I will make a solid effort to keep this from becoming a full on rant but if it slips into that please forgive me. At this point, the issue is no longer abortion or reproductive rights. The nation that we live in is trying to take a giant step to the right--the right wing. Now, I've posted about here the whole post-racial thing. We are slipping off the effing cliff here people. Rich people are claiming that the rest of the population is waging class warfare. All while they are trying to bust unions, suppress the vote and show general disdain and disrespect for the Office of the President, in large part because it is occupied by a man of color.
In the midst of all of that, Republicans turned an employment issue into a religious issue while trying to do the very same thing they accused the President of--forcing his political will on the masses. So, you have a hearing on Capitol Hill about contraception and you don't allow anyone with a uterus and a brain to speak? Really? So, Catholic institutions shouldn't have to pay for contraception? Seventh-Day Adventists have to offer patients meat and Jehovah's Witnesses can not exclude blood transfusions from covered medical expenses. Some institutions were already covering it under their respective policies, most Catholics use it anyway and quietly stand against the Church's policy. 
To further throw salt in the gender wound, enter stage left the state of Virginia. Let me pause here to say that this especially hits me close because that is the state I have entrusted my daughter to. Please don't make me come the hell down there. They wanted to require every woman seeking an abortion to to take a trans-vaginal ultrasound. This is the tool they use to perform them. As a woman that has had one in the past, let me remove all doubt--THEY ARE INVASIVE. Not the kind ot "tool" you want in your vajayjay. I had several of these during my pregnancies and the tool coupled with positioning is very invasive. I am still trying to figure out the ultra-conservative right can be against birth control, abortion and single mothers all at the same time. If you allow women access to birth control it reduces the likelihood that they will need abortions or become single parents. It took me a minute to reason that out so what can't the Republican presidential field? The saddest part of this entire shift away from reproductive rights is the fact that it only further marginalizes people who were marginalized to begin with. Thank you to every legislator--with cahones and without--that have stood up to protect women across the nation.
As a woman, you need to be figuring out how to get in this fight before it isn't a fight anymore. Back in the day we used to say "Protect Ya Neck" now it's "Protect ya Womb. Scary.
