The current backlash against women is falling under the creative new smokescreen of "religious liberty." Religious arguments against contraception have been used for 50 years, but women, public health officials, and legislators generally favored common sense and personal religious freedeom over ideology from an earlier century. In this election year, however, common sense seems a distant memory.
The current attacks on women’s health, sexuality, and self-determination — in states, GOP debates, on the airwaves, and beyond — are appalling enough. But it’s only part of the story.
Passionately anti-choice Texas House Representative Bill Zedler couldn't get the legislation he wanted approved in last year's lawmaking session--he'd like to know as much as possible about women seeking, and doctors performing, abortions--so instead of pursuing the consent of his peers in the legislature, he got the Texas Department of State Health Services to do it for him. So much for democracy.
Boycotts and harassment tactics have an impact, even if it’s not the impact the anti-choicers would like. When businesses submit to antiabortion browbeating, it forces clinicians to scramble to find new suppliers, diverts attention from the provision of care, and exacerbates tensions and anxieties.
Rewire conducted a Q & A with former Michigan Governor and host of Current TV's 'The War Room' Jennifer Granholm on how Republicans want to treat women like children and why women should be leading this country.
In March, Argentina's Supreme Court issued a decision clarifying a woman’s right to obtain an abortion in all cases of rape. While this is an enormous achievement, ensuring that rape survivors are able to access abortion in practice represents an even greater challenge.
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