“FDA may loosen ‘morning-after pill’ sales”
Note to President Bush and Congressional Republicans: You had better hope that this decision is not made on your watch, or y’all will pay for it dearly in the fall election.
July 31, 2006
Nobody Has Trackbacked Yet
The trackback URL for this post: http://www.southernappeal.org/index.php/archives/1442/trackback
July 31st, 2006 at 7:56 pm
ok - i hate to even fight this battle, but according to the article you linked, no “person” (even by your standards) is created, right? it either blocks the release of an egg, or blocks fertilization. what’s wrong with that - particularly when the public policy benefit of allowing this is LESS abortions.
July 31st, 2006 at 8:20 pm
Publius,
Many articles fail to provide the whole story: The morning-after-pill, like many birth control pills, also acts post-fertilization to cause the destruction of human life that has already come into being. That is not allow for less abortions, it is just allowing some people to pretend they did not have an abortion, or to not know whether or not they did.
July 31st, 2006 at 8:27 pm
is it by not allowing it to implant or by destroying the zygote (assuming for the sake of arg that it’s relevant)
July 31st, 2006 at 8:57 pm
Why would it be relevant?
July 31st, 2006 at 9:00 pm
If the objective is to criminalize birth control, why not develop the integrity to say so?
If birth control were to be made criminal, what penalties should apply, and to whom? Fines? Incarceration? Consumers? Pharmacists? Doctors and nurse practitioners?
July 31st, 2006 at 10:18 pm
huh, never before been accused of not saying what I thought. And it is strange that you question my intergrity for not saying something that is unrelated to the post and also is not my objective. Now, I have no problem criminalizing the killing of innocent human beings, or the selling of drugs that are sold for that purpose, But that is not birth control, that is an abortificant (even if they call them birth control pills). The punishment would be a prudential call, and I’d say that the dispenser would be must prudent person to punish.
July 31st, 2006 at 10:38 pm
again - is it only b/c it prevents it from implanting? and if so, isn’t that a stretch?
July 31st, 2006 at 10:43 pm
again, why is it relevant?
August 1st, 2006 at 12:06 am
Verity, do you regard a zygote that naturally fails to implant and is eliminated with the menstrual flow as an “innocent human being”?
August 1st, 2006 at 12:13 am
that makes jogging attempted murder if the intent is to prevent implanation after sex
August 1st, 2006 at 8:03 am
1) I didn’t call it murder
2) I don’t believe jogging would prevent implanation
3) If jogging would, and that is the motivating intent of jogging, that is wrong, just like if the motivating intent of throwing yourself down the stairs is to cause a miscarriage. If that is not the motivating intent of jogging, the the double-effect principle would apply.
August 1st, 2006 at 8:38 am
understood. just so i’m clear, under your theory, jogging with intent is at least attempted homicide right?
August 1st, 2006 at 8:53 am
Publius-
You’re using a legal term that you know doesn’t apply for the purpose of being cute.
But yes, pub., as Verity notes, if a woman jogs with the intent of preventing implantation, then she is acting in a way that is hostile to life and has committed a grave sin. You can call it what you will, but it is a morally repugnant act.
August 1st, 2006 at 10:00 am
why isn’t that “homicide”? i didn’t use the term murder for precisely that reason, but why shouldn’t THAT term apply to?
yes, i’m trying to be cute, but it’s not a ridiculous point. this view would, in theory, allow a jogger to be prosecuted for attempted murder, would it not?
August 1st, 2006 at 10:44 am
Publius,
I’d be happy to do the analysis, if you first provide me with reasonable scientific support that a reasonably expected outcome of jogging is the prevention of implantation.
August 1st, 2006 at 11:13 am
Publius-
No, it wouldn’t allow her to be prosecuted because your side has (unfortunately) been quite successful in dehumanizing life pre-delivery.
The larger questions we should ask as a society are these: Why are we so selfish? Why are we so unwilling to be open to life? We do we try so hard to suppress nature?
The problem is the motivation behind the act. It is selfishness, plain and simple. The heart curved inward is an ugly thing.
