where I am coming from on this matter. I am certainly not a rightwinger of any kind.
I understand that women generally have greater respect for men than vice versa and that in a pro-feminist society, respect between the two genders would be equal. I also connect feminism to a variety of issues such as agriculture, economy, foreign policy, environment, health, education, etc... I look at France, Germany, Sweden, Poland, etc... where people socialize more, have better education and give students the chance to self-develop and teachers the ability to dynamically teach without having to worry about a "No Child Left Behind" Orwellian policy, have a proper health care system where everyone is covered, farmers are far more resistant to GMOs than the USA farmers, and where women are being given the proper respect by their employers upon pregnancy to name a few examples.
The USA is a rugged individualist nation that spends recklessly on wars and foreign occupations, restricts women's reproductive rights in so many ways, treats the poor and unemployed as nobodies while nurturing corporate rapists, has little respect for collective thinking and actions, and puts profits over caring. My state, MO, is very hostile on women's rights especially reproductive, funds churches headed by priests and bishops who are known wife beaters, funds fake "abortion" clinics, and even has a female state legislator named Jean Cunningham hell bent on removing all child labor laws win or fail. Women generally have more love and respect for their children and would never want to do this kind of an act in their right frame of mind. The reason I say feminism is dead in the USA is because more women are being socially pressured into believing that they must also possess male-dominating characteristics just to get anywhere. In other words, women are being PUSHED into believing that if they do not embrace the macho-egotistical ideology then they are doomed to failure and being left out. If most men and at least half of the women are going to embrace militant/patriarchal thinking, then where is the room for feminism and matriarchal ruling?
If it were not for my abstract and concrete views on feminism, I would probably be taking women's rights for granted rather than being alert enough to notice the slow but steady erosion of those rights. As for labor unions and progressivism, they may not be dead but like us feminists, they have also been marginalized to the point of almost being rendered lifeless. Luckily, the protests in WI, MI, OH, and IN are beginning to possibly change that. I apologize once again for coming off as "rightwing" on this matter. It was my full understanding that this article is a symptom of the fact that feminism is lacking in the USA.
That was a marvelous understanding of feminism. Socializing and feminism, now that gets interesting. You're a very interesting feminist. Feminism may not be dead yet if we can see more feminists of your kind.
Thank you John for the kind reply. Yes, I am a feminist and yes, I am passionate for fighting for justice and equality of all women. However, unlike some feminists in the USA, I do not limit myself to revenge against men or stereotype all men as "bad this, bad that". Yes, some men can be complete jerks. However, I also realize that some men actually get it and will be accommodating. It is sad that in the USA, if a woman tries to keep it kind hearted, she gets persecuted as a self-hating woman. I used to be tormented and persecuted like that. One day I would be considered "sister" but I would later be verbally kicked out of their "club". The failure of feminism in the USA is the same failure that is noticeable on labor unions, progressives, and the entire left in general in the USA. Everything has to be about revenge and opposition and very passionately so but when it comes to showing what they stand for, most on the American "Left" just do not get it unlike the Left in Europe and Africa. The American "Left" is not going on the offensive for if they had been doing so, we would find more compassion, unity, peace, love, and understanding similar to what a typical visitor to a nation such as Sweden would find. I may get called "male centric", "concern troll" or "suspicious person" but such people who misjudge me like that are missing the point. I am passionate enough to get out there and communicate with others in my attempts to get them to understand and possibly accept progressivism and feminism. I try not to be rude but if they are rude beyond a tolerable level, then I believe that they crossed the line and will then fight back. I have come to think spiritually but with compassion, tolerance, and understanding. That and connecting the issues is how I came to see feminism on a deeper level. A few weeks ago, I had gotten into an argument with a psycho poster who accused me of conflating feminism with socialism. I came to find out that she was a rugged individualist kissing a few rightwing butts which would explain why those who tried to defend my writing were verbally tortured. She has a "meanie girl" attitude and spends all day posting psycho babbling and attacking others, part of why I left that site. Such people can kiss my ass and rot in hell. I will continue to stay independently kind-hearted and level-headed in my efforts to bring feminism to life here in the USA even if I have to withstand persecution from all sides so that someday, our governments in the USA will stop joking around with the word "uterus" and instead produce generous policies to aid the lives and health of women and yes, it will automatically help men as well.
