Thru the Looking Glass

The world keeps spinning on and on in this terrifying new course, through the looking glass, everything upside-downer and upside-downer by the day. So many people still don't get it. Mollysavestheday put up this post, soon to be mass-PDFed by people who would offer... necessary services to the women of South Dakota, if necessary.

It's chilling. I can't believe we're talking about this now. I hope it's a slightly overwrought reaction to the abortion ban. I hope a lawsuit will be brought immediately to minimize the damage to the women and girls of that state who, as of now, will be compelled to bring every pregnancy to term, regardless of the circumstances of conception.

There are still so many people... wait, I said that already, didn't I... but I'll fucking say it again and again because I simply cannot wrap my pea-brain around the warped reality they've created for themselves... there are so many people who still don't get it. I have avoided all rightwing blogs on this, but enough of Them are posting comments on the lefty blogs, enough of them are writing letters to the Rapid City newspaper online, to cause me this great consternation. So many people, men and women both, saying that the only "choice" involved was the woman's choice to have sex in the first place. Ignoring, for the moment, the utterly indefensible ignorance of these statements in reference to a law that makes no exception for rape-caused pregnancies, all culpability is placed on the female. The male of the species apparently has no control over his sexual encounters, makes no "choice" of his own, seemingly reeled in by the tip of his dick by voracious vaginas lurking everywhere.

Damn. Look at me. I've morphed into a flaming demon-possessed feminista. So be it. Continuing...

All of the approbation is placed on the pregnant female, who clearly values her own sexual pleasure above all else. On the selfish, selfish woman who must now be forced to accept responsibility for her actions. Sole responsibility, as if her actions occurred independently of any participation by the sperm donor. One commenter--I believe it was on Molly's post--helpfully pointed out that the only reason ever to engage in sex, of course, is to create a new life. Do people really believe this? Do people exist who honestly believe this crap and rigorously apply it to their own lives? I don't hate men, really, I don't. I hate this mindset that throws up its hands and takes the soft road, the easy way out of an intellectual conundrum, by reducing the entire conversation to the maxim that only the woman gets pregnant, ergo...

In other news, I am sad that I can't go back to South Dakota, like, ever, unless the populace comes out of its haze and votes out every single one of the assholes who supported this law. I'm glad I went to the Black Hills last summer, the only weight on my conscience being my government's extermination and internment of the Lakota and outright theft of their lands. Jesus. Fucking amazing beautiful country tucked away there in the southwest corner of the state. How humbling and awe-inspiring to travel through lands soaked with the blood and heartbreak of tens of thousands of native people who dared to stand in the way of the white man's greed for power.

The county encompassing most of the Pine Ridge reservation is the poorest county in the nation, with upwards of 65% of the population living below the federal poverty limit. Alcoholism claims more than half of the adults; homelessness, unemployment, and the attendant crime rates are through the roof. This is officially a federal problem, to be sure, but it takes place within the geographic boundaries of a state whose governor claims his people value all life and work hard to take care of people who need help. Take a hard look at the amount of hope the state of South Dakota offers to the Lakota languishing on its reservations, and tell me how many scrapings of hope you think are there to be offered to under- or unemployed women who find themselves pregnant and out of options.