Devil's advocate

I don't remember where I heard it, but someone (probably Jon Stewart) once said, "If you say you're playing devil's advocate, you're really just saying you're going to play an asshole." I think this is hilarious, and almost always true.

Earlier this week, I sent Eric this segment from the Today Show. It discusses a new phenomena where young women go on "Sugar Daddy" websites to find older, wealthy gentleman who will help pay off their loans or otherwise compensate them in exchange for (ahem) companionship. The women, called Sugar Babies, were touted as yet another byproduct of the crippling recession.

I was surprised by the segment - surprised that one of the women profiled was a Sarah Lawrence grad, that there were hundreds of thousands of women signed up, that the women weren't considering their faux-mances to be prostitution.

I said to Eric, Sarah Lawrence birthed the feminist movement! How is this even possible?!

Eric said he agreed, but he was going to play devil's advocate. Boo. He wondered, Could the women have different values than you? Perhaps they can justify and even become empowered by their role, rather than allowing it to defeat them?

No! I cried. Being a sexual object is never empowering. Empowerment is all about engaging in your chosen behavior with no strings attached. Saying that women might gain empowerment by sleeping with older men is no different than saying that women shouldn't feel denigrated if their bosses hit on them.

That's when Eric told me I was coming at this issue from a white, middle class, Judeo-Christian perspective. That's the problem with feminism - it assumes we all have the same values, backgrounds, and goals.

I've had this argument about a hundred times - hell, I majored in this argument. However, it doesn't ever get any easier. Also, the longer you're away from Emily Dickinson essays and classrooms full of women advocating for transgender bathrooms in preschools, the harder it gets to fight the good fight. Even when you're just fighting with someone on your side, playingdevil's advocate.

So, in the beginning there was basic modern feminism, which stated that women had the right to control their bodies. And now, we've added an asterisk, where we remind women that selling their bodies in exchange for a lifestyle upgrade is simply a new way to relinquish that control. In ten years (in ten days, probably), there will be another way in which sexuality is being used as a commodity, and I'll fight that, too.

Whew. After we finished discussing the horror that was the Sugar Babies, we somehow segued to planning a Rick Moranis marathon. That was a much more fun topic, to tell the truth. But this was an important one.

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I fought Lent!Blog! and Lent!Blog! won

Perhaps four days after Easter is a good time to come back to the blogosphere, tail between my legs, to apologize for not having finished the epic blogging challenge that was Lent!Blog!

Back in the day, when I read crappy teen mags like Seventeen, there were often really pointless quizzes that my friends and I delighted ourselves with while tanning at the pool. For example, a question from the quiz "Can he tell you're into him?" would have read:

You meet up with some friends at the mall, and when it's time to go home, one guy you've been talking with asks if you'd like to hang out sometime. You:

a) write down your pager number*, screenname*, home phone number*, and address*, and tell him to call you that night

b) agree that would be great and give him one good way to contact you

c) say "sure" and that he can get your number from one of his friends - they all have it

After answering several inane questions like this, Seventeen, in its infinite wisdom, would tell you where you landed:

Mostly a's: Girl! Tone it down a bit! It's great that you like this guy, but it's never a turn-on to be too available. Lighten up, and you'll have him calling you in no time.

Mostly b's: You know it's sexy to be casual but flirty, and you're hitting your perfect mark. Don't forget to turn it up a notch once you've got him.

Mostly c's: You've taken "hard to get" to a whole new level - how is anyone supposed to feel confident around the Ice Queen?! Open up and let him see the fun side of you.

I have a point, and it's not to get you wondering when in the hell I traded teen mags for Contemporary Feminist Theory. My point is that even before you took the quiz, you knew where you'd stand. Right in the middle - the other sides of the spectrum were just too off-kilter.

That's kind of how I feel about Lent!Blog! When it comes to both blogging and religion, my interest in participation shifts between "avid" and "when it's convenient". So if you'd told me 45 days ago that I'd start out strong and then completely forget for the last few days, I wouldn't have been shocked. Still, I wish I would have sacked up and finished it off with gusto.

Anyway, thanks for tuning in and thanks to those who participated! It was super fun!

Do not let your daughters read this garbage.

* What up, 1999!

