Women's Issues in the News

It seems like there have been a lot of news stories concerning women and women's rights lately. For example, how Republican representative Pete DeGraaf compared being prepared for pregnancy due to rape to being ready for a flat tire. And, of course, the Strauss-Kahn case. Also, if you're in the Chicagoland area, you might be familiar with the Chicago police officers who have been charged with sexual assault and misconduct. Obviously, we can't forget the Planned Parenthood fiasco.

It's absolutely infuriating that women are still being put in these situations, and that politicians are dragging women's rights issues into the political arena as something to be debated and negotiated. It's as if they don't realize that women are real people who will be affected by the decisions they make.

I have to say, though, I'm inspired that stories like this are so prevalent in the news. Not because women are suffering, of course. It's because treating women as objects, and women's rights as banter material is in no way new. It is new, however, that people are paying attention when it happens, and fighting against it. Planned Parenthood's federal funding was not cut (it's a different on a state level in some cases, but that's a blog for a different day), and even men in power are being punished for committing sexual assault. So we need to keep speaking up about these issues. We need to vote for politicians that have women's issues in mind, and will fight for us. We need to keep doing what we're doing, and we need to do more of it.