Sharron Angle: Comparing Rape to Lemons and Lemonade

So we already knew that Sharron Angle has some pretty fucked-up super-conservative opinions about abortion. Well, here's some more of the same, in case you weren't sure. In a radio interview last month, she took on the issue of rape, and even specifically incestuous rape resulting in pregnancy, refusing to back down from her hard-line stance even in such an awful situation.

"I think that two wrongs don’t make a right. And I have been in the situation of counseling young girls, not 13 but 15, who have had very at risk, difficult pregnancies. And my counsel was to look for some alternatives, which they did. And they found that they had made what was really a lemon situation into lemonade."

Really? That's how it is? Being a teenager, raped and then forced to carry a baby you didn't want, plan, or even know what the father's genetic contributions are (or worse, know that they're your father's), is akin to making lemonade? Well sign me up, because I fucking love lemonade!

Heartless bitch. Obviously she has no compassion, or common sense. And hopefully voters will be so disgusted by her lack of concern for other women that they keep her out of the Senate. 

Angle: Rape victims should use their pregnancies as a way to turn lemons into lemonade.

Operation Enslave America

Operation Rescue/Save America was having a convention in Charlotte, NC this past week. During the week, their festivities consisted of protesting abortion clinics, Planned Parenthood offices, and at least one other anti-choice church because, you know, they aren’t against abortion enough.

The group snarled traffic and made people sick with their vile pictures of aborted fetuses. The set up shop outside of a Chick-Fil-A, dressed as cows, and marched around with pictures of aborted fetuses (To their credit, Chick-Fil-A denounced the group, which I don't believe for a minute). I have heard numerous stories of people going to eat lunch, only to be confronted with the disgusting pictures. One person was having a business lunch and was called a “fornicator”, for what reason I am not sure.

I wonder how effective these actions are. From what I gathered from talking to different people around the city, all this group did was infuriate passers-by with their ridiculous material and basically make themselves look like a group of morons, which they are. These people are operating on, you guessed it, a religious code that has no place in today’s society.

I hate that these groups are called “pro-life”. They are anything but “pro-life”. What they are in favor of is taking away a woman’s right to choose what goes on with her body. Groups like OSA are not interested in circumstances surrounding a pregnancy or health issue because of a pregnancy. This is a common thread that most conservative Christian people share. In their eyes, there is no gray area; there is no room for context or circumstances. If a 9 year old girl was raped by a relative and became pregnant, then she would be forced into carrying the child to term, if that was possible without the death of the mother of the fetus, if OSA had their way. What about the people who practice safe sex, but still get pregnant? I guess that they should have gone against all human nature and not had sex in the first place.

I cannot stomach the thought of these groups calling themselves “pro-life”. Anecdotally speaking, these people are generally in favor of the death penalty, the war, and giant military spending. There is a lot of crossover between these groups and other religiously fanatic groups like the Tea Party or militia groups. What have they contributed to society other than civil unrest? In the words of Jim (and I am paraphrasing): “How many of them have adopted or fostered children? None that I have seen.”

These groups exist for one purpose: to impose their belief structure on everyone else. They are no different than al-Qaeda. I would go as far as to call them part of the American Taliban. The pictures that these hypocrites hold up do not further their cause, they only annoy the people whom they are trying to appeal to. The spread lies about abortion and expect to go unchallenged. These groups should be called by the names that fit them best: Fascists. Hate-mongers. Anti-life. Anti-choice.

Abortion rights are a major achievement for women. If these rights were repealed, then women would be forced to find other means to terminate an unwanted pregnancy. These groups are trying their hardest to drag us, as a nation, back to the dark ages where women would drink poison or use an array of objects to perform an abortion that could end up seriously injuring or killing the mother in the process. I am sure that members of the OSA would have no problem with that. I guess the women would be getting what they deserved.

Catholic Church Continues to Make Catastrophically Crazy Calls

Here's an infuriating story to rile up your blood pressure. Sister Margaret McBride, who is a nun and hospital administrator, was just excommunicated for approving an abortion for a woman who would likely have died had she continued her pregnancy. The church's position, of course, would be to let both the woman and fetus die.

On NPR today, Rev. John Ehrich, the medical ethics director for the Diocese of Phoenix, compared Sister McBride helping save a woman's life to priests molesting children:

"She said 'Yes you can kill that unborn child.' That's a heinous act. And I'm not gonna make a distinction between what's worse, you know---they're both abhorrent."

This is just so disgusting it's almost unbelievable. You can't make this shit up! Why does the Catholic church keep doing this to themselves? And to date, no pedophile priests have been excommunicated. Keep protecting the child-raping priests. But a nun who okays an abortion for a woman who would otherwise die---nope, get rid of her evil ass!

Nun Excommunicated For Allowing Abortion

Nebraska Hearts Fetuses, Sucks Balls

So people in Nebraska are crazy and hate women, and have been passing all kinds of awful legislation restricting abortion. Feministing sums everything up; first up, LB 594 "..requires doctors to screen women for mental and physical problems that could pose as a "risk" after getting an abortion." Because women are morons, and can't be trusted to make their own decisions, and are obviously crazy for wanting an abortion in the first place. Amanda Marcott at RH Reality Check wrote a great piece explaining the misogynist mindset behind this weird bill.

Then, there's the new fetal pain debacle. This is really scary, because they're basically saying "fuck you" to Supreme Court precedent and trying to establish a new standard limiting factor on abortion, one that is completely unsupported by science. Ms. Marcott (this time at Slate) again explains in detail why this is such a problem.

I've gotten into heated arguments (at parties, yeah I'm that girl) about abortion rights being chipped away, and I'm always treated like a hyperventilating hussy making a big deal out of nothing. "Roe vs. Wade will never be overturned," I am assured time and time again. But when I see stories like this in the news, constantly, it gives me panic attacks. And it seems the anti-choicers just seem to keep coming, always have more money flowing in, always marching around with their giant fetus pictures. Ugh. I think I'm gonna go have some quiet time and think about my vagina and uterus and reassure myself that they do and will always belong to me. Good thing I don't live in Nebraska.

UPDATE! Oklahoma wanted to join Nebraska in its mind-numbingly stupid quest to control women's bodies. Monday, five bills were approved by the state senate that are basically designed to make getting an abortion a harder, annoying, convoluted process. Apparently, a woman in need of an abortion needs to be bullied into looking at ultrasound pictures of her fetus, you know, just cause. These kinds of overreaching laws are posited by people who say they care about women, but really they only care about restricting or flat out ending abortion, and doing everything they can to invade in the life of a woman that is seeking to undergo that very personal procedure.

Right-Wing Violence