Jabberwocky Superfly

As we all know by now, HHS Secretary Sebelius has overruled the recommendation of FDA medical experts in order to prevent Plan B One-Step from being sold over-the-counter in pharmacies in the US. Katha Pollitt at The Nation wrote an excellent op-ed about it, which I’ve quoted below.

I’m trying to think if there are any laws or regulations affecting only men in which unfounded fears about middle-school boys deny all men normal adult privileges. Needless to say, no one suggests that underage boys get a prescription if they want to use condoms, or that grown men have to ask the pharmacist for them and maybe get a lecture about the evils of birth control and promiscuity.

By the 1930s, a Gallup poll showed that 75 percent of Americans favored contraception. Sanger’s organization, then called the American Birth Control League, reached out to the medical community and clergymen for support. In 1931, a committee of the Federal Council of Churches of Christ endorsed contraception in order to promote “marital love.”

That struck Lepore, she says, because of how people think of birth control and religion today.

“A big reason why I wrote this piece was to try to ask us to remember that things have not always been thus,” says Lepore. “This set of issues around birth control and abortion seems so overdetermined, as if they are naturally partisan … or had been consistent over time.”

But that was not the case in the 1930s and 1940s, when birth control gained religious support from Protestant and Jewish leaders.

liberal-life:

As Republicans seek to eliminate funding for contraception, a new report from the Guttmacher institute finds that while “the rate of unintended pregnancies continues to decrease among wealthy or educated women, the rate among women who fall below the federal poverty line has climbed.” “At a minimum, however, we must ensure that all women, and particularly those who are most vulnerable, have access to the education and range of reproductive health services and counseling they need in order to plan the pregnancies they want and prevent the ones they don’t,” Guttmacher Institute President and CEO Sharon Camp said.

prolifehypocrisy:

stfusexists:

This firsthand account comes to me from feministexpression, and is a perfect example of why we need hard and fast rules for pharmacists, and real consequences for a failure to follow those rules. 

Let me start with a little background. I am a seventeen year old, sexually active girl from a conservative state with conservative parents. This past week, I needed to purchase emergency contraception. As I’m sure you know, the legal age in the United States to purchase EC is seventeen. I went to a local pharmacy (a chain pharmacy that is located across the U.S.) that was about fifteen or so minutes from my house, to avoid running across anyone who would think about telling my parents about what I was purchasing.

I walked to the counter, and asked the man at the desk for “Plan B.” As expected, he asked for identification and I willingly handed over my drivers license. He stared at my license for a bit, counting back the months to make sure I was of age. Then, he appeared puzzled. He walked to a woman working behind the counter as well, and asked her if you had to be seventeen or eighteen to purchase emergency contraception. She immediately responded “Legally, she needs to be eighteen.” He still seemed confused, and walked back to me, and repeated what she said to me. I was completely shocked, and said “No, I’m positive you have to be seventeen years old to purchase emergency contraception.”

The man helping me continued to look confused. But the woman slowly turned to me and looked quite angry. She called another female pharmacist over, and asked her the same question. She also said that I needed to be eighteen. I repeated, “The law says seventeen.” And both women glared at me. The second woman said “It would be illegal for us to sell you Plan B, because you’re eighteen and the law says seventeen.”

At this point our conversation had started to get quite loud, and so I took back my driver’s license from the man and walked out of the pharmacy, completely outraged. I had to drive another thirty minutes to a pharmacy to get EC. The woman who worked at that pharmacy (the same chain of pharmacy, mind you) gave me a smile and a box of EC….Which said very clearly on the box, “Over the counter for those seventeen and older.” 

Enough of this conscience clause bullshit, enough of this slut shaming bullshit. We don’t make exceptions for Christian Scientists to become pharmacists and deny people prescription drugs, and anyone unwilling or incapable of performing their job in accordance to the law shouldn’t have that job anymore. We’re at nearly 10% unemployment in the US right now. If you’re not willing to do your job, GTFO and let someone else do it. 

Another example of Why We Can’t Have Nice Things.

I have a very difficult time believing that this was an honest mistake. This is something that the pharmacists should know. This is something clearly written on the outside of the box. If they truly did not know that they were mistaken, then I’m frightened at their ignorance.

Unfortunately, this is something that anti-abortion pharmacists are known to do quite often. It’s something that anti-abortion, anti-contraception activists have explicitly supported. They believe that emergency contraception is the same as an abortion, which is absolutely not true. It even says on the label not to take it if you are pregnant because it won’t do anything. It works the exact same way as the birth control that millions of people take every single day.

But they don’t want to give it out, and this is a problem. They’re using their position of power to deny someone a perfectly legal medication that will prevent them from getting pregnant. You know what that leads to? More abortions!

It wouldn’t surprise me if some anti-choicers went to pharmacy school just because they want to be on the front lines of denying contraception to desperate, frightened young women.

my-abortion-story:

“I’ve had two abortions, one at 17 and one at 20.  The first taught me to use birth control responsibly and the second taught me that sometimes it fails.  My first experience visited a lot of guilt on me because even though I didn’t agree with anti-abortion rhetoric logically, I retained the fear that God would punish me for what I was doing.  But when I woke up in the recovery room with a dozen other women and saw the anguish mixed with relief in each of their faces I realized that whatever brought us here, nothing would be better in our lives under the added burden of caring for a child.  It took a while, but I forgave myself and never looked back.

My second experience was different but equally stressful.  I was working and going to school and when I found out that I was pregnant didn’t have enough money for hormonal birth control every month, let alone the abortion procedure and neither did my boyfriend.  I called around and found an organization that was willing to chip in the last third of the money and arrived at the clinic.  This time my emotions were much more limited.  It felt like going to the doctor for some other routine procedure, not an abortion.  I also went to a different clinic, a facility run completely by women who really seemed to care not only about a successful procedure, but about how we were dealing with the experience as individuals.  They even offered in-house counseling.  In both cases my greatest allies were my friends who supported me even if they didn’t agree, and my boyfriend who is now my husband and the person that I’d love to have children with when we’re both ready.”

This is a brand new Tumblr.

Doing my part to spread the word about this new blog!

(Source: )

rabbleprochoice:

Evital is not approved by the FDA and it’s suspected that counterfeits of this drug have been distributed in Hispanic communities.

Please click the link to see a picture of the counterfeit packaging.

Please reblog.

Love,

Rabble