Category Archives: feminism

On Breakfast in Bed and Bitches, Pragmatically

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I changed my mind about the potential chauvinism deal. I mean, I didn’t change my mind, exactly.

You’ll get your chance to explain where you’re coming from. You will bring over brownie mix, and he’ll make brownies. You’ll watch movies, ones that you haven’t seen but that he thinks you’ll like. He’ll be right. You won’t sleep because you will be too excited. You will talk about everything. You will tease each other. You will make plans. You will talk politics and find some common ground. You will fall asleep and when you open your eyes, he will be walking through the door with the bacon and eggs that he woke up early to make just for you. You will be so happy. You will do the dishes as quietly as you can, since he’s asleep. You think feminist thoughts while you’re doing the dishes. You will leave him cherries in a bowl in the fridge. You will awkwardly say hello to his landlady on the way out, then panic and wonder if you should have made better conversation than “Hi!” as you shut the door.

***

I have been working at the same office building for a year and a half. I have never had an assigned parking spot, but every day, I park in the same spot. For the past week or so, I’ve been noticing that if I don’t get to the office early enough (ha, my definition of early is much different from yours, I’ll imagine), someone will be in “my” spot.

So yesterday, I had to park in a different spot. Our parking system is totally unintelligible and strange, so when you see a spot that has no number painted into the concrete at its opening, you assume that it’s free. So I parked in one.

I went to my car after work to see a note. “THIS IS A RESERVED PARKING SPACE.” Pssh, like hell it is. So I texted my boss and told him that it is probably time to see about getting me a real parking spot. My lovely lady boss went down to greet the very scary building secretary today, and was met with resistance. Lots of resistance.

And, to top off that resistance, the scary building secretary said something to my lady boss about how she recognized my license plate and also the fact that my car had duct tape on it. What exactly does that have to do with anything?

My car took a beating in Chicago. I was the hit part of a hit-and-run, leaving a giant jagged wound in my back bumper. My windows were spray painted. (For like a month, I had to roll down my window to turn left because the word “PAIN” was in my way. I eventually paid a guy $8 to razor-blade the paint off.) My front side bumper was hit. I was driving along a narrow street and a man opened his door, shattering my side-view mirror.

All of these things are parts of Chicago that I will carry with me until my car dies, because even though I pay Allstate a significant amount of money each month in “full-coverage” insurance and have never been in an accident that they had to pay any money for, it’s going to cost me my full deductible to fix each individual incident of damage, which at current count is 2 new bumpers and whatever else they decide that they’ll need. Duct tape, on the other hand, is $4/roll, and every time I buy it, my insurance doesn’t go up.

With the transmission starting to get janky – through no fault of my own, it’s a 3rd gear pressure switch thing, whatever that means – I’m making important decisions and stocking away money to fix that when it goes rather than keeping up with your needless aesthetic expectations.

So, scary building secretary, the reason that my car looks like it belongs to an undesirable is merely because of the financial advantages to not fixing my car (plus, no one wants to steal a car that’s not worth chopping up and selling). Don’t think that I haven’t looked into it, because I have. Stop judging people for what their cars look like. The quality of their hearts and souls is of far greater importance.

The conclusion here? I now have an assigned parking spot. I am annoyed about it. But…the parking spot coupled with my brand new dual monitors (46 inches of computer screen!) means that I am having a great week. I am so blessed to work where I do. I am so grateful. Currently bitchy, but so incredibly happy.

On Male Chauvinism, Attractively

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Let’s say that you’re “dating” someone new. (I’m using the term loosely, just like the rest of my generation. I was going to make a bad pun, but I’ll leave that alone.)

Let’s say that person makes comments that may lead you to conclude that they probably fall somewhere between “Hardcore” and “Might just be a defense mechanism” on the Male Chauvinism Scale that I haven’t made up yet. (Which is why the scale segments are strange. Deal with it.)

Deal breaker?

Usually, yes.

Your analyst/therapist might tell you that you should probably break the habit of dating guys that you want to change. Exactly right, but you might not one to listen to advice, no matter how right it is.

But you’re not one to turn down a challenge, especially not one that attractive. The red flag has been raised. It was raised that night in the bar when he made those jokes that irked you.

It’s not like you’re naturally inclined towards excelling at being a traditional woman anyway, so it’s not like he’ll last very long unless he can learn to love who you are. Who knows? Maybe you’ll get bored first and it’ll be a future crisis averted. But in the meantime, you’re not one to waste an opportunity to learn new things, try new things, and have life adventures, so have fun and remember: don’t let anything slide!

On Gloria Anzaldúa

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The first time I came across Gloria Anzaldúa’s Borderlands, I was 17 and a senior in high school. I hated it. Like, really hated it.

I came across Anzaldúa again during an exploration of feminist literature for a women’s studies class in college. I liked her a little better, but found her style of inserting snippets of Spanish into her writing annoyingly pretentious.

(This stems from an upper-level Shakespeare class I took the summer between my junior and senior years of college. On the first day, the professor asked us to go around the room and give an example of “fool.” When we got to the girl sitting next to me, she said smoothly, “I have a highbrow and a lowbrow example for you.” I rolled my eyes. I would later go on to hear the professor telling the girl that it was unnecessary [subtext: pretentious and douchey] to put so many French quotations in her papers.)

I have no idea why I initially disliked Anzaldúa so much. Her writing isn’t really pretentious.  It’s honest. It’s the product of her cultures, and her experiences, and her feelings. (After I post this, I’m going to find my box of file folders and dig through it to find notes on why I hated Borderlands so much the first time. I bet it’s a seriously silly reason.)

Her writings influenced the lesson that my AP English teacher taught about segmentation in the mind. I remember it as this: as the human brain learns new information, it attempts to categorize that information, and puts it into the boxes that it already has established. Woman. Dog. Boy. Adult. And so on. Each box exists as a separate container for information.

(I know what you’re thinking, and no, I’ve never been great with a straight line. I am also aware of the fact that I have the handwriting of an 8th grade girl. I was one once,  you know.)

The identity of a person doesn’t fit into just one box. An identity is a combination of boxes, all jumbled together to form a bigger picture of the whole.

Anzaldúa’s writing focuses on her lack of a concrete identity (belonging entirely to one box) since she is mixed-race and a lesbian, and therefore inhabits many boxes within many other boxes, hence the title Borderlands. Being both of those can get difficult, especially in a society that does not seem to value diversity.

As a college student, I was more receptive to her writing style, although I’m not sure that I was as gung-ho on her as I was on other authors (Judith Butler, I love you).

