“Rights”

Today while eating lunch in my office I was perusing blogs and after a few links came across an entry about “reproductive rights” and how it relates to a 69 year old woman who has unfortunately passed away recently, leaving behind the two twins that she gave birth to three years ago. It kept me agitated all day, and I’ll tell you why (probably in the most long-winded way possible unfortunately).

The writer of the entry (blog: The Pursuit of Harpyness-I could write for an entire day about that choice of title alone) made arguments that women of any age should be allowed to undergo fertility treatments in order to conceive. That it is a “reproductive rights” issue. On the contrary, I feel that it is certainly not a reproductive rights issue…it’s a moral issue that centers around the well-being of children that have absolutely no choice as to what they’re born into. I encourage you to read the original article via Fox News; especially since it details how Maria del Carmen Brousada deceived a fertility clinic about her true age in order to even be considered for fertility treatment.

The most significant point of disagreement the blog author had about the content of the Fox article was the quote from Allen Pacey:

Allan Pacey, secretary of the British Fertility Society, said the organization recommends that assisted conception generally not be provided to women beyond the natural age of menopause.

“The rationale for all that is that nature didn’t design women to have assisted conception beyond the age of the natural menopause…once you get into the mid-50s, I think nature is trying to tell us something,” Pacey told The AP.

He added: “I think many people would worry about providing fertility treatment to women in their 60s. I think as a general rule, to embark on pregnancy when you may not see your child go to university is potentially a very difficult situation.”

I agree on both counts, simply because what he said is true. Nature did not intend for women to give birth after menopause…if it did intend for that then most women would be able to conceive until the day they died. Pure and simple. And yes, having a child when your life expectancy after a certain age is decidedly up in the air is a potentially difficult situation…for the child.

Bullshit was called in that entry on both reasons and I’m calling bullshit on the bullshit that was called.

Yes, nature didn’t intend for a lot of things to be possible that our medical knowledge now allows. Does that mean we have carte blanche to do whatever we want? No. We have the science to clone people and nature clearly didn’t intend for that to be possible but does it mean we should? No.

Secondly, to completely dismiss the issue of what it means for a child and to do so in a sarcastic manner is completely narrow-minded. And I quote:

Secondly, the whole “Oh, what about teh babeez?” cry doesn’t take into account that parents die all the time and leave their children behind.

Truth be told the whole “Oh, what about teh babeez” comment is what really got me sideways today. Yes, parents die all the time before they thought they might and they leave children behind and it’s a sad situation. But it is simply selective thinking to banish the fact that statistically a parent bringing a child into the world that is say 30 or 40 has a much better chance of being around for that child than someone who is 63. Yes, people with various illnesses and longterm ailments also conceive at younger ages…I would wager that most likely someone that had battled cancer at the age of 30, or 40 even, probably has a better chance than someone at the age of 60+ of being around for the duration of what that child needs. So, yes “what about teh babeez” is exactly right. The slippery slope idea applies to both sides of the argument. Sure, it’s a “slippery slope” to get involved in who shouldn’t be allowed to conceive. But it’s also a slippery slope to argue for who should be able to conceive based simply on an ideal. I would be shocked to find anyone in their right mind who would argue that on the basis of reproductive rights a mother in active heroin addiction should be able to receive fertility treatment. That’s what the flimsy “slippery slope” argument can get you.

The online dictionary gives 62 different contextual definitions for the word “right”. Clearly as it pertains to this not all of them apply…some of them do:

1. in accordance with what is good, proper, or just: right conduct.

Is it good, proper, or just to pay for treatments that allow for birth at the age of 63, or 70, or 75? I think most people would probably agree that it falls on the side of “not”, otherwise it would be neither an anomaly nor newsworthy when we heard about someone doing so.

2. in conformity with fact, reason, truth, or some standard or principle; correct: the right solution; the right answer.

Is it in conformity with some current standard or principle that people should have children regardless of what those children will have to deal with…simply because they feel they have the “right” to do so? I don’t think it is.

4. fitting or appropriate; suitable: to say the right thing at the right time.

Is it appropriate or fitting that we reproduce with no thought to the consequences, simply because our “wants” are seen as the most important? Many people can afford to pay for fertility treatments. Does that mean they should? Not necessarily. Many people can naturally conceive children. Does that mean that they should? Not necessarily.

