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if government is so limited, why can it tell me what to do with my body?

In the slosh of post-State of the Union commentary, the Repugs talked a lot about the need for “limited government.” Paul Ryan, the Eddie Munster-ish Wisconsin dude who gave the initial Obama rebuttal was all about how government has to scale back and cut back and generally just stay the hell out of everybody’s business (free enterprise cures everything, dontcha know). Somehow he invoked Lincoln as an arbiter of limited government (at about 9:04 of his speech), thus revealing himself as a graduate of the Michele Bachmann School of Historical Nonfacts. Wasn’t that whole Civil War thing fought about the question of federal authority? Lincoln’s government wasn’t so much limited as it was marching all the hell over the south proclaiming its power–abolishing slavery was sort of incidental.

Ryan’s talk looked a bit like a Midwestern infomercial, right down to the I-practiced-them-in-the-mirror head nods and sympathetic smiles, and his doublespeak should be something we’re used to by now, but this drumbeat of “limited government” has gotten so loud that when it stops, the silence is deafening.

And the silence about limited government deafens me most when Congress starts talking about abortion. When it comes to abortion, conservatives from both parties think the government should be making decisions on the uterine level.

The latest effort to unlimit government comes in a new bill introduced by Chris Smith of NJ, which would rewrite the laws about government funding (including tax benefits, such as a Health Savings Account) being used for abortions.  Currently, federal law prohibits the use of taxpayer dollars for abortions, except in the case of rape, incest, or where the life of the pregnant woman may be endangered.

The new law under discussion–which has the full support of the orange crocodile himself, John Boehner–restricts funding in all cases, except those of “forcible rape” (Sect 309.1).

Okay, so maybe it’s just my English Professor hackles being raised here, but isn’t rape by definition “forced?”

Not according to the wisdom of Boehner, Smith & Co.  Statuatory rape isn’t “forced,” date rape isn’t “forced,” rape in instances where women were drugged or drunk isn’t “forced,” rape in instances where a woman isn’t mentally competent isn’t “forced.” And abortion for pregnancy that results from incest is only covered by federal funding if the pregnant body in question is under 18. Over 18? Apparently that’s not “forced.”

Would anyone like to guess who will be most profoundly hurt should this bill become law? Yeah, that’s right. Any woman (or girl) who doesn’t have private health insurance. Gosh, that would seem to suggest mostly poor people. Isn’t that astonishing? The teary-eyed congressman with the small penis giant gavel favors a law that will further screw poor women who have already been screwed against their will.

So let me conclude today’s lesson in how to speak conservative:

“Limited government” means unchecked regulation of Big Business and lots of regulation of small uteruses (uterii?); “forcible rape” implies that there is something called “unforced rape.”

Here’s the thing, Mr. Boehner. All rape is forced and my uterus is my own, thanks very much. Keep your gavel out of it.

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Read full story · Comments { 4 } on January 28, 2011 in Feminism, Gender, Politics

Abayas

Here’s where you get your abaya when you visit Abu Dhabi’s Grand Mosque:


No, there are no shoes available here, just black full-length robes for all female visitors not already wearing a robe, and white full-length robes for male visitors wearing shorts.

And here’s what you look like when you put on your black robe and veil:


When Muslim women wear the full abaya, with head scarf and face veil, they look to me like beekeepers in mourning. Me? I just looked like a white girl in a black bathrobe.

As I swished from the outer patios of the Grand Mosque into the inner courtyard, I imagined that wearing this robe would render me anonymous—just another devout Muslim woman.  But of course, peeking out from the black veil is my round Midwestern face–and no amount of Manhattan living, or black veiling, can disguise that, alas.

When I first put the headscarf on, Liam chided me for doing it wrong. I ignored him, of course. What ten year old boy knows anything about scarves?  And then just before I entered the mosque itself, the very nice young woman guard standing in the doorway pulled me aside. With a quick pinch of fabric in the back, a flick of the wrist, and a deft tuck or two, she had the veil adjusted: covering all of my hair in the back and snugly wrapped so that it wouldn’t slide around while I walked.

Liam, of course, was delighted to be corroborated in his sartorial judgments.

Wandering around the mosque in my black abaya, I wondered what it would be like to wear a robe all the time. It would certainly solve the whole muffin-top problem—there’s no waist-band in a robe and thus nothing for a tummy to spill over.  What happens to the concept of “sex appeal” in countries where women wear the abaya? Is it all about the eyes and the pedicure? The voice? Or are there codes and silent signals, the way there were when women carried fans all the time—fanning fast meant one thing, fanning slowly something else.

What would it be like to have your body not be available for scrutiny from anyone passing you on the sidewalk? To not catch a glimpse of a jiggly upper arm as you walk by a shop window and sort of wince? Would it make you feel more powerful or less powerful, do you suppose, to have your body just…not part of the equation of daily life, at least in public?

