The Incredibly Shrinking Woman's Issue
By Asma Hasan
US
In a recent blog, Arianna Huffington laid out the alarming attitude of John McCain towards reproductive rights. Most alarming: according to a Planned Parenthood poll Huffington cites, 23% of women in swing states actually thought McCain was pro-choice! Although he has defied party colleagues on some choice-related issues, he shouldn't be mistaken for anything but anti-choice.
With the sole female candidate effectively out of the race, the pro-choice voice (or what we little hear of it) will continue to be a male one. Even NARAL's political action committee endorsed Obama earlier this month, earning criticism for grabbing on to Obama's coattails while there was still yardage. I regret that the partisans of reproductive rights are seen as just another lobby, trying to line up behind the winner (not to mention disregarding the first major female candidate). As a teen, I proudly plastered binders and books with NARAL stickers. As an adult, I don't even remember the last time I received one in the mail or was handed one on a busy street corner. I used to know women who were staunchly Democrat solely because of the choice issue. I haven't met any women like that in a while. Now race, Iraq, the economy, and other issues drown out choice.
Other than Colorado Congresswoman Diana DeGette, who will be sounding a call with her July book, Sex, Science, and Stem Cells, indicting the right's attack on reproductive rights, I think most of us presume abortion will remain legal and accessible. Do you think our fight over reproductive rights is mostly over and part of a nostalgic past, like the bra burning of feminists of yore? Or do we need to raise the pro-choice voice louder? Pro-choicers: let me hear your voices again!
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