I don’t know why some people have columns

I think I wrote about this guy once before, and surprise, surprise the topic was misogyny. Ross Douthat has yet another inexplicable opt-ed in the New York Times, you know that liberal rag, yes, yes, that liberal rag. He’s very excited one study corroborates what he’s known all along, being a father of a daughter makes you a republican…my father would disagree, but we’re always being difficult.

So the study was cited by Pew, so it is good, factually speaking, “Study: Having daughters makes parents more likely to be Republican.” Back in 2006, this was not the case. I want to get this out of the way first. The Pew piece notes people may lean toward “conservative” values because they want more morally restrictive values…not the phrasing they used.

Douthat notes the war on women language that was thrown around. I read the Pew article, and skimmed the actual study, I got bored when I couldn’t find the n’s, what I like n’s. See they are using a rather dated survey, and without the n’s or the years they are pulling the data from, we don’t know who their sample was, but I digress. Regardless, Pew and the authors note that people might be drawn to perceived conservative values such as sexual purity, etc.

Douthat brings that home, “You can love your daughters, want the best for them, and find yourself drawn to…conservative ideas! Especially if you’re highly educated, which is where the effect was strongest! Better dust off a different set of talking points—maybe something about the family as the source of all oppression and how deeply international patriarchal norms make parents subconsciously inclines to tyrannize their female offspring and then we can argue about that.”

Well, he’s right at the end, except I don’t think they are subconscious, I think they are social norms that value female purity above all things. Oh, structural oppression and self-policing. It is as if Douthat wants to reference Foucault, but doesn’t know how. Oppression is a cycle that reinforces itself. So our parents give us ideas about gender roles, and then we employ those roles, which impacts society and policy, which impacts the parental ideas and ideals about gender roles, and so on FOREVER. Of course, all of this is dependent on perspective such as race, class, sexual orientation (Douthat’s argument is framed in the heteronormative, and presumably upper class and white).

Douthat then invokes a fictional character as to why a parent might lean conservative. I haven’t read the book, it is on my reading list, so maybe next year. Regardless, the character, Nathanial P, from Adelle Waldman’s The Love Affairs of Nathaniel P., he’s not the guy you want for your daughter; he isn’t a bad guy, but he is a toxic bachelor. The quote Douthat uses from Waldman about the character is, “Contrary to what these women seem to think he was not indifferent to their unhappiness. And yet seemed, in spite of himself, to provoke it.”

Nathaniel P sounds like someone who would annoy the hell out of me, and like most of the men I’ve dated. But I don’t think a fictional character should send fathers running to the Republicans because sex and marriage no longer walk hand in hand. Then Douthat notes that women are miserable because work and education…which fits in his argument if you know you want to raise Daisy Buchanan’s daughter, “I hope she’ll be a fool. That’s the best thing a girl can be in this world, a beautiful little fool.” Preach Daisy. Hey, Douthat opened up the literary references. Be glad I’m not dropping Emerson.  Douthat concludes with daughters provide an insight sons do not specifically that if marriage is the goal and as only something men can instigate women must using sex as a form of currency, though Douthat obviously doesn’t say that. I have to wonder if he realizes that is the argument he is making for his daughters.An argument some would say sounds a hella lot like prostitution, but there he goes with the unintentional Foucault references (sex even in marriage as a form of domestic work).

See my father is a feminist of sorts, he’s completely pro-life (anti-capital punishment etc), which I’ve mentioned before, but he wouldn’t risk my mother’s life for a baby either so there is that. I also know my dad doesn’t want to know who I’m sleeping with. We never talk about it and never will. That said, my father is a big supporter of my sisters and me. We can do anything and everything. He doesn’t know anymore who is a better parent, smarter, funnier, etc. As a collective we’re pretty damn awesome. My father also doesn’t care if I ever get married. He wants me to put my career and education first. My father and I have discussed the possibility of me not marrying. He knows my stance, and more importantly I know his. My father doesn’t believe in divorce, so marriage is permanent, end of story.

So let’s take a step back and think about how that study sample might matter. If the sample has young children, then purity and perceived safety might top the list of important things, but if the daughters are older than health choices and equal pay should top that list. The later top the list for my father. He doesn’t want me or my sisters to be dependent on someone else. My father’s concern isn’t just with our happiness, which Douthat seems to be preoccupied with. My father wants us to be capable and independent, and yes he wants us to be happy, but that comes a little later on the list. Happiness is great, but it isn’t necessary for survival and thriving.

Spousal Consent

Sometimes I worry I spend too much time thinking about issues that seem to only be the concerns of women.  According to PEW, there is quite the gender gap on certain election issues. These are issues that women find very important (percentage point difference): abortion (W+18), health care (W+14), education (W+10), and jobs (W+8). The chart is below. I find it pretty interesting there is such a margin on jobs as well; the other areas a generally perceived as women’s issues. Of course, anyone who would read this recognizes that “women’s issues” are everyone’s issues.

Naturally, we’ll talk abortion today. The National Pro-Life Alliance (NPLA) isn’t as recognizable as some of our favorite anti-choicers like National Right to Life, the Susan B. Anthony List, and Personhood USA (with a name like that who could leave them off?). Robin Marty did a write up for RH Reality Check on the NPLA funding and a survey they are passing around, which I’m going to summarize and then discuss the theoretical issues surrounding one of the survey questions.

