Women

I have Al Jazeera on just about all the time while I'm at the computer. Riz Khan came on and the subject was maternal health in Africa. I decided to watch to see if our Dear Leader's name or grand plan came up.

In order to snark at Motherhood Steve, of course. (Answer: Didn't come up.)

But then I got rivetted by the guest, Liya Kebede, a stunning Ethiopian super-model, actress, and WHO Good Will Ambassador for maternal health.

She was charming and articulate and stuck to the subject, until Khan brought up her own charitable foundation and her effort to support Ethiopian women's hand-weaving traditions with her fashion line, lemlem, which means 'to bloom' in Amharic.

The very last bit was about her starring in a movie called 'Desert Flower' based on a book by the same name by another gorgeous super-model, Somalian Waris Dirie.

In 1997, at the height of her modeling career, Waris spoke for the first time with Laura Ziv of the women's magazine Marie Claire about the female genital cutting (FGC) that she had undergone as a child, an interview which received worldwide media coverage. That same year, Waris became a UN ambassador for the abolition of FGC, and later paid her mother a visit in her native Somalia.

Apparently, she was the first woman to speak so publicly about it. She has a foundation too.

Women, eh? Talk about giving back. . .

Patriarchy is so fucking stoooopid. Stifling the brains, courage, and creativity of half the world's population.

Bonus: Photo of Liya.

Motherhood Steve: Between a Rock and a Hard Place

Rock:

Any discussions about maternal health should address issues of family planning and abortions, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said Tuesday.

Ms. Clinton made the comments during a news conference in Gatineau where G8 foreign ministers met this week.

Hard place:

The director of one of Canada's largest evangelical Christian lobby groups says Prime Minister Harper's decision to leave a door open for contraception aid in the plan could spark a backlash from a swath of social, fiscal, and church fundamentalists that numbers up to two or three million voters.

Looks good on him, doesn't it?


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Fucking Liberals

So there I was, having a quite pleasant day, happily anticipating the Liberal abortion gotcha -- backed by the NDP and the Bloc -- designed to force the TheoCons to show their true colours over family planning and women's rights.

Earlier, after an 'emergency' caucus meeting, the ReformaTories had come up with an absolutely brilliant counter to it -- the motion is 'anti-American'.

No. Really. They went with that. I was laffing my ass off all over the Intertoobz.

I was enjoying the witty comments at the various sites that reported the Cons' genius move.

Like this one from the Globe site:

I suppose its Anti semitic as well.

The Freaks were exercised too -- always fun to watch.

The CBC's Question of the Day was: Should access to safe abortion be part of a maternal health plan? The sane answer to that was doing very well indeed.

And, extra bonus! Kady was going to liveblog the latter part of the debate and the vote.

I mean, it was a no-brainer, done deal, all the Opposition would vote for it and the Cons would look like ijits. Poifect! Non-binding but at least Canada wouldn't look quite so stooooopid on the world stage.

Well. If you haven't heard yet, the MOTION WAS DEFEATED.

BY THE FUCKING HARPER LIBERALS, to wit, Dan McTeague, Paul Szabo, and John McKay, who voted with the TheoCons against family planning.

Yes, indeedy, in the 21st century, there are people who have the gall to call themselves Liberals and yet vote against their party in order to tell the wimmins -- yet again -- what we can do with our lady parts.

Two other Harper Liberals -- Albina Guarnieri and Gurbax Malhi -- abstained.

And here's Kady on the other Liberal no-shows:

Curiously absent from the Chamber, despite having been there just a few moments earlier: Derek Lee.

Other Liberal absences, some of whom, at least, were simply not in Ottawa and would almost certainly have supported the motion had they been around, from a list provided by the ever helpful PMO: Anita Neville, Gerard Kennedy, Andrew Kania, Borys Wrzesnewskyj, Alan Tonks, Marlene Jennings, Joe Volpe, Lawrence MacAuley, Stephane Dion, Mario Silva (paired with B. Calkins), Jim Karygiannis.

Just when I was developing a smidge of respect for the Liberals. . .

Just when I was not quite so despairing of Opposition cooperation . . .

Well. That shows me, I guess. Women's rights, here as in the Excited States, are always negotiable. At least for Liberals.

