I am hopeful that as the old guard party line and single issue voters die off, we may have a chance to improve things.
Process, Ethics, and Justice: An Inauspicious Note Regarding the Politics of Rape Culture
- Thread starter Tiassa
- Start date
I am hopeful that as the old guard party line and single issue voters die off, we may have a chance to improve things.
#dueprocess | #rapeculture
One thing we might consider while sorting through the horrifying report from Reuters↱ regarding the state of due process in questions of sexual harassment is the general lack of surprise, which in turn further erodes pretenses to the other, such as simplistic notions about how harassment victims should simply go to the police postulated as if, say, one's mother was somehow not smart enough to figure that part out for herself.
News headlines of late have focused on sexual harassment accusations against movie mogul Harvey Weinstein, former Today show anchor Matt Lauer, former U.S. Senator Al Franken and other media figures, entertainers and politicians. In each case, the accusers say they waited years to confront the men who accosted them, most of them too ashamed or fearful to complain publicly or persuaded to keep quiet by tactics meant to suppress the truth.
But these three plaintiffs, and many like them, chose to confront their alleged abusers and hold the companies they work for accountable in public court. Rather than opening the incidents to full public scrutiny, however, judges let companies push the legal boundaries of what should be considered confidential and to keep details of abusive behavior secret.
A Reuters review of federal court cases filed between 2006 and 2016 revealed hundreds containing sexual harassment allegations where companies used common civil litigation tactics to keep potentially damning information under wraps. Plaintiffs in some cases say companies sought to conceal internal documents that reveal similar harassment claims, as well as corporate policies that favored abusers over victims ....
.... The true number of such cases is likely much greater than the hundreds identified by Reuters. Federal courts categorize sexual harassment within a larger group of gender discrimination claims, which makes a full accounting difficult. In addition, many sexual harassment cases are filed in state courts. Reuters focused its review on the federal courts because records are more accessible and consistent.
As a result of the sealed documents, cases that could shine light on specific abusers, or on toxic corporate cultures, do the opposite: They enable the very secrecy and corporate complicity that allow sexual harassment to persist in the workplace.
But these three plaintiffs, and many like them, chose to confront their alleged abusers and hold the companies they work for accountable in public court. Rather than opening the incidents to full public scrutiny, however, judges let companies push the legal boundaries of what should be considered confidential and to keep details of abusive behavior secret.
A Reuters review of federal court cases filed between 2006 and 2016 revealed hundreds containing sexual harassment allegations where companies used common civil litigation tactics to keep potentially damning information under wraps. Plaintiffs in some cases say companies sought to conceal internal documents that reveal similar harassment claims, as well as corporate policies that favored abusers over victims ....
.... The true number of such cases is likely much greater than the hundreds identified by Reuters. Federal courts categorize sexual harassment within a larger group of gender discrimination claims, which makes a full accounting difficult. In addition, many sexual harassment cases are filed in state courts. Reuters focused its review on the federal courts because records are more accessible and consistent.
As a result of the sealed documents, cases that could shine light on specific abusers, or on toxic corporate cultures, do the opposite: They enable the very secrecy and corporate complicity that allow sexual harassment to persist in the workplace.
Former federal judge Shira Scheindlin, for instance, does not protest the inquiry but explains the price of shielding relevant human-resources complaints and processes from the record, that "you get the serial abuser just doing it at the next job. If that record had been available, there would have been no next job."
Federal District Judge Charles Breyer told Reuters courts seal too much information in too many cases: "It's hard to see why their private interests to avoid embarrassment trumps the public's right to have access to litigation."
Many judges, meanwhile, are reluctant to enforce transparency when neither side has requested it, according to several current and former federal judges.
“I don’t think any judge is presumptively hostile to the idea of disclosure,” Breyer said. “We may be presumptively hostile to doing more work. I’m speaking for myself.”
“I don’t think any judge is presumptively hostile to the idea of disclosure,” Breyer said. “We may be presumptively hostile to doing more work. I’m speaking for myself.”
Pretrial secrecy also favors institutions and abusers in civil cases settling without trial, and Goldman-Sachs strikes a strange posture in ongoing litigation, trying to "keep hundreds of documents under wraps for three years" ostensibly in order to protect the confidentiality of claimants.
Much of the article is comprised of various examples and explanations. While the awful details might in and of themselves make for some manner of news, there really isn't anything surprising about the idea that various institutional systems, including law enforcement and the judiciary, operate in ways that protect, preserve, and even cultivate rape culture.
The institutional barriers to justice in questions of sexual violence are neither new nor unfamiliar↗. Screeching about how sexual violence survivors should behave is one thing; having a clue about what that involves is, as such, actually rather quite important.