It doesn’t escape me that putting legal limitations on the conception of babies is certainly a precarious arena, especially in light of what we still go through today to exercise what is actually our reproductive rights as they pertain to the sovereignty of our bodies. But at the same time it also doesn’t escape me that choosing to bring a child into the world is an incredibly serious matter. I don’t have children and I’m sure it would be easy for someone to say that since I don’t how could I possibly have the right to weigh in on the matter. I’ve been in a position to make the choice of whether to have one or not and I chose not to. My choice was not made on the basis of what I wanted or didn’t want. It was made based on what I didn’t want to put a child through considering the situation it would be born into (as a disclaimer I wouldn’t ever judge a woman that chose not to have a child based on any other reasoning). And anyway, people that have never even been in a position to have a child have no less of a reason to feel one way or another about the issue, because we’ve all been children.

And that’s what I have to say about that.

 

Small victories

No I’m not referring to the recent election; especially since that really can’t be termed simply a small victory in my opinion. I’ve sort of had a few recently, although they may not have seemed so at first.

The other day I realized that I have the ability to skip the endless waiting for a W-2 and file my taxes early based on my last paycheck for the year. Having filed taxes at THS before I happen to have the ID number which is pretty much the only thing missing from my last paycheck of 08. Curious while at work the other day, I rummaged through my drawer of paycheck stubs for the all important one I was seeking in order to check out my tax withheld. Oddly though, I couldn’t even locate my year to date income on it. I immediately became frustrated and shoved it back in the drawer thinking that someone must have messed up on my typed out (literally, it’s a typed piece of paper) paycheck stub. Today I happened to be talking with a friend at work on our break and I mentioned my frustration. She shared with me that her total income, etc. was certainly on her last paycheck. That’s when it hit me in a most overwhelming wave of realized idiocy.

I was looking at the wrong check.

OF COURSE my first check from 09 is not going to hold the answers I was seeking. It worked out well though…I was able to provide the employer ID number to my friend and she was able to provide me with an epiphany of how stupid I had been a few days ago. Yes. Worked out well indeed. In the interest of self-image, I was thankful to be more relieved than embarrassed.  Small victory…I will have my tax return soon.

Not all victories are so easily won though. I made it to work today…and while that shouldn’t necessarily count as a tremendous achievement, it did for me today. I got on the wrong bus. Really. I did.

I have been riding the joy of public transportation for many, many months now. There is one bus that journeys from lower Queen Anne right to the front door of my work; it vacilates between route 13 and route 2. Sounds pretty easy right? (On a side note, I learned the hard way to avoid route 2 express when I first began my public transportation era…I learned that it certainly is an express route since it completely avoids going up the hill which is where I need to go. In my defense, it had been a while since I was required to battle with Metro.) Apparently the wool had been pulled over MY eyes because maybe it’s not that easy. This morning while waiting in the cold I spied a route 13 coming down QA ave. In hindsight I realize that I did notice a millisecond of hesitation since it just said ‘downtown’ when it usually says ‘madrona park via E union’. However, in all these months I had only seen route 2 with just DT on it because they also say express. I boarded it on my happy way to work.

It didn’t turn on Spring st. That’s when I got that horrid pit-of-the-stomach feeling of ‘where the hell am I going?’ Sooo…I had to get off the deceitful bus in order to get back to where the honest 2 would get me to work; and I was really late. But at least I got there. Recent victory number 2.

The last one is actually not that small of a victory in the grand scheme of things, but at the same time it is. I am hard pressed to accurately describe it. There are situations that have the capacity to cause great cracks in our strength and durability. For me, they have that capacity especially when intertwined with men somehow. To be specific, when they are intertwined with a man who has behaved destructively and poorly about something which resulted in pain on my part.

Sometimes though, there are little angels that have the capacity to do little things which help with a healing process even when they don’t realize or even intend to help do so. Sometimes the smallest thing such as someone holding you, making the smallest effort to dry tears, refrain from judgment and asking anything of you  is enough kindness and caring to get over some of the huge hurdles of letting something go that might seem too big to let drop. Real friends do little things like that which sometimes in the long run are actually significant things, and I’m grateful to have people like that. Small victory number 3.