The idea of not fitting in entirely is not a foreign concept to most people. Granted, as a straight white chick, I will never quite understand the implications of being part of both racial and sexual orientation minorities, but the inability to truly identify as something concrete is something that I struggle with as I attempt to accept that I’ll never know who my birth father was and as I process the larger implications of being adopted as I enter adulthood (although the possibility of being part Vulcan or Russian or English or German or Elfish or Canadian is always exciting, I guess).

Anzaldúa definitely brought a different perspective to American feminist writing, which was (and still is) primarily driven by a very monochromatic subset of our society, and I think it’s really good to continue to acknowledge that even in feminism, minorities are under-represented and overlooked, and then work to change that.

Girldrive – which I highly recommend reading, highlights the importance of looking at feminism from outside academia – also brought my attention to the importance of identities for women, particularly as they navigate the various roles they identify with. (Are you white first? Or a woman first? Or a feminist first? Eventually, you have to accept that you’re a mass of all things all at once, even if people see and identify you as one thing or another immediately.)

Anzaldúa’s contribution was a giant one and as much as I hated Borderlands then (I have since come to respect both the author and her works, and sincerely appreciate being exposed to them earlier than most), I think it needs to remain an important part of our educational curriculum far into the future.

What sparked this? This article in Bitch.

BiblioBitch: 25th Anniversary of Gloria Anzaldúa’s Borderlands/La Frontera

Books post by Devyn Manibo, Submitted by Devyn Manibo on July 11, 2012 – 1:14pm; tagged 25th anniversary,BiblioBitch, books, Borderlands, feminist, Gloria Anzaldúa, La Frontera.

If you read Bitch, you are likely at least somewhat familiar with Gloria Anzaldúa and her work with feminism, her beautiful writings, and her advocacy for women of color. She was a Chicana-Tejana-lesbian-feminist poet, theorist, and fiction writer, born September 26, 1942, in Raymondville, Texas. She passed away on May 15th, 2004, but still remains one of the most widely read, respected, and loved queer woman writers of color in history.

As someone who identifies as queer and mixed race, her work was bound to play a pivotal role in the way I construct and understand my identity, the way I live my life, and how I interact with others. I picked up a used copy ofBorderlands/La Frontera (the first edition) when I was 18 years old. Her semi-autobiographical collection of memoir and poetry was older than me, and I had no idea of the gravity of the impact it would have, but I began reading it, slowly–swallowing her words, and digesting them into my being. It was a lot to take in. Quickly, she helped me realize that the comfort I thought I found in labels was simply an assimilationist value I had adopted, not for myself, but for the comfort of others. I never knew how to answer the question, “so, what are you?” It was what I had been grappling with for my entire life; I was living between worlds–the borderlands. I am not either or, but rather, on the edges of all, in an unstable, and ever-changing terrain, “nepantla”–a Nahuatl word for the in-between spaces, where the boundaries are unclear, and we are constantly in transition. I can use ambiguity as resistance, and realize that I will not, and never will, fit so neatly into the boxes left out for me, for that would be the death of the borderlands, and the death of the identities I hold.

It is the chapter “Movimientos de rebeldia y las culturas que traicionan,” which roughly translates to “movements of rebellion and the cultures they betray,” that I carry closest to my heart. I have read those 10 pages more times than I can count. In this chapter, Anzaldúa notes “homophobia,” and not in the way you might think. She means the fear of going home, the fear of abandonment, by the mother, the culture, for being “unacceptable, faulty, damaged.” And to avoid rejection, we conform to values of “the culture,” while pushing what we are taught to understand as unacceptable into the periphery of our vision–the shadows. We’ve internalized our oppressions, thus, creating what Anzaldúa aptly named the Shadow-Beast. We fear that the beast will break free, and that our truths will show. Though, it is possible to come to terms with the Shadow-Beast, to see her as kind, and tender, as a being that wants to be released not in the name of destruction but to uncover the lies we’ve let inhabit our bodies, in order to come into our true selves, to resist imposed ideals, and to not be simply tolerated, but loved, and understood. It is a process, and most often, a struggle of pain, and melancholia. I am on a constant search for home, language, and kinship, and I was able to find a basis for all of this in Anzaldúa’s words.

gloria anzaldua with her arm outstretched, leaning on a wooden plank fence

Needless to say, this book has impacted my life in a way that I can barely scrape with a short blog post. I will revisit this text for years to come, it will live with me, it will understand me, and I will continue to discover what it means to live in such a transient space.

Aunt Lute, a nonprofit press focused on bringing the voices of women—particularly queer women and women of color—to publication, is celebrating its 30th year, as well as the 25th anniversary of Anzaldúa’sBorderlands/La Frontera. For the 25th anniversary of the book, Aunt Lute is looking to publish a fourth edition, but they cannot do so without your help. So, please, keep Gloria Anzaldúa’s voice alive, and donate via Kickstarter by July 28th.

On Anatomically Correct Language, Vaginally

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This news stunned me. Literally.

June 15, 2012 at 11:02 am

Michigan reps silenced for use of ‘v-words’

Comments about sexual parts, procedures during abortion debate cause controversy

  • By Chad Livengood
  • Detroit News Lansing Bureau
  • 48 Comments

Lansing — House Republicans tried to silence two female Democratic lawmakers Thursday for floor outbursts a day earlier referencing male sterilization and a female sex organ.

The majority party prohibited state Rep. Lisa Brown from speaking on the floor Thursday after she ended a speech the day before against a bill restricting abortions by referencing her female anatomy.

“I’m flattered that you’re all so interested in my vagina, but ‘no’ means ‘no,’ ” said Brown, D-West Bloomfield.

State Rep. Barb Byrum, D-Onondaga, also wasn’t recognized to speak Thursday for a disturbance she caused on the House floor Wednesday when the GOP majority wouldn’t allow her to propose a ban on men getting a vasectomy unless the sterilization procedure was necessary to save a man’s life.

Majority Floor Leader Jim Stamas, R-Midland, made the decision to prevent Brown and Byrum from speaking on any of the slew of bills the House was racing to pass before adjourning for the summer.

As the party in power, the Republicans can decide who gets to speak and what issue — just as the Democrats did to them when they were in power two years ago.

“My concern was the decorum of the House, not of anything she said,” Stamas told The Detroit News.

“I ask all members to maintain a decorum of the House, and I felt it went too far yesterday,” he said.

Speaker Pro Tem John Walsh, R-Livonia, gaveled Brown out of order for saying “no means no” — because it suggested Brown was comparing the abortion legislation to rape, House GOP spokesman Ari Adler said.