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Notes:
Levine, Dan, Benjamin Lesser and Renee Dudley. "Courthouse Confidential: How the courts help companies keep sexual misconduct under cover". Reuters. 10 January 2018. http://reut.rs/2DkALBN
there are a few details that haven't been addressed yet. it's the opposite, iceaura's position is that the odious methods are reason and reality, therefore not odious at all and in the reverse an uncompomising stance (on this issue such as bell's stance) is the odious one. this is because there is an underlying beef that it was too harsh (consequences) relative to actions (misconduct) according to their perceptions.
what hasn't been said is that iceaura's position on this matter and is the discrepancy isn't a liberal view (as is the ruse) but he actually leans moderately republican and libertarian on the issue but doesn't represent their votes as he implies. this is because the handling of the sexual harassment issue according to him is not the winning point for either type of voters nor do they care unless they stand out from republicans so they have some reason to notice. and some actually have because of that uncompromising stance on this issue. if they would be won over on this issue or change votes, it would be the uncompromising one (for some, especially women) or other issues. not that they are the only votes that would turn the tide or make a difference but as far as his argument on that aspect, it's erroneous. what iceaura doesn't state is that some women especially who were moderately republican have been swung on this issue due to the way the democrats have handled it and have decided to vote democrat coming mid-term.
so if his major point is public perception in light of gaining votes, this issue and especially his stance makes no difference to the voting public, except perhaps male liberal voters such as electricfetus but they would still vote for their party regardless, because of the majority positions of the democratic party on many other issues as well as what it represents.
the only valid point he actually makes is the shooting yourself in the foot or punishing members of your party (valid) with any mudslinging the right can come up with since they won't be playing by the same rules. but there are other considerations such as public perception, reputation and voters influenced on that account. the major point of contention is the lifetime appointments when more republicans (through lack of moral scruples) win seats which is the real problem.
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This would be where the insistence upon a fair and impartial (and preferably non-partisan) investigation would stem from - if the person is found guilty then they can recommend a course of action and follow through with it.
Of course, there is something to be said that, with the entrance of Sherrif Arpaio to the Congressional race, the GOP now has four candidates running that are convicted criminals, three of which are seemingly proud of it.
https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/joe-arpaio-2018-election_us_5a563b5ae4b03417e8743168
Bells
Staff member
Still dodging.
What faction? And still dodging.
They can shut down clinics, delay or deny permits for clinics to open, etc.
I mean, it's not rocket science EF.
Oh gee, I don't know EF. How do you think shutting down or not allowing an essential service to women's health in the zone or State or town or city harm women?
I mean, people might as well vote for a Republican, since they hold the same ideology. In other words, they would be getting the same deal.
Except if you are a woman in those counties or States, in which case, the issue remains the same for them.
For you? No. For women, it's still a loss of their fundamental human rights either way.
Are you being deliberately obtuse? Or does this level of stupidity come naturally?
How do you think women could be damaged if they are unable to access essential healthcare, EF? I mean, I know it's asking a lot from you, but just try to think about it a bit.
Universal healthcare and higher taxes on the rich will mean diddly squat if they are unable to access essential reproductive health services, which affects them economically. At what point are you and your little buddies here going to start to understand that access to reproductive health services is an economics issue for women?
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/25/opinion/why-abortion-is-an-progressive-economic-issue.html
http://www.huffingtonpost.com.au/en...an-economic-issue_us_58f8d11be4b018a9ce58dd4f
https://theconversation.com/how-lim...control-and-abortions-hurts-the-economy-57546
I think most people with even 2 functioning brain cells are able to understand and define sexual harassment and sexual assault, EF. Why can't you?
I have linked it multiple times. You keep demanding it again and again. Frankly, this is trolling and if you do it again, I will treat you like a troll.
Seriously? How many times do we have to go through this?
Stop trolling.
Because instead of running pro-choice candidates that can guarantee and ensure essential access to reproductive health care on a State and local level, then the Democrats are selling out women by running pro-life candidates. It is that simple.
This is a human rights issue. And those "few pro-life Democrats" would continue to endanger the lives of women and girls as much as the Republicans are and would. If the Democrats can't even run candidates that will ensure the fundamental human rights of half the population on a local level, then really, why should women vote for them? Because the rich would get tax? Okay! Woopdie doo! Too bad the Democrats like you still fail to understand that access to reproductive health services is also a deeply economic issue for women and the greater community. Yay, the rich get taxed! Too bad those women can't access essential health care services because the Democrats have chosen to run pro-life candidates locally just to win. It's all about bums in seats for you and screw everyone else, particularly women and their human rights.