August 1st, 2006 at 11:58 am
Publius simply does not agree about what a man is or is not. Thus, he does not recognize his utterly de-humanizing and offensive comments…
August 1st, 2006 at 12:16 pm
Since Verity is unwilling to answer my question, I will repeat it for anyone’s comment. Is a zygote that naturally fails to implant and is eliminated with the menstrual flow a “human being”?
August 1st, 2006 at 1:00 pm
John,
I did not ignore your question; I did not see it. Sometimes, with timing, the comments pop between old ones. I now see it: Yes, it is a human being, just as one that implants in the tubes and causes a utopic pregnancy, just as one that implants and then dislodges, just as one that is created in a test-tube and does not implant when IV is attempted, or is left over and frozen. It is human because it is the offspring of humans; it is a being because it has a being unique and distinct from all other beings. Read Robbie George for fuller and more scientific explanation.
August 1st, 2006 at 1:40 pm
P.S. That is not to say, I don’t ignore some questions. Unfortunately some people are unwilling or unable to have a logical discussion. Commenters do not have to agree with me (you can remain stubbornly wrong as long as you want), but some have proven themselves uninterested in an honest and logical discussion, and after they have proven themselves unable to have an intelligent discussion, I ignore their comments since it is not worth my time to engage those who put fingers in their ears and hum “we’re the flintstones” while typing a non-sequitur.
August 1st, 2006 at 1:57 pm
Even if we disregard the abortifacient (sp?) effect of Plan B, shouldn’t we have some discussion about the public health consequences? Do we really want to make it easier for people to have uncommitted sex? Has that been an unmitigated good for society?
August 1st, 2006 at 3:26 pm
“Do we really want to make it easier for people to have uncommitted sex?”
If that’s the issue, then we should ban birth control altogether, no?
August 1st, 2006 at 4:17 pm
i would love to talk about the public health consequences
look, any policy that relies on people not having sex won’t work. more than that, it deliberately ignores the problem.
people have sex. teens have sex. always have. always will. a public policy of wide and easy access to birth control would not only reduce abortions, it would prevent teen pregnancy, which disproportionately affects poor people (esp. poor southern states).
it baffles me why social conservatives are so hostile to birth control given these effects. and it makes you think that underlying motivation is hostility to sex itself
August 1st, 2006 at 4:44 pm
How are the consequences of engaging in uncommitted sex which results in (probably uncommitted) pregnancy preferable to the consequences of engaging in uncommitted sex which does not result in pregnancy? It would seem that, by the time that “morning after” contraception is needed, these are the two alternatives. I am honestly trying to follow Catherine’s logic, but I am missing something.
I strongly suspect Publius is right; the antipathy here is to sex itself.
August 1st, 2006 at 4:55 pm
Publius-
I am hostile to sex outside of marriage, and sex within marriage that treats either spouse as a sexual object, because engaging in such conduct is dehumanizing and sinful, and leads to one’s spiritual death.
August 1st, 2006 at 5:05 pm
Ditto to Steve, and add to that the easy access to birth control has neither reduced pregnancy rates or abortion rates. Look at the stats from when birth control was illegal to now. To when it was bought on the sly in a gas station bathroom, to handed out at school. Sin exists and always will exist, but when people are told premarital sex is not sinful and that everyone is doing it, more fornicate. Taking away the possibility of negative consequences (unwanted pregnancy that you can’t “get rid of”), also takes away a practical reason to keep on the straight and narrow.
August 1st, 2006 at 5:06 pm
P.S.
John and Publius,
Do you really, really, believe it is apathy to sex, or are you just being snarky?
August 1st, 2006 at 5:18 pm
Please note that I did not say apathy; I said antipathy. There is quite a difference.
No, I am not being snarky; however, I should more accurately have said that I suspect the antipathy is toward personal autonomy in sexual matters.
