Vent Sesh

As I continue to spend more and more time in Abortionland, I get more and more pissed off at antis. I have never in my life encountered a group of people who were so closed-minded, selfish, and delusional. Normally, I do a pretty good job of avoiding anti-information,* but recently I was doing some totally work for my job, and I stumbled upon several blogs that were attacking our blog. I don't feel like naming names, thereby increasing their sites traffic, giving them some type of credence, etc... but I did find it at minimum extremely annoying. A woman responded to my post about abortion funds, stating that she simply "didn't believe" that a woman might have to pawn Christmas gifts she had purchased to pay for her abortion,** and that she couldn't believe the fathers wouldn't help out and pay for part of the abortion, or help with her prenatal care, etc. I just really have a hard time understanding how people can be so woefully misinformed. If she spent ONE DAY working on a pregnancy hotline, like NAF or ACCESS, she would find out that 1) women DO have to sell or pawn things like intended Christmas gifts to pay for their abortion, and 2) men are all too often totally absent from the equation. If I had $1 for every time I spoke with a woman seeking an abortion where the guy involved was MIA, wouldn't give her money, etc, I would have several hundred dollars, possibly over a thousand.

My point is that everyone in this debate, no matter how pro-choice or pro-life you are, could benefit a lot from finding out about what women who are choosing or not choosing to have an abortion are going through. To presume that you know what is best for a 23 year old pregnant woman living of off food stamps with 3 kids is totally fucked up. You don't know anything about her life, where she is coming from, where she is going or what she has been through. Why do you get to choose for her? Why do you get say if she can or cannot access a legal medical procedure? I have really spent a lot of time trying to understand how you can believe a woman should never be able access abortion ever because she is "murdering a person." Instead of focusing on the pregnancy or "baby" or whatever you want to call it, why can you not focus on the living, breathing woman standing before you? Do you not see the pain in her eyes? I understand having personal reservations about abortion. HOWEVER, just because I am not sure if I would choose to have an abortion if I were pregnant, does NOT mean that I get to dictate another woman's life for her!

:LKDSF:LEKTHE:ORSEILRJSKLDJBFK I just get annoyed sometimes. And this is not even taking into account the Crazies. A Crazy somehow got my email address and started sending me pro-life BS. Any social networking site I am on I have very ramped up security settings, and I don't just blab my email all around the interwebs... So.... what gives. I have plenty of co-workers, collegues, friends, etc that have:

1) gotten threatening phone calls
2) been followed home on foot
3) been followed home by a car
4) gotten harrassing messages on Facebook
5) oh yeah, been murdered.

WHAT THE HELL. WHAT GIVES. BLERG>>>

*NOTE: I am always interested to read pieces by anti-abortion folks who are reasonable, thoughtful, and don't live in a world of hatred. Unfortunately, most of the anti stuff I have read tends to be uninformed and vitriolic, but I just wanted to say that I don't just avoid allllllllll anti-abortion material and live in a bubble of WHEEABORTION. I do think it's very important to have a well-rounded view of "the issues."
**For anyone out there wondering, that is totally true!!! Things of that nature happen way more often than the average Joe would think!

Super Bowl Sunday

It's that time folks. Grab your corn chips, your salsa from a jar, and a good old American Bud Heavy and sit down to watch the Saints try to keep the American Dream alive and beat the Colts. And also to see the much talked about, much hyped Focus on the Family commercial.

For those of you blissfully unaware: Pam Tebow, Tim Tebow's mother, was pregnant when she was on a missionary tour in the Philippines. She became extremely ill and went into a coma. The drugs used to get her out of her coma and to treat her dysentery caused a severe placental abruption to occur. Basically, the pregnancy detached from her uterus. REALLY BAD. In fact, "fetal mortality rate of 20-40% depending on the degree of separation. Placental abruption is also a significant contributor to maternal mortality." So the doctors said that the baby was likely to be stillborn and recommended abortion. She was in the Philippines, where abortion has been criminalized and illegal since 1870, so I am not sure how great her doctor was since he was apparently ignorant of the country's laws?? Anyway, she said no, and carried the pregnancy to term. AND TIM TEBOW WAS BORN WOWOWOW MIRACLE OF LIFE.

