Warning: rant ahead.
So what do we do with this family values stuff? Especially when the party that once claimed them so desperately as their own can't seem to make the darned things fit into their grand scheme of things, into their ideas about the relationship between government and private companies. It's like the fish in the percolator: Family values are out of place and stinky and unwelcome in the brewing, bubbling world of business.
Case in point: this morning, NPR carried two items back to back. One on new legislation proposing four weeks paid parental leave (ooooh, how generous!) started out with nice statements from both sides of the aisle and I thought, so maybe all this talk about bipartisanship and all of us wanting the same things is true. Then NPR talked to some Texan tool who talked about parental leave as if it were a deadly threat to the American economy and our society.
Next came a disheartening piece on the murder of Dr. Tiller, the Kansas physician who was shot for performing about a dozen late-term terminations of pregnancies over the last ten years, ALL mind you to save the life of the mother or prevent her from having to deliver a baby so ill or deformed that it would die immediately in agony, as required by Kansas law. This is underreported in the media, unfortunately. Anyway, it just seemed sad that after hearing the virulent condemnation of paid leave for federal employees, we get to hear more about why many people equate abortion with murder, and why some real wackos feel that justifies cold-blooded shooting in churches.
Thus, from some Republicans' perspective, as a woman (or a woman's devoted partner), you must have that baby, but you get zero support for doing so, except a flimsy guarantee that for 12 weeks with no income, you won't be kicked to the curb by your employer. Same goes if you want to adopt the baby from a woman who decided abortion wasn't her way. This in the richest nation in the world.
It's just pathetic. If we want to advocate for "family values," let's hear some plans to actually support families. If we want to support the unimpeded ability of businesses to cut costs and manage human resources, let's just say so, and screw the families.
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8 comments:
Amen, sister.
EXTREMELY well said!
I couldn't agree more, Shinejil. Perhaps someone can remind your legislators that there is a very successful experiment going on nearby where parents can take up to 50 weeks of maternity leave at 55% of their salaries, and that in such a socialist paradise, according to this morning's job numbers, at least 3 provinces (including my own) in said jurisdiction actually gained jobs. So clearly it's not the parental leave that's crippling anyone's economy.
You are so right to tie these issues together - thanks for being so articulate about this, as usual.
Yes, well said.
Very well said. It is always amazing to me that someone who is against abortion will go kill someone doing abortions. Also they make it sound as if these late term abortions were just happening willy nilly for no reason other than it's an inconvienence (pretty sure I spelled that wrong).
Here, here! I was so pissed about Dr. Tiller's sensless murder. What. The. Fuck.
Yep.
Yep. It's the inconsistent logic of these folks that always gets to me -- pro-life until it's out of the womb (or a criminal or certain kind of doctor), then you're on your own. Phhhbbtt.
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