August 1st, 2006 at 5:24 pm
not snarky - kevin drum has mentioned htis. i’ll try to find a link tonight (leaving now).
but if you look at the constellation of a lot of the hot-button issues from abortion to birth control to homosexuality, they all relate back to sex.
there’s probably some deeper freudian principle in here somewhere, but i’ll leave that for someone smarter than me
August 1st, 2006 at 5:24 pm
lol. Woops. Yup, there is a difference.
So, you not think we have an antipahty to sex? Or an apathy for that matter?
I have an antipathy for things that are morally wrong.
August 1st, 2006 at 5:28 pm
Taxes; takings; war; torture; socialism; big government; PC; environmentalism. Lots of hot-button issues you’d get the same reaction from me on. As I said it is an antipathy for things that are morally wrong.
So publius, you stand by the antipathy of sex line? This goes to your logical reasoning on honesting in engaging.
August 1st, 2006 at 5:33 pm
“…easy access to birth control has neither reduced pregnancy rates or abortion rates.”
Everything I can find on the ‘Net indicates that teen pregnancy and abortion rates have been steadily declining since the late 1980’s. Do you have a source that contradicts this?
August 1st, 2006 at 5:39 pm
What were the rates pre-Griswald and pre-Roe?
August 1st, 2006 at 5:54 pm
And I mean out-of-wedlock pregnancy rates and abortion rates–not married pregnancy rates, as that is a societal good.
August 1st, 2006 at 5:55 pm
“What were the rates pre-Griswald and pre-Roe?”
You tell me. I can’t find anything that goes that far back. How would we have statistics for something that was illegal? The only numbers for teen pregnancy I can find that go back to 1972 are from Guttermacher and they indicate that teen pregnancies rose throughout the 70s and 80s, reaching a peak in 1990, and have declined ever since. What this tells me is that, after an initial burst of activity during the “wanton” 70s and 80s, education and common sense have kicked in, while birth control and abortion remain as available as ever. Maybe you have a different interpretation.
August 1st, 2006 at 6:08 pm
“And I mean out-of-wedlock pregnancy rates and abortion rates–not married pregnancy rates, as that is a societal good.”
I’m looking at teen pregnancy and abortion rates, 15-19. Married, unmarried, the decline has been consistent.
http://www.guttmacher.org/pubs/or_teen_preg_decline.html
August 1st, 2006 at 6:13 pm
Did the decline in the ninety still exceed the level before Griswald and Roe? The current level still must be higher before birth control and abortion became legal and prevalent. For instance, I found this info:
Between 1990 and 1994, 41 percent of girls and women ages 15 to 29 were unmarried when they had their first child — compared to just 8 percent 60 years earlier.
The proportion of first babies conceived out of wedlock by young women in the 1990s nearly tripled from the 1930s — rising to 53 percent from 18 percent.
Before Roe abortion was not illegal in all states, so that data could help you extrapolate, but frankly, I don’t see how, even without statistics, you can’t realize that current rates of out-of-wedlock pregnancy and abortion exceed the rates before birth control and abortion became readily accessible. The decline in the 1990 might mean more birth control or more abstinence. The articles I’ve read go both ways on that, but that’s a decline from a peak! The levels were obviously much lower before Griswald and Roe. See quotes.
August 1st, 2006 at 6:25 pm
Well, the number of 15 - 18 year olds is minimal, so that wouldn’t alter the analysis significantly, but again, that’s a decline from a peak. Not a decline from before birth control and abortion became legal and readily available.
August 1st, 2006 at 6:32 pm
I meant married 15 - 18 year olds.
August 1st, 2006 at 6:33 pm
“What were the rates pre-Griswald and pre-Roe?”
Here, this is an article about nonmarital birth rates, not specific to teenagers:
http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/nvsr/nvsr48/nvs48_16.pdf
The curve for percent of births seems to grow steeper after Griswold. I suppose that lends some credence to your point. But not much. Latex condoms were invented in 1919 and were enormously popular by the mid-1930’s (hardly surprising during the Depression) so I guess we’ve been in trouble ever since then.
