My news feed is overfilled with newsletters and organizations’ letters about the horrendous draft of the leaked Supreme Court decision about Roe v. Wade. Many of us thought it couldn’t happen. I began to see it happening with the last disastrous administration. I’m sure the Rethugs and trumpers have been planning this for years. Forty-Five nailed the coffin on a Supreme Court with integrity through the nomination of his three jokers. All three of these lied through their teeth to get on the Court. I wasn’t fooled with their assurances that Roe v. Wade was the law of the land.
I was a high school senior in 1973 when Roe v. Wade became law. I have to admit I was indifferent to the whole thing. My parents didn’t rant or rave about it, and my friends and I were too busy with graduating and summer jobs to think how this law would affect us.
I was too young to suffer the restrictions women faced. In those days, doctors would discuss a woman’s condition with her husband—in her presence, as if she wasn’t there. In those days, a woman had to get permission from her husband before the doctor would prescribe the birth control pill. In those days, pregnancy, child birth and child care were all the woman’s responsibilities. Men just planted their seeds and went their merry way.
By the time I was an adult and then a mother, things had changed. I didn’t have to have my husband present for doctor visits. He and I split the parenting responsibilities as fairly as we could. There was one time I did come across male supremacy from a doctor. I wanted to have my tubes tied after my third child was born. I was 37 and already had been considered “high risk” because of my age.
The doctor asked: “Are you sure? What if you lose one of your children?” Um, what? Like a new baby could replace a lost child?
The doctor then asked: “What does your husband say about it? Does he agree to this?”
I already knew my husband agreed and said so. I felt deeply offended. Why did this doctor think my husband controlled my health care?
It’s because men have thought from the very beginning of time that they were in charge. They’re the strong ones. They’re the heads of their families. They have final say in everything. It’s even Biblical, for crying out loud. I was fortunate enough to have an enlightened husband who didn’t see issues that way.
And so, I’ve lived with Roe v. Wade in my background for almost 50 years. I am not an advocate of abortion. I wouldn’t consider one for myself but every woman has a right to choose what’s best for her health. I absolutely understand necessary abortions: pregnancies that harm the mom’s health, pregnancies resulting from rape or incest, pregnancies where the baby is so disabled life would be difficult. I’m not a fan of birth control abortion but there aren’t enough resources out there to educate or help women who get pregnant “in the heat of the moment”.
I’m reading now that Roe v. Wade isn’t encoded, whatever the hell that means. The bottom line is that the Supreme Court is primed to take away a woman’s right to choose, denying her the right to decisions about her health. I realize that it won’t stop there.
Some people may be indifferent, thinking well, I am never going to get an abortion so who cares?
Do you really think the Rethugs, trumpers, GQP followers and other right-wing influencers will stop there? People, listen to what they’re saying and WAKE UP. I’m sure they’d love to dismantle other fundamental rights. I read a Reuters article which said in part:
“Abortion is among a number of fundamental rights that the court over many decades recognized at least in part as what are called "substantive" due process liberties, including contraception in 1965, interracial marriage in 1967 and same-sex marriage in 2015.
“Though these rights are not explicitly mentioned in the Constitution, they are linked to personal privacy, autonomy, dignity and equality. Conservative critics of the substantive due process principle have said it improperly lets unelected justices make policy choices better left to legislators.” https://www.reuters.com/world/us/gay-marriage-other-rights-risk-after-us-supreme-court-abortion-move-2022-05-04/
It seems to me the trumpers on the Supreme Court are saying if it’s not mentioned specifically in the Constitution, we can throw it out. This offends me to my very core. I see that if the Rethugs, trumpers and GQP take control of the House and/or Senate this year, we are going to be following a path to a patriarchal dictatorship with 45 installed as king.
People have to start caring. Here is another issue that really gets me. I belong to a generation known as Baby Boomers, those of us born from 1945-6 to 1960. When we were young, we rebelled against repression, racial injustice, the war in Viet Nam that killed and maimed so many, bureaucrats, autocrats and generally, The Establishment. I wonder where all our fire has gone? I’m sure there are many Boomers who are still activated and for human rights and equality.
But what happened to so many Boomers who are now seniors and enthralled with the Rethugs and 45? How can they support those people? Those politicians do nothing to help anyone but themselves and the rich. They fight any program that would help seniors, children, pregnant mothers, and families. Why are these seniors so deluded? Do they not remember how it was in the 60s and 70s? Where did their fire go?
This day, May 4, 1970, students at Kent State were shot down and killed by National Guardsmen. It sent shock waves through everyone. I think about how we reacted then and the crickets I hear now after learning that 45 asked then Secretary Esper if people protesting the police murder of George Floyd could be shot. Esper demurred and 45 then asked why protestors couldn’t be shot in the legs. We’ve become so numbed to outrageous Rethuglican behavior that no one says anything about this.
We’ve been asleep too long, hoping the Democratic leaders would DO SOMETHING. Well, they can’t. They’re stymied by the Rethugs and by the DINOs in their party. It’s up to us. We have to vote in every election and we have to vote against the Rethuglican candidates. The name I call what used to be the GOP is disrespectful, I know, but I don’t care. Those people have done more damage to our country than any foreign attack on us.
Vote, people, for God’s sake, vote.
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