All I wanted to do was a bit of laundry

That’s it. Maybe some cleaning that really needs to be done before a single person sets foot in my apt on Wednesday evening. But at least some laundry, because the pile of it had become a house of its own in the back room of my tiny apt.

The day was overwhelming to say the least, after many days of not being at work to handle the stuff that piles up so willingly. I almost stayed way late to get more done than I could in a 8 hour day, but decided against it, because I have my own life too. I may have been better off staying at work.

I arrived home and was greeted by the same SUV that has been blocking the apt alleyway for the past four days…the alleyway that conveniently holds our huge dumpsters that are now overflowing…because the parking “authority” didn’t think it was all that important the first four times I called. So I called them again because officially it is now an abandoned vehicle per their definition. I was told it could be up to two weeks before they get to it. The garbage is already overflowing.

Fine. They don’t care and I’m doing what I can do. So I continued on to pile up a couple of bedrooms of laundry from the newly formed house and plodded up to the laundry room. It took me a second to realize that the laundry room was less bright than it regularly is. A light out. A light requiring a bulb that has to be special ordered and that I don’t have on hand because I”m not “on top of” one single thing in my life right now. Nice.

I’m probably over dramatizing, I tend to do that. The light broke the proverbial camel’s back however. It’s amazing how much things can break. That’s what today made me think of especially after a conversation I had earlier in the day.

My family postponed our routine Christmas eve dinner until this past Saturday due to the inclement weather. It sounds silly, but every year my uncle lovingly builds what he calls the “chili pepper lounge” (named so because he puts up chili pepper lights rather than Christmas lights) on the back deck for those of us in the family that make the poor decision to smoke. Usually he will come out at some point and smoke a cigar. He did this as usual on Saturday. Only, the lounge did not hold chili pepper lights this year. He couldn’t find them and instead put up blue and green lights. Seahawks for those of you that don’t know. We remarked on the lack of chili pepper lights and he explained laughingly that instead we had Seahawks lights. I made some disparaging comment about football which (although I don’t really hate football and actually enjoy going to the games) is just what I do and he returned said comment by saying in general that as far as sports in Seattle this past year, things couldn’t get much worse.

I just couldn’t leave it alone (as per usual) and said, “well…they could always sell the Seahawks next year”. Nice, Kelly. However, he did concede his point and say, “well, I suppose things could get worse”.

It’s really nice and quaint to say that “things couldn’t get much worse” in various situations and referring to various things. The fact of the matter is, things can always break a little more. As small as they’ve been reduced to they can always get smaller, and a little bit worse even if the “worse” seemed incomprehensible. We did split the atom after all.

Things can break more at any time, and some things continue to break a little more over periods of time until one day it’s too obvious to ignore, and sometimes they are beyond one person’s control. The little dutch boy in the popular fable did his best with the whole dike thing, but one person can’t fix something alone, or even hold things as they are alone. I know that as I get older I’m supposed to accept this more gracefully…the whole “I can’t fix everything” and “I can’t keep people from arguing or fighting”. The truth of the matter is that it doesn’t get easier to accept. It actually seems to get more frustrating.

Leaps of logic and what should have been done

Today I illegally perused blogs while at work on my lunch break. I say illegal because technically it wasn’t work related and they’re (the infamous ‘they’) cracking down lately. I came across an entry in a popular feminist blog (Feministing) detailing a messy little situation that the Supreme Court is ruling on. Bottom line really, is that they must decipher and clarify what is said to be a poorly written law. 

As a result of the alleged poorly written law the current ruling could allow those who have been convicted of misdemeanor DV crimes to own guns:

Congress in 1996 sought to strengthen the laws against domestic violence. Before, only persons convicted of violent felonies in such situations lost their rights to own a gun. Going a step further, lawmakers adopted an amendment to take away gun rights for those who had a “misdemeanor crime of domestic violence” on their records.

Problem with that?

But last year, the U.S. 4th Circuit Court of Appeals in Virginia cast doubt on the law’s reach. Its judges decided the federal gun ban did not cover misdemeanor convictions involving assault or battery at home. Instead, it said the federal ban applied only to those convicted under a state’s domestic violence law. 

