It’s been nearly two years since the U.S. Supreme Court outlawed abortion and left it up to individual states to decide whether or not women should be able to decide what to do with their bodies. The Dobbs decision sent proverbial shock waves throughout the American conscience. For the first time in modern judicial history, a fundamental right was snatched away by a band of elitists who – like most extremists – feel they know what’s best for everyone else.
Now another abortion-related issue has come before the Court: whether mifepristone is legal or not. Basically this medication induces abortion without an individual having to visit a clinic. Recently the U.S. Food and Drug Administration expanded approval of the drug. That incited the ire of Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine, a conservative anti-abortion group that forced the matter onto the plate of the High Court. If the Dobbs decision is any precedent, things don’t look good for mifepristone.
I might have one solution to the overall problem of unwanted pregnancies: tax-free condoms. Even before I entered my teens, my father put the fear of the Almighty into my brain – never trust a girl when she says she’s on birth control. Of course, women should never trust a man when he says she can quit her job because he’ll make her his queen, but that’s a different dilemma.
To many men wearing condoms is comparative to showering while wearing a raincoat. (Points to anyone who has actually heard that firsthand.) But, as we saw with the AIDS epidemic, condoms are a safeguard. Personally I’m tired of hearing men say that birth control is a woman’s responsibility. A real man takes charge of his own birth control.
Unexpected pregnancies present more than a few challenges to an individual female. Children who come into the world unplanned and unwanted often end up being unloved; thus, they often become society’s problem. Two decades ago economists Steve Levitt and John Donohue hypothesized that a reduction in crime in the 1990s was one effect of the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision that legalized abortion nationwide. A strong economy and a greater presence of law enforcement, especially in major metropolitan areas, were also counted as dominating factors. But it was the abortion connection that prompted the most controversy – and greatest outrage. Liberals opined that abortion provided women with greater autonomy over their own health care, while conservatives pointed to a reversal of liberal social policies beginning in the 1980s as the primary reason for a reduction in criminal behavior. Either of these theories bears some truth.
Another interesting result of the Dobbs decision is the sudden rise in vasectomies here in the U.S. Perhaps some men are finally getting the hint that they also have reproductive choices. Institutes from the Cleveland Clinic to Planned Parenthood are noting an increase in vasectomies. It’s both logical and practical.
But I still think eliminating taxes on condoms will provoke younger and/or single men to buy and use them. As of now, I don’t know of any state that maintains this practice, but I still feel it would be worth the trouble. States will garner tax revenue on a slew of other products anyway. I’m fully aware condoms are not a panacea to solve unwanted pregnancies; no form of birth control outside of abstinence is. But, just as with the foolishness of “Just Say No”, abstinence only blanket ideology isn’t reasonable either. Children cost money – as any parent can tell us. They should be a blessing, not a burden.
Chief Writing Wolf 
I have to say that I was extremely shocked to hear of the decision to reverse Row versus Wade. I couldn’t believe such a regressive move was happening in the modern world. It won’t stop abortion it’ll just force them underground and women and often young girls may die as a result.
I think your idea has merit.
I was shocked, too, even though I shouldn’t have been, considering the extreme conservative direction the U.S. Supreme Court has been moving towards over the past couple of decades. Five of the justices currently sitting on the Court were appointed by presidents who didn’t win the popular vote. That’s never happened before! I’ve always known the elections of both George W. Bush and Donald Trump were fraudulent, but I’m starting to think they were deliberately manipulated to create the right-wing bent on the Court.
Never in modern U.S. history has the Supreme Court granted a right (abortion) and then stripped it away. The decision has already proven detrimental. One case here in Texas garnered national attention and proves how dangerous letting politicians and judges make medical decisions.
https://www.texastribune.org/2024/01/24/texas-kate-cox-biden-state-of-the-union/
Oh that is not good to hear that things have already become a problem. From afar, Yes I think the right-wing fearmongers had a deliberate plan of how better to control democracy, as democracy can be a loose cannon to them. They set out to move in this direction and due to the popularity of religion in America, appear to have suceeded.
There also was a deliberate move to infiltrate politics here, involving the pentecostal churches. They prospected for people who might be candidates for politics. They succeeded to but Australia is a different kettle of fish, and largely secular. It didn’t work and the right wing goverment and their hyper religious leader – aka Scomo – or Scumo as people began to call him was ousted a couple of years ago. The party may not recover from the infiltration of the right wing and appears to be in disarray. Australians really dislike someone who doesn’t pitch in and help. They were disgusted when half the country was burning with bushfires and this ex -Prime Minister went on holidays to Hawaii with his kids. There was outroar. His comment was “I don’t hold a hose!” It disgusted Australia and his government was doomed form then on. Worse was to come about his megalmaniac ways after the next election. He appointed himself to around six or more ministerial positions – while his ministers were still occupying them so he could make decisions, using the executive powers granted to him under the pandemic! A nasty man – so if this is any indication of the religous right in US, I can understand their zeal for power.
Thanks for the link – I find it completely shocking and disgusting that the court could rule in this way. Don’t they see they won’t eradicate abortion, just make women go elsewhere that may be back street clinics?
I tell people that it would be great if every child came into the world loved and cherished. But that type of utopia simply doesn’t exist on this side of the universe.
I read an editorial recently speculating that even Jesus is considered too liberal for a growing number of evangelical Christians. I don’t know what god they intend to worship in response, but I want no part of it.
For Heavens sake. It is like the flip side of islamic fundamentalism.