Strawman. Trolling.
Yo, troll..
Want to know what happens when pro-life shut down clinics and deny reproductive healthcare?
The rate of Texas women who died from complications related to pregnancy doubled from 2010 to 2014, a new study has found, for an estimated maternal mortality rate that is unmatched in any other state and the rest of the developed world.
The finding comes from a report, appearing in the September issue of the journal Obstetrics and Gynecology, that the maternal mortality rate in the United States increased between 2000 and 2014, even while the rest of the world succeeded in reducing its rate. Excluding California, where maternal mortality declined, and Texas, where it surged, the estimated number of maternal deaths per 100,000 births rose to 23.8 in 2014 from 18.8 in 2000 – or about 27%.
But the report singled out Texas for special concern, saying the doubling of mortality rates in a two-year period was hard to explain “in the absence of war, natural disaster, or severe economic upheaval”.
From 2000 to the end of 2010, Texas’s estimated maternal mortality rate hovered between 17.7 and 18.6 per 100,000 births. But after 2010, that rate had leaped to 33 deaths per 100,000, and in 2014 it was 35.8. Between 2010 and 2014, more than 600 women died for reasons related to their pregnancies.
No other state saw a comparable increase.
In the wake of the report, reproductive health advocates are blaming the increase on Republican-led budget cuts that decimated the ranks of Texas’s reproductive healthcare clinics. In 2011, just as the spike began, the Texas state legislature cut $73.6 m from the state’s family planning budget of $111.5m. The two-thirds cut forced more than 80 family planning clinics to shut down across the state. The remaining clinics managed to provide services – such as low-cost or free birth control, cancer screenings and well-woman exams – to only half as many women as before.
At the same time, Texas eliminated all Planned Parenthood clinics – whether or not they provided abortion services – from the state program that provides poor women with preventive healthcare. Previously, Planned Parenthood clinics in Texas offered cancer screenings and contraception to more than 130,000 women.
[..]
Texas is one of several southern states where health officials say there is a risk of a local outbreak. But about half the state lacks ready access to OB-GYN care, making it difficult for women to obtain contraception or for pregnant women to confirm the health of their babies. Just this month, Texas’s health department drewfire for allocating $1.6m of the $18m the state budgets for low-income women’s family planning to an anti-abortion group that does not provide basic health services.
The finding comes from a report, appearing in the September issue of the journal Obstetrics and Gynecology, that the maternal mortality rate in the United States increased between 2000 and 2014, even while the rest of the world succeeded in reducing its rate. Excluding California, where maternal mortality declined, and Texas, where it surged, the estimated number of maternal deaths per 100,000 births rose to 23.8 in 2014 from 18.8 in 2000 – or about 27%.
But the report singled out Texas for special concern, saying the doubling of mortality rates in a two-year period was hard to explain “in the absence of war, natural disaster, or severe economic upheaval”.
From 2000 to the end of 2010, Texas’s estimated maternal mortality rate hovered between 17.7 and 18.6 per 100,000 births. But after 2010, that rate had leaped to 33 deaths per 100,000, and in 2014 it was 35.8. Between 2010 and 2014, more than 600 women died for reasons related to their pregnancies.
No other state saw a comparable increase.
In the wake of the report, reproductive health advocates are blaming the increase on Republican-led budget cuts that decimated the ranks of Texas’s reproductive healthcare clinics. In 2011, just as the spike began, the Texas state legislature cut $73.6 m from the state’s family planning budget of $111.5m. The two-thirds cut forced more than 80 family planning clinics to shut down across the state. The remaining clinics managed to provide services – such as low-cost or free birth control, cancer screenings and well-woman exams – to only half as many women as before.
At the same time, Texas eliminated all Planned Parenthood clinics – whether or not they provided abortion services – from the state program that provides poor women with preventive healthcare. Previously, Planned Parenthood clinics in Texas offered cancer screenings and contraception to more than 130,000 women.
[..]
Texas is one of several southern states where health officials say there is a risk of a local outbreak. But about half the state lacks ready access to OB-GYN care, making it difficult for women to obtain contraception or for pregnant women to confirm the health of their babies. Just this month, Texas’s health department drewfire for allocating $1.6m of the $18m the state budgets for low-income women’s family planning to an anti-abortion group that does not provide basic health services.
How is that for "buzzwords and highlight reels"?
I see you are still flicking that trolleycart switch on women's rights, Kitta..
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Well, I agree it's reality (a quick perusal of the news demonstrates this) but doesn't mean they are reasonable - just that they are the norm. (Unfortunately.) Which is why liberals may be faced with the choice of winning or being reasonable.
