GOP's small government of the bedroom - best form of contraception is abstinence
Posted on Saturday, February 18, 2012 at 08:27 AM
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This week we learned the GOP's best prescribed form of contraception is abstinence.
And if a woman decides she wants to get pregnant she can simply refrain from abstinence. The country's Catholic Bishop's are in complete agreement.
Call it small government of the bedroom.
Do you think I'm joking? 'Abstinence works 100 percent of the time,' Republican State Rep. Lynne Blankenbeker said this week. 'If you decide you want to get pregnant you can refrain from abstinence,' she said.
Your great grandmother will remember what she's talking about.
Blankenbeker, a New Hampshire lawmaker, made her remarks in the context of trying to explain why the Obama administration's requirement to provide insurance coverage for birth control should be overturned.
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Read more:
Sean Hannity's all-male Fox News contraception panel
The Catholic Church blasts contraception - ignores own failings in sexual abuse scandal
Madness for Church and GOP to oppose contraceptive use for women or men
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Not content with the success they've had blocking gay people's attempts to form legal unions and make mature decisions about their futures together, this week the GOP decided that the American Catholic Bishop's Conference have laid the best groundwork for successful heterosexual arrangements too.
You don't need contraception when you have abstinence, you don't need a range family planning options when you should really be creating a family every time you have relations with your wife. The pope couldn't have said it better. God's law surpasses man's law.
As Governor Chris Christie just showed us last night, when it comes to a showdown between Biblical Law and the US Constitution, the GOP will always pick the Bible these days.
And don't think it will end with contraception. If you do become pregnant and want to consider your options, in Virginia they'll soon want you to take a mandatory vaginal sonogram first. The new GOP sponsored bill, which will almost certainly pass, makes no exemption for victims of rape and incest.
No wonder Rick Santorum is trending so well in the primaries then, he's the theocratic man of the moment. 'This contraceptive thing, my gosh. Back in my days, they used Bayer Aspirin for contraception. The gals put it between their knees and it wasn't that costly,' he enthused.
So gals, if Santorum becomes president, and the GOP really do start teaching you the true meaning of small government in your bedroom, you better buy yourselves an aspirin. You're going to learn the true meaning of the phrase Not tonight, I have a headache.
You may also want to buy a candle, I hear it's pretty dark in the Dark Ages.
43 comments
American32 | Feb 20, 2012, 11:41 AM EST
Rick Santorum NEVER said that. The financer of his superpac said that. To attribute the quote to Santorum is irresponsible. More importantly, the argument isn't whether American women have access to birth control, its whether the government can force anyone to pay for Abortion inducing drugs, sterlization, and actual birth control when it is against their moral beliefs. Obama promised this wouldn't happen and then he renegged, violating the fee practice [of religion] clause in the first amendent that the government shall make no law ". . . prohibiting the free practice thereof." .
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EphraimKibbey | Feb 20, 2012, 12:08 AM EST
@Gearoid4 - Has the RC now sunk to relying on nature for its tenents. I always thought that one of the church's main lines of belief was that we were to rise above our animalistic nature. What is so natural about celibacy?
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EphraimKibbey | Feb 19, 2012, 11:53 PM EST
Sorry, Again, are't = aren't. stste = state. I REALLY do proof read these before I post and my wife bought me a new big screen monitor for Christmas but my 62 year old eyes can't keep up with my numerous hunt and peck typos.
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EphraimKibbey | Feb 19, 2012, 11:45 PM EST
@eiriamach - Thanks, I was going for obfuscate (are't v and f transposed in some languages?) but I'll give your half the bragging rights to our new word for your inventive definition. I think we are all missing something in this argument. Rights are for individual PEOPLE. Organizations and corporations are not people! (Sorry, Mitt - you're wrong as the laughter of the crowd should have told you.) They are not granted any rights by the constitution. They are governed by the laws of the United States. That is why the courts have found against the RC everytime it challenged one of the similar state laws. Most of those stste laws, by the way, were enacted by GOP lawmakers.
