I don't want to go home

Right now I think the most embarrassing thing in my life is my country. Not my family or my background or the fact that i can't expect to make it far in life as a theatre major, but my country, the Grand Ol' US of A. And its not even for the reasons that, typically, Europe brings up for which to hate us. I don't give a rat's ass about the gas issue or our last four war efforts which we've fumbled--no, I care about what I am.

I'm a woman. I'm a girl. I'm a citizen of a country that has chosen to hold that against me. A country in which a man was re-elected because he shared the views of the people, and what the people want is repression. The American people have spoken and they have declared that my Body, that which is Me, is not mine to govern. That if something undesirable occurs to it--such as its becoming a host to a parasitic cell--that it is not my place to remove it on my own terms. That I am under some form of obligation to it, and if it ruins my life, so be it. I'm not the important one here--the cell is.

By law of nature, two people are required in order for this cell to exist. Yet on account of someone losing a bet i'm sure, the cell will only reside in the body of a woman. Thus the woman is landed with full responsibility for it--and if she doesn't want to put up with that well just too bad, she should have thought first before having fun. The male contributor to the production of this cell, conversely, is held to no real obligation to it, and is actually encouraged by society and government to have fun with as many women as he can. As it is most likely that when the woman doesn't want the cell, the man doesn't want the cell--or the woman, for that matter--we encounter the issue at hand.

Politicians elected by the American people want to do away with the right of a woman to choose whether or not to carry this cell. Some of the more vehement of them want all women who opt not to to be tried and executed for murder. Smart. Real smart. Kill a woman for what her body has probably done on numerous occasions without even letting her know.

Yep--its true. Fertilized eggs are rejected by female bodies every day, simply because the Body, not the Mind of the Woman, doesn't want it. Its not a miscarriage, its not a stillborn--its not a baby. Its a fertilized egg that didn't work out. Its not a tragedy, its nothing to get upset over, and it is not, by any stretch of the word, murder. Its nature. If we can understand this as a choice of the body of a woman, what's to say her mind can't make the same choice?

Women of all cultures have been using a wide variety of means to prevent childbirth since there was such a thing as sex. Drugs, herbs, dances, prayers, and unfortunately even pokey objects have all been utilized to make sure that a new life is not brought into the world. If a woman doesn't want to have a baby, chances are she'll do everything in her power and then some to make sure she doesn't.

Outlawing abortion is not going to prevent it or reduce the number of abortions in a year. It will, however, lead to an increase in women who use the at-home coathanger method and the number of women who die on account of it. The fetus will be destroyed either way. Some religious fanatics/politicians would call this justified. I call them a bunch of sadists. Why force a woman to endanger or take her own life for something that HER BODY DOES ON ITS OWN?

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I recently heard on the BBC that a growing number of southern chemists refuse to dispense contraceptives such as the pill for religious reasons, stating that they found this a crime against life (or as one memorable Texan yokel put it on the daily show "i just cant participate in taking the life of an innocent human being.") In that mindset, every time I menstruate naturally--or worse, don't get laid--i'm killing a baby. By Not being pregnant, I am killing those precious demi-cells in my ovaries as they slip unfertilized from my body every month and, according to desired anti-abortionist politics, I should be executed.

Does Anyone Else notice a trend in American politics that favor exclusively CHRISTIAN MALES? Everyone else's rights are forfeit to their self-inflating agenda. Men have full license to do what they will to their own bodies, but they don't want us to. I'm personally offended, as every woman should be. If the Christians take away our rights to our BODIES, they're taking away our rights to EVERYTHING. Women's lib will be a fond memory, but can be safely ignored just like other temporary uprisings from minority groups. We get the death sentence for removing an unwanted pregnancy? That sounds downright Biblical--you know, that age in which women didn't have rights and the stars were glued to the sky. If women can't be entrusted with the administration of our own bodies, how can we be trusted with the administration of the nation? We shouldn't be allowed to VOTE. Hell, if we might choose to fix a problem in a way that someone doesn't agree with, how might we fix problems in the workplace? We shouldn't be allowed to have JOBS. Similar arguments can be made for education, licensing, and the right to wear pants or show our faces in public.

Feminism is dead if we choose not to stand up for ourselves against this. This is not about the right of DNA to become life--it is about repression of women. Don't let anyone convince you to stand for it, for you are standing against yourself.