RH Reality Check, one of the best reproductive rights blogs out there, has a fantastic, hilarious and sad piece written by Amanda Marcotte who also writes for Pandagon. The piece is on how easy it would be for anti-choice activists to take their anti-abortion messages and adapt them to another topic - like menstruation. I have a feeling this stems from the school in Grahamsville New York that has started questioning students about tampons. The school has a "no bags" policy and when one student was "caught" carrying a small purse, a security guard pulled her out of class to ask her if she had her period. He then told her that only girls on their periods were allowed to carry bags. I know if I were a teenage girl, I would be thrilled at having every single person on the school know my cycle.But, back to the RH Reality Check piece. The story starts by acknowledging that one of the tactics the right uses to denounce abortion is that it is "icky". Images of aborted fetuses (real images, not the fake ones they use) are probably something most people aren't prepared to see. But you know what? We're also not ready to see what the inside of our colon looks like or watch a big piece of fat flap get sucked up in liposuction. Surgery, blog, fat, guts - they're all icky. It's just convenient that anti-choicers get to use this as a way of convincing women not to have the procedure. I've seen reconstructive knee surgery and it was pretty revolting. However, if my knee needed to be reconstructed, I wouldn't think twice about it.Here's an excerpt from the article - check out there entire piece here.

To cover up the anti-woman bent of the anti-menstruation campaign, ban advocates would cultivate an army of soft-spoken good Christian women who want to ban menstruation for women's own good. To bolster their claims that menstruation hurts women, they would point to the instances of toxic shock syndrome, menstrual cramps, and anemia, all while ignoring that the proposed alternatives of non-stop pregnancy or mandatory hysterectomies run higher risks. Leslee Unruh of the Abstinence Clearinghouse could go on TV to accuse Big Cotton of duping women into menstruating to maximize their profits. Republican candidates for President would scramble to cover up any campaign donations received from Tampax or Kotex.