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X Marks the Spot

The most important questionnaire of all time:

[X] It's possible to be a realist and a romantic

[ ] As a child I liked to get dirty

[X] It's okay that Jimmy Fallon laughed in every SNL skit in which he appeared

[X] Speaking of Jimbo, Fever Pitch is an excellent movie

[X] His late night show really sucks, though

[ ] I'm super stoked that Bristol Palin is telling teenage girls to be abstinent instead of telling them how to avoid unwanted pregnancy

[ ] Salty snacks are overrated

[ ] Fresh flowers are a waste of money

[X] I think girls who "just get along better with guys" are usually lying, and secretly wish they had girlfriends

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Unresolved

I took a cue from Martha today- wanting to just get on to the letter V, I picked up the nearest magazine (MORE, as I didn’t have a dictionary handy) and decided to write on the first word I found starting with the letter U.

U is for unresolved.

Things that are currently unresolved in my life, in no particular order:

• A plan for paying off student loans in 10 years (Yes, 10 years is really the goal. Yes, for undergrad. Yes, I’ll be 35. Yes, it’s depressing.)
• If I could ever be a “Compartmentalized Catholic” - someone who recognize the faults inherent in the doctrine/institution, but still practices - and, if I would ever want to be?
• My feelings on Don Draper’s foray into masochism in the season premier of Mad Men
• What it means to be a pro-choice feminist dating a pro-life one issue voter
• If I should try tuna. Everyone else seems to like it
• How to use the resources of my job and my background in Women’s Studies to develop a program that will positively impact the self-esteem of the teenage girls I coach. Then, how to expand this program’s philosophy to other teams.
• How to be ambitious without being ruthless, and how to be humble without being self-deprecating
• Knowing at what age/weight it’s appropriate and considerate to eradicate skinny jeans from my wardrobe

Probably I'll have all of this solved by the end of this blogging challenge.

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Read what I read. Or just read my recaps.

Blog friends, I'm a little uninspired as of late. My lack of writing doesn't mean that I'm not reading a ton of great stuff on the world wide web, so here are some articles I've found lately. Thanks to Jamie at Betwixt and Between for this fabulous idea.

LZ Granderson for CNN: Myth of the 'Gay Lifestyle" Justifies Bias

Granderson writes about the unfair stereotypes perpetuated about gays, and how these myths are leading to the passing of new laws/ordinances, and the justification of new ones. Of course, he argues, gay people are no more likely to be all the same than any other subset of the population bound by one shared trait. This article was all the more important because Granderson himself has shattered a number of stereotypes- he's a gay black sportswriter. He certainly doesn't fit the prototype that the social conservatives are trying to highlight and marginalize. I hope he continues to get press for his opinions on this subject because we could use a lot more advocates like him, and a lot less like Newsweek's Ramin Setoodeh.

Gail Collins, What Every Girl Should Know About Birth Control

In Collins' post celebrating the 50th anniversary of the pill, she describes its history as well as its social and cultural impact. There have been a lot of recent articles that scold young women for not being more involved in the reproductive rights movement. They mostly argue that we have never lived in a society where abortion is illegal, so we don't worry about losing access to this right. I think that's unfair- I feel that most young pro-choice women are drawn more to action surrounding education about and access to birth control/Plan B because we don't necessarily buy into the idea that abortion isn't a big deal (but we do believe that it should be a legal option). Posts like this draw attention to the importance of proactive prevention, which I think is the real 'next frontier' of reproductive rights.

Rebecca Traister, Screw Happiness

At the suggestion of this article, I have happily shelved my obsession with HAVING IT ALL for the time being. Traister gives the case for embracing dissatisfaction- as difficult as it may be to accept that your life isn't perfect, the imperfections can be used to propel you forward to a place that you want to go. This place would most likely involve happiness - but at least this argues that it's okay for happiness to be the end goal instead of the day-to-day mandate.

Joaquin Phoenix Movie is No Joke

Let's lighten the mood from progressive politics and life goals, eh? Is Joaquin Phoenix (Walk the Line, that one movie that looked like a poor man's Backdraft) starring in a documentary about him going off his rocker, or a really elaborate performance art piece? My money is that it's all a big joke, but not because Phoenix is too normal for this to be real. I think Casey Affleck, Phoenix's brother-in-law and the director of this... initiative... isn't weird enough to film this in earnest. Also, the plot points mentioned in this article make me wonder if it will be harder to sit through than Bruno was. I think that 'film' hit my quota on raunch and nudity for this century, so even though I want to see and judge this shitshow, I'm not sure I can stomach it.

Happy Wednesday! Tell me what you've been reading this week.

