May 16, 2017 By: Juanita Jean Herownself Category: Uncategorized
Welcome to The World's Most Dangerous Beauty Salon, Inc.
My name is Susan DuQuesnay Bankston. I live in Richmond, Texas, in the heart of Tom DeLay's old district. It's nuttier than squirrel poop here.
I am honored and privileged to know Miss Juanita Jean Herownself, hairdresser extraordinary and political maven. Since she does not have time to fiddle with this internet stuff, I type her website for her and you can read it if you want to. If you don't, she truly does not give a big bear's butt.
A lot of what I post here has to do with local politics, but you probably have the same folks in your local government.
This ain't a blog. Blogs are way too trendy for me. This is a professional political organization.
OK.
Before this election I thought a flip to Democratic was a lock as Texas population became more and more Hispanic. BUT a couple of Hispanic co-workers were early Drumpf supporters. I have come to suspect some Hispanics are one issue snacilbupeR sympathizers: abortion. So it seems to me they voted against their interests over Dems support of abortion. Sad now, but geometrically sad if they remain snacilbupeR sympathizers over just abortion and vote for and elect nacilbupeR after nacilbupeR over that single issue.
1I can understand the revulsion some people feel for abortion, but if a woman cannot control when and how often she has children, there’s not much in the rest of her life that she can control (school, job, money, housing). Most Americans do support legal abortion in at least some circumstances, but unfortunately the antis are more likely to vote on the issue. I think Dems need to keep supporting legal abortion, even if we need to flex a bit to get the support we need to regain offices.
2Rhea:
if a woman cannot control when and how often she has children, there’s not much in the rest of her life that she can control (school, job, money, housing).
You forgot the most important one — her own health and life.
This is important not only for the obvious reason but also that it punctures a gaping hole in the right-wing worldview of the issue: abortion seekers area all morally loose and promiscuous women having unauthorized orgasms while buying luxury goods with taxpayer money and want abortions so they can continue doing so.
3Micr, not just the Hispanic vote. We know a very well educated lady of Middle Eastern descent who is also a one issue voter due to abortion. Apparently we have not been clear about messaging the “meaning of America.” Freedom. Admittedly I am at a loss as to how better to express that the freedom of choice is individual and everyone can & should choose for themselves whether it be abortion, religion or any other debatable topic.
Dunno. Maybe some “Freedom to Choose” bumper stickers superimposed with “Not the Freedom to Impose.” Or, Freedom means to choose one’s values, not impose one’s values.
Frustrating. A concept that is both logical and simple seems to miss so many.
4What Alan says + Rhea!
@Jane&PKM
5Bumper stickers are great. They, to me, epitomize asynchronous communication. Stick one on your motor car and drive per normal. Then dozens of folk daily see your message even if subliminally. “The Freedom to Choose” “Not the Freedom to Impose” sounds great to me. Rather like the “Respect existence or expect resistance” signs I saw at a protest in downtown Dallas a couple of months ago.
Officially, the largest religion in Texas is Christianity.
Unofficially, the largest religion in Texas is Conservatism.
6So there are 2 chief focuses:
71. Keeping blue states blue.
2. Turning TX blue.
(2b. Abortion messaging. Preventing unwanted pregnancies.)
Unfortunately, not only are the Kristians anti-abortion, but they want to restrict access to birth control AND maternity care. Absolutely illogical, unless you want to keep women under control, which is exactly the Republican end game.
8Is there anyway to get Texas Republicans to hold their breath until Cheeto Mussolini retires? That would turn about half the state blue.
9With the Hispanic guys I knew abortion was not about the sanctity of live but machismo. Eventually they will grow out of it but it can’t come soon enough.
10Turn, baby, turn! True blue for me and you!
11Alan, it would help if some women would come forward and say, “I had an abortion because my husband and I couldn’t support the three kids we already had on two jobs each and the condom broke,” but that would take a lot more guts than most people have. Better yet, “I didn’t need an abortion because Planned Parenthood helped me get good birth control.”
12From mostly Blue Oregon, I’m rooting for ya’ll in Texas.
13Anyone who opposes abortion and also opposes providing prenatal care, then claims to love the unborn, is a damned world-class hypocrite!
I don’t think many of them care about the baby at all, except as a receptacle for the soul. Never mind that it might be born into a situation where it’s sick, neglected, or even abused – not their problem.
I was raised Catholic, and the doctrine then was that ensoulment occurred at the moment of conception. But previously, it was considered to occur at the time of quickening, when fetal movement can be felt in the womb. Many people argue that we don’t possess souls at all. I think they exist, but within entities that are conscious of their own existence.
More to the point; at least 25% of all pregnancies result in spontaneous abortion (miscarriage). Many of them occur so early that the woman is never even aware that fertilization had occurred. Far from each fetus being a perfect gift from God, there are plenty of anomalies on Nature’s part, resulting in non-viable fetuses that can’t fully develop. As a soul delivery system, it has a lot of flaws. But the religious right steadfastly denies this reality, and keeps trying to impose their religious beliefs on biology, no matter how bad the fit.
I do feel conflicted that many abortions are of fetuses that would become normal, healthy babies. But I must come down on the side of the woman. She must retain her own agency, and often is choosing not only for her own welfare, but for that of the family she already has. And I know that with very few exceptions, it’s not a decision that any woman makes lightly.
14Lunargent, this nails it:
“She must retain her own agency.”
Period.
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