Why Is The Right Going Against Birth Control?

[debrand]

I really don't understand this. It seems that attacking birth control and women's medical issues would hurt those on the right. Most Americans are not quiverful nor do they want to have unlimited numbers of children.

From Santorium's comment about the state's should have the power to ban birth control to the attacks on Planned Parenthood, it does appear that there is a move among the right to limit the accessibility of birth control.

I'm just curious as to why?

By the way, vote. If you haven't registered, please do so.

[emmiedahl]

They tend to use language that refers to promiscuity, and also to point out that it is not entirely effective. And then they bring in the abortion thing, and conservatives are hooked.

Like, "My problem with birth control is that it is not 100% effective. Young ladies think that they can have sex with multiple partners and have no consequences because the pro-choice industry puts out that propaganda. And some birth control methods are abortifacient, don't you agree that life begins at conception?"

Translation: "Sluts don't need protected. If you have sex, you deserve whatever you get."

[MadameX]

Well, the short answer is because birth control is for whores who go against what God wants for them, i.e. a lifetime of repressed sexuality and lots of babies.

The more complicated answer is that denying women birth control limits their ability to function in society as independent, autonomous people. It limits their access to education and keeps them from achieving upward mobility without relying on a man (her husband).

[Terrie]

Because it's about controlling women. Plain and simple.

[valsa]

Because the right hates women.

Seriously, that's the only thing I can think of.

They fear women having control of their own bodies and reproductive choices, and they love to have a big cushion of poor people to blame things on (since many women have abortions for financial reasons, being pro-forced-birth keeps those women and their children in poverty)

[Austin]

I think it boils down to one simple truth that we know and they know: if women can't self-determine their fertility, they can't self-determine at all.

I honestly think it has not a damned thing to do with religion, no matter what they claim. They need to get women back into our "place" and the one surefire way to do that is to prevent us from determining our own fertility.

[sassycupcake]

I agree with the above posters and also believe that it is a swing against everyone who has stood with Planned Parenthood since Rep. Pence's original attacks on Title X funding. Pence tried to make the issue about abortion (even though no Title X money funds abortions) and failed miserably when a wave of reproductive rights advocates made it clear that he was only attacking contraception.

By making it "in" among conservatives to oppose birth control, supporters of reproductive rights lose ground. And I'm fairly certain that conservative politicians are terrified that they live in a society where 99% of the population felt that access to women's contraception is an inalienable right.

And as usual, it's really an attack on low-income women. Just as wealthy women will always be able to find safe abortions, they will also find and afford effective contraception. And the conservative politicians we see know that their wives and daughters aren't in danger.

[MadameX]

In the past, it was the Dems who were anti-abortion and uncomfortable with birth control. There was an interesting New Yorker article on it a few months ago. Then the Republicans figured out that there was a considerable voting population they could tap if they pandered to their religious beliefs and that started the party on the path which led to where it is today. It sickens me all the more to know that it's ultimately some political game, it isn't even as though they're staunchly defending their own beliefs, however ridiculous and misguided they might be.

[JuJuBee]

My hope is that, once they start targeting birth control, there will be a backlash. A significant portion of the population is against abortion, but I would say an even more significant number of people are pro-birth control. I think we're already seeing some of this backlash with the support of planned parenthood concerning the breast cancer foundation incident, the personhood bill not being passed in Mississippi, and the growing support of Romney over Newt and Santorum. Romney, I think, is the most moderate on this issue.

[darkplumaged]

This is what I don't get: a ban on birth control would affect married people as much as it would unmarried ones, if not more. Do these loons actually think that married couples should all have as many children as they can naturally conceive? No, of course not: after all, the country is full of people who are--gasp--not white, not Christian, and not middle class. They wouldn't want THOSE people to have lots of babies. And they haven't thought through the consequences of their favored people breeding without limit, either.

I should be used to the logic fails of fundies, but I guess I'm not.