Considering questions of female empowerment was not, perhaps, the most mosque-appropriate line of thought, especially given that I was in the main prayer room—which is to say the men’s prayer room—while I contemplated the position of Muslim women in their society. (There are two ladies’ prayer rooms, each of which holds about 1500 people, adjoining the main prayer room, which itself holds about 9000.)  The main prayer room also, in fitting tribute to the “can you top this” spirit of the UAE, boasts the largest carpet in the world:


Of course, the other thing I kept thinking about, as I walked around with the boys, marveling at the intricate carvings and delicate details, is the Tea Bag Head kerfuffle a few months ago about the building of a Muslim community center in downtown Manhattan, near Ground Zero.  While there will be a worship space in that planned facility, it has about as much relation to “mosque” as a YMCA has to St. John’s Cathedral.

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Read full story · Comments { 3 } on November 29, 2010 in Feminism, Gender, NYC, Travel

Taking It Back…

So the Tea Party got what it wanted last night: control of the House and the constant presence of the George Hamilton-esque John Boehner, he of the crocodile tears. You do know the story of the crocodile’s tears, don’t you? The crocodile pretends to sigh and be sad, thus attracting his prey close enough to gobble it up–still crying. Or, as the ancient phrasing goes, “thei eten hem wepynge.”

Rand Paul was on TV last night, standing in front of someone in a truly hideous argyle sweater vest, claiming that voting him into office means only one thing: “The people are taking our government back!”  Riotous applause greeted his comment; Kentuckians seem delighted that Rand and his argyled followers are taking governement back…

But of course the obvious question is: back where?

Back to the 1950s, those halcyon days of yore, when blacks and women knew their places: in the back of the bus and on their backs, respectively?  Or back to the 19th century, when Kentucky’s economic engine chugged merrily along on the backs of slaves?

Or back to, like, Macy’s, as if government is some kind of misfitting shoe? No thanks, these wing-tips pinch a bit, think I’ll get something a little more conservative, perhaps an oxblood loafer?

I mean, when Rand says “the people,” don’t we have to ask ourselves which people? Blacks, browns, wimmins, gays and lesbians? What does “taking back” mean for us?  I think it means that Congress is going to get busy taking back all those hard-earned civil liberties that are so pesky when it comes time for Big Biz to make a profit–all those silly little laws about health codes, workers’ rights, parental leave, food safety–kiss ‘em good-bye, all you people who are taking back your government. And don’t come crying to me when your kid gets a burger laced with e. coli; or when your factory lays off 40% of its workforce in order to be more “efficient; or when your uncle, who was one of the first responders at 9/11 and now has respiratory problems, can’t get insurance.  You took the government back, so now it’s all yours.

Remember: be careful what you wish for. You just might get it…or you might get devoured by a weeping crocodile.

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Read full story · Comments { 1 } on November 3, 2010 in Politics

Don’t Rock the Vote, Incentivize It!

Today is election day. In my apartment building, there’s a polling place, which in 2008 had lines out the door and around the block.

This morning? I darted in, voted, and was back upstairs drinking coffee, all in about 10 minutes. That’s the upside of low voter turnout, I guess: no lines.

Caleb was upstairs waiting for me, wanting to know who I voted for. Yes, he was home. Because what makes it easier for grownups to vote? Why, having their children home from school. In Manhattan, public schools are used as polling places, so public schools are closed today.

Yeah, so okay, trying to juggle work and kids-at-home schedules with voting is not like facing down tanks in Tianamen Square, queuing for days under broiling sun in the Congo, or any number of other desperate-for-democracy situations.

But why can’t we make it easier to vote? Why not a national holiday, really?  Many offices are closed on Veteran’s Day, too – is Veteran’s Day really more important than Election Day? I mean, didn’t the soldiers die in the name of democracy–which is to say, one person one vote?

And what about instituting a bribe–I mean, an incentive–for voter turnout? What if the state with the highest percentage of voter turnout per capita got, I don’t know, like a bridge or toll plaza or some other boondoggle-ish public works program? A casino or a new highway or a baseball stadium?  Would that spark voter turnout? New York would be all about beating New Jersey; Michigan would want to beat Ohio… it would be like a sports rivalry but with an actual, you know, purpose.

I guess it’s illegal to pay people to vote – the first Mayor Daley in Chicago tried that, and it worked for a while, but then it got ugly. So we need to find a way to make people vote–get them up and out and into the polling places. We don’t have tanks and guns barricading our path to the polling places (although after the Tea Party sweeps this election, we might), so all we have to blame is inertia.

Now, I know about inertia–it’s the reason for my increasingly Buddha-like belly–but it seems to me that if the Repugs are all about “American values” and eagles and flags and shit like that, then maybe they would like to figure out how to make it easier for people to vote.

Oh. Wait. I forgot. The Repugs don’t want to make it easier for us all to vote. Because if we all voted? Then it would like 2008 again and the lines at the polling place would be around the block.

It’s the only time in my life I wouldn’t mind waiting in line.

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Read full story · Comments { 0 } on November 2, 2010 in NYC, Politics