One thing that I am confused about - why does it have to be mutually exclusive?
We know already that Republicans will do whatever it takes to win, and then make obscene and absurd legislative choices once in office (such as blowing up the deficit to provide tax breaks for some of the wealthiest and most profitable corporations in the nation).
What if Democrats fought to win, and then did the reasonable stuff when they are in power and in a position to actually do so?
After all, we can say with a good margin of safety that putting more of the GOP in office isn't going to help victims any... but then, it seems, some would rather just complain about things rather than discuss actual steps to make a difference. All or nothing, and so far the nothing is winning.
what steps? unless your a politician or have some power, what major steps can you take? i mean, taken literally, all of these things are fixable, even completely, but they aren't always because there are other obstructions and impediments in the way such as 'people' and their unwilligness to do so or change their behavior or ethics or policies or greed or whatever it is.
all of it can be changed and it's not impossible.
What, we're back to this? That's even more than eight and a half months ago. We're back to the discussions leading to eight and a half months ago.
Question: is there an abortion clinic in nowhere nebraska? Generally zoning is not even set by the Mayor either.
See this is a the problem with you, you have no fucking clue beyond your single voter issue, of which your not even a single voter issue voter because your not a voter, your watching this from countries away and armchair lecturing us!
Pro-lifer is just a tiny part of republican policy, to keep the rest of republican policy, the pro-military warmachine, tax the poor, fuck everyone that not rich, fuck immigrants, cuddle homophobes and racist and tradcons, out of the government is worth a few pro-life democrats that will do nothing in the way of that policy, heck it is worth a president that gets blowjobs from interns, heck it is even worth Hillary Clintons Machiavellian corporatist triangulating baby stepping.
How? pro-life democrats are not going to do anything with there prolife ideology so long as democrats control the government. Let me put it to you in a different way, let the women in these states vote, because unlike you most women don't give a fuck, or rather care more about healthcare cost in general than abortion.
Once again a handful of pro-life democrats is not going to strip women of essential healthcare access! All of this is based on your fallacious slippery slope, you clearly don't have a clue how american government works, it is just a vote getting tactic, nothing more!
But they don't win in red districts. And once again I rather have a pro-life democrat come out of a red district then a pro-life republicans, for all the reason I have laid out before.
Your links provide no evidence for your your conclusion. I'm telling you that a few pro-life democrats are not going to vote in pro-life policy or stand in the way of a general pro-choice party bill, it is nothing more then an ingratiating tactic for them to say they have common values with the voters of these districts, who would like free healthcare and education but because they are bible thumping morons have to vote for the pro-life candidate because 'god doth commands it'. They are sort of like you: rather die for their narrow minded ideology then think rationally.
Consider 47% of women vote against us in the last election, voted for a moronic narcissistic pig boar, you are wrong. Sorry to tell you this Bells, but women are not hive mind clones of you, they have a variety of opinions and concerns, and abortion is not that big of a priority on average, in fact a plurality of women are against it, and in some places those women are a majority of voters and they vote specifically on that one issue, I know, I have met them.
and those women will have access to reproductive health services so long as democrats control the government in general, some red-county out in rural nowhere filled with both men AND WOMEN that think abortion is evil, not withstanding.
What a hysterical slippery slope! Once again a few pro-life democrats are not going to strip women of human rights, and yes help for the poor and middle class overall is worthwhile.
No that is an ethical question: would you flip the switch?
Nonsense. They have the majority of the voters on their side, the polled center of public opinion, and the rightwing is fucking up in public again. Very badly.
Even Clinton won a majority of the votes - the single least liked Democratic candidate available, with a rightwing authoritarian track record, after taking the bad side (or more accurately, in her case, not taking the good side) of every major issue for thirty years.
The current political environment is a gimme - it took W five years to get to where Trump has found himself in less than one, and the Republicans had built themselves much better out tunnels and lifeboats by that time (Tea Party! New! Grassroots!). This is a dumpster fire, and a lot of them are trapped in it.
The current media environment, of course, is a problem. Different story there.
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Aye, and it would take a simple consensus - agree to vote, not based on party affiliation, but rather an ability to get things done. Agree to set aside petty differences and push for fixes to a system that is so broken as to leave the most vulnerable of our own citizens behind. Agree to sit down at the table and talk like rational adults, rather than finding reasons to be insulted at perceived slights that don't even exist...
Except, repeatedly, we as a nation show an almost uncanny inability, or perhaps, unwillingness, to do this.
Bells
Staff member
There are abortion clinics in Nebraska and in Omaha. Now imagine what would happen if the Democrats endorsed pro-life candidates who then shut down those clinics?
