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[Trollstormur]

FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF

[KvP]

You know it shouldn't be surprising, but it's still surprising. And infuriating.

[jhocking]

Personally, I think becoming fat and ugly should be considered contraception, and thus by extension abortion.

What I'm getting at is that pro-lifers should start picketing McDonald's.

[Jimmy the Squid]

Well, this is just sickening.

[imapiratearg]

This Just In!: The American Public Knows More About Baby-Makin' Than the Experts!

More at eleven.

[Liz]

Jesus Fucking Christ.

And abortion as terminating a pregnancy. If you are using contraceptives you don't get pregnant. How the hell can that be considered an abortion?

[Cartilage Head]

 Masturbation is killing potential babies.

[Liz]

Well, just for dudes I would imagine. So I guess ladies are safe on that one.

[pilsner]

As much as I disagree with this HHS initiative and the ideology behind it, the Huffington Post blog has once again willfully exaggerated a bad idea to make it seem much worse.  This LA Times article gives a much more nuanced and accurate analysis of what appears to be a draft regulation on the part of the HHS.

(1) This is a draft regulation that was probably intentionally leaked to gauge public outrage should the regulation actually be passed.  So public outrage across the US, especially in states where Republican incumbents are facing strong Democratic challengers would be a very good thing.

(2) The regulation would forbid federal funds to organizations that did not promise not to fire workers who refused to provide certain contraceptives which are thought to end pregnancy after fertilization of the egg but before implantation of the embryo.  Got that?  No?  Me neither.  But this is not about a bunch of fundies saying "No more condoms".  It's a little more subtle than that.

I find the HHS initiative abhorrent, I don't think that blogs like this one do justice to those who would defend reproductive choice.  Just look at the posts in this thread that completely miss the fucking point.  If all this outrage were guided by an intelligent understanding of the issues...

P.S. *Misconception*, heh heh

[pwhodges]

Read the book; sing the song.  Altogether now:

"Every sperm is sacred,
Every sperm is good,
Every sperm is needed
In your neighbourhood."

But the proposal is actually closer to the recent UK case in which someone was explicitly allowed by a court not to do their job when they felt it conflicted with their religious views (in this case, holding a civil partnership ceremony - not a religious marriage, note - to recognise a same-sex relationship).

[Jesus Christ]

You are killing babies when you are having a good time.

This is all ridiculous. Seriously. Comic relief, anyone? Onan's death by sex was supposed to be a tension-breaker inbetween all the death in the Bible. People who died because they had sex was like the funniest thing ever back in the day.

What was it Bill Hicks said? "I have wiped civilizations off my chest with an old gym sock!"

[Liz]

P.S. *Misconception*, heh heh

This joke has been made a number of times.

I no longer find it funny.

[jhocking]

Just look at the posts in this thread that completely miss the fucking point.

huh? what point

[benji]

I don't think anyone's missed the point at all. The point is that, if a hospital receives federal grants it can't fire someone for denying requested and necessary treatment to a woman. Limiting access to the pill is a big deal. Condoms won't cut it in all situations. A condom requires the active knowledge and proper participation of the man involved. The birth control pill has been the single most important development in the ability of women to control their own sex lives. It remains the best option for a woman to choose not to have a child without needing the permission or cooperation of anyone else beside their doctor. The pill represents, in many ways, the end of the idea that a woman's body is the property of the man she's with. It represents resistance to patriarchy.

[pilsner]

Yes, that is the point.  You said it much better than I could have.  Am I imagining a distinction between what you just said and what is in the Huffington Post blog?  If I am, I apologize.

[jhocking]

Looking at some of the other articles linked on the right side, I at first assumed something groan-inducing when I saw this title:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/andy-borowitz/obama-releases-list-of-ap_b_112837.html

However, I quickly realized the article is a joke, and in fact the jokes within it are hilarious:

"A horse walks into a bar. The bartender says, "Why the long face?" Barack Obama replies, "His jockey just lost his health insurance, which should be the right of all Americans.""

lololol

[pilsner]

I really enjoyed this NYT article about how (white) late night hosts who are not Colbert are finding it difficult to draw laughs about Obama.  There's a great Colbert quote in there about the recent controversial New Yorker cover.  His persona makes his out of character comments seem super insightful.

