Kansas Enlists In The Republican Jihad Against Women

Kansas Governor Sam Brownback just signed a law that allows pharmacists to refuse to fill prescriptions that “may result in the termination of a pregnancy.” Naturally, the law fails to specify what drugs might be used to terminate a pregnancy, thereby empowering your average right-wing, God-fearing pharmacist to override specific medical decisions made with a physician based on his “conscience” – as dictated by the ayatollah from Colorado Springs James Dobson - to deny an individual birth control.

Republicans seem hellbent on proving that they love “big government” when used to tell women what they cannot do.

h/t TP

Marriage Equality: Progress In Rhode Island

h/t TPM

Virginia GOP: No Gays Allowed On The Bench

These bigoted and homophobic lawmakers ought to be ashamed of themselves and subject to recall:

Virginia’s General Assembly rejected a gay man for a Richmond judgeship early Tuesday, after conservatives argued that his support for gay marriage and challenge to the military’s now-defunct “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy made him unfit for the bench. The House of Delegates voted 33 to 31, with 10 abstentions, to make Richmond prosecutor Tracy Thorne-Begland a General District Court judge in Richmond. He had needed 51 votes in the 100-member chamber to win appointment.

“He holds himself out as being married,” said Del. Robert G. Marshall (R-Prince William), who is running for U.S. Senate. Noting that gay marriage is not legal in Virginia, he said that Thorne-Begland’s “life is a contradiction to the requirement of submission to the constitution.”

The Senate did not vote on the nomination itself, but Republicans killed it by passing it by for the day — the very last of this year’s General Assembly session. The decision to pass it by cleared the evenly divided body 20-19, with one Democrat, Yvonne B. Miller of Norfolk, not voting.

“The debate in the House of Delegates was homophobic and embarrassing and showed a disrespect to a chief deputy commonwealth attorney and decorated veteran who was honorably discharged,” said Sen. Adam P. Ebbin (D-Alexandria), Virginia’s first openly gay state senator. “It’s offensive that the Senate wouldn’t even grant Lt. Thorne-Begland the courtesy of a vote.”

Hours before the vote, in response to a reporter’s question, Gov. Robert F. McDonnell (R) said through a spokesman that a judicial nominee’s sexual orientation should not be an issue. “The Governor believes candidates for judicial vacancies must be considered based solely on their merit, record, aptitude and skill,” said McDonnell spokesman Tucker Martin. “No other factors should ever be considered and the Governor has long made clear that discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation is not acceptable in state government.”

Marshall, the Family Foundation of Virginia and others who raised concerns about Thorne-Begland’s nomination said they did not object to him because he is gay, but because of his outspokenness on the subject of gay rights. “I would guess — law of averages — we’ve probably nominated people who have homosexual inclinations,” Marshall said. He faulted Thorne-Begland for coming out as a gay Naval officer on “Nightline” two decades ago to challenge the military’s now-repealed ban on gays openly serving in the military. He said that the action amounted not just to insubordination, but to a waste of taxpayer dollars, since it resulted in his dismissal from the Navy. “The Navy spent $1 million training him,” Marshall said. “That’s cheating the country out of the investment in him.”

Stated differently, it is okay to be gay as long as you stay in the closet and keep your mouth shut. And the state slogan? Virginia is for lovers…that might need to change.

Fertility Preservation And Sex Reassignment

Having represented many transgender clients over the years, I can find no justifiable reason to deny them the right to have children. To the contrary. Dr. Vardit Ravitsky and Professor David Heyd take a look at this provocative issue in light of a recent case in Israel where the Israeli Ministry of Health denied a request to preserve ovarian tissue from a transgender man who was born as a female:

The patient is about to go through sex reassignment surgery, and removal of the uterus and ovaries will be the first step of the surgical transition from female to male. He is requesting that the ovarian tissue removed during this procedure be preserved for possible future use (1).

The surgery has already been approved by an interdisciplinary committee, as required by Israeli regulations, but the requested permission for fertility preservation is being denied by the Israeli Ministry of Health, because ‘it is not, to date, a standard procedure in Israel’.

