That Time My Baby Was Assaulted with $21

This morning, Omaha Atheists joined some others at our local Planned Parenthood clinic to counter their anti-choice protesters.  

We knew we'd encounter some shitty behavior from them, but I still wasn't expecting my 16 week old baby to be assaulted.

It was mid-morning, so it was kinda cold out.  My girlfriend, Rosalyn had the baby in her jacket.  It was zipped up, and he was in the wrap low enough to make her look pregnant.  We noticed several of the protesters trying to figure out if the bump was a real baby or a fetus.

Later in the day, it had warmed up and she had removed the jacket, making the baby quite visible.  It was after this that a woman in a red hat approached her.  This woman had been attempting to give balloons with "Pro-Life" propaganda to the children there.  After my girlfriend politely refused her offer of balloons, she said that she had looked in her purse for her and shoved a wad of cash into my girlfriend's shirt.  When this happened, it was very clear to her that a baby was there.

That money, $21, was immediately walked over the Planned Parenthood staff as a donation.  Thanks for the donation, anti-choice people!

I later explained to her that she had assaulted a baby and the problem with shoving germ filled money in the face of a preemie.  Her response was to not say a word and walk away.

Later, I was explaining what had happened to some of the red hat lady's fellow protesters.  Their response was, "Well, then call the cops."  I don't think she appreciated how close that was to happening and how lucky she was that it didn't.

Earlier, the people pictured above, were having a prayer circle.  So I took that photo to document the hypocrisy.  The guy looking at the camera was attempting to photobomb with a wave.  After having read the sign pictured.  They are oblivious to their hypocrisy and brazen about not caring.

A while later, my step-son got curious about the prayer circle.

Unfortunately, he didn't make it out of the circle without being given a small crucifix.  The cross was promptly returned to the group with a request to not hand our children things.  The man acknowledged me by saying "thank you" for me returning the cross.  He never really acknowledged that he'd done anything wrong or apologized.

This became more apparent later when they were leaving and he attempted to hand a quarter to our oldest as they walked by him.  I yelled at him to stop trying to hand things to my kids, so he took a few more steps and handed it to the girl instead.  After being chastised by multiple atheists for involving the kids, a different guy said "sorry" a few times and then they all disappeared.

I get that they do shitty things.  I even get that they have no qualms about involving children.  Ultimately, I'm not even that surprised that they were all okay with assaulting a fucking baby.  And that lack of surprise says all that needs to be said about the morality of these people.

I'll leave you with this sample of how Omaha Atheists behaved during the same event.

Some Questions For So-Called "Pro-Life" People

Today, the Facebook page Bigot Vanquisher has posed a few questions^[1] on the issue of abortion that I think are worth sharing.

For those who are 'against' pregnancy termination, would you answer the following questions please?

1) If a woman accidentally gets pregnant (because she is a stupid whore, obviously) do you think she should be forced to carry the pregnancy? How far would you be willing to go to make sure she carried the pregnancy to term?

2) If abortion was illegal and a woman got an alley-abortion and managed not to die, but got caught, what should her punishment be?

3) Would you rather a young woman had access to an early pregnancy termination, or put her newborn baby in a dumpster or toilet?

I have some of my own to add.

1. How much of a tax increase would you be willing to accept to provide the universal healthcare for pregnant women to keep them healthy enough to prevent the complications that are the reason for most late-term abortions?


2. How much of a tax increase would you be willing to accept to provide for the care of the children who would have otherwise been aborted?


3. Have you lobbied your legislative representation to make those changes happen?


4. If against your taxes going up for programs that would reduce abortions, how do you justify calling yourself "Pro-Life".


5. Have you ever lobbied to have our military budget cut?


6. If you support our military spending, how do you reconcile that with calling yourself "Pro-Life"?

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1.  http://www.facebook.com/BigotVanquisher/posts/593778917316295

Zack Kopplin Gets It

When you see a stand you know needs to be taken, you have two options.  You can wait and hope someone does something.  Or you can do something yourself.  The first option is by far the easier one.  Doing something yourself is much harder, but it's also what gets results.

I would much rather not have to fight with religious people.  My preference would be to not counter protest anti-choice people^[1].  I would rather not constantly fight for science to be taught in science class instead of Creationism.  It's exhausting.

But the alternative is letting them win.  The alternative is giving (more) power to people like Rick Santorum & Pat Robertson.  The alternative is letting terrible laws like the Louisiana Science Education Act stand.

Zack Kopplin chose to do something about it.  However, that wasn't his first choice.

No one was more surprised of his becoming a science advocate than Kopplin himself. In fact, after writing his English paper in 2008 — when he was just 14-years-old — he assumed that someone else would publicly take on the law. But no one did.

Now the law has a chance to be repealed, thanks in large part to Kopplin's efforts.  Like other young atheist activists, he stood up for what was right.  And like the others, Christians have tried to vilify him for it.

His efforts, needless to say, have not gone unnoticed — particularly by his opponents. He's been called the Anti-Christ, a stooge of "godless liberal college professors," and was even accused of causing Hurricane Katrina. Kopplin cooly brushes these incidents aside, saying they're just silly distractions.

They are indeed silly distractions.  It's meant to distract from the real issue, their blatant violations of the Constitution.  It's meant to intimidate us into silence.  Good for Kopplin for recognizing this and keeping up the good fight.

Unfortunately, Texas might need even more of a fight.

(Found via @rdfrs)

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1.  They call themselves "Pro-Life", but we all know that's a canard, so I call them what they really are.  Anti-choice.

Pro Life Kills

On Gawker today:

A 31-year-old woman admitted to a hospital in Galway, Ireland, late last month with severe back pain was revealed to be miscarrying, but doctors repeatedly refused to abort the fetus.

Savita Halappanavar, who was 17 weeks pregnant at the time, eventually developed a life-threatening infection to which she succumbed a week later.

People who call themselves "Pro Life" often claim they respect the sanctity of human life.  I call bullshit.

I am someone who personally opposes the practice of abortion.  I hate that it exists, and I hate that it is sometimes (while still rarely) used as a backup birth control.  But I'm not so selfish as to attempt to force my personal opinion on other people's bodies.  And I don't have my head so far up my as that I would let a woman die because I dislike a procedure that would save her life.

The very least that should happen is these doctors immediately losing their licenses to practice medicine.  Although, manslaughter is an appropriate word to use here.

(Found via Recovering From Religion-Tucson, Arizona)