Feminists For Life History

I wrote about Serrin Foster's article on National Review Online, yesterday. Be sure and click through to the actual op-ed and to the Feminists for Life website. (Especially the "Covetable Stuff"!)

The actual founders of F4L were two women, Catherine Callaghan, Ph.D. and Pat Goltz. Like many of us in the '70's and '80's, these women recognized the conflict between abortion and feminism. Both were once members of the National Organization of Women. Ms. Goltz was expelled from her local chapter, and both eventually resigned from the national organization.

Feminists for Life reminds us how common it is to assume that we know all about other people and other groups. It seems that we quickly stereotype and assume division, rather than look for common ground.

I love common ground! My goal has been to offer that ground and possibly to offer my translation and peacemaking skills in order to demonstrate the logic of the prolife arguments to the domestic and sexual violence communities, non-Christians and even atheists, pro-life churches and other prolife groups who assume they have nothing in common. Unfortunately, far too many prolife organizations require members to agree to a Christian creed.

For more surprises and information on opposing abortion in the public square, take a look at Libertarians for Life and Democrats for Life. And then, check out the Atheists and Agnostics Prolife Leaque (you've got to see their url).


(For those Christians who are offended, I offer the book of Romans - I try to live so that others can see some of the insight in Romans 1 through my example. A little bit of truth can serve as a catalyst for more truth.)

"Forcing" women to talk to their doctors

This pro-abortion rant from the San Antonio Current is really reaching:

Frank Corte is a pro-life legislator who wants to control Texas’s women and health professionals. With HB 21, he wants to deny women the ability to review abortion warnings privately on video, and instead force them to hear it directly from the doctor; with HB 23, he’d force pharmacists who handle emergency contraception to post “If you believe that life begins at fertilization ...” warnings.

The SA Current is spinning their commentary on the 80th Legislature as though it's a review of TV shows during sweeps week. The Current is a free/throwaway rag, found in lobbies and vestibules of businesses all over town. They advertise themselves as

The Current strives to capture the times in which San Antonians live. We attempt to challenge our readers, by being provocative, irreverent, skeptical, funny, vibrant, and imaginative. We earn our readers' trust by being devoted to fact and dedicated to artful storytelling.

Make that an emphasis on "provocative, irreverent and skeptical."

Texas has a great "Woman's Right to Know Law," designed to fully inform the older - usually surviving - victims of abortion of the nature and consequences of abortion. There's a companion document that lists resources that provide help to pregnant women and young families, which is intended to enable women to chose not to kill their children.

The abortionists hate this booklet and the information that they are required by State law to give the woman, as well as the informed consent process that the State mandates. They've worked out all sorts of ways to avoid the booklet and having the doctor provide the consent, from showing the girls and women the book and telling them they have the option of reading it (or not), to placing stickers on front that state that the information is inacurate. The main tactic is to set up "informed consent" procedures so that the doctor (herself or himself) does not actually have to tell a girl or a woman what he or she is going to do and what will happen.

However, since this "choice" is "between the woman and her doctor," shouldn't the consent process be between the "woman and her doctor?" (Forget for a moment that in real life, the great majority of abortionists never meet their patients before the day of the procedure, unless they do follow the letter of the Texas Womans Right To Know law.)

The irreverence continues in the Current's discription of the legislators who would introduce bills to make the punishment for sexual abuse of children more severe. I hate the death penalty and extremely strict, mandatory prison terms, but recognize that they are sometimes appropriate. (A few years ago, we had a prison break, and the 7 escapees ended up killing a policeman before they were caught.) Child sexual predators are known to be prone to recidivism. This article tells us that these men usually molest 80 to 120 children before they are caught, and tells the stories of Jacob,Jessica, Megan, and Ashley.)

Here's how that Current article views these stories:

Having campaigned successfully for reelection on a kill-all-repeat-child-rapists platform, Dewhurst is now Senate President and determined to pass Jessica’s Law, a Bill O’Reilly-endorsed, sex-offender-punishment proposal that includes a mandatory 25-year sentence for repeat child molesters. Dewhurst can’t introduce legislation on his own, but he’s got a team of senators under his command. They include: “2005 Crimefighter of the Year” Bob Deuell, who’s sponsoring SB 68 to make a second child-rape charge a capital offense; hard-nosed Democrat Rodney Ellis, whose SB 97 would remove the statute of limitations for certain sex offenses; and Florence Shapiro, who ushered through a series of “Ashley’s Law” sex-offender bills in previous sessions.