By Taure Shimp
Planned Parenthood serves as an indispensable resource for millions of women and men each year, offering access to STD testing, breast and testicular cancer screenings, emergency contraception, sex education and abortions. However, the House of Representatives recently passed a measure which will pull federal funding from Planned Parenthood.
Indiana Republican Mike Pence is the driving force behind this movement and he has made abortion the key issue. In an opinion piece at The Daily Caller, Pence writes, “The Title X Abortion Provider Prohibition Act would close the loophole that has forced millions of pro-life Americans to subsidize the nation’s leading abortion provider, sustaining and underwriting the destruction of innocent human life that has been carried out on a massive scale by Planned Parenthood.” However, by law, Planned Parenthood doesn’t receive money from Title X funds for abortion services in the first place. Taxpayers aren’t paying for Planned Parenthood to perform abortions. Furthermore, abortion constitutes less than 5% of the overall services Planned Parenthood offers and yet, outrageously, this act restricts all federal funding from going to Planned Parenthood, including funding which allows them to test for STDs, perform breast exams, and offer contraceptives.
Indiana Republican Mike Pence is the driving force behind this movement and he has made abortion the key issue. In an opinion piece at The Daily Caller, Pence writes, “The Title X Abortion Provider Prohibition Act would close the loophole that has forced millions of pro-life Americans to subsidize the nation’s leading abortion provider, sustaining and underwriting the destruction of innocent human life that has been carried out on a massive scale by Planned Parenthood.” However, by law, Planned Parenthood doesn’t receive money from Title X funds for abortion services in the first place. Taxpayers aren’t paying for Planned Parenthood to perform abortions. Furthermore, abortion constitutes less than 5% of the overall services Planned Parenthood offers and yet, outrageously, this act restricts all federal funding from going to Planned Parenthood, including funding which allows them to test for STDs, perform breast exams, and offer contraceptives.
What this legislation really does is relegate women to second-class citizens, where our health and our bodies are denied support from the very government that is supposed to represent us. Now, Planned Parenthood will be forced to generate all of their own funding the services they offer to women and men will not be available to the same extent. Planned Parenthood states, “The reality of Rep. Mike Pence’s bill is that millions of women who rely on Planned Parenthood health centers for their primary and preventive health care, including annual exams, lifesaving cancer screenings, contraception visits, and testing and treatment for STDs, would lose access to their main source of basic preventive health care.”
To sign a petition in order to help Planned Parenthood and send this to your local representative, click on this link here. No donation is required, but names are very much needed and appreciated during this time.
For more information on this issue, check out these links:
1. Feministing
2. Bitch Media
3. Planned Parenthood
4. The Daily What
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