And you still fail to recognise how abortion is a very important issue for a large portion of voters?
You think 'pro-lifer' is just a tiny part of the Republican Party policy? Heh!
Access to reproductive healthcare is a vital part of "healthcare" for women, EF. When those clinics close, so do cancer screening, access to affordable contraception, for example. If you still don't understand how access to reproductive healthcare is a deeply economic issue for women, then really, it comes down to you simply refusing to acknowledge it.
How can you promise that? You can't know that. We know how pro-life politicians affect healthcare access for women. You are essentially making an empty promise at this point, with nothing to back it up.
Access to reproductive healthcare should not be ummed and aahhed by the Democrats. This should be an absolute baseline policy that is not shifted from for the sake of politics. The same goes for education, healthcare, civil rights, equal rights, the environment, LGBTQ rights, voting rights, for example. These are not things that the Party should be leaving open to ambiguity and misinterpretation or even contemplating running candidates that are counter to these core values. These should be absolute and not up for debate.
And yet, we find that women's rights, at least, is up for debate for Democrats and this isn't just locally. But nationally as well.
Imagine if Democrats, sick and tired of losing white votes in Mississippi, decided to nominate a segregationist for governor. Imagine if they found that LGBTQ rights turn off voters in Tennessee, so they ran one of those anti-same-sex-marriage Christian bakers. Imagine if they found that plenty of Oklahoma voters didn’t believe in climate change, so they ran a denialist. After all, why get hung up on one item in the long list of good things we all support when the important thing is getting back into power? Everyone has to take one for the team sometimes, right?
Don’t worry, Nation readers. These scenarios aren’t about to happen. Only women are expected to let history roll backwards over them. Only women’s rights to contraception and abortion are perpetually debatable, postponable, side-trackable, while those who insist on upholding the party platform—and the Constitution—are dismissed as rigid ideologues with a “litmus test.” Party leaders can’t come right out and say so—in fact, Democratic National Committee chair Tom Perez has issued a statementdeclaring that abortion rights are non-negotiable. But if you pay attention, you can feel the waters are being tested. House minority leader Nancy Pelosi told The Washington Post, “This is not a rubber-stamp party.” Why else would Perez meet with Democrats for Life? And why did so many pay such close attention to Heath Mello, a former state legislator in Nebraska with a long record of anti-abortion votes, who ran for mayor of Omaha with the approval of both Bernie Sanders, and, initially, Perez? Maybe they hadn’t done their due diligence and didn’t know, or maybe it was a test: Can we win in red states if we run anti-abortion candidates?
After Mello lost, some blamed meddling out-of-state pro-choicers and the national media for making his many anti-abortion votes in the State Legislature a high-profile issue, despite the fact that his opponent was a reasonably popular Republican incumbent. So then why did the takeaway become “Ooh, look at those mean pro-choicers messing with our candidate” and not “Well, I guess being anti-choice isn’t such a vote-getter after all, and the price in nationwide opposition is too high to pay”? See above: because the issue concerns women’s rights. Amazingly, it is still an open question whether a woman is a person or a human bassinet.
Now comes Joshua Svaty, who is running in Kansas’s Democratic gubernatorial primary. Svaty, who served most recently as the state secretary of agriculture and EPA adviser, has a long anti-choice record from his years in the State Legislature (2003–9). He voted for no less than 11 anti-abortion bills, including one that declares the “unborn child” a person from the moment of conception, and a rather confusingly worded measure, vetoed by then-Governor Kathleen Sebelius, that would have allowed a woman’s husband, parent, or guardian to sue the clinic to prevent her from getting an abortion or receive damages if one had been performed. Never mind what the woman wanted; her pregnancy belongs to her family.
[..]
What tends to get forgotten by those who push for the Democratic Party to run anti-abortion candidates is that the party base is pro-choice. That is who votes in primaries, and that is who knocks on doors and makes phone calls and gets out the vote on Election Day. An anti-abortion Dem might steal some votes from the Republican candidate, but at the cost of losing the most ardent Democrats—who happen to be women. “If you’re a Dem or unaffiliated pro-choice voter, you’re going to sit on your hands on Election Day,” says Julie Burkhart, the founder and CEO of Trust Women Foundation, a reproductive rights organization that owns and operates clinics in Wichita and Oklahoma City. “People are Democrats for a reason.” There’s a pro-choicer running in the primary, Carl Brewer, former mayor of Wichita. Sounds like he knows that.
