Hilarity reigns in the fight to control women

March 18, 2012

Woman to pharmacist: I need some birth-control pills. Pharmacist: Of course. I'll just need the prescription from your congressman. Q: What’s the difference between a fertilized egg, a corporation and a woman? A: In Oklahoma, one of them isn't considered a person. These are hilarious times. We women seem to be having some trouble with our right to personhood lately, and not just in Oklahoma. Take the comments about Sandra Fluke, and not just the two words that got so much attention, but everything that was said about her. I forget who said them. Cruel, hateful, extreme, inaccurate, radical, out-of-touch-with-reality stuff. The trouble is, the Republican Party can’t fawn enough over the radical, cruel guy. They have given him carte blanche to speak for them, and now, when he’s gone yet again into terrible misogynist la-la land, no Republican dares to refute him, or even suggest that he may not speak for everyone in the party. Part of what's happening is that the Republicans’ lurch to the hard, extremist, far right is alienating — if not obliterating — the party’s moderates, including the thoughtful and reasonable Republican Sen. Olympia Snowe, who has announced she's had it. The radical types are busy lately, speaking words that sound like bloopers to most moderate folks of either party. There are so many recent examples. Take Rick Santorum, who, on the topic of a pregnancy resulting from rape, said, "Accept that horribly created gift, the gift of human life. Accept the gift that God has given you and make the best of a bad situation."

Wow.

As his opinion, that’s fine. As his requirement of every American woman made pregnant by her rapist, hell no. Mitt Romney the other day said of Planned Parenthood funding: "We’re going to get rid of that." Rep. Bob Morris of Indiana said, "The agenda of Planned Parenthood includes sexualizing young girls through the Girl Scouts." These stupid men have not noticed that a lot of women — and men, too — think Planned Parenthood is as American as apple pie. On March 10, The New York Times ran a story titled, "Centrist women tell of disenchantment with Republicans." In the piece, Mary Russell of Iowa City said she had planned to vote for Romney but she's thinking better of it. Russell, who described herself as an evangelical Christian and a Republican, said of the GOP presidential candidates, "If they're going to decide on women’s reproductive issues, I'm not going to vote for any of them. Women's reproduction is our own business." Further, Russell said she is thinking seriously about voting for President Obama, adding, "I think he’s more of a women’'s candidate." To the GOP’s many war-on-women participants, I say, thank you for helping to re-elect President Obama. To disaffected Republican women and men, I say, come on over to our side. We have a big tent and we welcome a range of views. I'm giving Hillary Clinton the last word today because every day she’s out there working relentlessly for America and sticking up for women around the globe. Here's what she said last week about extremists:

"It doesn’t matter what country they're in or what religion they claim, they all want to control women. They want to control how we dress, they want to control how we act, they even want to control the decisions we make about our own health and our own bodies. Even here at home we have to stand up for women’s rights and reject efforts to marginalize any one of us because America needs to set an example for the entire world." -- Barb Guy is a twice-monthly contributor to Sunday Opinion. She lives in Salt Lake City.