lundi 5 juin 2017
More Men Need to Stand With Planned Parenthood
The following story, "More Men Need to Stand With Planned Parenthood" by Doyin Richards, was originally published on Daddy Doin' Work.
Lately you may have noticed that I've been a lot more political lately. And whenever someone talks about politics on the Internet, some people absolutely love it, others absolutely hate it.
I've been doing this for long enough that I don't really give a sh*t about the hate anymore (and I'm sure I'll get a bunch from this post). I'm here to use my platform to share how I feel I can make the world a better place. And with that, I'm going to talk about something more men should talk about - Planned Parenthood (PP).
I have two young daughters. There is so much about the state of America that scares me to death when it comes to being their dad that I can't list them here for fear of slipping into a deep depression - and access to quality healthcare is definitely one of them.
The narrative that PP is an "abortion mill for those disgusting baby-killing liberals" is just plain dumb. Pro-choice does not equal pro-abortion - and whatever your thoughts are about abortion don't change the fact that it is legal here in 'murica. Secondly, a 2014 report shows that only 3 percent of the care PP provided were abortions. It also provides other health services such as cancer screenings, STD testing and treatment, family planning, and many other vital services to families who may be unable to afford it otherwise.
From Planned Parenthood's 2013-2014 annual report
In other words, if PP is taken away, thousands of people will suffer and/or die. If you call yourself "pro-life," you can't be OK with that unless you're OK with outing yourself as simply being "pro-birth" (or outing yourself as a damn hypocrite . . . either one works). And just a heads up - if we really want to reduce the abortion rate, we need to provide as much access to family planning services as possible (including education and access to birth control). Nobody in America does that better than PP.
Not to mention, the proposed American Health Care Act (AHCA) is awful - and that's probably due to the fact that all of the people who helped to design the bill are dudes, but that's another story. If passed, this bill will leave 23 million Americans uninsured. That includes liberals, conservatives, Christians, Muslims, etc. Bottom line - it's just a terrible plan, and a solid amount of Republicans feel that way.
But let's get back to PP for a minute. Defunding this program by no means "makes America great again." America is great when even its lowest income citizens can have access to great healthcare. Mr. Sanders says it best.
Get the facts and understand that PP is far from the big, bad monster that some want you to believe. If you love and care for women and girls, you should want to fight to ensure PP stays alive. I'll be damned if I'm a guy who sits around while a bunch of out-of-touch men decide how women should handle their healthcare needs. Hell, the fact that it's 2017 and I'm actually writing about this is just one of many examples of why the rest of the world continues to laugh at us.
Enough is enough. We need to pressure the Senate to vote against the AHCA and the defunding of Planned Parenthood.
This post is made possible by support from The Mission List. All opinions are my own. Find out how you can put the heat on to help oppose the bill.
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