Don’t worry, Nation readers. These scenarios aren’t about to happen. Only women are expected to let history roll backwards over them. Only women’s rights to contraception and abortion are perpetually debatable, postponable, side-trackable, while those who insist on upholding the party platform—and the Constitution—are dismissed as rigid ideologues with a “litmus test.” Party leaders can’t come right out and say so—in fact, Democratic National Committee chair Tom Perez has issued a statementdeclaring that abortion rights are non-negotiable. But if you pay attention, you can feel the waters are being tested. House minority leader Nancy Pelosi told The Washington Post, “This is not a rubber-stamp party.” Why else would Perez meet with Democrats for Life? And why did so many pay such close attention to Heath Mello, a former state legislator in Nebraska with a long record of anti-abortion votes, who ran for mayor of Omaha with the approval of both Bernie Sanders, and, initially, Perez? Maybe they hadn’t done their due diligence and didn’t know, or maybe it was a test: Can we win in red states if we run anti-abortion candidates?
After Mello lost, some blamed meddling out-of-state pro-choicers and the national media for making his many anti-abortion votes in the State Legislature a high-profile issue, despite the fact that his opponent was a reasonably popular Republican incumbent. So then why did the takeaway become “Ooh, look at those mean pro-choicers messing with our candidate” and not “Well, I guess being anti-choice isn’t such a vote-getter after all, and the price in nationwide opposition is too high to pay”? See above: because the issue concerns women’s rights. Amazingly, it is still an open question whether a woman is a person or a human bassinet.
Now comes Joshua Svaty, who is running in Kansas’s Democratic gubernatorial primary. Svaty, who served most recently as the state secretary of agriculture and EPA adviser, has a long anti-choice record from his years in the State Legislature (2003–9). He voted for no less than 11 anti-abortion bills, including one that declares the “unborn child” a person from the moment of conception, and a rather confusingly worded measure, vetoed by then-Governor Kathleen Sebelius, that would have allowed a woman’s husband, parent, or guardian to sue the clinic to prevent her from getting an abortion or receive damages if one had been performed. Never mind what the woman wanted; her pregnancy belongs to her family.
[..]
What tends to get forgotten by those who push for the Democratic Party to run anti-abortion candidates is that the party base is pro-choice. That is who votes in primaries, and that is who knocks on doors and makes phone calls and gets out the vote on Election Day. An anti-abortion Dem might steal some votes from the Republican candidate, but at the cost of losing the most ardent Democrats—who happen to be women. “If you’re a Dem or unaffiliated pro-choice voter, you’re going to sit on your hands on Election Day,” says Julie Burkhart, the founder and CEO of Trust Women Foundation, a reproductive rights organization that owns and operates clinics in Wichita and Oklahoma City. “People are Democrats for a reason.” There’s a pro-choicer running in the primary, Carl Brewer, former mayor of Wichita. Sounds like he knows that.
This is not a winning strategy.
Nor is it an acceptable one.
And yet, they do win in those districts.
The conventional wisdom is that you need to be anti-choice to win in Kansas, where the “pro-life” movement has long been extremely militant. But is that true? According to a 2016 poll, 30 percent of Kansans want to ban abortion completely, which is much higher than the national average; 30 percent want it to be legal; and 38 percent said they wouldn’t choose abortion for themselves but that the government shouldn’t prevent women from making their own decision. Over half said they would be less likely to vote for a candidate who wanted to defund Planned Parenthood, which Brownback tried to do before being blocked by the courts; 32 percent said they would be more likely to vote for such a candidate. Indeed, in 2016, even as Trump carried the state by 56.2 percent, Kansas Democrats elected 17 new members to the State Legislature, most of them pro-choice.
Remember, too, that Sebelius was a popular pro-choice governor until 2009, not so long ago. Her predecessor, Bill Graves, a Republican, was pro-choice as well. True, back in the 1990s, Democratic Governor Joan Finney was anti-choice, but Finney pretty much left abortion alone. Svaty is different. Like Mello, he was a hard-core extremist during his time as a legislator.
Remember, too, that Sebelius was a popular pro-choice governor until 2009, not so long ago. Her predecessor, Bill Graves, a Republican, was pro-choice as well. True, back in the 1990s, Democratic Governor Joan Finney was anti-choice, but Finney pretty much left abortion alone. Svaty is different. Like Mello, he was a hard-core extremist during his time as a legislator.
Stop the willingness to gamble away women's lives for the sake of politics.
Bells
Staff member
Really, you missed the part about how lack of access to reproductive healthcare, including abortion, is dangerous to women's health?
Your pro-life candidates have a history of voting for denying women their fundamental human rights.
I mean, I get why you think that the fundamental human rights of women is a "narrow minded ideology", but if this keeps up, then you will be no better than the GOP. Your base, the majority of whom are women, will simply not vote for you.