There is a slutwalk in Detroit in June, according to their facebook page.
I do not do porn !
Republicans - walking argument for the necessity of retroactive abortion.
MTL: Murderous Totalitarian Libertarian.
"Nice idle, incitement to violence and murder..."
Unlike the active incitement of the Christian right to plan and execute the assassinations of several doctors who legally provided abortion, multiple acts of arson committed against licensed and regulated medical clinics, bombings of same, intimidation, terrorism, the violent assaults of nurses, patients and innocent bystanders, the disgusting, frankly perverse and opportunistic placards used by the anti-abortion fanatics, and the protection, aiding and abetting the persons who commit these acts etc., etc. etc. actually committed by 'fine upstanding Christians' of 'decent moral character'.
Bite me, troll.
Souixsie and other have seen me post here for close to ten years, and they can attest I am anything but 'totalitarian'.
Passionate? Yes. Tolerant? Not always. Honest with myself? Always.
As for murderous - don't make me laugh. I detest violence, but I am more than willing to defend me and mine, WHEN and IF I am accosted. Unlike you and your Libertarian ilk, who are paranoiacally looking for someone, *anyone* to be made an enemy.
If you honestly support the System as it operates today, YOU are a far greater 'Murderous Totalitarian' than I.
Non Serviam - I will not serve.
"It makes perfect sense that someone who flinches at the word “uterus” does so out of a combination of prudery and misogyny, which just happen to be the same two elements that form the anti-choice mentality." Sorry Amanda, that's a very shallow analysis. The pro-life movement is about power and control of women. The pro-lifers could give a shit less about the unborn.
The word penis should be outlawed also, but then that's what all of us utuerus folks are jealous of, isn't that right?
Great blog, Amanda.
Conservative communities have the highest rates of online porn subscriptions. So, the conservatives that don't want to hear an anatomical term uterus in public are busy at home watching what....ATM, DP, rape.
And, why aren't they concerned about "the children" who have 24/7 access to hard core porno despite the illegality of making it available to juveniles. "Click I am 18" is not adequate enforcement of hard core pornography laws. Nor can the common Comcast porno channel prove that all scenes are consensual instead of filmed sex acts of trafficked prostitues. Another failure to enforce the laws of the land.
So, they don't want us to speak the word uterus, but they are busy watching vagina, clitoris, anus, penis, mouth, ejaculate, blood, stool, and beatings sold as sex entertainment?
Sorry if this link doesn't seem clear to some of you. The suppression of female sexuality and the cultural oppression of mass distribution of male-only sexuality is just an ugly outgrowth of this hate towards women's body of patriarchy.
DZONG: I wasn't going to make the link, but I thank you for doing so. The proliferation of porn not based on sane, decent, or HEALTHY sexuality is a real danger to all women. While only a percentage of men "go off" and try to force these dehumanizing sexual scenarios on women, those men who are picked up for violence, rape, and even serial killing often report the role porn played in their violent behaviors.
I see a DIRECT relationship between the desecration of the female body in all this grotesque, twisted porn (I learned about it reading Robert Jensen's book, "Getting Off,") and how the Earth Mother is treated... why it is that there is such callous disregard for the destruction and denigration of ecosystem after ecosystem. One can make the connection between the oceans and the great WOMB of life. The constant drilling is like knives into the womb of the Great Mother, and the new nuclear wound is yet another indication of the depraved indifference to life, via the birth canal in its direct and symbolic living counterparts.
The same people who campaign against porn, also campaign against women's right to do what they want with their bodies. They also campaign agaist gender equality.
Something you should consider.
They don't campaign against foreign wars which are porn by nature.
Why don't you organize a slutwalk - or see if there is already one in your areas on youtube!