August 1st, 2006 at 6:44 pm
Verity, if you want to argue that we’ve become a more licentious society since 1940, be my guest. There’s no question that we’re a far more sexually liberal society than we were in in 1940, and that has brought problems with it. But how much of that is attributable to the availability of birth control is difficult to prove, unless you can find some hard data. I’d say it’s the opposite–sexual liberation has led to a rise in the demand for and use of birth control.
Either way, it does little to forward the debate about Plan B, IMO. We’re not going to regress to the values and mores of 1940, no matter how much some might desire it. By that measure, you wouldn’t be a lawyer, but a secretary at best, and you certainly wouldn’t be enjoying the kind of financial and professional independence you enjoy today. And of course you wouldn’t be voicing your opinions on a blog. So take us back, if you wish, but we”ve *all* got to go back–not just the sexually licentious among us.
August 1st, 2006 at 6:56 pm
Thank you for your link and integrity in pointing it out, but:
“But not much.” WHAAATTTT?
Please be honest here: What I said and you took issue with was this statement:
“…easy access to birth control has neither reduced pregnancy rates or abortion rates.” (I also wrote that in context of another point. See above.)
You didn’t believe me. But look at the graph!! While condoms were invented in the early 1900s, I said “easy access,” and the birth control pill wasn’t yet invented then, and they didn’t hand out condoms at schools–and parents weren’t about to give them to their children. Do you honestly not believe that birth control became more readily available in the late 60 and more so in the 70, 80, 90, and now? Yet, the pregnancy rates increased substantially in that time–three-fold.
Please, be honest: You have to admit that birth control is more used now, but the out-of-wedlock pregnancy rate is more than tripple than what it was when pre-marital sex was considered and treated as a sin. Yes, as humans, people fell, but not in nearly the numbers of today. And that decline you are talking about is miniscule, and is still 3 times higher to pre-Griswald. How can you possibly look at these facts and possibly say “not much?”
August 1st, 2006 at 7:05 pm
“How can you possibly look at these facts and possibly say ‘not much?’”
It’s rather easy, really. What you said is not true today. Teen pregnancy rates have been falling for 15 years, with birth control and abortion more available and convenient than they ever have been.
As I said, and perhaps we are cross-posting, you will have to find me some hard data proving that the availability of birth control *caused* the rise in nonmarital birth rates since 1940, rather than the otrher way around. You could just as easily say that rising nonmarital birth rates have led to a greater demand for birth control and abortion.
“You have to admit that birth control is more used now, but the out-of-wedlock pregnancy rate is more than tripple than what it was when pre-marital sex was considered and treated as a sin.”
Doesn’t this argue against your point?
August 1st, 2006 at 7:25 pm
Oops, I see my mistake. I was misreading your statement. You are correct that easy access to birth control has not historically reduced nonmarital birth rates. According to the sources I cited, it has contributed to a decline in teen pregnancies since 1991. Handing out condoms in high schools could *very well* be a factor in declining teen pregnancies and abortions, and I think that’s the main point we’re arguing here. If you want to say we’re worse off than we were in 1940, fine. If you maintain that access to birth control won’t make it better, I’d argue that with you.
August 1st, 2006 at 7:34 pm
I should more accurately say that increasing access to birth control does not *correlate* to a reduction in nonmarital birth rates.
August 1st, 2006 at 7:42 pm
Grover,
I didn’t take the issue away from Plan B, others did, (including you when you pulled out something I said in response to someone else).
Don’t you think that the availiabity of birth control and abortion was a large part of what helped “liberate” society sexually??
No, that doesn’t argue against my point. My point was that easy access to birth control does not reduce out-of-wedlock pregnancy or abortions. That’s because more people are fornicating, in part because the harsh consequence is not expected (because they used birth control), or because they can always get rid of it. When more people are having pre-marital sex, they will use more birth control, but the numbers show that with the increased use of birth control you are not seeing an reduction in the out-of-wedlock rates. Again, more people fornicate with easy access to birth control than fornicated before. And women don’t have the practical support for their moral “no.” Yes, that may be in part because of the sexual “liberation” as opposed to the failure rate of people fornicating who wouldn’t have been had they not obtained birth control. But it is large part the easy access that led to the “liberation.”
