In case you’ve been in a dungeon and locked away from all media contact (or you simply haven’t been following the news!), here’s a quick rundown of the story.
A Bit of History
On Feb. 16, 2012, the House of Representatives held an oversight hearing to discuss the mandate in President Obama’s healthcare plan requiring religious institutions (and others) to provide women with health insurance that included birth control. Committee chair Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif., called as witnesses five conservative men: an Orthodox rabbi, Lutheran and Baptist clergy, a Roman Catholic bishop and the president of Catholic University of America. They all opposed – on the grounds of religious freedom – the idea that religious institutions opposing birth control must provide their employees with the option to secure such coverage. The Democrats invited one witness – Sandra Fluke – to provide a women’s perspective, but she was not allowed to speak because Issa said she was not a “religious expert.” Democratic committee members walked out and later decided to hold their own hearing.
On Feb. 23, Fluke was the only person to testify at a Democratic hearing. She told the story of a classmate at Georgetown, a Jesuit institution, who lost an ovary because her insurance wouldn’t cover the cost of contraceptives that would have stopped the growth of cysts. Fluke said the cost of contraceptives can reach more than $3,000 during the three years a stud
ent is in law school. Fluke is also quoted as saying, “I’m an American woman who uses contraceptives.”By Feb. 27, the conservative blogosphere had picked up the story, which was being retold as “Sex-Crazed Co-Eds Going Broke Buying Birth Control,” according to a headline from cnsnews.com, which uses the tag line “The Right News. Right Now.”
On Feb. 29, Limbaugh attacked Fluke on his show for asking the government to “subsidize birth control.” Here’s part of what he said: “What does that make her? It makes her a slut, right? It makes her a prostitute. She wants to be paid to have sex. She’s having so much sex she can't afford contraception. She wants you and me and the taxpayers to pay her to have sex. What does that make us? We’re the pimps.” He added that paying for contraceptives would be just another example of “welfare entitlements.”
By March 1, people on both sides of the issue had started speaking out, but Limbaugh did not back down. Instead, he said Fluke was “having so much sex, it’s amazing she can still walk. ... So, Ms. Fluke and the rest of you femi-Nazis, here's the deal. If we are going to pay for your contraceptives, and thus pay for you to have sex, we want something for it, and I'll tell you what it is: We want you to post the videos online so we can all watch.” Yikes!
On March 2, those supporting Fluke included President Obama, who called her on the telephone to offer his encouragement, and the president of Georgetown University, John J. DeGioia, who called the comments by Limbaugh and his supporters “misogynistic, vitriolic, and a misrepresentation of the position of Sandra Fluke.” Michael Steel, speaking on behalf of House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, said Boehner thought Limbaugh’s words were “inappropriate” (not “wrong,” mind you). It’s curious that Boehner – a leading Congressional Republican – would not speak for himself but rather used a surrogate. Several of Limbaugh’s sponsors announced that they were pulling their support from his show.
On March 3, Limbaugh, in a rare public apology, said: “My choice of words was not the best, and in the attempt to be humorous, I created a national stir. I sincerely apologize to Ms. Fluke for the insulting word choices.” More sponsors jumped ship. And Republican presidential candidates weighed in on the controversy, criticizing Limbaugh’s words but, again, not his argument. For example, Rick Santorum said Limbaugh was being “absurd. But that’s, you know, an entertainer can be absurd.” Mitt Romney said, “It’s not the language I would have used.” Newt Gingrich said he was glad Limbaugh apologized but he also disagreed with Fluke’s position. Only Ron Paul said he thought Limbaugh’s apology was not sincere: “He's doing it because some people were taking their advertisements off of his program. It was his bottom line he was concerned about.”
On March 5, Fluke appeared on the TV show “The View” and said she didn’t think Limbaugh was sincere in his apology. Limbaugh apologized again but framed his apology this way: “I acted too much like the leftists who despise me. I descended to their level, using names and exaggerations. It’s what we’ve come to expect from them, but it’s way beneath me.”
Framing the Issues
“Framing” is a concept that means the words we choose help shape the messages we want people to receive. For example, the words “third-trimester abortion” may conjure up a certain image in your mind while the words “partial-birth abortion” certainly would conjure up another. “Gun control” may make you shiver, but “gun safety” may make you nod in approval.
George Lakoff, UC Berkeley professor of linguistics and cognitive science, argues that we use the metaphor of “the family” when speaking about our country. For example, we use terms like founding fathers, sending our sons and daughters to war, and Uncle Sam. Lakoff says there are two basic ways of looking at this family/country of ours: the “strict father frame” and the “nurturing parent frame.”
Under the strict father frame, we assume the world is a dangerous and difficult place. Thus, we need a strict father to teach us right from wrong through punishment. Once our children leave home, they are on their own and don’t need “meddling” from us. We rank god above man, man above nature (and women), adults above children, America above other countries, and Western culture above non-Western cultures. Our overriding guideline is “moral strength.”