“It has nothing to do with the word vagina,” Adler said.

Some male Republican representatives, however, said Brown’s comments were vulgar, “inappropriate” and “offensive.”

“What she said was offensive,” said state Rep. Mike Callton, R-Nashville.

“It was so offensive, I don’t even want to say it in front of women. I would not say that in mixed company,” he said.

During a Capitol press conference Thursday, Brown noted “vagina” is the “medically correct term” for the female organ at the center of the Legislature’s ongoing abortion restriction debate.

“If I can’t say the word vagina, why are we legislating vaginas?” Brown said. “What language should I use?

“We’re all adults here.”

House Speaker Jase Bolger, R-Marshall, would not address the controversy that had become a national news story by late Thursday.

“I think we’ve made plenty of comments about her inappropriate behavior,” Bolger said.

In an appearance on MSNBC’s “The Rachel Maddow Show” Thursday night, Brown maintained she did nothing wrong.

“I followed the House rules,” said Brown, noting the incident has helped her raise campaign donations.

Democrats said the GOP’s action was more evidence of Republicans trampling women’s rights.

“The war on women in Michigan is not fabricated — this is very real — and it comes at the highest levels of state government,” said Senate Democratic Leader Gretchen Whitmer of East Lansing.

Whitmer made the comment in a YouTube video appearance with state Sen. Rebekah Warren, D-Ann Arbor, posted Thursday in response to the House abortion bill.

As the controversy brewed Thursday, Republicans launched into public relations damage control, emphasizing Byrum and Brown could speak in the future as long as they abided by the rules.

“As a woman and mother, I was personally offended by Rep. Lisa Brown’s disgraceful actions during Wednesday’s floor debate,” state Rep. Lisa Lyons, R-Alto, said in a statement released late Thursday.

After passing a bill with new regulations for abortion providers, the House tabled another bill Wednesday that would ban all abortions after 20 weeks with a narrow exemption for the life of the mother.

Byrum indicated she wants to give men the same treatment House Republicans proposed for women who may be unable to terminate an unwanted pregnancy under House Bill 5713.

House Republicans also wouldn’t let staByrum speak on the House floor Thursday.

Byrum, D-Onondaga, caused a disturbance on the House floor Wednesday when she wasn’t allowed to introduce an amendment to the abortion regulations bill banning men from getting a vasectomy unless the sterilization procedure was necessary to save a man’s life.

“If we truly want to make sure children are born, we would regulate vasectomies,” Byrum said.

When House Speaker Pro Tem John Walsh, R-Livonia, wouldn’t recognize Bryum to propose her amendment, she began shouting at him and stormed out of the chamber.

“You should have let me speak. … I represent the same number of people you do,” Byrum told Walsh.

From The Detroit News:http://www.detroitnews.com/article/20120615/POLITICS02/206150373#ixzz1xtly27z0

Regardless of where you stand on the abortion issue, or even this bill, the events that transpired should ignite an anger somewhere deep inside you. (Even my cervix is enraged.) This goes far beyond abortion.

The word “vagina” may scare people, but that’s because those people are cowards.

During a Capitol press conference Thursday, Brown noted “vagina” is the “medically correct term” for the female organ at the center of the Legislature’s ongoing abortion restriction debate.

“If I can’t say the word vagina, why are we legislating vaginas?” Brown said. “What language should I use?

“We’re all adults here.”

From The Detroit News: http://www.detroitnews.com/article/20120615/POLITICS02/206150373#ixzz1xtoxbqTT

Adults? I don’t think you should be an adult to know words like “vagina.”

When I was two (or not quite two), my little brother was born. My parents brought him home. Apparently, I started anatomy lessons early. While my mom was changing his diaper one day, I asked her what “that” was. When she told me, I went down the hall saying, “Penis, penis, penis”  over and over again. She laughs when she tells the story. “You weren’t going to forget that,” she says.

My family wasn’t scared of anatomically correct words, and rightly so.

I hardly think that understanding the proper words for referring to “private parts” are going to cause children to become immoral beasts. But then again, the way certain members of the GOP are pushing their agenda of ignorance, you’d think that they’d rather have us never mention those words at all. (…because we’ve been so great at stopping kids from accessing information in general with the advent of the internet, and all).

Speaker Pro Tem John Walsh, R-Livonia, gaveled Brown out of order for saying “no means no” — because it suggested Brown was comparing the abortion legislation to rape, House GOP spokesman Ari Adler said.

“It has nothing to do with the word vagina,” Adler said.

Some male Republican representatives, however, said Brown’s comments were vulgar, “inappropriate” and “offensive.”

“What she said was offensive,” said state Rep. Mike Callton, R-Nashville.

“It was so offensive, I don’t even want to say it in front of women. I would not say that in mixed company,” he said.

From The Detroit News: http://www.detroitnews.com/article/20120615/POLITICS02/206150373#ixzz1xtpz9k84

What? Vulgar? The word “vagina”? I bet Callton is a real hoot at dinner parties. What else makes his list of vulgar words? Here’s a great list of words that sound dirty but aren’t.

The feminist who lives inside me is begging me to rant about the choice of diction in Rep. Callton’s statements. Firstly, “mixed company” generally (although I’m sure that at some point, it will be proposed that we amend “mixed company” to include only men and fetuses) includes women, and most of those women have are in possession of a vagina. They probably aren’t scared to say it.

I don’t just casually drop it in conversation, but then again, I generally don’t drop other anatomical parts unless necessary. “I seriously bruised my coccyx yesterday.” Or, “They had to X-ray my pelvis for signs of bone deterioration.” (I don’t know, it could happen.)

Having someone refer to “vagina” as vulgar is insulting. Women have spent the better part of human history being associated with dirty and unpleasant connotations because they possess them. To say that saying “vagina” is offensive is offensive to me. (Say that sentence three times fast.) As a human, I am not offensive. My vagina is not offensive. It’s not vulgar, or crude. It’s a part of who I am. It’s a part of half the United States (give or take a few). Ask Georgia O’Keeffe; she – albeit only potentially, and even then, only subconsciously – totally got it.

Marketers spend billions of dollars telling woman that we’re offensive, that we’re unclean, that we’re not perfect, so I’d prefer to not add the stress of having a legislator reinforcing that message.

Attempts at “respecting” women by legislating their personal choices and keeping them from hearing words like vagina are very reminiscent of a time not so long ago when women weren’t allowed to vote. Or own property. Or get divorced. Or refuse to have sex with their husbands.

