Saturday, February 25, 2012

IS THIS WHAT YOU REALLY VOTED FOR IN 2010?

In looking around the country, it seems that contraception has become an issue. Isn’t this an issue that we were discussing in the 1950’s and 1960’s? With our economy just beginning to recover, how are women’s issues all of a sudden front and center? Why do middle-aged people feel that they have the right to tell women what do with their bodies?  The Obama Administration probably overreached in the original HSS ruling that all religious affiliated organizations had to pay for contraception coverage; the intent was honorable.  When you think about religious affiliated organizations you think of hospitals and colleges.  My question is what about people who work for those organizations that don’t subscribe to that religion? Some of these people are professionals who were hired to do a job.  Don’t these people deserve access to contraception? All around the country we see extreme anti-abortion legislation being passed into law, we now see the same thing happening with contraception.  Contraception used to be a bipartisan issue. In the early 1990’s the New Hampshire Legislature passed similar legislation to the HSS ruling and back then everyone was in favor of this; it was considered good public policy.  Now the leadership of the House wants to introduce legislation that would change this law, that would allow any business or organization to NOT pay for anything they feel goes against their religious or moral convictions.  If we pass this law, will that mean that eventually employers will be able to say they are not going to cover heart disease related issues, because the employee was overweight or smoked? I was reading the Huffington Post recently and saw that the Utah House passed legislation that would only allow sex education with abstinence-only education. Contraception is not only about preventing unwanted pregnancy, but is also about preventing the passing of sexually transmitted diseases, some of which can kill you. If I was a parent I would want my child to have a well balanced sex education, not just a narrow religious-based perspective. Contraception is not just about birth control, it is sometimes prescribed for women’s health issues. Also insurance companies would rather pay for this because it’s cheaper than the alternative’s abortions and unwanted child births.
In closing, don’t we have other issues to be concerned about? Are social issues what the American public is worried about?  With millions of Americans struggling to find jobs, others worried about mortgage payments, it seems that contraception in 2012 should be a non issue.