There’s been much talking here lately on the need for “purity” in the politics of the candidates we support. Is it OK if they throw racial justice out the window, but are OK on everything else? Is it OK if they let healthcare slide, but support everything else? Is it OK if they are murky on abortion, but support eveything else? My answer too is NO. It’s not OK. Ever.
As a proud warrior in the abortion rights wars for over 40 years since 1974, I’ve seen alot of mushy support on abortion from Democrats that has been accepted in order to promote the common good. But what is missing is that abortion rights are central to ALL rights.
Men can easily walk away from a pregnancy even though they were half of the cause. Frighteningly I’ve been reading recently about a phenomenon called “Stealthing”, where a man purposefully takes off the condom in the middle of the sex act. Is this rape? Is this sexual assault? Is this future fatherhood? Are there going to be laws to restrict this practice?
The scenario goes like this. A women consents to sex with a man on the condition that a condom is used. But, in the middle of sex, he takes it off, goes bareback and ejaculates inside her. He therefore breaks the rules that were set up at the beginning. He violates her. Apparently this is happening even in committed relationships with fine young men.
According to an article in the HuffPo:
Victims are confronted with not only the potential repercussions of condom-less sex ― pregnancy, STIs, HIV and AIDS ― but similar feelings of confusion and shame to those who have been victims of other kinds of sexual violence. After all, women who have been stealthed have been forced into a sexual act to which they have not consented. One victim in the study called the act of stealthing “rape-adjacent.” Another shared how the experience left her feeling violated and “freaked out.”
SNIP
“One can note,” Brodsky writes, “that proponents of ‘stealthing’ root their support in an ideology of male supremacy in which violence is a man’s natural right.” (The Huffington Post attempted to reach out to two publicly vocal and proud stealthers for this story but did not hear back.)
Politically speaking, it sounds to me like men are trying to take back control of the sex act by making a power move and ignoring the woman’s wishes. Men are even discussing with each other ways to “stealth” so that the woman is none the wiser. They are planning and plotting sexual assault.
A man in Switzerland was recently convicted of rape for “Stealthing”.
If women don’t have abortion rights, we don’t have the tools to fight stealthing, rape, and other violations.
If women don’t have abortion rights, we don’t have access to education. An ill-timed birth can cause financial and time consuming constraints on acceptance and success in higher education.
If women don’t have abortion rights, we don’t have economic opportunities. For a child can disrupt job opportunities and advancement.
If women don’t have abortion rights, we can be forced into marriages that we don’t want. Sex for fun will be no longer. Men and women in power need to make sure that’s what they want for themselves and their children.
If women don’t have abortion rights (and access) the population explosion that will happen will overload an already fragile planet.
If women don’t have abortion rights, all rights go out the window.
Period.