There’s something beautiful about the way Mike stops the Christian protestors by quoting their own book right back to them.

However, any action in which a man ejaculates or otherwise deposits semen anywhere but in a woman’s vagina shall be interpreted and construed as an action against an unborn child.

Sen. Constance Johnson, D-Oklahoma City, said that while it takes two people to create life, Crain’s measure focuses only on half of that equation.

My amendment seeks to draw attention to the absurdity, duplicity and lack of balance inherent in the policies of this state in regard to women. Oklahoma already incarcerates more women than any other place in the world. Under the latest provisions, a woman in Oklahoma may now face additional criminal charges and potential incarceration for biological functions that produce or, in some cases, destroy eggs or embryos, such as a miscarriage. In vitro fertilization, involving the fertilization outside the womb for implantation into the womb, would also potentially represent a violation of the proposed Personhood statute.

Finally, this amendment seeks to draw humorous attention to the hypocrisy and inconsistency of this proposal – from the Republican perspective of down-sized government and less government intrusion into people’s private affairs.

This new video is a perfect response

I loved the line, “Don’t look a rape-horse in the mouth.”

(via Christian Nightmares)

Click here to view the embedded video.

Morgan: Do you really believe, in every case, [abortion] should be totally wrong, [including] cases of rape and incest? You’ve got two daughters… If you had a daughter that came to you who had been raped, and was pregnant, and was begging you to let her have an abortion, would you really be able to look her in the eye and say “No,” as her father?

Santorum: I would do what every father would do, which is to try and counsel you daughter to do the right thing.

[Crosstalk]

Morgan: It’s almost an impossibly hypothetical thing to ask you, but there will be people in that position. And they will share your religious values…

Santorum: It’s not a matter of religious values…

Morgan: …and they’re looking at their daughter saying, “How can I deal with this? Because, if I make her have this baby, it’s going to ruin her life.”

Santorum: Well, you can make the argument that if she doesn’t have this baby, if she kills her child, that that, too, could ruin her life. And this is not an easy choice. I understand that. As horrible as the way that that son or daughter and son was created, it still is her child. And whether she has that child or doesn’t, it will always be her child. And she will always know that. And so to embrace her and to love her and to support her and get her through this very difficult time, I’ve always, you know, I believe and I think the right approach is to accept this horribly created — in the sense of rape — but nevertheless a gift in a very broken way, the gift of human life, and accept what God has given to you. As you know, we have to, in lots of different aspects of our life. We have horrible things happen. I can’t think of anything more horrible. But, nevertheless, we have to make the best out of a bad situation.

I really don’t like the way Morgan conducted the interview. By asking Santorum to imagine himself as the father of a pregnant rape victim, he may have thought he was putting the candidate in a difficult position. But evangelical men thrive on this line of thinking. I get the sense that Santorum wouldn’t mind being regarded of as a clear-headed Daddy to a nation of hysterical women who might not “do the right thing.” If you want to challenge patriarchal ideas, you don’t do it by framing women’s health issues as father-daughter conversations.

More revealing than Morgan’s inane question were Santorum’s explanations of what kind of God he believes in. For him, God (Sky Daddy, if you will) is responsible for each and every human life, all of which begin at conception. Each of these lives is a gift. When a man rapes a woman, sometimes God decides to give the woman a “broken gift” in the form of a pregnancy, in the hope that this will woman will “make the best of a bad situation” and give birth to the child of her rapist. But what if this imperfect woman starts to think that she might just be better off terminating the pregnancy she didn’t ask for? In that case, it is the job of her father, who is head of his household as Christ is the head of the church (Ephesians 5:23), to “counsel” her so she doesn’t “ruin her life.”

And why is it that the father and head of household gets to makes these determinations even though he never has been and never will be pregnant? That’s easy enough to explain. You see, the first defective woman that God made tricked the first defective man into eating a piece of fruit that would allow him to know things (Genesis 3:4-7) and be less reliant on his heavenly father. And so God punished her, and all the women who came after her, with the pain of childbirth (Genesis 3:16).

I’m fairly certain that Rick Santorum will not be the Republican nominee, let alone the next president. But let’s not forget that more than 150,000 American adults in Iowa, New Hampshire, and South Carolina have voted for him so far.

