I just read
this article in the Austin American Statesman and dates back to March 7, 2013. That's what brought all these old memories back to me.
First of all I
want to thank the hundreds of people that rallied outside of the Texas Capitol
on Thursday in support of Planned Parenthood.
Planned
Parenthood is seen by many Texas legislators as Public Enemy No. 1, only
because they say it promotes abortions and Texas is a state that is against
this practice.
In 2011, the
Legislature voted to bar any financial assistance to any groups that had
anything to do with abortions. This has
led to Planned Parenthood being removed from the Texas Women’s Health Program,
which provided care to more than 130,000 low-income women.
In my opinion
as someone who has used these services and as a mother of teenage children, I
truly believe that we need to keep Planned Parenthood. It does not promote teen sex nor does it promote
abortions. They provide great services
to our women and let’s not forget our men.
We need family
planning services, and Planned Parenthood has been providing women with these
services for many years. They also
provide other services such as, cancer screenings and other care services that
have nothing to do with abortions.
Planned
Parenthood has helped so many low income women during pregnancy and thanks to
that help many of them have been able to succeed in school and have even earned
college degrees because they had a support system that worked for them not against
them.
Texas taxpayers
pay more than $1 billion annually for Medicaid, a figure that will continue to
rise if we do away with Planned Parenthood services.
Republicans are
the ones in control statewide. They are
the main ones complaining about our economy being so bent out of shape, yet
they take no responsibility for their actions.
Go figure….
So the answer
would be a definite yes, we do need Planned Parenthood.
In this blog post, Dolores is discussing whether or not Planned Parenthood should receive federal/state funding under the Texas Women's Health Program. She firmly believes that they should.
ReplyDeleteFirstly, she does a good job of alluding to her own personal experience as a reference for her stance. She claims that Planned Parenthood has helped her in the past, and that experience is irrefutable (because it is just that- personal experience).
The only objection I have with the points that she makes is that she claims that Planned Parenthood doesn't promote abortions. This kind of a claim has to be backed by some evidence or statistics, because it simply doesn't seem true (unless proven). For instance, Planned Parenthood is the largest abortion provider in the US and in Texas. For instance, in 2004, for every 1 person they refer to adoption agencies, they perform 138 abortions. And on top of that, Planned Parenthood is still a business. Abortion is one of the primary ways that they get paid, so it seems like common sense that, in order to thrive as an organization, they must promote abortions.
Overall, I would say Dolores has done a good job of sharing her own experience as support for her claims, but her research and evidence is lacking.