Open Secrets, the website for the Center for Responsive Politics, claims NPLA received less than $15,000 from individual donors giving more than $200 in 2010. Most of these funds are then sent out to anti-choice candidates for federal office and political action groups. Yes, federal office. I have a pro-life friend (universal pro-life so we don’t just drink and scream at each other) who told me once that the “pro-life” movement are pretty convinced they will never overturn Roe v. Wade so instead they are focusing on the state leave enter personhood and the like. This organization appears to be focusing on a combination of state level and national scale. Neither is good but it does provide for some insight. A list of candidates getting funds from this group can be found here. Look! One from Ohio.

Marty and John Celock (a reporting covering Kansas for the Huffington Post) think NPLA is laying the ground work for something more than funding. Celock discovered a sample NPLA questionnaire that was sent to candidates in order for the candidates to receive an endorsement. Questions included:

• Will you vote to bar the distribution of ‘home abortion kids’ like RU-486?
• Do you support a 24-hour ‘cooling off period?’
• Will you support legislation giving spouses the right to be notified and [to] intervene before an abortion is performed on the couple’s baby?

These questions came off a 2008 survey as part of the pre-primary presidential candidate questionnaire. All Dems ignored the survey. A few Republicans did respond, supporting every measure on the list. Sam Brownback (the Governor of Kansas) is on record with NPLA as saying he would support a spousal-consent law. Marty looked on the group’s website and saw most of the issues raised by the questionnaire featured on their website including RU-486, parental notifications, etc. However, spousal consent is missing. Marty contacted them asking if they are focusing on spousal notification nationally or just in Kansas. No one was available to comment.

All this poses the question: Will there be a spousal consent law in the works for states in 2013? And what are the ramifications of such a measure?

So I actually don’t know if there will be one. My assumption is yes, they’ll try this out in Kansas and then on a state by state basis, if they are smart. They’ll be the ALEC of reproductive policies for states to implement. Copies of poorly designed mass market reproductive right limiting policies will be passed along from Republican to Republican.

So there are a few intellectual issues that spousal consent raises aside from the infringement of women’s reproductive freedom all these bans and personhood bring up: 1. And the legality to discuss medical procedures of adults with others, 2. Infantilization of women, 3. Property rights,  and 4. Rights of the father. It is worth noting that a measure like this would have no concern for the life of the pregnant woman because a policy like this would open women up to violence at the hands of their husbands for seeking an abortion behind their husbands’ backs. Reproductive freedom is frequently a tool used by abusers. Also, we have to assume that consent is not merely a notification.

1. I actually have no idea how this works in a legal framework. However, we’re not allowed to release medical information concerning an individual without their consent except in emergency situations. That was covered in HIPPA training (dusting my shoulders off on that one seeing how I rarely work with clients directly). So I have to wonder why women’s privacy regarding healthcare doesn’t count. I’m guess we’re supposed to see women as not protected by HIPPA regulation in this context? So problematic. What about women’s right to privacy over medical procedures? More so, will women have the right to confidentiality if they have already had an abortion? Do common spouses count or partners in civil unions? That being said, I’m not qualified to discuss this at length.
2. The infantilzation of women is a reproductive issue raised whenever the state decides women can’t be trusted. However, spousal consent takes that to a new degree. Women would be required to seek consent from a husband before a medical procedure. Women are unable to make decisions for themselves regarding their own bodies, but men can. So what if the woman doesn’t want an abortion, but her husband does? Does her husband have the right to make her get one? Or does this only work when women want the procedure? I can’t imagine the law would be written in such a discriminatory way as to preserve the husband’s right to dictate medical procedures only when she is seeking an abortion. But if the husband’s decision only stands when he is anti-choice? How is that going to work? What about the commandeering of a woman’s body forcing her to carry a baby to term? What about if the life of the mother is in danger, but that medical information hasn’t been released to the husband? Will all medical information be released? What about IPV situations where pregnancy is a form of control exercised by an abusive partner? My questions have no limit. I could go on for days. All these questions aside, the infantilization of women comes back to women not being able to make their own decisions based in some fallacy that we lack the capacity, but our husbands can make these decisions for us. Which leads us to…
3. Property rights. Why would I bring this up? Because marriage is an exchange of property at least the way it has been traditionally framed (traditional marriage!). A spousal consent law brings that back. A woman’s body is her husband’s property, and thus he can make decisions about her reproductive health. This is seriously disturbing. This would open up marriage rape cases on top of abortion. After all if a wife’s body belongs to her husband then he wouldn’t be able to sexually assault her. This opens up so many questions too; do wives have the right to change their bodies without husband consent like tattoos, etc? Can husbands put demands on wives such as exercise, sex, diet?
4. Rights of the father. Honestly, a spousal consent doesn’t make a lot of sense for all these reasons and so many more, but even on the anti-choice side. Many people get pregnant without being married; do the fathers in those cases have rights? The underlying assumptions about spousal consent revolve around marriage and monogamy as defaults. If paternity can be established does that man have rights over the woman’s body? Unlike marriage, there is no binding contract in place, but the fetus is half his DNA. Does he have a right to it baby machine be damned? Enter rape cases, do rapist have the right to control the bodies of their victims if their magic vaginas don’t perform the god sanctioned abortion? (Too cynical?) I am always torn on discussions of the rights of the father because I like men, generally. But my affection for them doesn’t mean I want one, even the one I’m partnering with to have control over my body.

Spousal consent is a pretty complicated issue, and one that might arise in the next few years. I wish everything thinks reproductive issues all the way through instead of just the simplistic terms we’re so used to seeing during the campaigns.