Bad Faith
By Dr. B points us to this remarkable story:
Imagine two rape victims taken to the same hospital emergency room. Imagine them put in adjoining examination rooms.
Let’s say they have identical injuries.
Presume everything about them is the same except for where they are in their menstrual cycles.
Do they deserve access to the same medical treatment?
At most Catholic hospitals in Colorado, they can’t get it.
The protocol of six Catholic hospitals run by Centura calls for rape victims to undergo an ovulation test.
If they have not ovulated, said Centura corporate spokeswoman Dana Berry, doctors tell the victims about emergency contraception and write prescriptions for it if the patient asks.
If, however, the urine test suggests that a rape victim has ovulated, Berry continued, doctors at Centura’s Catholic hospitals are not to mention emergency contraception. That means the victim can end up pregnant by her rapist.
Now, admittedly, it would be possible for these hospitals to act in a principled manner. “Women cannot be informed about contraception and are obligated to bear their rapist’s child” is a disgusting, antihuman principle, but it is a principle. They could explain to their patients why emergency contraception is immoral, or perhaps even not disclose the information. But they’re not even willing to do that. The hospital is willing to discuss emergency contraception, and permit women for whom it is likely (but, if I understand correctly, not certain) to be unnecessary. They don’t mind women spending their money–most likely in vain–and supporting the manufacturers of emergency contraception. They will only refuse to disclose the information when it’s most likely to work. So not only are these hospitals bastions of irrationality and contempt for the lives and freedom of women, they’re not even consistent about it. (And, needless to say, withholding information about emergency contraception will increase the numbers of abortions. But, if there’s anything we know about the vast majority of “pro-lifers,” it’s that they could care less.) Make sure to remember this the next time someone named “A. Sullivan” tells you that pro-choicers should accept the vast moral superiority of the pro-life position.
Then there’s this:
Time is running out for legislators to try to override the governor’s ridiculous veto of an emergency-contraception notification bill for rape victims.
So, just to be clear, Bill Owens is a scumbag who thinks that state-licensed doctors should be permitted to deny crucial medical information to women, so that women will get more abortions and be more likely to bear their rapist’s child. You may wish to give his opponent some turkee in the next cycle. And remember that James Dobson wants to be as influential in the national party as in the Colorado one, and he and his ilk have already gotten Bush to reinstate domestic and global gag orders…