This commercial is getting a TON of press, and my head is about to explode if I have to read another article talking about how IT'S NOT A BIG DEAL AND TIM TEBOW IS SO NICE AND WE LOVE HIM. (Note Revolutionary Vagina commented on this briefly a few weeks ago) Take for example, Roland S. Martin of CNN, who says

There is no rule anywhere in existence that says that the Super Bowl should be free of politics and social causes. None. So what's the big deal over Heisman Trophy winner Tim Tebow and his mother starring in a pro-life ad?

I agree with you, Mr. Martin. Whole heartedly. Expect that apparently there ARE rules, put in place by the Super Bowl, about what kinds of ads they air. In 2004 PETA wanted to run an anti-fur commercial and they were rejected. Moveon.org wanted to air a commercial about how much Bush is running up the deficit, and they were rejected. The United Church of Christ wanted to air a commercial letting the world know they don't discriminate on the basis of sexual orientation, and that EVERYONE was welcome at their church. They were rejected. Why? The Super Bowl peeps said they had to reject those ads because they were not going to “touch on and/or take a position on one side of a current controversial issue of public importance.” Even this year, a homosexual dating website wanted to air a commercial about the site and they were rejected as well. I am just confused how Pam Tebow's story is not a controversial issue? Abortion has been and seems like always will be a hot button issue in this country.

Oh wait! CBS has CHANGED THE RULES about what is "controversial" this year. So I guess a gay dating website is, but anti-abortion is not. Ohhhhhhhhhh okay I toadily get it. Thanks guys.

I guess what bothers me the most, besides CBS playing favorites on political issues, besides the story of Pam Tebow's pregnancy being riddled with inconsistencies that don't add up, is that everyone is forgetting, as Revolutionary Vagina pointed out, Pam Tebow did have a choice. If she was really in the Philippines were abortion was 100% illegal, then not really, but the point in all of this is that she CHOSE to keep the pregnancy despite the risks to the fetus and to her own life. I know we are not getting the full story here in terms of what actually happened, but either way, she chose to carry a pregnancy that was dangerous to both her and her fetus and she was aware of this and made that choice anyway. That is a brave choice and I give her props for that. I do not give her props for making it seem like it was NBD and that we should always choose life. Unfortunately, carrying a pregnancy to term is not always choosing life because sometimes both the mother and the fetus die. Sometimes the mother dies but the fetus lives. Sometimes the fetus dies. There are a lot of risks and complications involved with that kind of stuff and it appears as if they are sweeping all that under the rug. Just not cool, you know?

And this is from Upright Citizen's Brigade, so, you know it's gonna be hilarious:

"Bump"

I was surfing the web, thinking about all that is going on in the world of abortion that I can talk about. And  I stumbled upon a website called Bump the Show. This is a fictional web show that follows 3 women and their unintended pregnancies. The idea is to watch as they make the decision on whether they will carry their pregnancies. The viewers then go on their web boards and have discussions about the show, its characters, and what they think these women should do. The viewers actually influence the direction of the show, and ultimately the decisions these women will make.

W. T. F.

Really? What are the producers of this show thinking? And watching this show, makes me think they have never actually spoken to any women who are struggling with an unintended pregnancy if they think that this is realistic.

One of the things I found most off putting while watching the pilot episode is something one of the women said during her interview with the producers. "I think it's a really interesting experiment." "It's a really big decision, and so to have so many...so much input into it, is a really interesting idea." --Umm, what? I have talked to many pregnant women struggling with this decision, and I can't imagine any of them would react this way. Now, I understand this show is dramatized -- it is fictional, after all. But come on.

The producers of this show say the purpose is to have an open conversation about abortion and (my favorite part) "find workable solutions to the problem of unintended pregnancies". I get that this is a way of having communication on the abortion debate. I just wonder how successful it will be, and if the conversation will really be about abortion, or the way the show is presented. Also, I don't get how this show will help find any solutions to unintended pregnancies. I guess we'll have to watch to find out.

*As of the writing of this blog post, I am trying to watch the 2nd episode. My uncooperative internet is making that difficult.*