Not good. Most states don’t have specific misdemeanor laws re: DV. No misdemeanor laws + upholding the constitution = violent wife/husband (because yes, there are women that beat mean…statistically not as high, but it happens) beaters could have guns with which to do more harm.

Instead of focusing on these small facts, the website I read chose to verbally nail the judge in the case to a cross for doing his job. Choosing instead to paint him as a sexist a-hole who doesn’t care about women.

In this case the judge ruled per the law.

Justice Antonin Scalia was unswayed by that argument. “People are governed by the law that is passed, not by the law that Congress intended to pass,” he said…But during Monday’s argument, Scalia said possessing a gun was “lawful conduct,” and a wife-beating charge lodged against a West Virginia man was “not that serious an offense.” The government lawyer shot back that the defendant “hit his wife all around the face until it swelled out, kicked her all around her body, kicked her in the ribs. . . . “

“Then he should have been charged with a felony,” Scalia interjected, “but he wasn’t.” (emphasis mine)

The bottom line for the blog? Judge thinks DV is not serious and does not matter. Judge is dismissive towards DV. Reality? Judge does his job and rules on the law alone. Did he write it? No. Did the U.S. tell him he could just make decisions willy-nilly based on his emotions? No. By saying it’s “not that serious an offense” I might guess that he was talking strictly about the actual charge; the state decided it wasn’t that serious an offense.

This I think, is what is irksome about how some of us demonstrate feminism. Leaps of logic based on emotion. It sort of makes the whole thing look bad.

If you think that voting doesn’t matter…

Initially you should just take a peek at the news anytime this evening when results are coming in to hear them mention the ‘record number’ of younger and/or diverse voters that are evident. That’s the ‘sum it up’ version of why it does matter.

According to CNSNews in the 2008 election:

Forty percent of first-time voters identify themselves as Democrats, 37 percent as independents, and just 23 percent as Republicans. Also, 32 percent of first-time voters describe their political views as conservative, 34 percent as moderate, and just 28 percent as liberal.
 
Almost half of first-time voters are minorities (47 percent) – higher than the proportion of first-time voters who were minorities in 2004 (33 percent), and that could be due to the historic nature of Barack Obama’s candidacy, Gallup noted.
 
First-time voters favor Obama 65 percent to 31 percent – a much better showing for the Democratic presidential candidate than in 2004, when first-time voters favored Sen. John Kerry over President George W. Bush by 55 percent to 41 percent.

Okay, so how reliable are the numbers? Average. A sample of 3,030 voters is okay, clearly a more significant sample would have been better, but 3,030 is okay. A margin of error of plus or minus 2%? Can be deemed ‘okay’ as well; to put statistics simply, the lower the margin of error, the better.

Silly poll with 3,000 people. Okay. I just thought it was interesting. Truth is, it’s very elementary and simple to explain why it matters. It starts when the caucuses started months ago.

It continues with Electoral College for Dummies (I really couldn’t help using it…it was too perfect).

Different states choose their electors in different ways. Some states have nominations for electors during party conventions, while others choose their electors in primaries.

In Pennsylvania, the campaigns choose their own electors. The only real things that can disqualify you from being an elector are holding a federal office or having engaged in some sort of insurrection against the U.S. government.

Chosen electors are generally loyal party members who can be counted on to cast a ballot that’s in line with their state’s popular vote.

Do they have to cast a ballot that’s in line with the popular vote or cast a ballot for the vote that they said they would? Not necessarily. Is it commonplace for them not to? No.

So there you go. Voting for dummies.

Not to mention the importance of voting on smaller races than say, the presidency. For example, hell yes I voted because, in part, there was no way and no how that I was passing up my chance to vote against Dino Rossi. I also wanted my chance to vote for the next King County Superior Court Judge because I know Barbara Mack, she worked in drug court and I like what I know about her professionally. And I was not going to pass up my chance to vote on prop 1000, death with dignity. Yes it’s an emotional issue to me, and I voted yes.

And I certainly wasn’t going to pass up my chance to vote for the president-elect (in the popular vote) who is now Obama. I so wish I was in Chicago right now. Not to mention the way that people are celebrating in other countries because of all this.