I don't have a lot of time to write, but the more I read each day about the days events happening in our nation the more I am shaken by the daily laws coming out from one state or another trying to prove their state can make the most brazen laws against women's reproductive rights. If I was a woman I'd wonder what did I ever do to deserve this type of attention.
It sickens me to the point where I just want to just get a placard, pick up some markers, go to our state capitol (in Ohio that would mean Columbus) and picket for women. It is time to stand up for women because the laws proposed or signed into law bewilders any sense of reason in my mind. I'm tired of hearing about these laws and I want to do something...but what?
Let me preface here: I grew up with three women--mom, grandmother, and sister--and I live with three women as an adult. The love of my life is a RN of 20 years who can tell me a thing or two about who goes out to get abortions in the first place and the need for contraceptives. We have a 10 year old girl and a close to 17 year old teen who is at the point of choosing for herself what to do with her reproductive/sexual life. So when I hear these moralist try to shame them with fear and guilt over what decisions I make I get enraged over their ideas.
I'm not a "rah-rah" person for abortion either; I come from a Christian background so I do appreciate the sanctity of life. But at the same time the rights of the mother, the woman, and the choices surrounding these issues are not mine to make but hers. To force these issues to near criminal levels is both unfair, wrong, and sets the women's gains back a century or two. What's next: Scarlet "As" for women who have committed adultery?
I think it is time to put my money where my mouth is a give to National Organization for Women, but I think i also need to find out if any proposals like those in Arizona, Pennsylvania, Virginia and other states are coming to Ohio too. But mostly, I need to vent because I get so damned tired of what they are doing to the psyche of the most important women in my life: My family.