[karl gambolputty...]

They did a follow-up that's also pretty entertaining.

[Slick]

So, when you guys elect Obama all this shit is going to stop, right guys? Right?

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/andy-borowitz/obama-releases-list-of-ap_b_112837.html

Gold.

[RedLion]

It's shit like this that makes me want to move to France. Or Britain. Basically a semi-post-religious country where insane evangelicals don't form policy on health care issues.

[Vendetagainst]

Uchhh. I am so fucking sick of the pseudo-politics that the assholes who blindly embrace a religion that they don't even understand adore so much.

[pwhodges]

Or Britain.

You don't know how much we discuss leaving this country....

We have a control-freak government which doesn't bother pretending it's about religion.  We are watched by more cameras per head of population than any other country in the world. 

But the situation reminds me of Winston Churchill's remark that democracy is the worst form of government except for all the others.  Ah well.

Paul

[Blue Kitty]

I for one enjoyed the McCain Ape Rape article

[Vendetagainst]

Talking on my other forum (it's a chemistry forum but it's ridiculously anti-what's been going on) I've learnt that the anti-privacy and anti-freedom movement is a global pandemic, and America's not even the worst offender--yet, at least.
But Americans seem to be the ones who put the most false credence in other nations.

Man, I am unnervingly close to becoming a misanthropic jerk.

[est]

I don't understand people who say "oh god, I'm moving out of this country" instead of "oh god, me and my non-idiotic friends are gonna try to do something about these morons shitting up our country"

[yelley]

fighting the system is hard. it's easier to just move somewhere else with a different system to complain about.

*whine whine whine*

[Slick]

We were talking about stuff one night at the bar, so I decided to raise a toast to space travel and being on the first boat out of here. My toast was refused on reasonable grounds.

[Liz]

I would love to go to space. That would be the coolest thing ever, just hangin' out in the space station and lookin' at earth.

[Vendetagainst]

a couple of days ago I was reading an article about the possibilities of sex in space (yahoo, if you were wondering). I couldn't find the exact one, but this is basically the same thing: http://www.slate.com/id/2159265/

[est]

Hooray for flying wildly off-topic!

[Vendetagainst]

well we WERE talking about space 
And it is happier than talking about loss of human rights 
Observe the smilies for comparison

[jhocking]

Those really were a series of amazing conversational jumps. Each post was just related enough to the previous to seem sensible, and yet still as large a leap as possible away from the topic of the thread. It's like a perfectly choreographed dance.

Seriously, the more I reflect on it the more beautiful it becomes.

[Trollstormur]

i swear to god i'll lock and fag up this thread.

[Fenriswolf]

I don't understand people who say "oh god, I'm moving out of this country" instead of "oh god, me and my non-idiotic friends are gonna try to do something about these morons shitting up our country"

Ha. Your voting system is so unbelievably fucked up I don't blame people... plus the idea of living in a place with a health system like the US kind of makes me want to run screaming from the room. Hell, I'm loathe to even visit the US the politics are so scary - I can hardly blame people for wanting to leave someone they didn't choose to be born.

In NZ the morning after pill is OTC. When my partner's ex visited him in the US and needed it she had to go to the doctor and get a fucking internal exam to get it. Fuck that. Fuck that fuck that fuck that

Through a story about a man that sexed up his brother's wife, but pulled out, and thus angered Invisible Man, written in a several thousand year old book, insane people can deduct that every single fuck should lead to a baby. It's like they watched Monty Python and thought "I like the looks of that! A bright future for our prospering nation!"

I mean I do not usually have a problem with religious people at all but Holy Dickshitting Christ on a Crutch.

Loving that post lol

[mooface]

chill out guys.  the us has a lot of problems but all countries have problems.  it's a lot easier to not see them when you are not living there.  all you can do is maybe move to a place where you can bitch about different problems than your old country had.

so... birth control!  it is pretty awesome ans useful!  i hope they don't try and take it away because then that would just mean a lot more abortions and that would just be silly.

[RedLion]

No, it would mean a revolution.

