The Ohio GOP war on women continues as Attorney General Mike DeWine quickly does the bidding of Ohio Right to Life when Toledo’s last abortion clinic successfully complied with one of the state’s draconian anti-abortion laws. The forced birth crew is now trying to change the rules yet again.
Suicide Is Not A Solution For Change
The news came out the other day that Leelah Alcorn, a transgender teen in living in the Cincinnati area had died after getting hit by a truck on I-71 near her home. Later it was found out that Leelah had committed suicide. I have never been able to wrap my head around the use of suicide as a solution for change. The real sad part for me is she didn’t have to die to bring attention to the issue of support for transgender teens.
Leelah’s story is heartbreaking even without the suicide. She wanted to transition to female and her parents, who were very religious, resisted Leelah’s wishes. They even sent her to Christian therapists to force her to live the way they wanted her to live. In her suicide note she said she had no real friends and no escape from her depressing life.
Ohio GOP Rigs Vote To Pass Heartbeat Bill Out Of Committee
In what seemed like deja vu, Republicans in the Ohio legislature rigged a committee vote on the anti-abortion law known as the Heartbeat Bill (House Bill 248). The GOP pulled a similar stunt back in 2011 in the Ohio Senate to pass out of committee Senate Bill 5 that attempted to strip collective bargaining from public employee unions.
No, Penn Jillette, Rape And Death Threats Are Not Free Speech
There has been a major storm over misogyny in the freethought movement for several years. Women in the movement who have spoken out against it have been harassed with rape and death threats among other nasty reactions. People who don’t see anything wrong with the misogyny, like comedian Penn Jillette, worry more about being able to call a woman a ‘cunt’ than why one shouldn’t be doing that in the first place. That’s the problem.
Buzzfeed has a very thorough article about the misogyny conflict in the freethought movement. It actually gave both sides of the issue and while I knew most of the incidents described the article also included interviews with several women who had been raped and/or harassed.
Teens Need Some Kind Of Dress Code. It Just Needs To Be Fair
There have been some news reports about young women in middle school and high school being sent home because the administrators have deemed their clothing inappropriate. An article, from 2013, on ThinkProgress gave me pause to reexamine my views on dress codes and the treatment of young women. While I feel any dress codes need to apply to all genders equally, I do believe that teens need some boundary setting.