Tell me I’m jumping to conclusions, fine. But I fear that we’re regressing. I fear that this county, which once stood for freedom and progress, now stands for freedom and progress…for a select few. And sadly, I don’t see myself as being included in those select few. I’m a woman. I’m an educated woman. I matter. When a member of my gender is discriminated against and sanctioned for standing up and speaking her mind, I will take offense.

Oh, speaking of sanctions…one of the motives given for barring Lisa Brown from speaking was “…concern was the decorum of the House.” Ha, well it’s not like she interrupted a speech or anything. (I’m talking about you, Joe Wilson.)

Disgusting. (More or disgusting than a vagina, obviously.) This trend of legislating against women is one thing, but the trend of silencing our voices is worse. It’s a grave offense. Limiting our ability to speak on issues that obviously pertain to us is oppressive.

Oppression, you say?

I’m going to stay away from the whole sexuality deal today, because this post just got long, but let me remind you that abortion has a root cause. And that’s usually sex. Consensuality (not a word, but whatever) and other issues aside, sex that causes pregnancy involves a man and a woman. Man and a woman. This is not just on the women. But I am obligated to at least remind you of the slut-shaming that happens before, during, or after sex. Sometimes no sex is involved for such insults and categorizations. Women’s sexuality is scary.

I googled this cartoon (because it has lived in my mind for a long time), and came across this post, in a blog called “Obliged to Offend.” The last paragraph of this post says, “Female sexuality can at times be subversive and powerful. It is for this reason that many men feel threatened by the presence of a woman expressing it. They feel that she has the greater degree of sexual choice and power so they try to control or dominate her. This is not, as some believe, confined strictly to the remnants of old-fashioned male sexism or the devout followers of monotheistic religion. Beauty and sexuality are a threat to orthodoxies of all stripes because they are an expression of our animalistic ancestry which cannot be levelled out or extinguished by force. Political creeds, however emancipatory their rhetoric, are also very often rationalisations of deeper emotional problems.”

It is my opinion that we are currently experiencing a wave of backlash resulting from the feminist movements that marked the late 19th and 20th centuries. We see women becoming more and more powerful. We are more educated, more involved in the workforce, and more independent.

In the search for equality, we have unintentionally upended the traditional male roles. They are lost, confused, unsure. (Not all, but quite a few. Trust me, I’ve been dating since I was fifteen. I have considerable experience interacting with them.) Marriages are declining, and they’re happening later. Now that women are focusing on their careers and their whole selves, they are less inclined to find a husband and procreate as soon as possible in order to meet hegemonic expectations for a normal family structure and life trajectory.

Personally, I still strive for a husband. And children. And that whole traditional white fence dream. But I’m determined to find someone who respects the shit out of me, who supports my decisions and my dreams, and who wants the same things out of life that I want. For me, there is no problem with combining female strength and wife-ness. (I’ll need some serious help or at least compromise on the traditional wife duties, though. I can’t clean to save my life. Or cook.)

I’m sorry that the root of this mad legislating and silencing and anti-women rhetoric might lie in the fear of powerful women (hence the emphasis on the cultural breakdown of the traditional family structure and the fervent attempts to rectify these perceived wrongs and immorality), but I’m not sorry. Just as women have had to adjust, compromise, and grow in order to accommodate their new opportunities (we still end up doing most of the housework and child-rearing; we just have to do it after we get off work), men should do the same.

Masculinity doesn’t have to be defined by the ability to produce income. Or the ability to dominate or control a woman. Masculinity can be a lot of things. Men should, well, man up and get to work figuring out how they can come to terms with women playing ball on their level. Because women aren’t going to stop fighting for equality, for respect, for rights. At the end of the day, we are all human beings with feelings and individual strengths. We need to work together in order to achieve any sort of forward progress.

But let’s start by being able to say “vagina.” Baby steps.

 

On Women, truthfully.

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Since I have a janky internet connection reminiscent of early aughts dial-up (was it really that recently?), I can’t stream too many things at once and therefore can’t check the link above. But my intention was to google “verizon commercial mom and daughter” and I think I’ve arrived at the right one.

Maybe you’ve seen it already: A mom and daughter are crying at a Verizon store. The daughter is moving away (4.2 miles away, to be exact, weeps the mother), and they’re getting phones equipped with GPS so they’ll still be close to each other.

Mike and I were watching that commercial, and I launched into a short-lived diatribe* about how women are portrayed in the media today and how it’s unfair to classify us all as weak, emotional beings.

“But it’s true!” Mike interrupted, before proceeding to do a sadly accurate impression of me sobbing my eyes out when I left for college. (that moment – or rather those hours – will haunt me forever.)

And he’s not wrong.

*diatribe – You know how Jacob and I play that game where you get points if you use words incorrectly? Well here’s the facebook thread that makes it impossible for me to hear the word diatribe and not laugh:

Jacob Wood posted to  Katie Barry
Last night in a bar, I heard a woman say, “you’ll have a diatribe of women come after you”. Is it possible to die of points?·

On Gender and Ambition, dejectedly

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(I still have backlogs of articles I’d like to address, so hopefully I can start posting and writing my critiques, comments, etc. soon!)

Madeline sent me this link last week and I thought I’d share the article with you.

Before you read it, know this: I’m a huge believer in the idea that there can be successful co-parenting, or successful relationships, or marriages full of good sex (or all of those things combined with monetary comfort!).

While I don’t think I’d last too long as a stay-at-home mom, I also don’t imagine my future to be full of trying to work 60 hour weeks and then awesome parenting while my husband just hangs out.

Note to readers: this is all coming from my childhood. My extreme paranoia about terrible husbands stems from my past experiences. My mom worked her ass off trying to support us all financially (and put my brother and I through private schools) while my dad didn’t take on the additional burden of stay-at-home dad (including, but not limited to: laundry, cooking, dishes, cleaning, childcare, etc.) even though it would have been well within his means and skill set and would have drastically improved the parental-contribution-to-the-family-via-work balance that did not exist.

Admittedly, my memories have been lost to my own subconscious erasure as well as the emotional tints that seem to color our own recollections of the past. Therefore, I can claim no exact memory validity yet still claim personal memory legitimacy. Whatever. You try to recollect and see for yourself how difficult it can be.

Regardless, as a young, twenty-something woman, I do feel pressure. Tons of pressure. Some of it is self-inflicted and some of it stems from a whole host of other influences. That pressure to succeed drives my work ethic, my independence, my stubborn sense of self, and my panic about the future. (Always panic, that’d be my motto.)