Translated into political terms, this means we may oppose government-mandated healthcare because we believe in “limited government” and that the government should not “meddle” into our personal lives. We may oppose any restrictions on gun ownership because “strong fathers” need guns to protect us from the “criminals who have guns.” We may oppose prenatal care because we assume “moral mothers” would be able to provide their own prenatal care, or if they can’t, they would at least abstain from having sex and babies. We may oppose abortions because we assume only two types of “immoral” women seek abortions: unmarried teens who get pregnant through lust and carelessness, or women pursuing careers who selfishly put themselves ahead of their (existing or potential) families. And we may oppose any new taxes on the wealthy because we assume “good citizens” have earned their wealth through hard work.
Under the nurturing parent frame, we assume the world can be made a better place. We assume parents nurture their children through empathy and responsibility, and that parents must “protect” their children. Important values include cooperation, fulfillment, two-way communication, happiness and fairness. Our overriding guideline is a variation of the Golden Rule: “Do unto others as they would have you do unto them.”
Translated into political terms, this means we may believe in such things as consumer protection, worker protection and environmental protection. We may support government-mandated healthcare because we believe it is our responsibility to take care of everyone, including those who cannot afford to take care of themselves (e.g., children, the poor, the elderly, people with disabilities). We may approve gun control because we believe guns cause more harm than good (especially when they are in the presence of children). We may approve prenatal care because we believe the government must provide for the basic needs of its citizens – and healthier mothers and children lead to a healthier society. We may support all women’s right to use birth control or to choose an abortion because we believe they are worthy of our help. And we may approve additional taxes for the wealthiest among us because we believe that taxes are the dues we pay to be an American, to live in a democratic society that provides us with opportunities for life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.
The Attack on Women
Many Democrats and some Republicans and independents see the attack on Fluke as part of a larger attack on women – especially women’s reproductive rights. Many statehouses and Congress have been discussing legislation to nearly eliminate all types of birth control and to make certain types of care, such as getting abortions, much more difficult. Our very own Florida Senator Marco Rubio introduced a bill that would have allowed ANY employer to deny employees birth control coverage (but not coverage for Viagra, by the way) for ANY religious reasons they could come up with. So if your boss assumes that all young women sleep around and thus are morally unsound, he could eliminate birth control as an option in his company’s health care plan.
Attacks on Planned Parenthood have gotten louder as the presidential election nears. For example, former presidential candidate and Texas Republican Governor Rick Perry signed legislation that goes into effect this month to eliminate funding for Planned Parenthood clinics in his state. The result will be to sabotage the state’s Medicaid Women’s Health Program, which provides cancer screenings, wellness care and other medical services – including contraception – for more than 130,000 low-income women each year. Staunch anti-abortion groups, such as Life Dynamics and its president, Texan Mark Crutcher, have tried to tie Planned Parenthood to efforts to “kill black babies” rather than provide health care to black women and others.
To me, the attacks on “religious freedom” seem to be code words for attacks on women’s rights for all sorts of medical care. Certainly contraception is not just a “women’s issue.” How many teenage boys (or males of any age, for that matter) hope they will hit the parental jackpot every time they have sex? Avoiding sexually transmitted diseases is important to both partners. Helping women detect and treat breast or ovarian cancer should be important to anyone who has a mother, a sister, a wife or a daughter – not just to the woman herself.
The Attack on Obamacare
First, let me address the term “Obamacare.” It is meant to be a disparaging remark about all things bad about Obama’s healthcare proposal. Specifically, many people object to the idea that “the government” is “forcing” people to have health care. If I were Obama’s campaign strategist, I would have urged him to embrace the term, arguing that yes, he DOES “care” about people’s welfare and that he has made their “care” one of his most important accomplishments.
The most-important aspect of Obama’s healthcare plan to me is that my son can continue under my health insurance plan until he reaches 26; he is 24 now and still looking for a “real” job with benefits. About 1.2 million young adults are affected by this part of the healthcare bill. The law closes the “doughnut hole” for seniors, which is the difference between the cost of prescription drugs and what seniors receive in Medicare benefits. (This benefit should be important to anyone with parents or grandparents.) According to a government website: “Beginning August 1, 2012, additional women’s preventive services that will be covered with no cost sharing in new health plans include well-woman visits, gestational diabetes, breastfeeding support, supplies and counseling, domestic violence screening, contraception and contraceptive counseling, HPV DNA testing, STI counseling, and HIV screening and counseling.” (This is the provision that sparked the House oversight hearings in the first place.) These and other provisions in the healthcare bill are clear examples of the government as “nurturing parent.”
What’s Next?
Listen closely to the debates in Washington, at the local level and in the media as we approach the 2012 presidential election. How are people framing the discussion of what our country should be like and which issues should be the most important for us to address? For example, when talking about the economy and jobs, are people speaking about “no new taxes” as the best means to spur the economy or “taxing the wealthiest 1 percent” to “pay their fair share”? When talking about healthcare, are people talking about “religious freedom” and “government meddling” or “women’s health” and “attacks on women”? When talking about global warming, are people talking about government regulations (e.g., whether to allow the Keystone XL pipeline to be built) as “killing jobs” or “creating jobs”?
Become wise consumers of information. Be prepared to vote. And most importantly, vote if you are eligible in November. Don’t assume someone else will make the right decisions for you.
