25-Missouri is trying to pull a fast one on abortion rights that they just got back

Send abortion rights back to state? That was the plan after the supreme court released the Dobbs decision, right? After all, restoring the power back to the states would make sure that your state made the right decision. Well, right in more ways than one.

Changing the state constitution or passing an amendment protecting a woman’s right to bodily autonomy is never done quickly. It takes a lot of time to gather signatures and gin up support. It takes more time to get the regular public excited about the measure, hopefully enough to get out to the polls.

There were seven states that passed abortion right legislation in the November 2024 election. There were 10 states with abortion related constitutional amendments with on their ballots. The states that wanted to protect abortion rights and enshrine them into the state constitution were Montana, Nevada, Missouri, Colorado, Arizona, Maryland, Wyoming, and Florida. The state that wanted further curtailing of a woman’s right to bodily autonomy was Nebraska. Wyoming and Florida were unable to pass their measure but so was Nebraska. Nevada has a 2 election pass/fail test, and they are half way there. These states join Ohio and Kansas and California and Vermont and Michigan in protecting abortion rights.

Of the seven states Missouri’s state legislature is throwing a temper tantrum. It’s not fair, they whined. People didn’t know what they were voting for, they cried! We deserve a mulligan, they challenged.

Eye roll.

I mean they’ve done everything a spoiled brat would do except stomp their little feet and threaten to hold their breath.

Pouty McPoutyton.

Well, they are kind of doing the last one.

They have put in place as many roadblocks as they possibly could. Including many bills in the state legislature about classifying abortion pills as a controlled substance, and legislation to treat abortion as a homicide. Also they have stopped allowing abortion pills to be prescribed.

But their favorite is crying foul on the Amendment 3. The amendment showed that women will be dying in hospital, unable to receive medical care.

Show me the lie.

Better yet, ask Texas or Georgia.

Best yet, google deaths post Dobbs decision in states that outright ban abortion. Cough, cough, Texas.

Go ahead, I’ll wait.

But the women who need this often life saving care can’t.

Women have died, are dying, and will continue to die without access to abortion.

Tuesday Top of Mind 6/18/24-professors suing to fail girls who have had abortions

To set the scene, two professors in Austin Texas want to punish students for their actions outside of class. The action in this case is abortion. How would they know that there was an abortion is not mentioned. The second professor is suing to not hire teaching assistants who have had an abortion.

Again, how would they know?

In their lawsuit, they claim that girls who take time off of class to have an abortion should be failed. By them. For the egregious crime of becoming pregnant and not wanting to be. Does this mean they will fail all women who can’t come to class because they are sick or need surgery? Because, of course, if they are absent because they are sick they must have had an abortion. But boys who are sick or need care can have it no questions asked, no threat to their grades?

Are they also going to fail the boys who participated in the girls becoming pregnant?

No?

I just asked because if the girls are pregnant and desire an abortion because reasons, the acknowledgment that it takes two for a pregnancy would be useful.

Or does it go back to the judge who sentenced the Stanford rapist to 6 months because otherwise, it might hurt his career? I won’t write what I said then because there aren’t enough curse words. This was back in 2016, let me jog your memory. And when his dad piped in that it wasn’t worth ruining his life for an action that was 20 minutes. I think he forgot that the girl that his son assaulted has to live with that forever. She got a far harsher sentence than he did and she wasn’t even on trial. Because he was remorseful. Yeah, remorseful he got caught.

But to go back to the failing of women and girls because they couldn’t attend class because of an abortion, how would they know?

This comes from an open desire to control the actions of women and girls.

Again, it is all about control.

The men want it and therefore the women should give in.

I’d ask if that was what they want but I’m afraid I can’t stomach the response.

This entire “culture war” that they’ve created and railed on is all about control.

I have a new shirt, did I say?

An RBG tee shirt that says “I’ve heard enough from old white men”.

That says it all, right?

These men are afraid of losing the control they think they have over women.

Tuesday Top of Mind 6/11/24- the vote against the federal right to birth control

Again with this bullshit.

Okay. Back up.

Last week there was a Senate vote on protecting the federal right to birth control. And it failed with only 51 votes to 39. Reminder, The Senate needs 60 votes to pass legislation. That is a different top of mind. There were some Republican yeas (okay TWO) and a couple of Democratic nays and still more people voted by not voting.

But the important thing is that it did not pass.

Even though over 90% of Americans support birth control.

What was to be protected by the bill?

A person’s ability to obtain and use birth control. And a doctor’s ability to prescribe said birth control.

There are mealy-mouthed people who say that the right to birth control is not in danger.

OH REALLY?

Some people said that Roe was settled law. This was very, very recently at their Supreme Court nomination hearings. Remember them? I do.

The right to birth control was settled with the 1965 decision of Griswold v Connecticut. This ruling essentially meant that the Constitution protected marital privacy rights against state restrictions. This has been used for many things, including Roe v Wade. And interracial marriage. This has definitely been mentioned in the last two years, by Justice Clarence Thomas and Justice Samuel Alito.

You understand our concern.

Forgive me if I don’t believe them. Any of them.

This is about controlling women.

And controlling child-making.

Which was the reason for Dobbs.

But it is ALWAYS and FOREVER about controlling women.

