This past week month year in ABLC land has been filled with uteri and vaginae-related news, mainly about the GOP’s War on Women™, to be precise. On the front page alone, as I type this, we have a post by ABL, sending out a uterus-shaped symbol to all the Uterati so we can gather all the anti-women bills that are being considered/passed across the country in one place, a guest-post by @ThundarKitteh on all the anti-women dumbfuckery going on in her state of Indiana, a guest-post by @deaniemills on the outrageous state-sanctioned rape bill that has passed in her state of Texas, and another post by ABL on the postponement of the “Personhood” Bill in Virginia, due to the national outcry that has risen over it. My own last post was on the flak the Girl Scouts have been receiving because of a perceived connection with the newest manufactured bogeyman of the right, Planned Parenthood. Right beneath my last post is an excellent post by roadkillrefugee on the real reason Glenn Beck nailed himself to the Catholic Church cross over the whole birth control nontraversy.
By the way, I haven’t bought GS cookies in years. Tonight, I changed that by buying 5 boxes of my personal favorite, Lesbian Cunnilingalongs (h/t @socratic on teh Twitter Machine. Actual name, Tagalongs. So. Damn. Delicious. Peanut butter and chocolate go together like me and Margaret Cho*. They make me want to listen do, err, listen to Melissa Ferrick all night long.) at a nearby supermarket just so I could support my local Lil Uterati (h/t, my angry black overlady).
This anti-woman bullshit is really getting to me. It seems like every hour, I’m reading of a new outrage. I also write fiction as well as blogging – writing fiction nourishes my soul – and I had been toying with the idea of writing a short story that incorporates the recent desire by the GOP to get all up in our collective uteri. Then, I received this short story from @txvoodoo on teh Twitter Machine, and after reading it, I realized that this was the story I had had in mind.
It’s written by Amanda Ching**, and it’s a harrowing, chilling, terrifying read. I still shudder when I think about it, and I read it hours ago. It’s a difficult read (and this coming from someone who writes pretty disturbing fiction), but a necessary one. It takes the concept of a Personhood bill/law to its logical conclusion – a society in which abortion and birth control are illegal – and with horrific, graphic consequences. The picture Ms. Ching presents is dystopic, scary, and not that far-fetched as I would have thought five years ago.
I may still write my own short story on the subject, but for now, read this one. To repeat my mantra on the War on Women™ : this is why we fight, and this is why we MUST win.
ETA: Amanda Ching is on teh Twitter Machine. Follow her at @cerebralcutlass.
*Normally, I would say Alan Rickman, but that would ruin the narrative of my post, so Margaret Cho it is!
**No, I don’t know her. Not ALL Asians know each other. Sheesh!
*reads Amanda Ching’s post* AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!!!!!!! *headdesks in a desk factory and breaks all the desks in under 8 desky minutes* *desk*
What a shame that Planned Parenthood also does this procedure before abortions.
Total nonsense.
PP does abdominal ultrasounds and considers transvaginal ultrasounds to be harassment and intimidation. Educate yourself.
Not true.
“Grrrl”. How clever and original.
Hey look, someone parroting right wing talking points without independently verifying them. How clever and original.
Deleted. Next time, banned – asiangrrlMN.
Stop parroting Forced Birth nonsense. Even if a woman were to receive this procedure at Planned Parenthood before an abortion, it would be with her consent. State laws mandating that women have such a procedure and deeming their consent unnecessary is government intrusion on women’s privacy.
Nice try, though.
Speaking as someone who had an abortion at Planned Parenthood, I can safely say that our “visitor” is so full of shit the whites of his/her eyes are brown.
This short story should be made into a movie. It was so fucking good.
ABL – I’d be interested in adapting it. Put my writing skills to some actual use. I had an idea for a script along similar lines a few years ago – different stories, but same subject matter, for lack of a better description.
i feel just like i did when i finished 1984 as a kid. holy shit life is good now, and what do i have to do in order to keep it this way? definitely NOT that way. but hey, five houses and a roast is the good life right? so fucking awesome.
At least one Republican in VA found that there’s consequences to voting for the transvaginal ultrasound bill:
Some of these men may find things getting a little … tense … on the homefront pretty soon :lol:
I can’t understand why any self-respecting woman would ever let an anti-choice misogynist anywhere NEAR her nether regions, let alone marry him.