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Blog For Choice 2010

In college, I worked for 9 months at NARAL Pro-Choice Wisconsin, where I learned more about the reproductive rights movement and myself than I ever imagined possible. Today is the 37th anniversary of the landmark Supreme Court case Roe V. Wade, which arguably remains the most divisive and famous (or infamous, depending on perspective) decision in our nation's history.

Today is also Blog for Choice Day. NARAL Pro-Choice America's blogging prompt this year is: What Does Trust Women Mean to You?

Trusting women means giving access.

Schools should teach a comprehensive sex education curriculum where children learn age-appropriate lessons about their bodies, reproductive organs, the risks associated with all sexual behavior, and the wide-range of preventative contraceptive methods. Last, they should be taught about all the legal choices that are available if you encounter an unplanned pregnancy. Responsible choices begin with access to information.

Next, we must trust women by giving access to preventative reproductive options. Free condoms, Plan B over the counter, affordable birth control methods for women with and without insurance, and the end of pharmacists who exercise their "conscience" only when it comes to women's health. Trust women to make good choices about their sexual activity by widening access to pregnancy tests, STD screenings, pre-natal care, and general gynecological check-ups. Prevention of unplanned pregnancies and STDs begins with access to healthcare.

Unplanned pregnancies are not 100% preventable. Women may have a predisposition to getting pregnant (read: Fertile Myrtle) and even after taking precautions, they may find themselves unexpectedly pregnant. In these situations, there needs to be access to both information and healthcare again. Unbiased medical research should be available to women who ask for it. Women should be able to discuss their options frankly with a counselor, but should not be required to do so. This is the most important time to trust women. If they decide that they do not want to continue with the pregnancy, they should be given an option to terminate within a reasonable time frame and reasonable distance from their homes. If they decide to continue with the pregnancy, they should also be given resources on the upcoming 9 months and beyond. Our current laws, which allow organizations to coax women into keeping a baby only to ignore their plights when the child is born, are as devastating as any other crack in our broken health system.

At this point, abstinence-only education and the decrease of access to reproductive healthcare has only led to sky-rocketing rates of STDs and teen pregnancy. Ignoring sex and the inherent dangers that come along with it isn't working. Trust women with access to information and healthcare, and then trust them to make the right decisions for themselves when they are granted this access.

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Oh! Sweet Nuthin'

Everyone's blogging but me, it seems. Rest assured that I'm out in the real world, over-analyzing and under-sleeping my way through these crazy few months. I've started no fewer than 6 posts since my last one, and they all are more worthless than the last.

So I'm diving into some prompted blogging- attempting to roll with Gwenbell.com's Best of '09 list. She suggests that you do every day, or just choose a few. I'm aiming for 15 total dates, but let's be honest- I hadn't even realized it's been a month since I last posted.

December 1: Trip

What was your best trip of 2009?

In June, I met the college girls in San Diego to visit Kretsch. Within an hour of arrival we were seated on K's couch surrounded by three bottles of Andre, an abundance of dips and chips, elbow deep in gossip we'd been saving up for months. College is over, but the few weekends I have each year with the old crew remind me that we can still hang on to the 2 best things that came out of our years together in Madison: 1) Our friendships and 2) Katie's idea to create a restaurant that has serves only a wide variety of nachos

December 2: Restaurant Moment

Share the best restaurant experience you had this year.

No-brainer. A few weekends ago, Greta signed us up for Spill the Wine's Taste of Tuscany. There's nothing better than enjoying a 3-course meal with wine pairings, with your best girlfriends, on a Wednesday. The only down-side was realizing that a few of us weren't cool to drive right after- and even that turned into another hour and a half discussion of the ad/marketing/PR world in my car outside the restaurant. We're definitely going back, and Em and I are lobbying for some Spanish red to be brought into the mix next time.

December 3: Article

What's an article that you read that blew you away? That you shared with all your friends.

Clearly, this question was made for me. I read and share 10 articles a day, I think. The one that stands out most clearly in my head was The Power of the Purse from the NYT magazine's issue "Saving the World's Women". While short, it was inspiring to me as someone who used to work in the non-profit world. For now, I can only afford a donation here and there to NARAL and my other favorite charities. Someday, I want to have the capacity to put my money where my (big fat) mouth is. The sentence "Women are the conduits through which change is made" reminded me of a Harriet Beecher Stowe quote I have written on a Post-it at my desk- "Women are the Real Architects of Society".