Finally, re your secretary comment: Oh, where to start. Well, first off: That’s rather condescneding to secretaries. That is a perfectly fine calling, and one I had amongst other job. Second, I’ve done lots of things that were not done by “girls” in my generation, and if moral, societal’s view would be irrelevant to me, and it would have been in the 30s to me too. On the merits: Well, first of all, fornication is a sin. Using birth control is a sin. That has nothing to do with the times. I don’t want to revert to the 1940’s because that was a better time. And I never argued that society should revert to the 1940s. I used stats to confirm my point. Now, being a lawyer is not a sin, (okay, you could argue with that.), so that women in the 30s or 40s weren’t lawyers, is irrelevant since my argument was based on the sinfulness of behavior and not the times. Additionally, it would be sinful to take a machismo attitude about what professions are suitable for a woman. So saying current society is promoting sinful conduct in one way, doesn’t mean you push society to revert to a sinful maschimo attitude also prevalent in the early time period.
August 1st, 2006 at 7:48 pm
Grover,
1) Other articles find support for abstinence programs reducing the rate.
2) Using birth control is sinful, so it shouldn’t be promoted.
3) Even if it wasn’t, its easy access and the culture it breeds will cause some who would hang tough to fall instead, and each of those individuals is harmed.
4) The rate of decline is miniscule, and given the strong rise in the previous decades, it isn’t surprise that that is a slight decrease, and cheering birth control for a slight decrease after the hug increase it caused with the licese it promote seems rather a strange position to me.
August 1st, 2006 at 7:59 pm
“Don’t you think that the availiabity of birth control and abortion was a large part of what helped ‘liberate’ society sexually??”
If you put it that way, and remove the “scare quotes,” yes, I’d agree.
As for sin, we will never agree and there’s no point getting into that.
I don’t believe I was condescending toward secretaries, just pointing out what was then a limit on female professional advancement.
As for going back to 1940, the problem I have with your argument that I believe that progressive advancements, both the good and the bad, go hand in hand. Without birth control, there would have been less progress in the advancement of women in the professions. You can’t parse these things out and say, “Oh, if only we could have this without that.” It’s all part and parcel of liberalized attitudes towards women, sex, homsexuality, race, and a host of other things. You may not agree, but that’s the way I see it.
August 1st, 2006 at 8:05 pm
“…cheering birth control for a slight decrease after the hug increase it caused with the licese it promote seems rather a strange position to me.”
Not to me. The curve is very long and we haven’t reached the end by any means. Ideally we would have access to birth control *and* a sensible approach to sex and pregnancy. It looks to be trending that way, which I find encouraging.
August 1st, 2006 at 8:13 pm
They weren’t scare quotes. They were I don’t agree with your word choice, but I’ll use the word you used, quotes, because it wasn’t liberating, it was licenseous.
There are many professional women today who do not accept the “liberalized” attitude re sex, homosexuality, birth control, and abortion. You don’t need the latter to have the former. Nor did society need to embrace the latter to embrace the former. Of course, you can’t re-write history, but if you are having a discussion on morals, it is illogical to argue that because one good came with the change of time, you can’t celebrate that good if you detest the evil that came of the same time period.
Off for my evening run.
August 1st, 2006 at 10:02 pm
“There are many professional women today who do not accept the “liberalized” attitude re sex, homosexuality, birth control, and abortion.”
I’m sure there are. But many do, and a good thing, IMO. Nor does that necessarily invalidate my point that without birth control, women wouldn’t have made the advances they did during the 60’s and 70’s, and beyond. Pregnancy in the workplace is still an issue, as my better half well knows. Her former boss was notorious for offering generous and lengthy maternity leave in the hope that the new mother wouldn’t return to the office. If she had the audacity to do so, she wasn’t treated well.
“Nor did society need to embrace the latter to embrace the former.”
