Your Opinion: Control issues and contraception

Dear Editor:

It is difficult to know where to begin to refute the comments one hears, not just from Rush Limbaugh, but from the entire Christian right and their pandering, opportunist candidates. Bottom line: far from leading to irresponsible behavior, sex education and contraception have proven vastly more effective in obviating unwanted pregnancies than ignorance and brimstone preaching.

Do Republicans really want us to return to the postwar, halcyon time of Beaver Cleaver where women loved, honored and above all obeyed?

I am a child of those days and am still repelled by the memory of the unquestioning worship of irrational authority, the nearly insane pursuit of material wealth and the terrible sexual repression, that infected everyone. For most Americans it seemed the best of times; for anyone with eyes to see, it was the worst of times.

I still remember those bad old days when abortion was illegal. A few women of means could secure an extralegal "procedure" performed discreetly and safely, sometimes even by the family physician.

All others, the young, the unwed and the poor were in a different boat. Often their situation was made extremely dangerous, even fatal, at the hands of the now clichéd coat-hanger butchers. I nursed a few dear friends through the results of just such back-alley abortions.

This argument over who controls women's bodies goes back to the ancient attempt of higher-primate tribal males to own and command their wives and daughters.

A deep hatred of female power is at the heart of most of the proscriptions of the Koran, the Old and New Testament and all worship of a male deity with obvious potency issues.

If God blamed The Woman for the fall of Man how can His servant be expected to treat his wife, mother, sister, daughter with respect?

Those opposed to women's health care services are in the deep grip of these grim fairy tales. They are reacting to primal fears surrounding their own sexuality and the terrible realization that women have finally escaped the reproductive bondage of a misogynistic God.

By 2050 we will reach nine billion souls. If we cannot control our reproduction by whatever means, we will overreach the carrying capacity of the planet. I assure you no one, believer or non-believer alike, will be ready for the consequences of that.

Our only real sin now is not enough conception prevention and carrying too many fetuses to term.

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