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eiriamach | Feb 19, 2012, 06:11 PM EST
Gearoid4, it's false that ella is abortifacient. You've cited no reputable medical journal for that claim because no research has shown it. Birth control frustrates no "natural order of things." Childbearing is given by nature to women to plan judiciously, not to engage in sex as though its consequences do not matter. The "so be it" said by Mary to the archangel Gabriel is no model for female sexual behavior, not if she remained a virgin, as your doctrine holds. Every woman knows that she may be solely responsible for her offspring and that God will not rain down baby powder, strained peas, and Pampers from the clouds, much less money for schooling. Again, contraception is a health issue for women because effective contraceptives are available only by prescription. If you wish to avoid getting a cold, you take Vitamin C; if a woman wishes to avoid pregnancy, she uses a contraceptive. Pregnancy is more natural? Sure, so is a really bad cold! It would be completely "natural" for human beings to capitulate to nature and die. But we don't. We resist nature in a multitude of ways every day just to stay healthy and responsible. Your notion that women should do nothing and let God manage their childbearing so completely objectifies the female body that it leaves women devoid of either free will or spirit, and such a condition does not fit my definition of "human." Your metaphysics of the female is dehumanizing; as Harliemt suggests, it's just a pretext for male control.
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seanomelb | Feb 19, 2012, 05:41 PM EST
If gearoid4 wishes to hold health insurance which proscribes contraceptives so be it. I do not wish to have Gearoid or a bishop in my bed at night or in my doctors surgery.If the minority christian right wish to dictate terms they should refuse federal funding and pay income tax on their $100 billion dollar earnings each year. An Innocent man was executed last year and the USBC stood silent. It's a pity their concern for human live ends at the pre natal stage the hypocrites.
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Harliemt | Feb 19, 2012, 03:45 PM EST
As an RN working in a psychiatric hospital prior to Roe V Wade, I was witness to far too many brain damaged children who were the result of coat hanger abortions. Is this really what they want us to go back to. Being Pro Choice is not being pro abortion. Once again it's the male gender wanting to controll our minds and bodies. Enough.
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Gearoid4 | Feb 19, 2012, 02:57 PM EST
The part that stipulates that the insurance payments (without co-pay) has to be paid by employers for certain procedures that go against the tenets of employers with a deep religious ethos. The grounds for employers to be excluded are so narrow, as to be completely worthless.
The encyclical "Humanae Vitae" is pretty clear on it's prohibition of artificial contraceptive as it constitutes a clear rejection of the connection between procreation and the mutual union between the married couple. It is deemed to be a serious sin according to the Ordinary Magisterium. To receive this teaching correctly, one's conscience has to be properly informed as opposed to one which rejects the inherent truths of it.
Studies have indeed proved the Ella pill to be abortifacient in it's effects i.e the forced ejection of the fertilized egg from the Uterine wall.
Again, how can contraception be classed as a "health" issue, when it is prescribed in the vast majority of cases for those who deliberately want to avoid pregnancy(which is clearly a normal condition which arises from the sexual act). I accept in certain cases that the contraceptive pill is effective against certain medical complaints but these only constitute a small number of instances overall.
Clearly contraception is not God's will when it frustrates the natural order of things that He designed. It is telling Him that He is not in control of events, but only the woman or the couple involved. The Bible unambiguously celebrates fertility and in the O.T the Creator encourage His people to go forth and multiply. In the Annunciation when Mary is told by Archangel Gabriel that she is pregnant, the child(John the Baptist) jumped for joy in the womb of Mary's cousin, Elizabeth. Barrenness was thus not seen as an advantage in ancient Judaic society or indeed the Bible.