December 4: Book

What book - fiction or non - touched you? Where were you when you read it? Have you bought and given away multiple copies?

Population 485: Meeting Your Neighbors One Siren at a Time. I was hooked after the first paragraph and refused to open it unless I had time to savor every word (so it took me 4 months). I love books that can properly represent the absurdity of the Midwest without resorting to writing the characters as simple-minded hicks. Population 485 is told from the eyes of part-time voluntary firefighter/EMT Mike Perry from New Auburn, Wisconsin; as the title suggests, he introduces us to his life and town by detailing different emergency responses he has participated in over the years. It's not that dry though- the main can reflect on life, death, and the frail moments in between (which often require his help).

I also love how he writes Wisconsin. The first paragraph reads:

Summer here comes on like a zaftig hippie chick, jazzed on chlorophyll and flinging fistfuls of butterflies to the sun. The swamps grow spongy and pungent. Standing water goes warm and soupy, clotted with frog eggs and twitching with larvae. Along the ditches, heron-legged stalks of canary grass shoot six feet high and unfurl seed plumes. In the fields, the clover pops its blooms and corn trembles for the sky.

If I had one wish to be granted, it would be to have imagery like that at the tips of my fingers. I just borrowed my copy to a friend, momentarily forgetting that I made scratches that read things like "Dylan Thomas- and death shall have no dominion" in the margins. He'll either think I'm schizophrenic or brilliant, depending on how closely he understands all my bizarre associations.

December 7: Blog Find of the Year

That gem of a blog you can't believe you didn't know about until this year.

Matt Logelin. He's smart, witty, and has the cutest child on the planet. My friends and I discuss him as if we're pals and we're not even remotely alone. I'll be the first in line for his upcoming book. Moreover, he's not one of those people that you'll be bitter about if he does become a famous author/memoirist. He deserves both happiness and glaring success for being so transparent about the tragedy that he is still working to overcome.

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And the archer split the tree

Being the good liberal that I am, I am a diligent Vanity Fair reader. For two hours a month, it makes me feel like my obsession with celebrities and pop culture makes me a renaissance woman in search of the truth, rather than a shallow entry-level worker with a lot of time on her hands. (If any Vanity Fair editors should come across this, I think it's high time you stopped running stories, interviews, and pictorials featuring Levi Johnston. It makes me feel like I bought STAR instead.)

Anyway, every month a celebrity of some sort answers the "Proust questionnaire", a tweaked version of the original personality questionnaire created by the French writer. Every month, I find myself staring at the questions wondering how I'd answer them if I were asked. So... because I'm taking a mental health day despite technically sitting at my desk, here are the answers I just came up with:

What is your idea of perfect happiness?
A full table of my favorite people at Amy's, cliche classic rock playing in the background. I have stolen bar signs in my oversized purse, and I'm double fisting vodka sobes as my friends and I laugh hysterically at things we won't remember in the morning.

What is your greatest fear?
Settling for less than I deserve

What is the trait you most deplore in yourself?
I'm bad at living in the moment

What is the trait you most deplore in others?
Entitlement

Which living person do you most admire?

My mom is the most genuine person I have ever known.

What is your current state of mind?
Bogged down by insignificant details

What do you consider the most overrated virtue?
Chastity. I feel really bad for Republicans because they haven't figured this out yet.

On what occasion do you lie?
When I'm caught in another lie

What do you dislike most about your appearance?
It'd be sweet to have a torso.

What is the quality you most like in a man?
Independence

What is the quality you most like in a woman?
Confidence

Which words or phrases do you most overuse?
Insane. Amazing. Fabulous. I'm one giant hyperbole (see- I can't even be just a hyperbole. I have to be a giant one)

What or who is the greatest love of your life?

Tie for first: Soy lattes with a sprinkle of raw sugar, and Caribou Cold Press with a 1/2 shot of white chocolate

Which talent would you most like to have?

To sing without people around me wincing.

If you could change one thing about yourself, what would it be?
I'd occasionally make decisions without worrying about everyone else's feelings.

What do you consider your greatest achievement?
Surrounding myself with a great support system. My friends and family are loyal, supportive, compassionate, and kind. I'm so lucky.

If you were to die and come back as a person or thing, what do you think it would be?

A cherry blossom tree in Library Mall. Not at all symbolic, I just love that place in the late spring.

What is your most treasured possession?
A necklace my grandmother left to me. I think it has special powers- good things always happen to me when I wear it.