I always read the comments, too. Sometimes they’re far more enlightening than the content of the article itself. Since this one only has three, it wasn’t difficult to get through them. Here’s the lengthiest (is that a word?) one:

BRYANROBB
I expected more from you, Good. This is terribly one sided reporting, and borderline misandristic to the likes of Jezebel. No wonder men don’t want to marry, every which way we turn we’re getting boxed and blamed. Did you ever stop to consider that the older men who make more than their women counterparts are the last vestiges of a bygone era? Soon they will retire, and as the women age through the system it is very likely that these young women will make more than their male counterparts. Also, give me the kids over cut throat corporate America any day. The two earner model is the cause of our failures as decent parents, all so we can afford more stuff? I don’t care who works and who doesn’t, but someone needs to be home with the kids in the formative years. And sure, I’m definitely for subsidizing child care. For single MOMs and DADs. Too bad almost all low income entitlements go to girls and men are exempt. Stop waging war on men for Pete’s sake.

I don’t disagree that this article is very one-sided. But then again, there’s not enough space in the world to give equal time to discuss women’s ambitions while simultaneously deconstructing the reasons that men may feel maligned by the media and neglected about the social pressures they face.

This article isn’t about men.

The only time that the author (whose posts I generally adore, by the way) could REALLY use some more statistical reference is when she says,

And while women are consumed with the problems of “work-life balance”—trying to maintain a successful career while raising a family—men seldom feel as much pressure or face as much doubt about their ability to “do it all.”

I don’t know that she’s entirely correct in making that assumption. I’d argue that men are feeling the pressure to “do it all” but instead of being accepted, they’re facing the same social stigmas that have kept gendered activities as segregated as a 7th grade school dance for so many generations.
Regardless of our new stances on equality and whatnot, we are failing to accept that there are differences. In our quest for equalization, we’ve neglected so much about individuality, about personality, about biology, and in doing so, we’ve created a situation that’s arguably far worse than before.
Take the emergence of “stay at home dads,” for instance. Advertising for household items is always geared toward women. Stay at home dads aren’t given the same amount of respect. It’s emasculating, I’m sure, to know that people don’t value what you do. But then again, welcome to the flip side of things.
For me, a household has many factors for success. You need cash flow to buy supplies, necessities, etc. But you also need to address the rest of it: chores, bills, laundry, parenting, cooking, shopping, maintenance, etc. Those two elements (the cash flow and the “rest of it”) need to be in harmony in order for a household to maintain successful balance. Communication is key. More than that, all parties need to recognize the importance of contributions made for the common good of the household.
Honestly, the thing that scares me most about this article is the bad sex after marriage, not to mention the extra weight, less money and more stress. But then again, it’s up to those women (obligatory heterosexual bias of the media comment here) to stand up to their husbands and tell them what’s up. I won’t stand for more housework, more stress, and less sex. And he’ll know that before he marries me. If that’s a deal breaker, I will have chosen the wrong man.

Why Are Young Women More Ambitious? They Have to Be


The headline of a new study by the Pew Research Center claims to have discovered “A Gender Reversal On Career Aspirations.” But upon closer inspection, the study appears to imply that young women are more ambitious than men their age across the board. Sixty-six percent of 18 to 34-year-old women rate their career high on their list of life priorities, compared with 59 percent of young men. This figure hasn’t really “reversed,” but it has shifted markedly in the past 15 years—in 1997, only 56 percent of young women felt the same way, compared to 58 percent of men.

Today’s young women aren’t planning to make any sacrifices on the home front, either—they’re prioritizing their personal lives, too. The amount of young women who say that having a successful marriage is one of the most important things in their lives has risen nine percentage points since 1997, from 28 to 37 percent. For young men, that stat is trending in the opposite direction—from 35 percent in 1997 to 29 percent now. More young women than men care about being a good parent—59 percent, compared to 47 percent of their male counterparts. It looks like young women are more likely to be thinking consciously about their priorities, period. Do dudes just not give thought to their futures at all?

Perhaps guys aren’t mulling their life priorities because they trust that marriage, parenthood and career usually work out better for them in the longrun. They’re right about that. When women begin their careers, they earn virtually the same as their male peers (95 cents to every dude dollar), but as they near their early thirties, the pay gap widens—women have kids, take maternity leave, and stall their careers for a few years, or else they get passed over for promotions and yearly raises. By the time a women nears retirement age, she earns around 75 cents for every dollar a man her age earns.

Although marriage is lower on young men’s list of priorities, they’ll fare better when they eventually tie the knot. Numerous studies show that married men are happier, live longer, make more money, and experience less stress, while married women are rewarded with more housework, less money, worse sex and a few extra pounds. And while women are consumed with the problems of “work-life balance”—trying to maintain a successful career while raising a family—men seldom feel as much pressure or face as much doubt about their ability to “do it all.” Women still end up performing the majority of the parenting, regardless of their jobs, and despite public platitudes revering the work of motherhood, the lack of universal childcare and inadequate (or nonexistent) parental-leave policies set women up to fail.

No amount of girl power—or denial—can obscure these deep-set gender dynamics. Women are acutely aware of the need to be especially ambitious in order to succeed—the same extra ambition any marginalized group needs to climb the career ladder and crack glass ceilings. It’s the reason more women are getting college degrees, and the reason why many women try more intently to find a mate at a younger age (although that’s changing). The sexual economy, as well as the professional one, are simply skewed in men’s favor, especially as the years go on. Why wouldn’t they be more relaxed about their life choices?

Photo by (cc) Flickr user gcoldironjr2003.

article source: GOOD

On Single Moms

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Kevin’s working late, so I’m stuck on the couch, trying to stay awake until he gets home. (hint: it’s not going to happen. I’m going to be dead to the world when he gets in. this week has been so exhausting!) I’ve been trying to get a chance to sit down and write a proper blog entry, but I just don’t think it’s going to happen until I’m at the airport on Friday. So hopefully you’ll get something good in time for the weekend. Unless, of course, you don’t.

Regardless, I came across this article tonight. I was at the bodega near my house the other night when I heard a reporter on the news talking about the rise in single motherhood (particularly for women who have had “some college” but don’t have degrees). I didn’t get a chance to finish listening, and haven’t even thought about looking it up since, so I was pleased to stumble upon it.

I don’t know that I necessarily like the conclusions that the author draws in the article – that this rise in single motherhood is a good thing based on a number of factors, but I do like that he points out:

“But what women of all social classes share is what one friend of mine, a single mom, calls the “if/then” attitude towards marriage. As she puts it, “If I meet the right guy, then I’d like to get married. But if I don’t meet the right guy, then that’s okay too. I’m not going to get married out of desperation.”…That insistence on doing marriage right –- or not doing it all –- transcends class.”