Serves him right. He should have understood what was going on here with this pathetic bill! Why would he allow his own wife to be forced to have this procedure against her will if they found themselves in a situation where abortion was an option?
I don’t understand that either Kerry Reid, but Rick (the P is silent) Santorum is rising (no pun intended) in the polls (again no pun) with REBUPLICAN WOMEN. WTF
Wow, that is totally awesome of you! Who knew all this would arise out of me making jokes that I should train to become the abortion ninja?
I think it would be fun to have a whole freaking set of short stories arise out of this. Because even though the TVUS bill that fuelled this is “gone”, I’m still a little queasy in my stomach about the future.
Thanks so much for the rec!
Amanda, your short story is the best I’ve read in years. It still haunts me! I had to write a post about it because I feel errryone should read it. You are right in that while this particular bill is gone, there are many springing up (or have been sprung) just like it all over the country. Our work is nowhere near done.
P.S. I would totally be an abortion ninja with you!
i think the proper term is “vagininja.”
Best feminist dystopia I’ve read since “The Handmaid’s Tale”. And I don’t say that lightly. OK, Uterati, this Amanda Ching story needs to be broadly distributed.
Honestly, I have a problem with anyone other than my husband putting anything anywhere near my privates. I’ve never even let a doctor do it, and I have several children… birthed at home because I feel so strongly about my privacy. But I guess the weird thing here is… if you’re going to have a surgical abortion, you’re going to need at least one vaginal exam. And then they are going to do the abortion by putting all kinds of horrid instruments in your vagina, too… So – how can someone complain about an invasive procedure being part of the abortion process, when the whole damn thing is terribly invasive as it is? Consent, I agree with – but consent to get in your privates seems to be implied by the very fact that you want someone to perform an abortion on you.
NM, when you consent to have an abortion, you consent to have a medical procedure and what is necessary to accomplish that. This isn’t necessary. It’s designed to intimidate and humiliate a woman who’s seeking an abortion into not having one. There is no medical need for this particular procedure.
no. consent does not automatically mean consent to everything. a woman who consents to an abortion consents to procedures necessary for an abortion. these ultrasound bills require doctors to perform medical procedures, whether necessary or not, in order to intimidate or “educate” women about the choice they have already made. these bills assume that women are too stupid, or incompetent, or [insert perjorative term here] to understand what they are consenting to when they consent to an abortion. they also assume that women who have made this difficult choice might change their minds if only they realized there was a fetus in there! as if women don’t know what being pregnant means and entails.
women who have a fetus inside them damn well know that there’s a fetus inside them. requiring them to look at it or listen to its heartbeat is nothing short of cruel. it’s emotional abuse. and don’t even get me started on how these laws are orders of magnitude worse when it comes to rape victims.
But it’s just a clump of cells, right? Not a ‘baby’.
One would think it would be like getting any other clump of cells excised. Would you feel hurt and intimidated if a Doctor were to you have you look at a wart before removing it?
Can’t… tell… if serious…
Great share, Asia! More chilling than “The Handmaid’s Tale” & “Native Tongue” imo. Anytime we think something like this could not happen, just listen to the words of these goatfiggers and read the laws they propose.
Hey, Aquagranny. I’m still thinking about the story (and plotting my own in my head). I’ve never heard of Native Tongue, and I’m a little skeered to Google it.
But, you are so right about how this could become reality. We can’t let it happen. *terrorist fist jab*
You missed 2 bills, the ones in Iowa. I’ve seen VERY little posts about the anti-choice bills here in my state and it worries me that no one here knows what’s going on. I typed up a letter to the Des Moines Register, I doubt they’ll post it so I posted it on my hubbys FB. It gives the names/numbers of the bills.
As someone that, because of medical issues, would die from a pregnancy, these bills scare the hell out of me :(
I’m linking the note
https://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=236518646441758
That’s horrifying and sickening, Jessy. I haven’t seen ANYTHING about it before. Thanks for bringing it to our attention. This shit HAS to be stopped.
ETA: I looked up both bills, Jessy. Apparently, one has been pulled completely and the other is dead for the session. I don’t know how it happened – maybe the outcry was too loud to ignore – but, yay! Please let me know if you have differing information.