Here is Sister Pale's take complete with a reminder of where that other great Liberal leader, Stéphane Dion, was when another assault on women's rights was passing second reading. When the Kicking Abortion's Ass Bill was being voted on, Dion was absent, eating little pink hamburgers in celebration of -- are you ready for it? -- International Women's Day.

Ah well. As the Liberal boyos are saying today, 'no big diff'.

You look like absolute, complete idiots, Liberals. You couldn't organize a piss-up in a brewery. And the Cons are crapping their pants laughing at you.

You deserve every snide snigger and gloating guffaw.

Ride That Horsey!

Yee haw!

Liberals are hoping to pin down Prime Minister Stephen Harper over where he stands on abortion in his G8 maternal-health initiative for the Third World.

The Opposition is to introduce a motion in the House of Commons on Tuesday demanding that the plan cover a "full range" of family-planning options, which would include contraception and abortion.

The Conservative government has been unclear about whether the plan will fund such options.

The motion says funding all options would be consistent with the policy of previous governments -- both Conservative and Liberal -- and with the approach approved by all G8 countries, including Canada, just last year.

The motion should pass easily with the support of all three opposition parties.

It could put the Conservatives in an awkward spot, forcing them to clarify the issue and potentially alienate one faction or another within the party.

Some readers may recall that Iggy and I have a troubled relationship, though I did applaud him when he first threw down the abortion gauntlet. But I really think this issue has legs.

From the beginning Motherhood Steve has been flipping and flopping on his G8 maternal health initiative.

The trick is to get the language -- oh noes! 'abortion language!' -- just right. Appease the base -- no contraception, no family planning. But repeating ad nauseum 'we will not reopen the abortion debate' -- for everyone else.

It's not working very well.

LifeShite has this headline: 'PM Harper "Caves": "Not Closing the Door" on Contraception in G8 Maternal Health Push'.

"As we have been saying all along, we are not closing the door on any options that will save the lives of mothers and children, including contraception," Oda said in response to a question from Bob Rae. "And as we have been saying all along, we are not opening the abortion debate."

Layton pressed the Prime Minister further, asking a question that he called "extremely important" and "extremely clear": "Does the Prime Minister agree with the broad sweep of opinion that is extremely clear, that contraception saves lives?"

Harper avoided the question, insisting that he had already answered it, and attempted to raise a different issue.
. . .

Mary Ellen Douglas, national organizer for Campaign Life Coalition, called the Prime Minister's comments "a giant step backwards and a disappointment."

"We're disappointed that the Conservative government has taken a step backwards in accepting contraception when they were very clear that their aim was to provide good maternal care," she commented. "All Canadians were supportive of providing good maternal health care, safe water, medicines and so on, so why bring in divisive items such as contraception and abortion?"

Douglas concluded, "The Prime Minister has caved in to pressure from pro-abortion activists to allow for contraception in the G8 health plan. Hopefully he will not cave on abortion too."

Ooooo, the dread word -- 'caved'.

A CBC poll asked if contraception should be part of the initiative. Not surprisingly, the vast majority of Canadians said YES (90% to 9%).

This issue resonates with normal people. This issue clearly demonstrates Stevie Peevie's problem with his base. He's hog-tied.

But don't listen to me. Listen to my Facebook friend Connie Fournier at the Freaks:

Ignatieff is playing this perfectly. He knows that Harper will run like a sissy from this issue, and it will cause another fracture in the conservative base.

When Harper promised to never let anyone discuss the issue of abortion, he showed the Liberals his Achille's heel. He proves it every election cycle when he makes some lame-assed pro-abortion* comment in the middle of the campaign and his poll numbers immediately take a dive.

As long as Harper lets them kick this sand in his face, they are going to keep doing it.

Kick that sand! Ride that horsey!

*Actually, I think it should be 'when he makes any reference to abortion', his poll numbers dive.

The Walk-Back Begins

On that Motherhood Steve maternal health thingy.

Or maybe we should call it a flip-flop.

Yesterday:

“It does not deal in any way, shape or form with family planning,” Mr. Cannon said about the initiative when he met with the committee. “Indeed, the purpose of this is to be able to save lives.”