This is your call to look up and see if your Senators in your state voted yea or nay. If they voted nay make a note on your calendar to call their office monthly to say how disappointed and angry you are. I mean, you are not one of their billionaire handlers but it will make you feel better.

I hope. Let me know if it works.

Tuesday Top of Mind 4/9/24-bbbbrrrraaaaiiinnssss

I was going to write about something completely different for this Tuesday Top of Mind. I had it written and everything but posted.

And then Arizona’s Supreme Court upheld an 1864 anti-abortion law, making it the law of Arizona.

A near-total abortion ban.

Okay. I see what you did there.

They resurrected a zombie law. A law that is technically still on the books but hasn’t been enforced in DECADES.

This completely dismisses more than half of their population. Because in 1864 women couldn’t 1) vote 2) hold office 3) hold property 4) hold a job 5) have a bank account. No women voted for it. Because they couldn’t. Women didn’t gain the right to vote in Arizona until 1912.

I am so incandescent with rage about this further degradation of women’s bodily autonomy and rights.

This zombie law has lurched back to life, aided by those who seek to control women and is now going to be fed the blood of those who it tortures. The women who request abortions and the often doomed children they are seeking to protect. Just like Texas. Just like Tennessee. Just like Florida. Just like any other state that has passed anti-abortion bills since the overturning of Roe v Wade and the Dobbs decision.

This is what Justices Alito and Thomas were signaling when they brought up the Comstock law against mailing indecent and lewd things in the mail during arguments about the legality of mailing mifepristone through the mail. You know, the abortion pill. The Comstock law hasn’t been enforced since the 1930s. I remember when it was bandied about when Larry Flynt was on trial for distributing lewd magazines in the 1970s and 1980s. That magazine was Hustler, among others. If I remember correctly, that is why magazines such as these started to be shipped in brown paper wrapping. To protect the eyes, you know.

Eye roll.

Cruelty and control are their endgame.

They don’t care about the potential child. They just want to control women and bring them to heel because we dare to think that we are people in our own right. With our own rights. With our own ideas. With our own bodily autonomy.

Cruelty is the point.

Control is the endgame.

Also endgame is to have the hard-won rights of women rolled back to when we could be controlled. If that ever was a thing.

This is what the attack on no-fault divorce is about.

This is what the attack on abortion rights is about.

This is what the attack on women’s bodily autonomy is about.

This is what the upcoming attack on birth control is about.

I’ve been writing and marching about it for years.

Increasing the birth rate of WHITE women by WHITE men is the ultimate goal.

This is and always has been about control and cruelty.

This is where being a Cassandra really sucks. No one believes us.

Gah!!!

Tuesday Top of Mind 1/23/24-light a candle for Roe

Yesterday marked 51 years since Roe versus Wade. The ruling protected a woman’s constitutional right to choose their own path, including the right to choose an abortion.

Well, thought men everywhere, we’ll see about that.

After all, if a woman as the right to her own body just think of what else she will decide to have the rights for.

She may decide that she has the right to end a terrible marriage. Not terrible because of abuse, or because of infidelity, but because they just don’t suit after all. There has been a rumbling, deep in the men’s groups, about the downfall of society was the no-fault divorce. This means that the woman (or man) can just decide that they don’t want to be married anymore.

Gasp, the audacity!

Yes, this is heavy on the sarcasm. The no-fault divorce will be the focus soon enough. And is what will be the focus of some groups next as I’ve heard the rumblings.

However, the Roe v Wade decision guaranteed a woman’s privacy in health care matters, including abortion.

Apparently we women don’t know our own mind.

But we do; and that scares people to death.

As I’ve written before, it is not about the child. If it was there would be affordable daycare, rent, healthcare. You know, the things that are required to raise the infant to adulthood. Where they can be a tax paying entity.

Money and power and control.

I’ve written about it many times because it is heavy on the mind. Especially 51 years after Roe v Wade was decided by the Supreme Court 7-2.

The Dobbs decision was June 24, 2022. Notwithstanding the outright lies to get three of the justices on the court during their confirmation hearings, this kicked back the decision to the states.

According to the Guttmacher Institute and their work on reproductive health, the state laws run the gamut of total ban, without exclusions for rape or incest or health of woman, to 6 weeks (the so-called heartbeat bills), 8 weeks after last menstrual period (essentially a 6 week ban), 12 weeks (end of first trimester, and also before the anatomy scans for sex of the baby are even done), 15 weeks after last menstrual period (essentially a 12 week ban), viability (which is nebulous and being pushed by medical science all the time), 24 weeks after last menstrual period, and one 3rd trimester. A couple of states don’t have any abortion ban laws at all. Confusing, right?

Raise a glass to the Roe v Wade decision, light a candle, not matter what you feel you have to do to mourn the rights that were stripped from ALL women in this country in June 2022.

Because some men said so. Okay, there was a woman too.

How dare they?

Taking away the power and the control and the patriarchical overtones, it is, and always has been, about cold hard cash. Taxes, I mean. The taxes that the baby could have paid as an adult. Or, in some states, as child laborers.

Not to mention to torturing of unborn babies who are incompatible with life, or the women who die because their state said no. Even though the pregnancy is killing them.

Mourn them too.

Then put the steel in your spine and fight to get our rights back.