Israeli regulations stipulate that ovarian cryopreservation is indicated in cases of ‘girls or young women of reproductive age, who suffer from malignant conditions and are about to undergo oncological treatment that may harm their ovaries or prevent them from conceiving in the future, or in any other case in which a disease or a treatment may irreversibly harm reproductive function’.

Sex reassignment surgery arguably falls exactly under this description. The Ministry would be hard pushed to argue that sex reassignment is not a medical treatment, considering it is approved by a committee that operates under its auspices and is publicly funded as a medical procedure.

The Ministry also notes that the procedure is ‘meant to preserve a woman’s fertility for future self use’. Since sex reassignment involves a hysterectomy, the Ministry argues, it would not be possible to implant any future embryos in the patient’s uterus, so ‘self use’ is impossible.

This, however, disregards the obvious possibility of employing a surrogate mother to carry the pregnancy, a procedure that would also be required in other cases in which a hysterectomy is medically indicated, such as uterine cancer. In all such cases the interpretation of ‘self use’ should be: ‘use meant to create a genetically related child with the intent of raising that child as one’s own’, an interpretation that fully satisfies the underlying rationale of the regulation. The Ministry of Health’s objections therefore seem to rest on shaky regulatory grounds.

In an appeal to the Israeli Supreme Court (2), the patient is now arguing that this objection can only be explained as an expression of a discriminatory attitude towards transgender persons. He further argues that denying access to fertility preservation in the context of sex reassignment violates not only a person’s right to equal treatment, but also the right to healthcare and the right to procreate.

What would be the practical implications of fertility preservation during sex reassignment? Two possible scenarios emerge. In the first, the transgender man would remain single and therefore would need a surrogate and donated sperm in order to have a child. Legally, this procedure would not be authorised under Israeli surrogacy law because surrogacy agreements are only approved for couples when the sperm is that of the intended father. Ethically, this would be analogous to the more ordinary case of a single man who wishes to procreate with the help of a surrogate mother and donated egg.

In the second scenario, he would establish a relationship with a woman who would be willing to become pregnant with his child. In such a case, through sperm donation both intended parents would be biologically related to the child: the woman as a gestational mother, and the father as a genetic mother.

Theoretically, Israeli surrogacy law should permit this because it involves a couple who wish to raise a child together. Since the egg belongs to one of the parents, the principle of genetic relatedness to the child would be preserved (although the law stipulates that the sperm must belong to the father, which is of course impossible in this case). This scenario might be psychologically less complicated than regular surrogacy, since the gestational mother will also be the social mother. It might also be less complicated than regular egg donation, since the ‘donor’ (i.e. the father) ‘stays in the family’.

However, should this scenario be considered in terms of surrogacy in the first place? We argue that a conceptual shift is required here. Rather than considering each individual in this scenario separately, which leads to the framing of the female partner as a surrogate, we should consider this through the lens of the couple’s reproductive project. The couple, as the ‘reproductive unit’, already has the required egg and uterus; all they are missing is donated sperm.

This view of the couple as the relevant unit already exists in the context of reproductive technologies. For example, IVF is publicly funded in Israel up to the birth of two children from the current relationship, even if partners already have children from a previous relationship. This alternative framing allows us to sidestep the question of surrogacy and reveals that this second scenario is less complicated than it first seems.

From a biological perspective the second scenario is similar to another case that is currently being argued before an Israeli court in which a lesbian couple is requesting to use the egg of one woman to create the embryo, and the uterus of the other to carry it to term. The difference would be that in one case the child would have two social mothers, while in the other she would have parents of both genders. In both cases, we argue, the couple as a ‘reproductive unit’ should be allowed to pursue their reproductive goals and fertility preservation through sex reassignment should be permitted.

Yet, other possible arguments can be made against such a practice. For example, could there be negative implications for the identity of the prospective child? Should the source of the egg matter when considering the child’s future wellbeing? What would be the psychological impact of growing up knowing that your social father is your genetic mother?

Although the situation might seem confusing, it is not necessarily more problematic than numerous others. Many children are born today to two mothers or two fathers; to a genetic mother who is not the birth mother (in surrogacy); to a birth mother who is not the genetic mother (in egg donation), and more. We doubt that this scenario would raise substantially new challenges to the child’s identity.

