After I wrote about the politically driven decision by the Susan G. Komen for the Cure foundation to withdraw grant funding to Planned Parenthood for breast cancer screening, I then found this article on yahoo saying that the organization has reversed its decision. Komen issued a public statement saying "We want to apologize to the American public for recent decisions that cast doubt upon our commitment to our mission of saving women's lives". I am glad to see that in the information age, the people of this country, and the people of our communities came together and displayed a disagreement with the new policies set forth by the Komen foundation.
According to several web postings, including this one on lifenews.com, the Komen website was flooded with complaints regarding their initial decision and was even "hacked". According to the stories, the banner on the original website read "Help us get 26.2 or 13.1 miles closer to a world without breast cancer", but was changed by an unknown hacker to read "Help us run over poor women on our way to the bank.” I completely agree with this hacker's thought process. I understand the complexity regarding the issue of abortion, but this was definitely the wrong way to address it. Denying women with low income the ability to get screened for breast cancer is inhumane. If you read my first post regarding this matter, you would know that my stand on abortion is in the hands of the voters. If it is legal, then it is legal and there is nothing anyone can do about it, but if legislature is changed through the appropriate democratic processes, then Planned Parenthood would have to dismiss this procedure from it's list of services.
The biggest thing that bothers me with the issue of abortion is the people who are so firmly against it are completely unaffected by any person's decision to have an abortion. If I were going to spend my entire life fighting for something, it would be for something that betters my life or the future lives of my descendants. Abortions do not affect anyone other then the mother of the unborn child. The belief that unborn fetuses are alive and they should not be aborted is one of personal nature, it is not one that should be forced on everyone. If the reason one believes in this ideal is religion, then it can be easily compared to the basis this country was founded on; we all have the freedom to choose what we believe and no one has the right to force their beliefs on another, especially when the decisions made by one have no effect on others.
I am truly happy to see that this new global environment has exposed this issue and has forced this organization to honor its obligations and provide an opportunity for less fortunate people to receive the minimal, humane treatments that we all deserve. If you are against abortion, then you have to face the fact that in order to prevent it, you will need the majority of the population to agree with you. If more people disagree with you then those who agree, then you have to deal with it, this is a democracy, not a dictatorship.
I am so glad to hear that the decision was overturned. My mother had breast cancer a couple of years ago and she had on side removed. That was a very bad health time for her. She had two tumors on her brain and had surgery to have one removed and the other was clipped. This has caused some memory loss so it is difficult to talk to her about things from the past because she doesn't remember a lot of it. Thanks for the update. You just can't read about everything out there other wise you would never get anything accomplished.
ReplyDelete