You need to start remembering that you can't win without women. And until you recognise that access to reproductive healthcare is a fundamental human rights issue, as well as an economic issue and a healthcare issue and also affects access to things like education and housing, not to mention employment, you will lose those core Democratic voters. And if you start to embrace running pro-life hardliners like you have started to do in the last year since the last election, you can kiss any chance of controlling any house of Government goodbye, because your voting base will stay home.
No, they aren't hive minds. But if you want to risk losing your core Democratic voters, your actual base, for the sake of trying to win back a few Republican voters, then you will continue to lose.
You have no way of guaranteeing that if the party itself is leaving itself open on a national level. And the last year has seen a shift on a national level.
Those "few pro-life Democrats" have the capacity to vote against women's rights on a national level, EF. These Democrats are voting to defund Planned Parenthood in Congress. Now imagine if the Democrats manage to win back Congress with a minutely small margin. Those pro-life Democrats have a history of voting against women's rights. Now imagine what happens when they vote against the party (they have in the past on abortion issues and access to reproductive healthcare), or they vote with Republicans who push legislation to defund PP or implement an abortion ban (they have already voted for these in the past).
You don't think it will happen? It's already happening now. You have at least 3 US Democratic senators who have voted against party policy in regards to women's access to reproductive healthcare. And at least 3 in the House of Representatives.
Now imagine if you hold a lead of 2-3 seats in the Senate. Or in the House of Representatives. Or worse, imagine if the Democrats continue to put forward candidates who are pro-life (which they have been, because apparently the party is a "big tent"). Women's fundamental human rights should not be up for debate. And the more the Democrats start swinging right on this, the more likely you will alienate your base.
The chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, Ben Ray Luján, said in an interview this week that his party intended to support candidates who can win, regardless of their position on abortion rights.
There will be no abortion "litmus test" in the Democrats' drive to win back the House, he said. His comments echoed earlier ones from Nancy Pelosi, Charles Schumer and Bernie Sanders.
That's not just an insult to the women (and men) who make up the Democrats' base. It's a fool's errand.
Much of the left has learned all the wrong lessons from Hillary Clinton's defeat. They could focus on increasing turnout among their base -- women and African-Americans -- but Democrats have instead taken a rhetorical page from both Donald Trump's sexism and Bernie Sanders's populism by trying to appeal to disaffected white guys.
This pivot to the right on women's health is particularly insidious, reflecting an anti-feminist backlash across the political spectrum.
Democrats may say they are trying to field the most competitive team of candidates they can to win a majority in Congress, and in some districts that candidate might be anti-abortion. But this treads a dangerous path: ceding to demands that the entire political system cater to the perceived values of a group that largely stopped voting for Democrats in the 1960s, when the party pushed the Civil Rights Act and equal rights for women.
[..]
It's not just "economic anxiety" the party is trying to transform into votes. Funding candidates who oppose legal abortion contradicts any claim that Democrats are the party of the masses, let alone the ignored and underserved.
Women are more than half the population, and one in three of us will have an abortion in her lifetime, according to a 2011 study from the Guttmacher Institute. Nearly every American will have a friend, lover, colleague, girlfriend, sister, boss, wife or mother who has had an abortion, even if they never know it.
[..]
Supporting laws that give the state the power to compel women to continue pregnancies is misogynist and illiberal. Expecting Democratic politicians to stake out clear ground on abortion rights is not a "purity test" or a difference in opinion on policy or efficacy, like divergent views on the best ways to reduce inequality or suggesting we should repair the ACA before promoting a single-payer system.
It's a basic question of human rights: Are women sovereign citizens in our own bodies? If your answer is no, the Democratic Party shouldn't fund your campaign.
It's disturbing to see the United States' ostensibly progressive party so quickly abandon both its own most loyal voters and progressive ideals, all in a frenzied grab for the same Trump supporters who have dominated sympathetic media coverage of the election. It's also a losing strategy.
[..]
What is obvious, though, is that abortion rights are an animating issue for the Democratic Party base, and support for abortion rights gets a whole lot of women marching, donating money, and volunteering for Democrats.
The party has a lot to lose by alienating them in a dodgy gamble to scoop up Trump voters, where a "win" apparently means building the ranks of the party by adding more people who are hostile to women's rights. Clearly, we have enough of those guys already.
There will be no abortion "litmus test" in the Democrats' drive to win back the House, he said. His comments echoed earlier ones from Nancy Pelosi, Charles Schumer and Bernie Sanders.
That's not just an insult to the women (and men) who make up the Democrats' base. It's a fool's errand.
