A major issue in the 2024 election: Sex and power
I refuse to pull my punches--I think that laws prohibiting abortion, and the rumored-to-come laws prohibiting birth control, are attempts by governmental authorities to use their power to punish women for having sex. Yes, men are also affected by pregnancy, but it doesn’t endanger (cis-gender) men’s lives.
8 Comments:
If you oppose forcing men to risk their lives, then I take it that you also oppose the draft, including in Israel and Ukraine, right? At the very least, men in those places should be given the option of serving in their countries' militaries in non-combat roles/positions, right?
As a side note, while I agree that forced pregnancy is worse than forced child support, the latter is still a huge burden when strict liability principles are applied to it (no matter how many precautions you took, you are still on the hook if an unwanted child is born afterwards) and when there is no way at all that one can insure oneself against this risk. Child support insurance doesn't actually exist and even if it did exist, it's unclear whether it would actually be compatible with public policy because case law in wrongful conception cases is not exactly optimistic in regards to this in various US states:
https://www.statesman.com/story/news/politics/state/2024/05/10/texas-supreme-court-rules-against-el-paso-woman-seeking-damages-failed-sterilization-pregnancy/73640377007/
https://www.reuters.com/legal/litigation/texas-top-court-rules-mother-cant-collect-damages-over-unwanted-pregnancy-2024-05-10/
Unfortunately, a lot of idiot judges hate the idea of viewing a child as a loss or a burden, due to the belief that it could hurt the precious child's feelings and/or et cetera. This doesn't bode very well for child support insurance.
The idea of child support insurance itself is very reasonable, though:
https://randommusingsandhistory.substack.com/p/child-support-insurance-a-solution
Women in particularly have a virtually 100% guaranteed way to avoid being forced to carry an unplanned pregnancy to return, even in red US states: Get a bilateral salpingectomy (there are plenty of childfree-friendly doctors who will perform them) and only ever have sex with sterilized men. They can have children later on through IVF if necessary. IVF plus embryo selection for desirable traits will produce superior children in the long-run anyway. And IVG (in-vitro gametogenesis) would allow artificial sperm and artificial eggs to be produced from human skin cells, which in turn could also subsequently be used for IVF, making the IVF process much easier and simpler in the future, not to mention possibly eventually significantly cheaper as well.
So surgery is your preferred solution to forced birth? And you consider that a female-friendly solution? If this is a joke, I think you have a warped sense of humor. :(
Also, neither of your comments addresses my central thesis, which is that governments are using their power, or would like to use their power, to punish women for having sex. If your idea of a solution is surgery, then you're putting the burden on women instead of holding the government responsible. I don't appreciate your attitude. :(
I'm reminding you--because you clearly need to be reminded--that this post is *not* about either the draft or child support. If you want to write about your *own* concerns, get your own blog! I don't appreciate having my posts hijacked. :( :(
I would advise surgery as a solution to anyone who wants to avoid the consequences of sex, regardless of whether pro-choicers or pro-lifers seek to impose these consequences on oneself. I do think that sperm/egg freezing should be covered by insurance for voluntary sterilizations in an ideal world, though. The consequences of a failed sterilization are heavier for women than for men, though, I will admit.
Women can also avoid surgery and only have sex with sterilized men. Does that work for them, at least unless they will get raped? (The lack of rape exceptions to abortion bans is especially repulsive, though perhaps unsurprising, given that judges have previously refused to allow male victims of rape, statutory or otherwise, any relief from forced child support payments.)
I brought up the draft here as an example to indicate that the state isn't capable of only forcing *women* to risk their lives, health, and well-being.
At least I can take pride in living in California, where abortion is still legal, thankfully.
I do hope that Republicans will get severely punished at the ballot box for what they are doing in regards to this, though, as well as for their various other crappy and dangerous behavior (January 6, et cetera) as well.
And before you will accuse me of being insensitive to women's concerns, I only ever plan to have sex after a bilateral epididymectomy combined with a radical scrotal vasectomy and three successful/negative semen analyses. The risk of failure there should be something like 1 in 100,000, I would think, even if the women is not using any contraception for her own (and I will insist that she will, and seek to personally verify this on a regular basis). I can't trust any woman's word or promises in regards to either abortion or adoption anyway since she can consider a fetus to be a worthless parasite before an unplanned pregnancy and yet also consider a fetus to be a precautious child after an unplanned pregnancy. Not worth the risk!
Get out of your NY bubble. There is no serious attempt to make birth control illegal.
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