Stand Up For Women's Health

Here are a few of the stories we’ve been paying attention to:

Mississippi:

• The vote on the Mississippi personhood amendment is tomorrow! The NY Times wrote an editorial against it: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/31/opinion/mississippis-ambiguous-personhood-amendment.html?_r=1
  
• As did a number of other places: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/sarika-bansal/-zygote-personhood_b_1066313.html?ref=politics
• NPR had a feature on the people behind the amendment: http://www.npr.org/2011/11/02/141900772/miss-set-to-vote-on-measure-making-fetus-a-person
• And Live Action tried, and failed, to do a “Sting” leading up to the vote: http://www.salon.com/2011/11/02/personhood_pastor_amendment_would_ban_the_pill/singleton/
• Even Mississippi Governor Barbour is concerned about the amendment: http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-503544_162-20129224-503544/haley-barbour-concerned-about-mississippi-anti-abortion-amendment/
• And Sarah Brown asks “why personhood and not pregnancy prevention?” http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/guest-voices/post/why-personhood-rather-than-pregnancy-prevention/2011/11/03/gIQAoqWPjM_blog.html
• Mother Jones points out that even conservatives are balking at this law: http://motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2011/11/abortion-law-even-conservatives-balk
• Including religious leaders: http://leadercall.com/top-news/x459217130/-Personhood-prop-divides-Miss-religious-leaders
•  And John Huntsman: http://loyalopposition.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/11/07/eggs-arent-people/

New York:

• We had an op ed in El Diario about how sex ed is an opportunity for parents to talk with their children about sex: http://www.impre.com/eldiariony/opinion/columnistas/2011/10/30/no-hay-que-tenerle-miedo-a-la—279869-1.html
  
• Which also ran in English on the Huffington Post: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/haydee-morales/dont-be-spooked-by-sex-ed_b_1071792.html
  
• Jill Stanek, of Pro-Life blogs, found our old list of pro-choice Halloween costumes and is shocked by it: http://www.prolifeblogs.com/articles/aggregator.php?entry=1126864
  
• Staten Islanders weigh in on marriage equality: http://www.silive.com/news/index.ssf/2011/11/archbishop_timothy_dolan_issue.html
  
• There’s a pro-sex ed letter to the editor in the Daily News: http://www.nydailynews.com/opinion/readers-sound-occupy-wall-street-sex-education-substitute-teachers-pay-article-1.972219?localLinksEnabled=false&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+nydnrss%2Fopinions+%28Opinions%29
  
• The Takeaway on WNYC does a show on a new sex ed book: http://www.thetakeaway.org/2011/nov/01/not-under-my-roof-parents-teens-and-sex-21st-century/
  
• The NYC DOE runs an awesome Huffington Post op ed on what’s actually being taught in sex ed: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/natalie-ravitz/new-york-sex-education_b_1063734.html
  
• And here’s an NPR show on the same subject: http://www.npr.org/2011/11/01/141908773/whats-actually-taught-in-sex-ed-class
  
• RH Reality Check says Lila Rose’s attack on sex ed is an attack on LGBT, Planned Parenthood, and women: http://www.rhrealitycheck.org/article/2011/10/26/the-war-on-sex-ed-targets-planned-parenthood-women-and-homosexuals
  
• And Feminists for Choice runs a pro-sex ed blog post: http://feministsforchoice.com/sex-in-the-city.htm?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=sex-in-the-city

Political/GOP:

• GOP presidential candidate Herman Cain accused Planned Parenthood of genocide: http://www.bet.com/news/politics/2011/10/31/planned-parenthood-refutes-herman-cain-s-comments-about-abortion-clinics.html
• Which was easily refuted: http://jezebel.com/5854740/planned-parenthood-herman-cain-he-has-no-idea-what-hes-talking-about
• By a number of people: http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/fact-checker/post/herman-cains-rewriting-of-birth-control-history/2011/10/31/gIQAr53uaM_blog.html
• And a number of sources: http://www.ibtimes.com/articles/241531/20111101/bashing-planned-parenthood-herman-cain-gets-facts.htm
• Though now the allegations have fallen off the media radar anyway because of the numerous sexual harassment accusations that have been made against Cain: http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1111/67755.html
• Apparently he has (allegedly) had a pattern of sexual harassment behavior: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/05/us/politics/cain-accuser-tells-of-harassment-pattern-lawyer-attests.html?_r=1&ref=politics
• Meanwhile, back in Washington, Congress has been holding a hearing on the HHS ruling on birth control: http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/ezra-klein/post/congress-picks-up-birth-control-battle/2011/11/01/gIQANd6QdM_blog.html
• Because religious groups want an exception: http://www.npr.org/blogs/health/2011/11/02/141949921/religious-groups-want-relief-from-birth-control-mandate
• Which the NY Times editorial board says is going too far: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/06/opinion/sunday/a-new-battle-over-contraception.html?_r=1&ref=opinion

National News:

• Must-Read: Jill Lepore has a huge article on the politics and history of Planned Parenthood (subscription required): http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2011/11/14/111114fa_fact_lepore
  
• As mentioned earlier, for Halloween, Planned Parenthood released a fun statement on safe (Vampire) sex that got a lot of pickup: http://www.latimes.com/health/boostershots/la-heb-vampires-sex-health-20111031,0,4268015.story
• There have been several recent studies on negative side effects of the pill: http://jezebel.com/5855025/does-the-pill-make-sex-terrible
• Here’s a great piece on how to talk about awkward subjects with your OBGYN: http://blisstree.com/live/sex/sex-reed-how-to-talk-about-awkward-stuff-with-your-obgyn-222/
• The men behind the war on women: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/11/01/the-men-behind-the-war-on_n_1069406.html
• The Nation runs a piece on online feminism: http://www.thenation.com/article/164338/you-are-now-now-future-online-feminism
• Nick Kristoff argues that birth control will help bring the world out of poverty: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/03/opinion/kristof-the-birth-control-solution.html?_r=1&hp
• Here’s a personal essay by a conservative woman who became a Planned Parenthood supporter: http://www.5280.com/magazine/2011/11/searching-help
• The Boston Globe did a retrospective on “Our Bodies, Ourselves” http://www.bostonglobe.com/opinion/2011/11/05/our-bodies-right-knowledge/RmajQuXWvCgvEbjpBIulQO/story.html
• NY Magazine has an oral history of Ms. Magazine: http://nymag.com/news/features/ms-magazine-2011-11/

That’s all we’ve got. What have you been reading?