[Rosa]

How are you going to pay women less for the same work, if they aren't so tied down with babies (and grateful you're willing to hire them despite their having families/probably going to get pregnant and need a whole 3 months off someday) that they don't have time to share information and organize?

[Austin]

This is what I don't get: a ban on birth control would affect married people as much as it would unmarried ones, if not more. Do these loons actually think that married couples should all have as many children as they can naturally conceive? No, of course not: after all, the country is full of people who are--gasp--not white, not Christian, and not middle class. They wouldn't want THOSE people to have lots of babies. And they haven't thought through the consequences of their favored people breeding without limit, either.

I should be used to the logic fails of fundies, but I guess I'm not.

A ban on birth control that affected married women as well is their big goal. Forcing married women out of the workplace because they have a zillion kids at home is their wet dream. The more of those children that are white, the better. Yes, they would have to accept that people of color and poor people would also be having more children, but that would just be collateral damage in their world.

What would actually happen is that women of some means would continue to be able to get their hands on birth control, and poor women would be disproportionately affected, so their whole scheme would backfire right in their faces.

[valsa]

This is what I don't get: a ban on birth control would affect married people as much as it would unmarried ones, if not more.

The problem is that a lot of the right's base voters are downright delusional. The politicians on the right are so good at using fear tactics that they've been able to basically brainwash their voters into not only voting against their own self-interest (yet thinking they're voting for their own self-interest), but also denying reality.

Much like the fundies we talk about here, voters on the right engage in a lot of magical thinking. To those voters, being good, married (heterosexual, white, Christian) is the holy grail of "family" and makes everything in life perfect. Things like not being able to afford birth control are a problem that just doesn't happen to nice married (heterosexual, white, Christian) couples who are doing things right.

As far as they are concerned, only promiscuous single mothers and poor minorities are unable to afford their own birth control. And the right certainly isn't okay with paying for birth control that allows those people to live their sinful lives.

[emmiedahl]

Racism and classism are probably part of it. I can't really put my finger on it or back up my beliefs. But, just anecdotally, I have had conservatives tell me it is nice to see a middle class white family with many children. (the people who have said it recently, obviously they do not know my situation well)

There is this implication that we are the *right* people to be breeding. One person actually told me that white women are having all the abortions, using birth control, focusing on careers, and that we will be bred out of existence. I am willing to bet that these same people are opposed to reproductive choice for white women while also supporting forced sterilization of "the wrong people."

[debrand]

A ban on birth control that affected married women as well is their big goal. Forcing married women out of the workplace because they have a zillion kids at home is their wet dream. The more of those children that are white, the better. Yes, they would have to accept that people of color and poor people would also be having more children, but that would just be collateral damage in their world.

What would actually happen is that women of some means would continue to be able to get their hands on birth control, and poor women would be disproportionately affected, so their whole scheme would backfire right in their faces.

Sometimes I wonder if the right's goal isn't to produce a group of very poor, uneducated people who will work for low wages and not expect any rights. However, that seems to much like a conspiracy theory to me and I don't like conspiracy theories.

[ladypuglover]

It seems those want to ban birth control only care about fetuses and not the living breathing babies or their mothers. My case is proof enough for me. I'm 41 years old so I have old rotten eggs and a history of miscarriages and premature labor and birth. I don't do pregnancy well at all and wouldn't even be here without the help of modern medicine helping me stay alive during pregnancy. So if they take away BC then I run the risk of a pregnancy that will kill me and taking me away from my children who still need a mother. If I did the mature thing and stopped having sex then there goes my loving marriage down the hole. My husband and I love having birth control and we would thank those who don't want us to have to mind their own business as they are trying to take away my right to life of my own life. BC isn't 100% 100% of the time but people like me who enjoy sex but can't risk pregnancy know to use 2 forms of BC. No loss of life then of either party. :whistle:

[BravaAmica]

Sometimes I wonder if the right's goal isn't to produce a group of very poor, uneducated people who will work for low wages and not expect any rights. However, that seems to much like a conspiracy theory to me and I don't like conspiracy theories.

