Thatcher’s legacy and feminism

Better late than never! Sorry it took me so long to get this done, my brain was a bit scrambled last week. - Becca

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Cobbling together some thoughts for a video on the life, death and legacy of Margaret Thatcher as the UK’s first and only woman Prime Minister, since that’s all anyone’s talking about today.

In the meantime here’s a playlist with our previous videos on the topic of Women in Politics.

UPDATE: FYI video on Thatcher won’t be up until tomorrow at least - it’ll take me a while to unravel my thoughts into something coherent.

Here’s some good links for anyone interested in other people’s thoughts though:

Where has all the shouting gone?

Emily talks politics and feminism and wonders if we’re moving backwards in terms of women’s representation.

This Dame:

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Why are there so few women in politics?

Reblooping for the daytime crowd, Becca’s thoughts on representative government, the lack of women in politics globally, and what can be done to improve this.

More women in politics videos: http://bit.ly/W6gUIv

This Dame:

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andyouhavetogivethemhope:

plan-l:

pastryheart:

Licia Ronzulli is one cool woman.

Licia Ronzulli, member of the European Parliament, has been taking her daughter Vittoria to the Parliament sessions for two years now.

i love this :)

Jeremy Cu…*cough*… Hunt - I hope you are listening.

Jeremy Cu…*cough*… Hunt - I hope you are listening.

wethetrees:

occupyallstreets:

Pharmacists And Doctors In Kansas Can Now Deny Women Access To Birth Control And Chemotherapy
Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback (R) signed a bill yesterday that will allow pharmacists in the state to refuse to fill a prescription they think could be used to induce abortion. But since the “conscience” measure says they cannot be required to provide a drug or devise that they think “may result in the termination of a pregnancy” — but does not define which drug in particular — the law’s opponents say it could allow a pharmacist to interfere with a woman’s health care by refusing to distribute birth control or emergency contraception.
Women who already have difficulty obtaining contraception may face additional hurdles, according to Julie Burkhart, founder of an abortion-rights group in Wichita, Kansas:

Burkhart said the law could create a hardship for women in small towns with a sole pharmacist who may refuse to fill certain prescriptions. In larger cities, women will have to make sure they go to a cooperative pharmacist, she added.
“Women should not have to go armed with a lot of research when looking for a physician or pharmacist in the community,” Burkhart said.

No pharmacist could be fired for refusing to fill such prescriptions, and doctors can refuse to refer patients to pharmacists who would fill a birth control prescription.
Additionally, the Associated Press had reported that the law could “allow a doctor to refuse to provide chemotherapy to a pregnant cancer patient because it might end her pregnancy.”
Brownback’s office justified his signing by saying the bill “gives more legal protection to Kansas health care providers who refuse to participate in abortions” based on their conscience. Kansas already had a law that allowed medical professionals to refuse to assist in abortion procedures.
While Kansas lawmakers failed to pass a sweeping anti-abortion bill that would have required doctors to give false information to their patients, the expanded “conscience” law is just one of several laws recently approved in the state that undermine women’s health and well being.
Source

Oh for fuck’s sake. Really?

wethetrees:

occupyallstreets:

Pharmacists And Doctors In Kansas Can Now Deny Women Access To Birth Control And Chemotherapy

Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback (R) signed a bill yesterday that will allow pharmacists in the state to refuse to fill a prescription they think could be used to induce abortion. But since the “conscience” measure says they cannot be required to provide a drug or devise that they think “may result in the termination of a pregnancy” — but does not define which drug in particular — the law’s opponents say it could allow a pharmacist to interfere with a woman’s health care by refusing to distribute birth control or emergency contraception.

Women who already have difficulty obtaining contraception may face additional hurdles, according to Julie Burkhart, founder of an abortion-rights group in Wichita, Kansas:

Burkhart said the law could create a hardship for women in small towns with a sole pharmacist who may refuse to fill certain prescriptions. In larger cities, women will have to make sure they go to a cooperative pharmacist, she added.

Women should not have to go armed with a lot of research when looking for a physician or pharmacist in the community,” Burkhart said.

No pharmacist could be fired for refusing to fill such prescriptions, and doctors can refuse to refer patients to pharmacists who would fill a birth control prescription.

Additionally, the Associated Press had reported that the law could “allow a doctor to refuse to provide chemotherapy to a pregnant cancer patient because it might end her pregnancy.