Much of the left has learned all the wrong lessons from Hillary Clinton's defeat. They could focus on increasing turnout among their base -- women and African-Americans -- but Democrats have instead taken a rhetorical page from both Donald Trump's sexism and Bernie Sanders's populism by trying to appeal to disaffected white guys.
This pivot to the right on women's health is particularly insidious, reflecting an anti-feminist backlash across the political spectrum.
Democrats may say they are trying to field the most competitive team of candidates they can to win a majority in Congress, and in some districts that candidate might be anti-abortion. But this treads a dangerous path: ceding to demands that the entire political system cater to the perceived values of a group that largely stopped voting for Democrats in the 1960s, when the party pushed the Civil Rights Act and equal rights for women.
[..]
It's not just "economic anxiety" the party is trying to transform into votes. Funding candidates who oppose legal abortion contradicts any claim that Democrats are the party of the masses, let alone the ignored and underserved.
Women are more than half the population, and one in three of us will have an abortion in her lifetime, according to a 2011 study from the Guttmacher Institute. Nearly every American will have a friend, lover, colleague, girlfriend, sister, boss, wife or mother who has had an abortion, even if they never know it.
[..]
Supporting laws that give the state the power to compel women to continue pregnancies is misogynist and illiberal. Expecting Democratic politicians to stake out clear ground on abortion rights is not a "purity test" or a difference in opinion on policy or efficacy, like divergent views on the best ways to reduce inequality or suggesting we should repair the ACA before promoting a single-payer system.
It's a basic question of human rights: Are women sovereign citizens in our own bodies? If your answer is no, the Democratic Party shouldn't fund your campaign.
It's disturbing to see the United States' ostensibly progressive party so quickly abandon both its own most loyal voters and progressive ideals, all in a frenzied grab for the same Trump supporters who have dominated sympathetic media coverage of the election. It's also a losing strategy.
[..]
What is obvious, though, is that abortion rights are an animating issue for the Democratic Party base, and support for abortion rights gets a whole lot of women marching, donating money, and volunteering for Democrats.
The party has a lot to lose by alienating them in a dodgy gamble to scoop up Trump voters, where a "win" apparently means building the ranks of the party by adding more people who are hostile to women's rights. Clearly, we have enough of those guys already.
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Good point. but it's not that they will turn and vote republican, the problem is they won't vote at all, which is just as defeating.
Bells
Staff member
Exactly. One of the articles I linked above touches on this.
What tends to get forgotten by those who push for the Democratic Party to run anti-abortion candidates is that the party base is pro-choice. That is who votes in primaries, and that is who knocks on doors and makes phone calls and gets out the vote on Election Day. An anti-abortion Dem might steal some votes from the Republican candidate, but at the cost of losing the most ardent Democrats—who happen to be women. “If you’re a Dem or unaffiliated pro-choice voter, you’re going to sit on your hands on Election Day,” says Julie Burkhart, the founder and CEO of Trust Women Foundation, a reproductive rights organization that owns and operates clinics in Wichita and Oklahoma City.
When you have progressives on the national stage, umming and ahhing about access to reproductive healthcare, they do so at the risk of losing their base, who will stay home and "sit on their hands"..
Eh, the right wing has been fucking up for years. Doesn't matter. Trump assaults women? He just says they are lying. The GOP cripples Obamacare? They just blame any resulting problems on Obama. And people believe them.
That's true. But what many people don't realize is that average voters are watching the dumpster fire and thinking "that's not so bad; it's fun and it keeps me warm. And I don't have to face any uncomfortable truths as long as everyone spends all their time talking about that fire."
Because we live in a sort of sports paradigm here in the US. There are two teams; one wins, one loses. If "your" team loses you are sad; if they win, you celebrate, drink a lot and are happy (despite anything else going on in your life) for a while. It's a quick dopamine hit, and to get that hit you'll put up with almost anything.
Now THAT is an excellent question. Imagine if Clinton had referred to Trump as "Rapist Trump" at every opportunity, spent all her time slandering him (i.e. abandon the "when they go low, we go high" approach) and won the election by beating him at his own game - then pivoted back to a her usual centrism. Would the benefit of such a presidency outweigh the damage done by such a campaign? I don't know. In hindsight almost anything would be better than what we have now, but that might not always be true.
Well, of course. And there are a lot of EF's out there who would rather whine and bitch than make any substantive contribution. Easier to just blame others for such failures. I am reminded of the Naderbots who spent years telling Nader supporters "I hope you're happy" after Gore lost in 2000.
lol. that is so stupid.
Welcome to America, where the candidates are lame and the votes don't matter
