Comments on: A Question for Women’s Groups

By: Lincoln Beachey

Lincoln Beachey — Thu, 19 Apr 2007 17:33:55 +0000

I went to the NOW web site to understand their position. Unless I missed something, NOW is against silicon implants only (not saline) taking the position they are not safe based upon the medical evidence. Setting aside the larger issue of whether aborion should be legal at all, the Supreme Court's decision outlaws a procedure which in at least some cases is safer than the alternatives. I am no fan of NOW, but in both cases they are taking a position they believe to be in the best interests of women's health. You can argue that they are wrong on both issues based upon the data but the positions seem consistent to me.

By: garble

garble — Thu, 19 Apr 2007 13:17:31 +0000

NOW is interested in improving the lives of women. Since breast implants are elective surgery that help women fit societies idea of beauty; It's bad. Abortion should be a decision entirely up to the mother. So it should be protected.

Through in overlapping interests of a 'typical' now member (i.e. big companies bad, Christians = morons, granola good, capitalism ooooh scary) and it's slam dunk.

At this point in time most of the levers of power in the US are in the hands of men so NOW wants the government to offset this systemic (and historical) disadvantage. Not limited government.

I will say that the rhetoric of NOW et. al. annoys the hell out of me and I'm glad that NOW isn't more powerful. But I think their positions are internally consistent.

By: CRC

CRC — Thu, 19 Apr 2007 02:14:46 +0000

In reality I find that people are often terribly inconsistent in their overall political/cultural/social philosophies. Often the “left” (I am increasingly unwilling to call them “liberals”) are all about liberty in one particular area of life or culture and adamantly opposed to it in another. Often they don’t even see it. Same goes for the other end of the political spectrum.

By: Tim

Tim — Wed, 18 Apr 2007 21:26:02 +0000

I am assuming you already know the answer to this question but I would like to sumarize it the way I see it. NOW is anti-abortion because they see it as fighting against the gender stereotype that they are supposed to be mothers. NOW is anti-breast implant for roughly the same reason. A woman shouldn't WANT to make a choice to subscribe to the male dominated gender order by enlarging her breasts and making herself more attractive to men. Therefore she should not be ALLOWED to make that choice.

In reality both their slant on abortion and their slant on breast implants is the same, it's not pro-woman, it's anti-man.

It is really a shame but when the women's rights movement largely accomplished all their bullet points, they went home. Unfortunately, that left the organization's apparatus available to the most angry and dissaffected men-haters.

NOW is at least predictable, find how you can spin a point of view to be anti-man and you have determined the NOW viewpoint.

By: JoshK

JoshK — Wed, 18 Apr 2007 18:44:12 +0000

Well said.

By: dearieme

dearieme — Wed, 18 Apr 2007 18:43:50 +0000

What a very good point. It could be extended to many health and safety laws, drug regulation and so forth. Here’s the risk, ladies; you choose whether or not to take it.