Indeed, this novel reproductive scenario deserves the attention of bioethicists and would require appropriate counselling before and after birth. Nonetheless, we believe that healthcare and legal systems should acknowledge the reproductive rights of transgender individuals and promote their reproductive autonomy through the use of available fertility preservation techniques.

Poster Of The Day

What Romney The Teenager Says About Romney The Man

Kevin Drum makes the case:

Yesterday I wrote that although Mitt Romney’s teenage “pranks” are, by current standards, fair game for journalists, “pretending that this makes him an anti-gay bully today isn’t. He’s got decades of adult experiences that tell us what kind of man he’s become.”

I still believe that, but the more I think about exactly that point — focusing on Romney’s actions right now, not his actions 50 years ago — the more disturbing the whole Lauber affair becomes. Lots of teenage boys bully classmates, and in the mid-60s it was equally common to bully kids for seeming effeminate. That doesn’t tell us much about Romney the man.

But Romney the man has denied, and repeatedly denied yesterday, even remembering this incident. Sure, it was half a century ago, but he led a posse of his friends, tackled John Lauber in a hallway, dragged him into a bathroom, and then chopped off his hair while he struggled in terror. Even if you grant that this kind of extreme behavior was more common in a 1960s prep school than it is today, it’s really not the kind of thing you’d forget.

At least, you shouldn’t. So either Romney has done this kind of thing so often that the Lauber incident just blends into all the others, which suggests a far more vicious childhood than he’s owned up to, or else he remembers it just fine and is simply lying about it.

My guess is the latter. And that’s depressing, as much for what it says about modern politics as for what it says about Romney. Because, really, what would be the harm of just talking about this? Fess up, acknowledge that you remember the incident, explain that you feel terrible about it, maybe even draw some gauzy lessons about tolerance for the View set, etc.? But for some reason Romney is too politically insecure to do that. He’s obviously afraid that he’d pay some terrible price. Afraid that it would make his seem weak. That speaks badly for him, and badly for American politics.

Reaction To President Obama’s Endorsement Of Gay Marriage

Not surprisingly, the internet is ablaze with reaction to President Obama’s historical announcement today that he supports gay marriage. From Fox Nation who reported that President Obama “declares war on marriage” to Andrew Sullivan who had these thoughtful words:

The interview changes no laws; it has no tangible effect. But it reaffirms for me the integrity of this man we are immensely lucky to have in the White House. Obama’s journey on this has been like that of many other Americans, when faced with the actual reality of gay lives and gay relationships. Yes, there was politics in a lot of it. I was in the room long before the 2008 primaries when Obama spoke to the mother of a gay son about marriage equality. He said he was for equality, but not marriage. Five years later, he sees – as we all see – that you cannot have one without the other.

But today Obama did more than make that logical step. He let go of fear. He is clearly prepared to let the political chips fall as they may. That’s why we elected him. That’s the change we believed in. The contrast with a candidate who wants to abolish all rights for gay couples by amending the federal constitution, and who has donated to organizations that seek to “cure” gays, who bowed to pressure from bigots who demanded the head of a spokesman on foreign policy solely because he was gay: how much starker can it get?

This issue will now become a focal point in the upcoming Presidential election. It will be the candidate of equal rights versus the candidate of separate and inequal. I hope America is ready for the former.

Know Hope: President Obama Officially Endorses Gay Marriage

President Obama’s evolution on the issue of same-sex marriage is complete. Today, in an interview with ABC News, he became the first sitting United States President to recognize the legalization of gay marriage and ensuring that same-sex couples have the identical rights and benefits as their heterosexual counterparts. This is a watershed moment in American history as it finally could lead to the freedom to marry and full civil equality for all gays and lesbians. While this does not signal the end to the fight for marriage equality (as this is a battle to be had in the States and Congress), it does bring us one critical step closer.

This is the Audacity of Hope. This is Change. This is why I voted for the man.