I’ve been spending a lot of time lately wondering about this marriage business. I, for some odd reason, still hold marriage as an eventuality, a pre-determined part of my life. I expect that I’ll be married, but I definitely agree that I’d much rather remain single forever than settling for the wrong dude. (My rant about marriage can wait for another day…) It’s curious to watch how the average age of first marriage seems to be constantly increasing (as a result of many factors, of course), yet so many people get married right out of college. I get that you might have found “the one”, but I’m also inclined to believe that those behaviors are more socially driven than they are romantic.

But what scares me more than the thought that I might have married whoever I was dating at 21 is the fact that we’re glorifying this rise in out-of-wedlock births. Granted, I dig that freedom. I also dig that I’m not constantly pressured about how I’m not married yet. Women who want to have babies but don’t have a husband are having babies every day. But they’re educated; they’re employed; they’re stable (say whatever you want, but those things do help. a lot). Working multiple jobs and relying on family members to watch your child does not sound like the kind of thing that leads to fulfillment without undue stress. It sounds like we’re perpetuating all of the downfalls of the “decline of the family” that the conservatives are so worried about. I wouldn’t mind being a single mother (some day far into the future), but I certainly wouldn’t embrace that at this point in my life. I’m in no way economically stable enough to want to be responsible for a kid.

I also think that they’ve focused in on the masculinity aspect of this, yet they’ve simultaneously entirely ignored men and their involvement in all of this out of wedlock birthing. (Even though the author brings the lack of men up in the article, I don’t think he could have adequately addressed the male component in the space allowed.) They’re also looking in the wrong places. They’re not looking at why these women are more likely to give birth out of wedlock than their more educated peers. They’re not looking at the economic impact that these pregnancies are having on the mothers, or the long-term effects. To be honest, they’re completely ignoring a lot of really terrible things in order to praise the fact that women aren’t willing to settle.

That’s great. No one wants to settle. But I think we’re letting men off the hook here by talking about how these women are strong enough to do this on their own, and the example given of one woman whose boyfriend couldn’t even buy his own cigarettes is really disgusting. Like you’d date something like that? And even worse, let it impregnate you and then just leave it to bear no financial or emotional responsibility as you raise a child because the guy you were dating wasn’t responsible enough? Bullshit.

I worry that we still don’t have enough support systems in place. We need to be sure that these women are going to be able to get jobs that will keep both them and their children healthy, educated, employed, cared for. We may not have marriage as an institution anymore, but we might need to really get behind the “it takes a village” mentality, especially as we start to embrace and adapt to our modern relationships and communities.

I’m not entirely sure that was the most coherent argument I’ve ever made. But then again, it’s late. Whatever.

Point of the whole thing? It’s not the sanctity of the family structure that I’m worried about. Single parents do a damn good job every single day. Parenting isn’t about how poor you are, how educated you are, etc. But I don’t know that this rise in births to single mothers who have some college is a positive thing, especially not based on the reasoning below:

The Increase in Single Moms Is Actually a Good Thing

BY HUGO SCHWYZER

FEB 22, 2012 5:40 PM

For the first time in American history, more than half of new mothers under the age of 30 are unmarried. The news has led to stark warnings from social conservatives about the supposedly disastrous consequences of illegitimacy –- and to renewed discussion about whether marriage remains relevant today. In the rush to pass judgment on these unwed mothers, one question is almost never asked: how many of these young single moms would actually like to be married?

Writing in the Times on Saturday, Jason DeParle and Sabrina Tavernise focused heavily on the harm to children that this new trend portends. The women they interview are exhausted, often leaving their children in the care of relatives while they go off to work multiple jobs. The article cites experts who lament single motherhood, warning that children born outside of wedlock face greater social and economic obstacles than their peers born into traditional nuclear families. Bizarrely, DeParle and Tavernise don’t even bother interviewing any fathers, an odd journalistic decision given the subject of the story. The implication of that deliberate oversight is that we already know all we need to know about why these guys won’t marry the mothers of their children. That not only shortchanges the men, it allows an even more dangerous assumption to linger: that if only these absent dads were just a little bit more physically and emotionally available, the single moms would marry them in a heartbeat. Uh-huh.

Like many of the articles that touch on contemporary American manhood, the Times piece can’t decide where the blame for male fecklessness lies. DeParle and Tavernise trot out the usual culprits: the much-oversold “mancession” (“men are worth less than they used to be”, the article laments) and the tendency, familiar to fans of Judd Apatow movies, for American men of all social classes to turn puberty into a quarter-century project. The Times interviews Amber Strader, a 27 year-old single mom, whose “boyfriend was so dependent that she had to buy his cigarettes. Marrying him never entered her mind. ‘It was like living with another kid,’ she said.”

So how much of this growing phenomenon of single motherhood is about male unreliability, and how much is about changing social mores that make marriage less relevant? I spoke with the noted sociologist of masculinity, Michael Kimmel, who said that the rising percentage of unwed moms was “over-interpreted.” Kimmel notes that in Scandinavia (where there is no equivalent to the American narrative of male haplessness) the majority of mothers in all social classes are unmarried. “They don’t need to get married because they have adequate health coverage, education, and retirement benefits.” The answer to the manufactured problem of “illegitimacy” is, says Kimmel, “better access to birth control and abortion.” Michael Kaufman, (who co-authored The Guy’s Guide to Feminism with Kimmel) concurs that this isn’t about masculinity at all, but about “the moral panic that is the conservative heart of the anti-sex agenda.”

Kimmel makes the important distinction between single mothers needing to get married andwanting to be wed “someday.” That qualification is often missing from these discussions, but it’s at the heart of Promises I Can Keep: Why Poor Women Put Motherhood Before Marriage. Poverty isn’t the primary problem, authors Kathyrn Edin and Maria Kefalas say, noting that “now there are few differences between the poor and the affluent in attitudes and values towards marriage.” However inadequate the American social safety net is compared to the Scandinavian model, it’s sufficient (barely) to ensure that very few women feel compelled to get married for economic reasons.