Today:

“The government’s position is clear,” the Prime Minister said. “I think the minister responded – the government is seeking to get the G8 countries to act to save lives, mothers and children, throughout the world.

“We are not closing doors against any options including contraception. But we do not want a debate here or elsewhere on abortion.”

Gee, what do you think prompted Stevie Peevie to 'clarify' something that was perfectly clear out of the mouths of Bev Odious and Lawrence LooseCannon?

The fact that this idiocy would have made Canada look like a buffoon among G8 members?

Maybe the political drubbing the notion was attracting?

Or maybe the spanking it took in today's NattyPo, of all places?

Ah, I've got it. Harper doesn't want to be associated with this guy.

Because, you know, some wag with PhotoShop skills (hint hint) might do this to a photo of Harpo.

If It's Lives We Want to Save

So now we know why Motherhood Steve's maternal health initiative doesn't include family planning, let alone abortion.

"It does not deal in any way, shape or form with family planning. Indeed, the purpose of this is to be able to save lives," Mr. Cannon told the Foreign Affairs committee.

Family planning and saving women's and children's lives cannot be separated as anyone with a functioning brain and no rightwing religious base to appease knows. But instead of posting a bunch of sciency-facty links proving that, let's instead look at one of the countries where the new and (dis)improved maternal health initiative may be called on to operate.

Kenya is trying to wrangle itself a new constitution. It's not going that well. Old political factions still exist and, to make things worse, the church stepped in to stamp its feet over the possibility of abortion being allowed.

An op-ed today by Isaiah Esipisu is titled If it’s lives we want to save, let’s make abortion legal.

Issues touching on sex are treated discreetly, especially in Africa. People rarely want to talk about sex in public, lest they sound immoral.

The same applies to abortion. Government officials, church leaders, and nearly all Kenyans know well that it takes place in the backstreet under quacks.

They know of women who have died procuring an abortion unsafely, or some who have suffered the negative consequences of abortion. But they are afraid to talk about it in public, lest they sound immoral.

But, just like our teenagers usually discover sex on their own, studies from some African countries indicate that nearly 90 per cent of teenage girls know at least one crude method of procuring an abortion — a method they discovered on their own.

And they rarely discuss it with their elders or their parents, lest they sound immoral.

Expanding the scope for safe abortion services remains a delicate one. If any policy-maker supported the proposal of including it in the Constitution, their political opponents would definitely use it as a campaign tool to question their morality.

During the just-concluded East, Central and Southern African Health Ministers’ Conference in Kampala, Kenya’s director of medical services made it clear that Kenya was not going to allow abortion services to be conducted in any of the health centres, unless the life of the mother was in danger.

The subject is unsafe abortion and there are some gory details I'll spare you. Let's get to the numbers:

According to government estimates, more than 860 women procured unsafe abortions yesterday, and a similar number will do it again today, and again tomorrow. In short, 316,560 abortions are procured unsafely every year, where 20,000 of the women end up in hospital beds, while 2,600 of them die.

This costs the country’s health systems an estimated Sh18 million every year.

And now for the facty-sciency studies:

Evidence from countries with progressive safe abortion laws indicate that appropriate laws, policies and services can eliminate deaths and injuries.

South Africa is a good example, where even midwives are allowed to offer the services on demand, especially if the pregnancies are 12 weeks old or less.

As a result, government records indicate that the country has reduced the maternal mortality rates due to unsafe abortion by 91 per cent since 1997, when the law was passed.

Abortion is lawful in Ghana, if the pregnancy is a result of rape, defilement or incest. It is also allowed if continued pregnancy would put the woman at risk, or where the child is likely to develop an abnormality. The same applies in Ethiopia and Zambia.

Maternal mortality in these countries due to unsafe abortions has reduced. Kenya may need to borrow a leaf and address abortion, not immorality.

Ah, I can hear Bev Odious and Lawrence LooseCannon now: 'What does this guy know? We in the developed world know what's good for these poor people and that's what they're going to get, even if we have to shove it down their throats.'

Oh. Wait. I'm wrong. That's what LifeShite said about Ignatieff's demand that the initiative address abortion.

And, if safe abortion saves lives, how many more would be saved by offering family planning so that women who don't want to get pregnant can take sensible measures to avoid it?