What do you regard as the lowest depth of misery?

Thinking more negative thoughts than positive ones.

What is your favorite occupation?
I'm taking this as dream occupation, so- Director of a non-profit centered around preventative reproductive healthcare and sexuality education for adolescent girls. Clearly, I've never thought about it before.

What is your most marked characteristic?

My mouth is the size of a five year old's.

Who are your favorite writers?
Audrey Niffeneger and Kaye Gibbons for the characters, James Joyce thematically, Dan Savage and David Sedaris when I need to laugh.

Who is your favorite hero of fiction?
Fern Arable. Dinah as written in The Red Tent.

Which historical figure do you most identify with?
Bobby Kennedy

Who are your heroes in real life?

Beyonce. Deep down, everyone wants to be Sasha Fierce.

What is it that you most dislike?
A tie between the Literal interpretation of the Bible, and pickles

What is your greatest regret?
Not majoring in Spanish in college

How would you like to die?

While napping, after walking my dog around the lake, coffee in hand, and realizing how wonderful and lucky a life I've led. (Yes, every answer I came up with to this question made me sound like I was living in a Nicholas Sparks novel)

What is your motto?

"The Secret of Life is Enjoying the Passing of Time" - One Mr. James Vernon Taylor

"The sharpest criticism often goes hand in hand with the deepest idealism and love of country." - Bobby Kennedy

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If Barbie were real, she'd have to carry her ribs in her handbag

A state rep from West Virginia is proposing a statewide ban on Barbie dolls, I have learned from the Today Show. His reasoning? "I just hate the image that we give to our kids that if you're beautiful, you're beautiful and you don't have to be smart."

Ugh, god. He's a Democrat? I thought sexual repression and censorship were on the other guys' list of priorities. 

For everyone who was expecting a feminist high-five via the blogosphere, sack UP already. It's a doll. I owned a dozen of them as a child. I spent hours dressing them up in ridiculous clothes, planning elaborate weddings to that stud Ken (who was actually the "Eric" doll from The Little Mermaid as blondes didn't do much for me even as a five year old) and of course, consummating said marriage in the master suite of the Barbie DreamHouse. Once, Barbie beat the hell out of (and ended up decapitating) Skipper because Skipper kidnapped little Kelly. 

My point? Barbie was the source of countless hours of entertainment for my friends and me, and we are not worse off for it. Yes, I wanted to look like her when I was younger. Junior year of high school hit and I grew hips but not DD's and I got over it. 

I'm not saying the state rep has no point. He does. All children should be raised in a culture where health is the goal rather than beauty. Yet I remember many instances when my body image was tarnished, and they don't involve Barbie. They involve open weigh-ins in grade school gym class.  Ballet teachers pinching my inner thighs and clucking their tongues in disapproval. A mean boy at the public pool laughing at my un-filled bikini top.  More recently, my self-esteem took a hit when I went shopping for work clothes after four years of binge drinking and consuming more than my fair share of cheese curds.

I can't speak for everyone, but real life affected my self-image more than playing with disproportionate dolls ever could have. 

More importantly, we are in the middle of an economic meltdown, jackass. Maybe no one co-sponsored your bill because they are busy saving the country from implosion.

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What Would Audre Lorde do?

Of all the things I'm qualified for, political blogging is not one of them. That being said, I'm going to try to tackle my thoughts on this mess so that my brain stops spinning and I can go to bed.

There’s an old feminist saying, the personal is the political. As a self-declared feminist breaking the glass ceiling, I imagine that Sarah Palin is familiar with this phrase. She all but ensured that her personal life was up for grabs when she told us more about her husband’s snowmobiling awards than she did about her two years of experience as the governor of a sparsely populated tundra. In her defense, she didn’t have much to go on without her family. She was picked on some level (perhaps a very high level) because she was a mom and wife in addition to a conservative leader. To ignore her family would have certainly been political suicide. I just don’t know what that makes her current situation.

All day, bloggers and pundits have delicately walked the line between fact and analysis, while knowing that every question would be critiqued. You cannot question her family values for not staying at home with her disabled child because you would never ask a male candidate to do the same. In fact, you cannot question her parenting at all unless you do it without bringing her kids into play. As we all know, children of candidates are off limits.