Single moms, write Edin and Kefalas, see motherhood as a “promise they can keep.” They are certain of their capacity to love a child. They are more cautious about committing to marry the fathers of their children (or other men), not only because of their keen awareness of divorce statistics but because they don’t see any reason to settle for less than a truly excellent relationship. Seen in that light, the rise in unwed motherhood and the declining marriage rate are cause for rejoicing. Despite Lori Gottlieb’s famous plea, fewer women than ever are willing to settle for merely “good enough.” It’s not that men are less economically viable than they were in the past — it’s that even poor women want more from a marriage than a lifetime union with a good provider. Rising rates of illegitimacy, in other words, may signify that more and more women can afford to be choosy. That’s a good thing.

A woman with a bachelor’s or higher degree is statistically far more likely to wait until after marriage to have her first child; the rise in unwed motherhood is driven primarily by women who haven’t finished college. But what women of all social classes share is what one friend of mine, a single mom, calls the “if/then” attitude towards marriage. As she puts it, “If I meet the right guy, then I’d like to get married. But if I don’t meet the right guy, then that’s okay too. I’m not going to get married out of desperation.” That jives with what Edin and Kefalas heard from many of the women they interviewed. That insistence on doing marriage right –- or not doing it all –- transcends class.

There’s another “if/then” dynamic at play in this debate over single motherhood. As the authors of Promises I Can Keep write, if — and it’s a huge “if” — society wants to encourage more women to get hitched before having children, “then the only course for those who want to promote marriage is to try improving the quality of male partners in the pool.”

Men don’t need to be “improved” because they’ve gotten demonstrably worse; rather, the standards for what makes a man marriage material have grown exponentially higher, even in the eyes of young moms struggling to stay above the poverty line. In that light, rising rates of single motherhood reflect undeniable progress for women.

On Ranting, as usual

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oh there’s some hardcore liberal bias here, so don’t think I’m trying to represent any position but my own and don’t be too upset if we disagree – it’s bound to happen:

I’m getting myself super worked up about this whole Komen-defunding-Planned-Parenthood deal. It’s not a big deal. It doesn’t directly affect me. But seriously? I’m never going to participate in, donate to, or eat another Komen-labeled anything. Not that I actively chose their products in the past (I am not the best eater of yogurt nor the biggest fan of pink), but now I’m consciously going to avoid. And perhaps I can flex my nasty letter writing muscles and do some direct complaining. They also spend a ridiculously low amount of their actual funds on research. 20%-ish?

I’m probably going to get breast cancer some day (from what I know about my medical history – which isn’t much – my birth mom, biological grandmother, and several of her sisters have all had it/died of it/have it right now). Of course I want a cure, but we’re silly to think that cures come from organizations.
The backlash against the Komen foundation has been insane. Donations to Planned Parenthood are way up. If I wasn’t broke as shit, I’d be all over that. I decided many years ago that when I finally get enough money to be generous with it, it’s not going to my alma maters, it’s going to Planned Parenthood, because they are absolute rock stars at what they do. I’m so sick of hearing about how horrible they are.

I hope that young women everywhere are able to continue to access care that their primary care providers may have denied them; I hope that young women of all colors and religions and income levels can continue to access healthcare including cancer screenings, STI-testing and treatment, and birth control, especially when they don’t have access to a primary care provider like I do.

Why? Because it’s important. The work that Planned Parenthood does isn’t just abortions (do I actually need to repeat myself again? Only 3% of their services go to abortions. That’s roughly 300,000 abortions per year. But guess what? That’s only about a third of the total number of abortions provided in the US. Where is everyone else having those?).

The reason I bring this up is because I was reading a Catholic website (trying to get all sides’ opinions) and they had huge charts about how 96.3% of services provided to pregnant women were abortion-related. Okay, I’ll take that. Yes, there is a disparity between abortion numbers and adoption numbers. I’d argue that that’s pretty consistent with the rest of the US as well. But does this Catholic website take into account the other forms of adoption such as from government agencies (41% of adoptions in 2008), kinship adoptions, foreign adoptions, etc? Probably not.

And how many un-pregnant women and men and people are using Planned Parenthood to access other resources? 3 million people go to Planned Parenthood every year. 3 million is a lot more than 300,000. By providing resources to the community including contraception, Planned Parenthood is helping to ensure that there will be fewer unintended pregnancies and thus fewer abortions as a result.

Here’s why I support Planned Parenthood 100% – and this has absolutely nothing to do with the Komen debacle. It’ll all blow over. Komen will continue to be the shining pink face of breast cancer walks everywhere and Planned Parenthood will continue to be the source of so much distress for  conservatives the uninformed everywhere:

[I’m sort of uncomfortable about posting this story online – to be honest, I think I’ve posted this before but can’t find it in the archives, and at the same time, I’m even more uncomfortable knowing that people perceive Planned Parenthood to be this horrible, evil organization that exists solely to kill babies. So this is why I’m putting this out there.]

I wasn’t quite 18 yet, which means I was somewhere between 16 and 17. I wanted birth control. When I asked my pediatrician’s nurse practitioner for a prescription (without telling her why I wanted it – Was it heavy periods? Was it hormonal reasons? Did I just want to take hormonal birth control because everyone else was doing it? Was I having sex?), she told me that doing so would put her “between a rock and a hard place.”

What she was referring to was my father, who has always been overbearing and inappropriate at the most inconvenient times. As soon as I started high school, he became convinced that I was having all sorts of sex (I wasn’t. I didn’t kiss a boy until I was almost fifteen) and consequently, had been squawking about it to anyone who would listen and making it nearly impossible for me to date (this, of course, backfired horribly and led to me putting myself in dangerous-ish situations on more than one occasion: sneaking out, hanging out with undesirables, etc).

I was well aware that Colorado law allows minors to consent to a prescription for birth control without obtaining parental consent or having to even notify a parent or guardian about it. When she told me that no matter what I said, she wouldn’t write me a prescription for birth control, I was furious. I still am. I never went back to that doctor’s office, even though I’d been going since birth.

That’s why, even to this day, I do not stand for doctors of any sort denying women information or care based on their own personal beliefs or fears. I also do not believe that doctors and providers (including nurses, etc) should be anything but professional. I had a friend go to her gynecologist and ask for routine STI testing only to be asked, “Why? Have you been exposed?” I told her to immediately find a new doctor. Call it overreacting but I call it ridiculous that you should have to answer any sort of seemingly-accusatory questions. I have doctors who I absolutely adore. They respect me; they don’t question me when I say, “Hey, throw an HIV test onto my blood work!” They respect that I’m active about my own health – regardless of whether it’s ADHD, STI-testing, the sniffles, the cut on my finger that should have had stitches 16 hours ago….(the last one was a joke…that was me not being proactive and facing the consequences).