(Via ThinkProgress)

Yesterday, a federal judge put a stop to this nonsense with a preliminary injunction. Katherine Lewis Parker, Legal Director of the ACLU North Carolina Legal Foundation (which argued against the North Carolina DMV) previously said in a press release:

“This is a basic issue of freedom of speech and fairness. It is a fundamental tenet of the First Amendment that the State cannot use its authority to promote one side of a debate while denying the same opportunity to the other side. Anyone who supports freedom of speech should agree with this stance, regardless of one’s position on abortion. Our position would be the same if the State had authorized a pro-choice license plate but not an anti-choice alternative. In that situation, the ACLU-NCLF would be suing on behalf of anti-choice drivers under the exact same theory of viewpoint discrimination.”

…

“If anti-choice drivers are permitted to express their views on their license plates, people like me should be able to express our view that women deserve full reproductive freedom,” said Sue Holliday, plaintiff and certified nurse midwife.

(I like how they both use “anti-choice.” Nice touch. See the footnote below.) Now, the ACLU appears to have limited their legal arguments to the idea that if you give a government-sponsored voice to one side of the debate, you have to give it to the other. (They requested a license plate which read “Respect Choice”). My issues with this go further, though. There’s a big problem with where the money is going from these license plates. The Carolina Pregnancy Care Fellowship gets $15 of every $25 that a driver pays for these plates. Now, there’s a debate to be had about whether this is private speech and thus protected by the First Amendment. My particular problem with this is found in the organization’s mission statement:

Carolina Pregnancy Care Fellowship (CPCF) is a statewide, 501(c)3 nonprofit, pro-life organization committed to offering help and encouragement to those God calls into pregnancy care ministry, especially those located in North Carolina.

Their site indicates they run crisis pregnancy centers. By approving this license plate and the revenue that would come from it, the state legislature (at the very least) is implicitly approving this position and the underlying religious rationale. They all, as individuals, can believe whatever they want. It’s way out of line to make this sort of religiously-justified rhetoric into the Official State Position.

The good news is that in order to win a motion for a preliminary injunction you have to show a “likelihood of success on the merits.” That means the judge has already shown a sympathy towards the ACLU’s position by granting the motion. The only logical outcome of this suit is to require the DMV to provide either an alternative or withdraw the “pro-life” plate option.

(I know, I know, lots of non-profits with religious bases get public funds. Doesn’t mean I have to think it’s constitutional.)

*There’s a whole discussion here to be had about the rhetorical uses of “life” and “choice” labels in this debate. I mean, who’s against life?

Via Joe. My. God. who adds:

This is a HUGE loss for the Family Research Council, which lobbied fiercely to essentially outlaw abortion in Mississippi. The bill, as written, would have also outlawed some methods of birth control.

Kate Smurthwaite, a member of the National Secular Society, appeared on the British show “The Big Questions” and gave arguably the best possible response to a religious man’s claim that “every aborted child is in heaven”:

And then she finishes the video with complete bluntness

Normally, I’d think that tactic is counterproductive, but if you watch an extended clip and see how the theists respond to her (Do you believe in money? Then you have faith!), it’s hard to argue that she’s wrong. In the heat of the debate, in that room, I’ll admit I would’ve had a hard time containing my thoughts, too…

On her blog, Kate points out:

At the time unsurprisingly the assembled religious leaders who were on the show reacted as if I’d defecated on the studio floor. But I wasn’t really expecting the general public to have that much of a reaction to the clip. I mean “idiots” is hardly the harshest insult. At very least it’s the sort of insult that goes out on BBC One on a Sunday morning.

By the way, if you read the rest of her posting, you can see for yourself the kind of awful things people said about her online — calling her a lesbian bitch, an idiot because she’s a woman, someone who needed to be gang-raped, etc — all on account of that clip. (It also doesn’t help that the video is titled “Atheist Bitchslap.”)

Even if you think people get way too hyper-sensitive when it comes to sexism (especially lately), I hope you’ll agree that those comments (some of which came from atheists) are completely uncalled for. If you see them, call the commenters out on it. If you’re making them… what the hell is wrong with you?

(Thanks to Gil for the link)

Send it to your favorite Republican relatives. And, you know, men.

“It is the intention of this proclamation to promote respect and protection to all human life, especially the infirm, the aged, the handicapped and the unborn,” the Protect Human Life Week proclamation states.

