Hooray For Planned Parenthood! Support Them!

I am for abortion.  (There -- I've said it, bluntly.  I am also a male, so my opinion is second-rate.  My apologies.)  I am disgusted by the hidden-camera smear video attacking Planned Parenthood.

Parenthood should happen by plan, not by accident.  No child should be unwanted.  Sex education should be mandatory.  Contraceptive products should be free.

Nothing positive results from forcing women to give birth to unwanted children.  In that regard, abortion is a social good.

Since the dawn of time, women have sought ways to terminate unwanted pregnancies.  Making abortion ridiculously difficult to obtain, or outright illegal, will not change that.

One in three adult American women have had an abortion.

Abortion is a safe, legal medical procedure.  It must remain safe, legal, and -- like other forms of health care -- affordable.  A little bit of government funding for Planned Parenthood and other providers to low-income individuals is appropriate and inexpensive.  (Federal funding of Planned Parenthood averages $2.22 per taxpayer, per year.)  If abortion is turned into a strictly financial proposition, rich women have abortions and poor women have unwanted babies.

No woman "wants" an abortion because it's fun or easy.  She wants it like a trapped animal wants to chew off its own leg.

This is an extremely personal and individual issue.  Think of abortion rights like gay rights at its most basic:  If you're opposed to gay marriage, don't marry a gay person.  If you're morally outraged by abortion and find yourself pregnant with an unwanted baby, don't have an abortion.  If others decide to do things differently, shut up, it's none of your fucking business! 

The disreputable group behind the undercover sting video -- the "Center For Medical Progress" (not medical, not progressive) -- are total slime.  They've done this shit before, and will again.  Sell-out right-wing pols like Scott Walker, John Kasich and all the rest who've come out in instant, shrieking, ignorant support of this pack of lies are slimy poop-smears themselves, and they're horribly wrong.

Long live Planned Parenthood!  They do good work, and we wouldn't want a world without them.  I made a small donation today.  Maybe you might do the same.

Here's a short video from Cecile Richards, head of Planned Parenthood (and daughter of the late, great Governor Ann Richards).  There's a a donation link at the top of the screen.

http://www.plannedparenthoodaction.org/cecile-richards-responds-latest-video-smear-attack?s_src=VideoResponse_0715_Blog_c3_e1