I am a woman, not a walking womb

[annathepiper]

I've already seen many of you on my Friends list expressing your ire about this, the Washington Post article talking about the "new federal guidelines" that are recommending that all women treat themselves as "pre-pregnant".

For the record, yes, I find this extremely annoying. I'm all for taking steps to prevent birth defects and make it possible for the healthiest possible babies to be born, but this? This translates to me as telling women that "you should take all possible steps to make yourself healthy just because you might have a baby"--which is a very, very different message than "you should take all possible steps to make yourself healthy because in the long run, it will help you have a happier, less stressed, and more productive life". It puts the emphasis on the health of a fetus who may never actually get conceived, not on the health of the actual woman who is right there, right now. And it totally disregards the wishes of women who for whatever reason specifically do not want to get pregnant, and who will have every right in the world to be furious if their health care providers will not trust them to keep from getting pregnant, and who will insist on forcing them to make health care decisions based on a hypothetical baby they will never actually have.

If you think it couldn't happen, go read what shadesong has to say about how she can't get epilepsy medicines that will stop her body from falling apart because of potential birth defects, and never mind how she is swearing up and down that she has no intentions whatsoever of having another child. And then think about this some more. Hard.

Over on filkertom's post on this same topic, one of the commenters pointed out that there's not a word uttered here about the male side of things, either. No hint of encouraging all men capable of siring children to eschew habits that could impact their virility. And another commenter pointed out that the sheer existence of these guidelines means that they start influencing court decisions... and those court decisions start influencing laws.

And that is a road down which we should not go.

Comments

[emmacrew.livejournal.com]

Speaking as a person who currently *is* a walking incubator, I gotta say this really Really REALLY pisses me off, too. *sigh*

[chamois-shimi.livejournal.com]

It's bad enough being considered nothing but a walking incubator when you *are* incubating... the idea of being reduced to that throughout most of a life makes me spit nails.

[chamois-shimi.livejournal.com]

I rather like a comment I saw on another post on this topic- we ought to all consider ourselves "pre-dead". :P

[annathepiper]

*snork* Yeah. As I mentioned to rosepurr elsewhere on the thread, I find myself inclined to start telling people, "We could all be hit on the head with hammers AT ANY TIME! Construction helmets for all!"

[cats-haven.livejournal.com]

I've already had my two, then made sure no more could come along because my body is already going to hell in a hand basket due to genetic problems. The courts and doctors need to trust us more to take care of ourselves, with or without baby. That article just made too made to describe.

If they are going to pick on women, then they need to pick on men, too. It would only be fair.

[annathepiper]

Yeah. But as chamois_shimi pointed out, the majority of the people who make these kinds of decisions are still men. And yet, somehow the male side of the whole baby question never comes up. Unless it's fathers trying to get out of paying child support!

Gosh, did I say that in my cynical outside voice?

[cats-haven.livejournal.com]

>:) Yes, you did. Unless men can start having babies themselves, they need to keep their yaps permanently shut.

[eveshka.livejournal.com]

*cough*

The Handmaid's Tale (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/038549081X/002-3163861-3156065?v=glance&n=283155) anyone?

[annathepiper]

Exactly what filkertom had suggested, too.

I haven't ever actually read that book. Half of me thinks I should and the rest of me thinks it would probably hit just a little too close to home for me right now.

[eveshka.livejournal.com]

It's a very powerful book that illustrates precisely what can happen when the Institution takes over birthrate.

[caligogreywings.livejournal.com]

Exactly what I was thinking. And that book scared me half to death.

[ceallaighgirl.livejournal.com]

The article makes sense and all, but it's kind of silly. Everybody should be doing all those things anyway. (Well, I don't know anything about folic acids, but you know, the whole "be healthy" thing, of course, DUH.)

I'm not a huge fan of the Washington Post anyway.

[chamois-shimi.livejournal.com]

I don't think the Washington Post reporter was saying that was what he/she believed should be done- it's a news article, not an op-ed. The thing that *really* bugs me is that the federal government found it necessary to actually publish guidelines about it.