…

“Aside from year one when she received a considerable amount of backlash from those who believe killing unborn babies is a good thing, she has largely escaped criticism of her show of tolerance toward the pro life community in the Central Okanagan. Supporters are encouraged to drop Mayor a Shepherd a quick note thanking her for respecting our mission,” the pro-life group said.

Yeah, she’ll respect human life… unless you’re a woman who needs an abortion, in which case she doesn’t give a shit about you.

Somehow, Mayor Shepherd has been able to do this for years with relatively little attention coming her way.

Ian Bushfield can’t believe it:

This is four years of a mayor putting a creepy religious attachment to their warped morality ahead of the interests of women, seniors, and the terminally ill.

They even plan to show Ben Stein’s horrendous movie Expelled. I’m not sure what that affront to human dignity has to do with respecting life, if anything I want the bit of my life back that I wasted watching it.

Interestingly enough, when Ottawa mayor Jim Watson did something similar back in May, he got a lot of flak for it. There’s no reason Shepherd should get off the hook this easily. At the very least, if she tries to get away with saying this is a “meaningless proclamation,” then let’s see if the British Columbia Humanist Association can get her to issue an official proclamation for an Abortion Rights Week. If it’s just a formality, she shouldn’t have a problem with it, right?

Her email address is mayorandcouncil@kelowna.ca. So let her know what you think, why this is a mistake, and how this proclamation crosses the lines of what she ought to do with her power. Please don’t be a dick when you write your letter — it won’t help — and feel free to repost your email in the comments below.

When a state government is run by theists who are guided by nothing but their religious beliefs… well, you’re now in Kansas.

That’s where abortion clinics must now undergo a special licensing process in order to stay in business. As of now, there are only three clinics left. One of them is about to close and the others could follow:

A lawyer for the Aid for Women clinic in Kansas City, Kan., said Friday that it received a notice that its application for a license had been denied by the Kansas Department of Health and Environment without an inspection. Attorney Cheryl Pilate said the clinic was looking at its legal options but would have to close, at least temporarily.

The clinic received its notice on the same day the leader of a regional Planned Parenthood chapter said inspectors who spent two days at its Overland Park clinic found it will comply with all new regulations. An inspection of the third provider is scheduled for Wednesday. All three are in the Kansas City area.

“We’re doomed,” said Dr. Herbert Hodes, who performs abortions for the third provider, the Women’s Health Center, also in Overland Park.

Remember: This is the same state in which Dr. George Tiller was assassinated in 2009 for providing late-term abortions.

The new list of requirements to run an abortion clinic is incredibly long and full of items unnecessary to ensure a patient’s safety. The latest version was given to providers just this past week — and they have until July 1^st to comply. Take a look at just a handful of the requirements every clinic must have (PDF) in order to remain open. Some make sense; others are absurd:

• [Each applicant must provide] documentation that the facility is located within 30 miles of an accredited hospital.
• [Each applicant must] identify and ensure a physician with admitting privileges at an accredited hospital located within 30 miles of the facility is available during facility hours of operation.
• Any physician performing or inducing abortion procedures in the facility [must have] clinical privileges at a hospital located within 30 miles of the facility.
• [Each facility must include] separate facilities for pre-procedure handwashing by staff members.
• [Each facility must include] private procedure rooms consisting of at least 150 square feet, excluding fixed cabinet areas.
• [Each facility must include] a recovery area consisting of at least 80 square feet per patient in the area.
• [Each facility must include] a storage area designated for janitorial supplies and equipment consisting of at least 50 square feet per procedure room

It’s almost as if someone from the government visited each clinic, noted what they had, and then wrote the regulations to make it all-but-impossible to adhere to them in such a short time.

“These requirements range from the impossible to the absurd,” said Nancy Northup, president of the Center for Reproductive Rights. “They’re not designed to protect patient safety; they’re designed to shut down abortion providers.”

…

M. Jeffrey Pederson, of Aid for Women in Kansas City, said there was no way he could meet the new standards. He said that his building was too small to meet the space standards and that he did not have visiting privileges with a nearby hospital — requirements he deemed unnecessary to run a safe clinic.

This is a state where Republicans control the House, the Senate, and the Governorship.

And it’s about to be a state where women are thisclose to not having access to safe, legal abortions. It’s scary to know how quickly their options are being depleted.

(Thanks to Tom for the link)