But we did, for a while, because it appeared necessary to do so. Forty years later we can afford to pick and choose a bit more. For instance, single motherhood doesn’t carry the stigma it once did, so while teen pregnancy rates are declining, birth rates are on the rise, which indicates that more young women are rejecting abortion and taking responsibility for their actions. That is a step in the right direction.
“…if you are having a discussion on morals, it is illogical to argue that because one good came with the change of time, you can’t celebrate that good if you detest the evil that came of the same time period.”
I never said you couldn’t. But, of course, in this case it depends on whether you view birth control and sexual freedom as evils, inseparable from irresponsibility and sloth. I don’t believe they are.
Enjoy your run–as well as the modern conveniences and opportunities that afford you the leisure to indulge in it.
August 2nd, 2006 at 12:10 am
it baffles me why social conservatives are so hostile to birth control given these effects. and it makes you think that underlying motivation is hostility to sex itself
and
there’s probably some deeper freudian principle in here somewhere, but i’ll leave that for someone smarter than me
It’s always nice to drop in and get some combox psycho-analysis. Freud was a fraud.
I suppose you could also chalk up my concerns about bulimia to a hostility towards eating.
August 2nd, 2006 at 8:23 am
Grover,
Yes, many professional women got where they were by using birth control or aborting inconvient babies, but that doesn’t make it right. Nor is an argument that “well, with progressive views towards sex, came computers, airconditioning, store bought food, and everything else that makes it possible to run in the evening, so you can’t criticize the former, since you enjoy the latter,” logical.
You misunderstand the meaning of freedom, in speaking of sexual “freedom.”
Society and individuals suffer greatly under your view of sexual “freedom”, and easy access to birth control or Plan B do not lessen that suffering, but rather, beyond the immorality, they pull society further to that licenseous extreme. That was Catherine’s earlier point, and a look at the historical out-of-wed-lock pregnancy rates confirms that reality.
August 2nd, 2006 at 10:22 am
“Yes, many professional women got where they were by using birth control or aborting inconvient babies, but that doesn’t make it right.”
That’s a nice way to spin it. As if there was absolutely no outside pressure on women to delay childbearing in order to contend for promotions and pay raises.
“You misunderstand the meaning of freedom, in speaking of sexual ‘freedom.’”
No, I don’t. We just have different interpretations of the meaning of “freedom”.
But at any rate, the pendulum is swinging. Having established themselves in the workplace, many women are demanding, and getting, the right to be a professional AND raise a family at the same time. Nonetheless, birth control is still an important part of many American’s lives and it’s doubtful that this will change. Abortion is another matter–attitudes are shifting, and for this we certainly have pressure from more conservative circles in part to thank, no doubt about that.
“Society and individuals suffer greatly under your view of sexual ‘freedom’, and easy access to birth control or Plan B do not lessen that suffering, but rather, beyond the immorality, they pull society further to that licenseous extreme.”
Again, we’ll have to disagree, and it’s pretty clear that the vast majority of Americans do as well.
http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/medicalnews.php?newsid=45678
http://www.harrisinteractive.com/harris_poll/index.asp?PID=608
Now, all these people may be terribly misguided and spiritually bereft, but I doubt most of them would agree with your narrow definitions of “extreme” and “freedom,” whatever those may be.
And I’m sorry to be picky, but could we get “licentious” right? It’s driving me crazy.
August 2nd, 2006 at 12:12 pm
Thanks, I didn’t want to bother looking up the spelling!
Well, the public might not agree, but I’ve got 2,000 years and infallibility on my side.
Another day we’ll debate whether woman have the right to demand that employers accommodate their desire to change working conditions expectations because they are also mothers.
August 2nd, 2006 at 8:20 pm
“Well, the public might not agree, but I’ve got 2,000 years and infallibility on my side.”
You must be exhausted.
“Another day we’ll debate whether woman have the right to demand that employers accommodate their desire to change working conditions expectations because they are also mothers.”
I can hardly wait to hear the litany of chaos and destruction wrought by the working mothers of the world.