I went to Planned Parenthood. I did it after school one day when Mike had practice so I knew I had some time. I was terrified. I was not getting the prescription so that I could have reckless, unprotected sex. I was not pregnant. I was just looking for something that my own doctor was unwilling to give me, but something that I knew I had a legal right to obtain and use.

My experience there was absolutely amazing. The staff was so nice to me. I think they absolutely understood how scared I was (I’ve never been good at hiding my emotions) and I think they went the extra mile to make sure that I had the most positive experience possible. I got my prescription. I got birth control. And it was in a no-stress, no-judgement, no-pressure situation.

My mom eventually found out that I was on birth control. She was furious. But she wasn’t mad that I was on it; she was mad that I had gone alone. She was mad that I was paying for it all by myself. She was just as mad at my doctor’s office as I was and she helped me to become a part of the practice that I currently attend (do you attend a doctor’s office? visit? reluctantly stop by sometimes?). I think that a lot about that experience helped solidify our relationship. It was a little bit rocky during high school – think ages 15-17. She was open and willing to talk about issues that I’d never realized I could talk to her about. She never judged me or criticized my opinions or decisions. She supported me so much then and continues to do so today. I honestly think that without those frank discussions, we wouldn’t have the relationship we do now. It’s stronger than it’s ever been and I’m so grateful to know that I can call her and tell her anything. She may not agree with it (she’ll definitely tell me when she doesn’t) but she’ll listen. And knowing that she respected me enough back then to know that I was making informed decisions about my own health is something that still makes me incredibly happy.

That’s why I love Planned Parenthood. I have only been there maybe twice in my life, but those two times were the most positive experiences I could have had. I’m grateful that they were there for me, and even though I hope my children will never have to go behind my back to get access to care, I hope they’re still there, just in case.

On Math.

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I’m admittedly not the biggest fan of the Huffington Post, but you know, they’re not all bad. Anyway, saw this article this morning.

I’ve been bad at math since about fourth grade. “Bad” is relative: on recent intelligence tests (I’ll explain in a blog post soon), even my weaknesses measure at or above average. So “bad” at math isn’t really that bad. But I’m still not great. However, finding out that I might be genetically inclined not to understand fractals and long division makes the grieving process (for my future as a geneticist or forensic scientist) much easier. Okay, so there’s not really any proof of the gender gap, but I’m going to run with it:  Damn you, double-X chromosomes and breasts! (Hah, mark this as the first time they’ve actually gotten in my way.)

Math Gender Gap Not Result of Girls’ Low Self-Esteem, Researchers Say

First Posted: 1/19/12 09:47 AM ET Updated: 1/19/12 09:48 AM ET

AmazingInspiringFunnyScaryHotCrazyImportantWeird
Are girls bad at math? From a talking Barbie doll saying “Math class is tough” to Larry Summers, the ex-President of Harvard University, speaking on the “different availability of aptitude,” it’s an issue that’s seen plenty of controversy. As one of the most sensitive topics in education today, there’s plenty of research on it, and even a body of research on the research.

A study to be published in Review of General Psychology, falls into the latter category. Its authors, David Geary of the University of Missouri and Giljsbert Stoet of the University of Leeds, find that if a gender gap in math test scores exists, it isn’t a manifestation of the so-called “stereotype threat” theory, as many researchers seem to believe.

According to that theory, girls tend to perform worse on tests after they’ve been told they’ll do poorly. Geary and Stoet found that past studies relying on the theory were flawed and lacking real evidence. This suggests that if girls are scoring worse than boys on standardized math tests, it’s not because of their low self esteem.

In other words, don’t blame ditzy Barbie.
The new finding suggests that it might make sense to scale back social programs designed to counter the stereotype threat. As Geary noted:

“The stereotype theory really was adopted by psychologists and policy makers around the world as the final word, with the idea that eliminating the stereotype could eliminate the gender gap…However, even with many programs established to address the issue, the problem continued. We now believe the wrong problem is being addressed.”

Geary and Stoat make no contention about the gender gap itself. Their study makes a strong case for ruling out a self esteem-based explanation of the gender gap, but an increasing number of scientists believe the gender gap is illusory in the first place.
Recent years have brought mounting evidence against the idea that, other things being equal, women are worse at math than men. A 2011 study published in Psychological Bulletin found evidence of gender gaps in various countries, but noted that in some countries, such as Jordan and Bahrain, girls had the edge.

On Obama’s Awesomeness for Today

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Yay! I love this:

Victory! Obama Stands Up to Bishops and Protects Birth Control Coverage

January 20, 2012 by  · Leave a Comment

Great news! Despite months of fierce lobbying by the U. S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, the Obama administration announced today that it would not exempt Catholic hospitals from the Affordable Care Act requirement for insurance plans to cover employees’ birth control. The news, which comes on the first day of Trust Women Week, is a welcome victory for feminists.
Back in November, feminists were concerned that President Obama might cave in to the Bishops’ pressure to exempt religious institutions. If the Bishops had their way, it would have meant that organizations that aren’t actual churches–such as colleges, universities and hospitals–would get out of covering birth control in insurance plans for their students and employees, despite an HHS ruling last August that birth control constitutes preventive care and should be covered with no copay. Feminists–including Feminist Majority President (and Ms. publisher) Eleanor Smeal–have loudly urged the administration not to let Catholic Bishops deny no-cost birth control coverage to millions. Here is Smeal’s response to today’s announcement:
At last—concern for women’s health trumps pressure from the Catholic Bishops. Millions of women who may have been denied access to birth control with no co-pays or deductibles will now have full access. I am especially pleased that college students at religiously affiliated institutions will now have coverage for birth control without co-pays or deductibles under their school health plans beginning in August 2012.
Birth control is the number one prescription drug for women ages 18 to 44 years. Right now, the average woman has to pay $50 per month for 30 years for birth control. No wonder many low-income women have had to forgo regular use of birth control and half of US pregnancies are unplanned. This decision will help millions of women and their families.
Some religious institutions will be given a one-year extension–from August 2012 to August 2013–to implement the no-fee coverage. Here are the details of the ruling:
  • Insurance plans that already cover birth control, including those of religious institutions, must do so with no co-pays or deductibles starting August 2012
  • All student insurance plans at religiously affiliated universities must cover contraception with no co-pays or deductibles beginning August 2012
  • Non-profit religious institutions that do not currently cover contraception have until August 2013 to do so with no co-pays or deductibles
  • Only women who work directly for a house of worship, such as for a church, synagogue, or mosque itself, are exempted from this required coverage
Photo of President Obama from Flickr user lednichenkoolga under Creative Commons 2.0