Friday, July 26, 2013

Update to Abortion post

The conservative in question had told me many times that this bill was for "women's health care" using the example of  LASIK surgeons. "Shouldn't these clinics have the same requirements as a LASIK office? Those doctors have to abide by the same regulations b/c they are ultimately performing surgery at these places" Now while I am all for women's health care I couldn't find anything on the net to back up her claim. When she and I started talking it was with an agreement that FACTS MATTER in decisions. So I had asked several times for corroboration of her claim, believing she was being factual. She continued to say "keep looking". When I had exhausted such search engine questions I decided to call LASIK offices and asking. What I was told by the offices I reached was this: There is no regulation which says LASIK surgeons need to have any privileges in their local hospitals or even admitting privileges to perform their surgeries. So it looks like this "fact based" conservative disregards facts in her actual decision making. I did ask her about it but she has declined to answer. At all. Hmmm.

Wednesday, July 24, 2013

Abortion rights: Conversations with a conservative...

I have recently had to opportunity to "Twitter friend" a conservative Tea Party Texan woman. It is an enlightening prospect. We agreed to follow one another and focus on the facts of things. But soon I realized that it's not just the facts but the conclusions that we come to from those facts. I had never before been so frustrated at the views of another human being who I wasn't related to. She is a nice person. I just have huge problems with the way she sees (and thus I imagine most conservatives) the world. It's astounding to me, but I guess it's the same way for 'them' looking in at me. So here goes a breakdown of what has happened thus far in one of our discussions.

Abortion rights

 I had posted something regarding the TX SB5 bill http://legiscan.com/TX/text/SB5/id/867548 and how I felt it was absolutely wrong. I had not read the entire bill but had seen the summary. SLW (my conservative Twitter friend) sends a message saying that it was a good thing because it brought up the clinics in TX that performed abortions which were surgical in nature. Now I agree that women need excellent care as do all people. However I was astounded at what I saw next. SLW stated that all the attention was ridiculous b/c the bill was being blown out of proportion. If you recall people from all over the USA went to show support for TX women and help save choice. So I said, well if even 5 of the supposed 37 out of 42 closed in a state as large and spread out as TX it's bad, but she continued to state that it was "all about saving women through health care". I was amazed. So I asked "Are you pro-choice?" to which after a few more "it's about health care" tweets she answered "I am up until the 24th week b/c babies have survived when born that early".  
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STUNNED
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This means several things to me a) she isn't pro-choice b/c there aren't limits in choice (as I have been informed numerous times from the gun crazed crowd)  b) there are discussions out there which put women even greater danger b/c of what NICU's can do c) the bill bans at 20 (no response on this)  d), oh it goes on and on.

So I reply and we continue to go back and forth. She says it's just about women's health care b/c doctors should have privileges at hospitals near them. But when I bring up that doctors who perform abortions are not welcomed onto hospital staff when the hospitals are religious (that covers quite a few here) and are doctors who perform LASIK required to have hospital privileges in TX at the hospital nearest them? She says yes but I have yet to find any evidence of it. 

Fundamentally she refuses to see this bill as anything more than a way to enhance women's health. The reality is that the bill also discusses "fetal pain" which is unreal. And the requirements expected from these women's centers are unbelievable. And that doesn't even take into account things like people who don't realize they are pregnant until after wk 20, which we know happens b/c there is an entire series based on the reality of women who didn't know until birth (it's not a fun show). I don't understand women who support and defend these things.

It's truly stunning to me that in a day and age where women have so much to fight for as a group, we fight amongst ourselves about something like choice. There are so many factors in a woman's decision to terminate a pregnancy. Not even 12% of abortions are outside of the first trimester. Does there need to be legislation anywhere that makes even first trimester choice harder? And please don't get me started on how rape kits DON'T work to facilitate pregnancy prevention. 

These are my thoughts on the conversation. Thanks for reading!