Gay Marriage: The Politics Of Spite

Andrew Sullivan eloquently responds to the results of last night’s vote in North Carolina which saw the state pass an amendment to its constitution banning gay marriage:

“It’s a generational issue. If it passes, I think it will be repealed within 20 years,” – North Carolina State House Speaker Thom Tillis, a Republican.

So there you have it. A key Republican leader concedes this amendment will one day be repealed and backed it anyway. The only word that comes to mind in the face of such cynicism is spite.

Absorbing the blow from last night is hard. If a victory for marriage equality happens, straight couples can go about their lives and nothing will change. If a defeat occurs, gay couples must live in fear of retaining joint custody of children, access to hospital rooms, health insurance, and on and on. Our families and friends, our children and nieces and nephews, come to realize that their family members are beneath civil equality – and that their inferiority is written into their very constitution. Listening to Maggie Gallagher this week, you may be struck by how she sees herself as the victim. Let me kindly suggest that that is not exactly an expression of human empathy.

Remember how meretricious this assault on gay couples was. They are already banned by state law from marrying. Now their own state constitution bans them from any civil rights as couples whatsoever: no domestic partnerships, no civil unions, nothing.

It’s an act of pure punishment of citizens who are gay, a deliberate psychological blow to their self-esteem, their sense of citizenship, their core equality as human beings. A 60 percent majority decided that 2 percent of their fellow citizens are and must remain inferior in law. When gay rights advocates seek recourse in the courts, is it so surprising?

All I can say to my fellow gays and lesbians in the great state of North Carolina is: do not allow these people to get into your heads; do not begin to doubt your worth as equal citizens, equal spouses and an equal parents. What we’re seeing is the strategy clearly laid out by the National Organization for Marriage: divide blacks from whites, create confusing amendments that do not just ban marriage for gay couples, but any recognition or rights at all, and use the churches as your main organizing tool. This had, for me, an added wound: seeing some African-Americans celebrate marginalizing another minority in the South is heart-breaking.

New Hampshire Senate To Vote On Fetal Homicide Bill Today

Yet another attempt to erode Roe v. Wade:

The Senate is set to vote Wednesday on a bill that would make causing the death of a fetus equivalent to murder. The Senate Judiciary Committee last week endorsed a version of House Bill 217 that is more restrictive than the one passed by the House in January, which applies to the death of a fetus 24 weeks or older.

The Senate bill applies to an embryo or fetus from conception, and unlike the House version, it would subject perpetrators to murder charges regardless of whether they were aware a woman was pregnant. Doctors or licensed medical professionals who perform abortions would not face charges under both the House and Senate versions of the bill.

The bill classifies an “unborn child” as another person in the first- and second-degree murder, manslaughter and negligent homicide statutes. The bill, endorsed by the Senate Judiciary Committee 4-1, restores the original intent of its main sponsor, Rep. Kathleen Souza, R-Manchester.

She criticized the House amendment to the bill earlier this year, saying it would allow a person who kills a fetus to say, “I didn’t mean to, and the mother is probably dead and can’t challenge the person.”

Opponents of the original bill, however, say it could lead to murder charges even when a woman in unaware she is pregnant. “If you go back to gestation, the reality is a person could be utterly unaware there’s a pregnancy,” said Claire Ebel, executive director of the New Hampshire Civil Liberties Union, at the Senate hearing on the bill last month. The bill is patterned after similar “fetal homicide” legislation that has been promoted by pro-life advocates and passed in at least 38 states.

The Senate version more closely follows the model legislation, including its use of the term “unborn child.” The House bill uses the term “fetus.”

The Senate committee’s vote for a bill that is more restrictive than the House version contrasts with its past actions on abortion-related legislation this session. The Senate has rejected or sent to study several House-passed bills that aimed to restrict abortion.

Featured Post

Life Is Not Sacred: Why Killing Someone is Morally Acceptable But Disabling Them Is Immoral

Not my thesis but the argument of two prominent bioethicists in addressing the issue of organ donation: Is it morally wrong to kill people? Not really, argue two eminent American bioethicists in an early online article in the Journal of Medical Ethics. Walter Sinnott-Armstrong, of Duke University, and Franklin G. Miller, of the National Institutes [...]

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