[Tom]

I don't understand people who say "oh god, I'm moving out of this country" instead of "oh god, me and my non-idiotic friends are gonna try to do something about these morons shitting up our country"

Ha. Your voting system is so unbelievably fucked up I don't blame people...

Um, yeah Australia has such a simple system when to compared to the US'

[Vendetagainst]

Ha. Your voting system is so unbelievably fucked up I don't blame people... plus the idea of living in a place with a health system like the US kind of makes me want to run screaming from the room. Hell, I'm loathe to even visit the US the politics are so scary - I can hardly blame people for wanting to leave someone they didn't choose to be born.

In NZ the morning after pill is OTC. When my partner's ex visited him in the US and needed it she had to go to the doctor and get a fucking internal exam to get it. Fuck that. Fuck that fuck that fuck that

Yeah, the Electoral College is a little screwy *cough*. The health care system really isn't that bad, though. In certain situations it's horrible, but if you, say, had your arm chopped off in some freak accident you could be worked on overnight without any reference to your health care. It's pretty weird, because at the same time somebody could be dying slowly of something and be expected to come up with thirty grand to save their lives. I guess Americans just like urgency. However in America there is barely a wait time for any medical treatment, as opposed to Canada where "Studies by the Commonwealth Fund found that 57% of Canadians reported waiting 4 weeks or more to see a specialist; 24% of Canadians waited 4 hours or more in the emergency room.".
I think that health care should be improved, of course, but I don't think the solution is to make the same mistakes that other people are making.

[jhocking]

It's mostly a load of crap people who say Canada is unusual in how long you have to wait for medical attention. I don't know when the last time you were at a doctor was, but the earliest appointments you can make are always like a month away, and wait times in the ER are pretty routine.

As you point out, it's all about triage; if you are in the middle of cardiac arrest then they'll take care of you stat (gotta use the lingo,) but someone with a broken wrist might have to wait hours.

[jhocking]

man these avatars keep confusing me. It's awesome.

[sean]

If I had a quarter for every time I thought Jens was Liz...

[Liz]

If I didn't like my Tommy avatar so much I would totally switch it to a picture of Jens to up the confusion factor.

[pi]

fun commentary on the topic: http://www.druckerbrothers.com/2008/07/you-conceived-him-at-hello.html

from the article :

[jhocking]

"Life Begins At Lust" is an awesome slogan. They should make shirts.

[Liz]

This one is so much better.

[morca007]

fighting the system is hard. it's easier to just move somewhere else with a different system to complain about.

*whine whine whine*

Fighting the system is a losing proposition if you fight to win.

[Liz]

This comic is at least mildly relevant to the topic at hand.

Also it made me chuckle.

[Trollstormur]

If I didn't like my Tommy avatar so much I would totally switch it to a picture of Jens to up the confusion factor.

but it's easy to see who isn't tommy -- he's the only one without a sigquote from tommydski.

[Nodaisho]

It's mostly a load of crap people who say Canada is unusual in how long you have to wait for medical attention. I don't know when the last time you were at a doctor was, but the earliest appointments you can make are always like a month away, and wait times in the ER are pretty routine.

Wut? I get appointments only a couple weeks ahead, and I don't think that my brother had to wait to get into the ER when he got a big cut on his eyebrow as a toddler. I can't recall whether I had to wait when I split open my chin, I was four and in a great deal of pain, I have managed to repress those memories. We didn't have to wait at all at the urgent care place when I scooped some flesh out of my hand, and I wasn't bleeding all that bad. I think your problem is living in the big city.

Hmm... contraception is abortion, masturbation is abortion? Wet dreams are abortion? Menstruation is abortion? But if you do have a kid, all those other sperm die. No matter what you do, you are killing thousands.

[BrittanyMarie]

okaynegativenellyhere technically both sperm and eggs have only half the chromosomes needed to become a baby, so not even under this ridiculousness would it count as abortion. I would hope the conservatives wouldn't slide THAT far down the slippery slope.

And some forms of birth control (see: morning after pill, IUDs I think?) could be seen as aborticajfeiajfel, but it would depend on if your definition of when life starts is at conception, implantation, or somewhere else. So for someone who sees life starting at conception (I personally don't), I guess anything preventing implantation would be an abortion under their mindset.