I don't like being babysat. I'm a competent adult, not an idiot or a child. What is it about being a woman that makes me automatically untrustworthy or stupid? When it gets to the point that someone is refused proper medical care because of the fact that she might, someday in the future, decide to get pregnant... that's just *wrong*.

[poetry-lady.livejournal.com]

It's been at that point for a while now. See, for example, http://shadesong.livejournal.com/2871261.html.

[annathepiper]

To which I linked in my original post on this, yeah.

[poetry-lady.livejournal.com]

Ah, I forgot A. already mentioned this...just take my reply as disgust that this is already happening. :

[annathepiper]

Heh, no problem.

[annathepiper]

Yeah, that's the part that annoys me, that they're trying to put a "but it's for the BABIES!" spin on something that people should be doing regardless.

[rosepurr.livejournal.com]

The number of people in various areas who do not understand why people are angry about this also seriously pisses me off.

[annathepiper]

I saw some folks on Tom's thread who were basically saying, "But, but, but, preventing birth defects is good, right?" Which I don't think anybody will disagree with. But yeah.

[chamois-shimi.livejournal.com]

Yeah, preventing birth defects is very good. Everyone who thinks that treating all women as pregnant will significantly reduce birth defects, when the highest incidence of such occurs in women who don't *get* health care, much less prenatal care, in the first place... raise your hands.

Yeah. :P

[annathepiper]

Indeed. :P

[rosepurr.livejournal.com]

Exactly. People keep saying, "Well that seems reasonable. Any woman could get pregnant!"

[annathepiper]

Were I a snarkier person, I would reply to these people, "Anybody could get hit on the head with a hammer at any time, so we should all wear construction helmets!"

But I am not a snarkier person! ;)

[rosepurr.livejournal.com]

Oh, that's too bad. Snarky is the right response, I think.

[annathepiper]

Oh, totally. Heh. I just am not normally comfortable being snarky on other people's journals. *^_^*

[wildcardgal.livejournal.com]

One further thought. This also once again makes the assumption that foetal health is entirely a WOMANS concern and that men need not care for their health in order to be capable of producing healthy semen/being healthy fathers.

[annathepiper]

Yeah, as I mentioned in passing in my original post. It takes both genders to make a kid, and for all the concerns that some folks like to express how it's so important for babies to have a mother and a father, you'd think they'd make more of a noise about making sure the fathers in the equation are just as healthy as the mothers.

[chamois-shimi.livejournal.com]

Maybe they would, if it were women who were making all the noise about it. But our fearless leaders are mostly men, and heaven forbid anyone should tell THEM what to do!

[annathepiper]

Quite. :P

[lysdexia.livejournal.com]

It is a long time since I have read something quite so dehumanising of any one group of people. It makes me kind of ill.

Wow.

[annathepiper]

Yeah, doesn't it just?

[pecunium.livejournal.com]

But the CDC didn't really say that. The WaPo did.

The CDC paper was aimed at women who are planning to become pregnant.

The WaPo needs to be ripped up and down, but blaming the CDC isn't really fair.

TK

[annathepiper]

agrumer already updated me--gave me data I hadn't had. I posted about that a little while ago, since it was only proper. :)

[pecunium.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I recalled, after I went and jumped to this, that you had said that.

It irked me (I went and read the report when this got its initial ballyhoo), that the people who most criticise the press for playing things to be more "conservative" than they are, just swallowed the WaPo presentation as legit.

I'll go back to whatever it was I was doing now.

I happen to, mostly, agree with your ideas on the strike. I like the features of LJ too much to chuck it all, and I suspect there are too many people I'll want to read/I want to easily read me, to make my quitting worth the candle.

TK

[annathepiper]

It is precisely in the interests of fairness and proper information that I wanted to make the second post, yeah. It's all too easy and tempting to give in to the tendencies you describe; liberals are often just as guilty of it as conservatives. Including myself. So!

*nodnods to the rest* Thanks for chiming in in general.