Brownback’s office justified his signing by saying the bill “gives more legal protection to Kansas health care providers who refuse to participate in abortions” based on their conscience. Kansas already had a law that allowed medical professionals to refuse to assist in abortion procedures.

While Kansas lawmakers failed to pass a sweeping anti-abortion bill that would have required doctors to give false information to their patients, the expanded “conscience” law is just one of several laws recently approved in the state that undermine women’s health and well being.

Source

Oh for fuck’s sake. Really?

thepedagogyofmysticalcreatures:

voting while trans*

Transgender people, the majority of whom have never had problems voting in the past, may now lose their right to vote due to dozens of new voter suppression laws. Over 25,000 transgender people could have their voting rights taken away. In response to these dubious new laws, we have released two resources to help transgender people reclaim their voting rights.

Voting While Trans: Preparing for the New Voter ID Laws will explain what identification you need to vote in your state. And the Voting While Trans Checklist is a one-page guide to educate poll workers and election officials on the voting rights of transgender people.

dontdrinkthetarwater:

As a politician, I often find myself in situations where, unfortunately, I express a certain thought or idea poorly, or find my words taken out of context. Indeed, that is what happened this weekend. Upon reviewing the impromptu remarks I made Sunday afternoon, I can now see that I used the wrong words in the wrong way. I would now like to set the record straight with the American people and clear up some confusion about what it was I intended to convey.

You see, what I said was, “If it’s a legitimate rape, the female body has ways to try to shut that whole thing down.” But what I meant to say was, “I am a worthless, moronic sack of shit and an utterly irredeemable human being who needs to shut up and go away forever.”

It is clear to me now that I did not choose my words with care and did not get across the point I was trying to convey. In hindsight, I guess instead of using the words “legitimate rape,” I should have used the words “I am an unforgivable, unrepentant, and unconscionable subhuman dickhead.” Or better yet, “I am an evil, fucked-up man who should never have been elected to the United States Congress, and anyone who would vote for me is probably a pretty big fucking dumbshit, too.” See how much more sense that makes? It’s amazing how a few key word changes can totally alter the meaning of a statement.

Because, of course, it’s all about context. And yes, when you take what I said out of context, I can see how it might sound like I’m denying that women can be impregnated via rape. This is, I assure you, not what I was trying to express at all. Such is the age we live in that one little sentence excerpted in a news report can come back to haunt a person in a pretty big hurry. But if you actually go back and look at the remarks closely, you’ll see that what I was actually trying to convey in my statement was that

(1) I am a big fucking idiot,

(2) I am a nauseating slug of a human being who doesn’t deserve to live, and

(3) I am essentially everything that’s wrong with this country and with humanity in general.

Honestly, that’s all I was trying to get across there. It was a simple misunderstanding, really.

It’s funny, because, in my head, I remember thinking very vividly, “I, Rep. Todd Akin, am a bigoted jackass who probably should not be alive, let alone in political office. People need to know what a terrible person I am so they will then remember to punch me in the face anytime they get the chance.” But when I opened my mouth and tried to articulate that thought, somehow I blurted out the thing about rape instead of just saying, in plain English, that I am awful, just purely and incontrovertibly awful.

Frankly, it’s hard not to make a mistake from time to time when you’re in the public eye as much as I am. I am constantly having to speak my mind in a public forum, and sometimes, when all I’m trying to say is something simple and inarguable, like, “Sweet Jesus, I am the worst person who has ever lived,” I wind up saying something completely different. It’s frustrating, really. Because I have a lot of very pertinent and very well-thought out things to say about how somebody should just smack me in the head with a goddamned cricket bat because of how brainless and insensitive I am, but instead my words just come out all jumbled.

I guess I just have a habit of putting my foot in my mouth! And for being the very worst that Western Civilization has to offer!

So let me take this opportunity to be very specific about what I meant Sunday, which was this: I am not a competent or respectable politician; I am, essentially, a subhuman monster of a prick, a prick as profoundly insensitive as he is monumentally unintelligent in every respect; somebody should apply dozens of layers of duct tape to my mouth every morning so that words are not able to exit my large, dumb, misogynist, imbecilic mouth at any point; I make the planet worse; I don’t know jack shit about any of the topics I spoke about in that interview, or about any topics at all, really; I should apologize every day to the women of the world, but doing so would most likely be an exercise in futility given my rock-bottom intellect and my complete and utter lack of human decency; I am, in no uncertain terms, not even worth the time it took you to read this.

That’s what I meant to say. Sorry for the confusion.