Breast cancer survivors for Planned Parenthood

Last year in January while I was recovering from a lumpectomy and waiting to start radiation (because early detection saves lives and contributes to better outcomes), a group of friends wanted to make a donation in honor of a young friend (32 at the time) who had just lost both breasts to cancer (she has the BRCA gene). We got the comfort food and flowers to her, but wanted to really do our homework on which organization to donate to in her honor.

Several of us checked Charity Navigator and Charity Watch (Guide Star is also good) to learn what percentage of funds are used for admin costs, research, providing screenings and other preventive care, and education (we agreed on the National Breast Cancer Foundation).

At the same time, Steven Colbert gave a Tip of the Hat to Susan G. Komen and their use of at least $1M of donor dollars a year to sue mom and pop groups working to support cancer research and cancer patients. That’s a lot of money spent to essentially bully small efforts to help sick people be healthy.

Fast forward almost 13 months later, and Komen has caved to pressure from anti-choice advocates and Rep. Cliff Stearns of Florida. Yesterday the GOP primary candidates were competing with coverage of Komen’s decision to defund Planned Parenthood.

Komen’s funding has been used to provide breast exams to women who rely on Planned Parenthood for healthcare services. These women are often poor, underinsured or uninsured, and do not have access to a family doctor or gynecologist for regular care.

Now Komen, an organization established to honor a breast cancer victim, has said it won’t help fund preventive care services like breast exams (and cervical cancer screenings, which is one of the most difficult cancers to identify because the cancer is usually advanced before the patient suspects a problem).

There is no evidence that Planned Parenthood misappropriated the funds for abortion or other services.  What is known is that Komen Vice-President Karen Handel, who served as the Secretary of State for Georgia before resigning to launch a failed bid for the GOP nomination for governor here, campaigned long and hard against state funding for breast and cervical cancer screenings which went to Planned Parenthood. Unfortunately what she couldn’t accomplish in Georgia she has now managed on a national level.

And, because it bears repeating by women who grew up while the battle was waged for safe and legal access to abortions, or came to adulthood not long after the dust began to settle, the issue isn’t whether abortion is good, moral, a form of birth control, etc. Really desperate women who want to end a pregnancy will find a way to do that regardless of whether it is safe or legal. We endanger lives without access to safe and legal abortion.

This defunding is a result of politics driven by such socially, politically, and religiously conservative officials that they will strip away access to preventive health care for poor women. If the lost funds aren’t made up to Planned Parenthood, how many women will not find the cancer soon enough? How many young children will suffer, and perhaps be left without a mother who makes pancakes from scratch on Sunday morning before going to church?

I donated to Planned Parenthood last night. I am remiss in not giving them even a small donation in the past.

Later today I am stuffing all my Komen Race for the Cure t-shirts and the return address labels they have sent me into an envelope and sending them back to:

Nancy Brinker
CEO, Susan G. Komen
5005 LBJ Freeeway
Suite 250
Dallas, TX 75244

I support access to preventive health care and good health information for all Americans. Especially for the mothers, daughters, wives, sisters, aunts, and godmothers, now more than ever.

No more rhymin' with the bitches

The materialism, violence, and blatant sexism that pervade so much of rap music are an assault against all women. The degrading way that women are referred to as a bitch or a ho doesn't pose as "art" when the images and words are repeated over and over again in demeaning tones.

If any number of reports hold true, this week a respected and successful musician and producer has sworn off any more bitches in his music. Since the birth of his daughter Blue Ivy Carter, proud father Jay-Z, has decided that calling a female a bitch just for the sake of using the word isn't o.k. In fact, he reportedly goes even further with this, “I never realized while on the fast track that I'd give riddance to the word bitch/To leave her innocence intact/No man will degrade her, or call her name/Forever young you may pass/Blue Ivy Carter, my angel."

If having a daughter brought this about, then congratulations are due to the father for quickly realizing that he doesn't want anyone calling his daughter a bitch (why he didn't give the word up out of respect for his wife or mother is another question). It is odd how a pink bow on the front door can change the way you speak (or rap). How many dads figure out that a lot of those doors will never open for their daughter?
Better pay? Women still earn about 77 cents to every dollar a man earns. Chances of leading a Fortune 500 company? The numbers are down to 12 women in that role because three left their posts in the last year and were replaced by men.

Women have made some significant gains in political leadership, but the United States Senate has 100 members and only 17 are women. In the House of Representatives 16.8% of the 435 seats belong to women. 
Last year Georgia State Rep. Bobby Franklin (R-Marietta, deceased) wanted legislation passed which would require rape victims to be called accusers. If rape were predominantly a crime committed against men, would any man in the Georgia General Assembly supported a bill requiring that they be referred to as accusers? Semantics? I don't think so.

Like all new parents, I suspect that while Jay-Z and Beyonce know they can provide for Blue Ivy, they worry about the world that she will grow up in beyond their guarded home. If her father knows it shouldn't be a world where women are casually and routinely called bitches, I hope he can also do something about women also being considered a ho. That's another verse to be sung.      
     

Hate SpewMaster Sponsors and Higher Math

Not being a Neal Boortz fan, and preferring to not be incensed all the time by listening to him or reading what he spews on the internet, I wasn't totally surprised when I read today via Blog for Democracy that Boortz tweeted earlier today: "If you haven't been charged with sexual harassment ... your 'nads haven't dropped yet."

Since it has been a while since I had looked at the Spewmaster's web site, I went there to see which companies have paid links there. In the upper right hand column there is an advertisement FOR A WOMEN'S SELF DEFENSE CLASS! 

I need to puzzle over the math here but I am pretty sure that calculus or any other method won't get the math right on this one: Neal Boortz thinks that unless a male has sexually harassed a women he isn't a man.   Companies like Ackerman Security and Chinese Shailon Center in Atlanta, who are sponsoring the workshop, are in the business of helping protect women from attacks. And yet they spend money to sponsor Boortz. 

I just spoke with a very nice woman at Ackerman who is following up on this and seemed to be just as upset as I am. She said someone would call me back.

In the mean time, if I were an Ackerman customer, I would cancel my contract with them and urge anyone I know, especially women, to do the same. The math just doesn't add up.