Fine. I can respect both of those media "truths" despite their obvious logistical faults. I will try to accept the flawed system that allows candidates to run on family values until the families themselves are, um, flawed. My main question, while it involves her parenting, has more to do with her overall judgment and lack of political savviness. I ask, what kind of parent (not just mother) could ever be so blinded with ambition that they would throw their seventeen year old daughter to the lions in order to move up the political ladder? Palin can claim to be many things, but she cannot claim to be ignorant of the media's ever-relaxing standards. To not think about how her daughter would be affected by this announcement shows an utter failure in judgment.

The candidates and their staffs can push for a ceasefire on this all they want. The talking heads can be threatened within an inch of their lives to stay on point with the issues. That won’t stop the blogging world, which has no regulating body. It won’t stop curious citizens from googling and spreading rumors that are void of facts. It won’t stop the tabloids from sending vulture-esque journalists into the tiny main streets of Wasilla, Alaska. Like it or not, this is news. Palin and McCain can demand respect and privacy until their voices are hoarse, but this is not going away.

So there it is. You have a young girl thrust into the spotlight who deserves more privacy than she will ever be granted. I feel terribly for her, but know that she has one person to thank for being put into that impossible situation. I say this mostly because I remember being a seventeen year old girl. In my journal that year, I wrote a painstaking account of getting my heart broken for the first time, of the everyday trials of dance team, and about an ongoing fight with a group of catty girls. All of these things made this year agonizing enough. To be going through an unwanted pregnancy, expectations of marriage, and then an international announcement of both, would intensely mess up any girl that age. In all of my experiences, which obviously pale in comparison, I turned to my mother. So then. Who do you turn to, who can you trust, when your own mother is at the helm of the ship that allowed you to become collateral damage?

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Viva la Vulva

It’s a pretty common misconception that conservatives are considered closed-minded, and liberals have a much more open way of thinking. I clarified my stance on this sophomore year while talking to Joel, saying that I am a closed-minded liberal. Sure, people are entitled to their opinions – but if they oppose some issues that I align myself with, they clearly have the wrong opinion.

A good example of this came up a few weeks ago when I was planning a group project with some ladies from my politics of fertility control class. Our topic was sex ed, and few things get me more riled up than having to picture small children being indoctrinated to hate their bodies.

This was an upper level womens’ studies class, so there wasn’t much opposition to our plan: show a whole bunch of fundamentalist videos, talk about virginity pledges (and those goddamned purity rings). The goal of the presentation was to make everyone in the class want to gear up a VW van and drive to Washington to bring down the man.

I may have been a little overzealous in ripping on those saving themselves. I made a joke and a girl said something to the effect of, “we should clarify that abstinence only education is bad, but abstinence is the only way to protect yourself from STD’s and pregnancy 100%. So, we shouldn’t totally rip abstinence apart”

My reaction expression was something between horror and smelling a bad fart. It did not go unnoticed. I weakly tried to save face, mumbling something like “oh of course we should say that… that abstinence is superior”.

In trying to iterate my staunch anti-abstinence sex ed views, I had come off looking whore-tastic. This is difficult to do in a group of women who use frank, personal examples from their sex lives to “broaden the academic discourse” in our class.

Just as I was beginning to feel like I was secretly a radical, militant feminist, I was then told in my other class this week that I was “ashamed of my own sexuality”. Obviously, this stems from my inability to reclaim the… c word. I can’t even type it, I have to use the asterisk or I get the willies. Regardless, one fellow student told me that my inability to find empowerment in the c word means that I am ashamed of my own sexuality.

I am just one person, with just one viewpoint on sex: Get it if you want it, bitches! Somehow my opinion on this can receive disapproval by both sides of the feminist spectrum (the politically correct progressives and the bat shit crazy, c*nt loving radicals). I kind of like my perch in the middle, where I am just close enough to touch each side, and far enough away to run off when they start preaching.

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lover, would you like some chevre?

Some musings from the pro-choice front...

1. "Your organization is too mainstream and politically correct for me. I think abortions should be available on demand and without apology. You beat around the bush and kiss too many politicians' backsides trying to get legislature passed" - 70 year old woman who chatted my ear off during phone banking

2. "Where did you get our number? My wife is pro-life, don't call back" - man whose wife has signed ten pro-choice online petitions, also during phone banking

3. "I don't think I should have to dispense birth control, because I can't be positive that a woman isn't going to use 3-4 pills at once in order to cause an abortion on herself. I would then be responsible for an abortion" -crazy pharmacist at the Senate hearing
"What if you filled someone's prescription, they took too many of them and ended up committing suicide?" - devil's advocate Senate member, making my life

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