June 17, 2005
There's Got to be a Morning After
by Lorraine Berry
Wisconsin is apparently determined to move ahead in the Stupid State Olympics. While previous contenders for the podium have included Florida, for its ban on adoptions by gay parents, Alabama for its ban on sex toys, and Kansas for fighting over the teaching of evolution, Wisconsin legislators now want to make it illegal for University of Wisconsin students to purchase Plan B contraception.
The legislation would prohibit University of Wisconsin System health centers from advertising, prescribing or dispensing emergency contraception — drugs that can block a pregnancy in the days after sex. The state university system has 161,000 students on 26 campuses.Republican Rep. Daniel LeMahieu introduced the bill after a health clinic serving UW-Madison students published ads in campus newspapers inviting students to call for prescriptions for the drug to use on spring break.
"Are we going to change the lifestyle of every UW student? No," LeMahieu said. "But we can tell the university that you are not going to condone it, you are not going to participate in it, and you are not going to use our tax dollars to do it."
Let's just parse that statement, shall we? are we going to change the lifestyle of every UW student?
No. Because, overwhelmingly, Plan B contraception is prescribed to and purchased by women. So, apparently, it's not going to have any effect on UW male students.
No. Because those who can't get Plan B contraception may find themselves pregnant. Some will decide to have an abortion. Some will decide to carry the child to term. And some will be lucky enough to find out that sperm and egg never met. But no doubt somebody's lifestyle is going to be affected.
No. Because the governor of Wisconsin, Jim Doyle, has already announced he's going to veto the bill. Good on you, governor.
Representative LeMahieu has apparently not gotten the word that we still have a right to privacy in this country, that prescriptions are between doctors and patients, and that, well, he needs to knock this shit off.
Drop him a line and let him know that, won't you?
Posted by in Body, Christian Fundamentalism, Civil Rights, Culture War, Drugs, Feminism, Freedom of Information, Gender, Health, Human Rights, Law, Pharmaceuticals, Reproductive Rights, Sex
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Say it loud, say it proud!
When they see Norm Coleman in the Senate and Tim Pawlenty in the Governor's Mansion, people ask me "What happened to Minnesota?"
What happened to Wisconsin?! I realize the place also gave us Joe McCarthy, but it was the first state in the country to add sexual orientation to its non-discrimination laws and to send an open lesbian to the U.S. Congress. When did it go so sexually retrograde?
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Comment by: Amanda Marcotte at June 17, 2005 05:09 PM
Despite his feverish fantasies of college girls paying for wild sex he'll never get to have by not getting their morning after pills, LeMahieu fails to understand that girls who plan to have sex generally come prepared. And the ones that stand to lose the most are the ones who "had sex" that they didn't consent to, a wildly common occurance in college.
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Comment by: Sarah in Chicago at June 18, 2005 10:18 PM
This is also the same state that has denied domestic partner benefits to employees at the state universities.
The dean of students at University of Wisconsin Madison has just recently quit over this. The woman is straight and married, but she was not only sick of the injustice, but also of losing potential and current high calibre employees who were turning down possible appointments or qutting because of the ban. I think she has taken up a position in Arizona.
I don't know what is happening in Wisconsin, especially given it's wonderful history of social progessiveness, but it's going downhill.
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Comment by: Jeff at June 17, 2005 01:01 PM