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eiriamach | Feb 19, 2012, 05:34 AM EST
Gearoid4, what part of the Obama policy prevents Catholics from "acting on the foundational tenets of the Faith"? I do not recall in the Creed "We acknowledge one baptism for the forgiveness of sins, and we will accept no government-mandated insurance coverage for contraceptives." Rejection of contraceptives is papal teaching, just as support for slavery was church teaching in earlier eras. It is not inerrant, not infallible, not ex cathedra, not dogma, and also never *received* by the laity or all clergy; in other words, consciences of Catholics around the world reject it. Abortion does not "lurk" in the background; there is no evidence that the ella pill is abortifacient. A woman does not know that contraception has "failed" until she is pregnant, and physicians do not prescribe the ella pill for pregnant women! Rape victims need the ella pill to delay ovulation in order to avoid becoming pregnant as a result of the rape. It's barbaric to withhold such a health measure! For women, birth control IS a health issue: effective contraceptives are available only if prescribed by physicians on the basis of medical exams and subject to health monitoring. It is not only a God-given right to use contraception; in most cases, it is essential to moral responsibility. You've done nothing but distort the facts!
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JoePatAl | Feb 18, 2012, 08:43 PM EST
EXCELLENT ARTICLE & TO THE POINT!!! As I have often said, "Lincoln is the only republican worth a penny." As bad as the current gop folks running for or being in office are, gov666-tie from NJ is the absolute worst. BIGot(even beyond his wasteline) that he is lead to the veto of equality this week, ensures that he is on the wrong side of history. I only hope he does get a national nomination (I guess in 2016) so I can be sure to vote against him and his dreadful philosophy!!!
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hollabackgurl | Feb 18, 2012, 07:39 PM EST
Rick Santorum is perhaps the biggest theocrat the GOP have ever run and look what he says about Protestants: "We all know that this country was founded on a Judeo-Christian ethic (*It was not - many Chritians live here, but this is not a Christian nation). But the Judeo-Christian ethic - sure the Catholics had some influence - but this was a Protestant country," said Santorum. "And the Protestant ethic, mainstream, mainline Protestantism, and of course we look at the shape of mainline Protestantism in this country and it is a shambles, it is gone from the world of Christianity as I see it."
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Gearoid4 | Feb 18, 2012, 07:20 PM EST
@Eiriamach,
It is nothing to do with enforcing Catholic teaching as the law of the land. It boils down to the intrinsic right of Religious body to act according to their own moral beliefs without a diktat from the State compelling them to act otherwise. This right has been respected since the creation of the American state.
The practice of religion is much more than going to Church and preaching. It also involves acting on the foundational tenets of the Faith to which you belong. This is under threat from the latest Health Care Act drawn up by the Obama Administration.
Abortion is indeed lurking in the background as represented by the Ella pill which is covered by those controversial Insurance plans. Also it is used as a backup measure by many when contraception fails.
You erroneously describe contraception as a "health" issue when logic tells us that pregnancy is the sign of a healthy woman who is blessed with fertility. It is as though the womb is now seen as a very inconvenient part of some people's anatomy due to it's life-giving potential.
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eiriamach | Feb 18, 2012, 05:58 PM EST
Gearoid4, the Obama administration is not "encroaching on the liberties of religious bodies to act according to their core beliefs." It is refusing to allow you to establish Catholic "moral" teaching as the law of the land. It refuses to allow the Catholic bishops to ride roughshod over the rights of non-Catholic and Catholic women to reproductive health care that includes contraception. Obama's policy leaves you with all the same religious liberties as every US citizen, nothing less and nothing more. You're free to preach and teach and practice whatever you wish about sexual morality, and the rest of us are equally free to follow our consciences on sexual morality. The Obama policy does not interfere with your religious liberty, and it has nothing to do with abortion. The abortion issue is a red herring, thrown in to the discussion by bishops and ideologues like you because Americans overwhelmingly reject the Catholic Church's teaching on contraception as immoral. However, the nation is split on the abortion issue, so you try to make abortion the topic. That dog won't hunt. Health insurance that covers contraceptives is the issue. Health care for women! You're so irrelevant.
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seanomelb | Feb 18, 2012, 04:51 PM EST
Some countries have religious priest snooping into peoples private lives.If the extreme right wing GOP gain power they may wish to do the same (headed by christian inquisitors of course).
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