I believe that keeping most people poor and uneducated and unable to articulate what they need and want is 100% one of the goals of the anti-BC/women's health movement. If most of the populace is too busy working their assess off, they're too busy to organize and effect meaningful change.

[Marian the Librarian]

Fear and loathing of, and a punitive attitude toward, human sexuality and sexual pleasure - specifically women's. Their philosophy, in a nutshell: "If you're gonna play, you gotta pay."

[Guest Anonymous]

I believe that keeping most people poor and uneducated and unable to articulate what they need and want is 100% one of the goals of the anti-BC/women's health movement. If most of the populace is too busy working their assess off, they're too busy to organize and effect meaningful change.

Not only too busy, but terrified of losing their jobs, crappy though they are.

[Kitty]

The elite of the Right want lots and lots of Christian babies, to outbreed non-Christians (and blacks, and Mexicans, and anyone else who isn't white or "honorary white"). They want a theocracy. Either they truly believe that women having any kind of self-determination or control over their own bodies is evil, or they know it's going to get in the way of producing more Christians. Note how these people seemingly have no issue hating gay people or people of other religions.

Those who blindly follow them, however, have never given abortion and birth control any more thought than "THE BABIES!!!1 WHAT ABOUT THE BABIES?!?!" and hate gay people and other-religious folk because they've been taught by the elite that they're weird and different.

[Linnea]

Racism and classism are probably part of it. I can't really put my finger on it or back up my beliefs. But, just anecdotally, I have had conservatives tell me it is nice to see a middle class white family with many children. (the people who have said it recently, obviously they do not know my situation well)

There is this implication that we are the *right* people to be breeding. One person actually told me that white women are having all the abortions, using birth control, focusing on careers, and that we will be bred out of existence. I am willing to bet that these same people are opposed to reproductive choice for white women while also supporting forced sterilization of "the wrong people."

That's interesting. In actual fact (per the US Census Bureau), black women have a much higher abortion rate than white women, but only a slightly higher fertility rate. And some anti-choice folks like to tout the higher black abortion rate as evidence that pro-choicers are racist.

The wrongness, it comes from all directions.

[Mama Mia]

I'm with emmiedahl and kitty on this one.

They think all those icky brown/black people are already overbreeding and greatly, greatly fear having white people be the minority.

Poor white people are their main target audience anyway, they won't mind having an overwhelmingly white under-class, as long as they get an under-class somewhere.

The super "religious" ones have just gotten so delusional over the past ten or fifteen years ( thank you interwebz :evil: ) that they think everyone else is going to agree with them.

[dairyfreelife]

I am going to disagree with this. It is not the right wing that is against it. I would venture to say that the majority of the Republicans are for birth control and most likely use forms of it and that's why Santorum can't do well. My father is a full fledged Republican, but even he can't stand Santorum because the man is so against abortion and birth control and is too much into religion and my dad is all for freedom of religion though he is a Protestant Christian. It's only the Christian elitists that wants to ban such things, not the right itself. The Christian elite like the Duggars don't speak for most people, not even for most Republicans. Santorum doesn't speak for the majority from what I see.

My dad can sometimes be a slightly offensive person with distasteful jokes around us, but he would never, ever say anything like Smuggar about short buses or the like. My father does not fear people of other races nor does he want to "outbreed" the Latinos and Blacks. My dad also sees women's health and rights as something that he doesn't have a say in-by that I mean, as a man, he doesn't have any right to decide anything for a woman and her health.

Btw, I am a registered Independent voter so I neither a Republican nor am I a Democrat. I just wanted to explain that everyone in a party is not the same.

[Austin]

I was referring to the religious right, not republicans in general.

[darkplumaged]

I agree--most Republicans are not this extreme. It's the super-right wackos who get all the attention, though, and set a frightening tone for the rest of the party.