Population: Church Vs. State.
Mary Racelis, The Missing Voices of Poor Women: “Of the 473,400 Filipino women per year estimated in 2000 to have undergone an abortion… statistics from 1,658 hospitals revealed that 105,000 women wound up in hospital beds from complications, mainly hemorrhaging and infections. An estimated 12 percent, or 12,600, died…. Research on the subject is taboo in official Catholic circles and viciously attacked by militant ‘pro-life’ groups. The conspiracy of silence triumphs again.”
Clara Rita Padilla, Catholicism and Reproductive Rights: “I challenge the bishops of the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) and other religious fundamentalists to go to the poorest communities in Tondo and interview the women there to see first-hand how having ten children impacts the health and lives of women and their families … I interviewed poor women who have borne the brunt of the restriction of access to family planning information, supplies and services due to the Atienza policy (EO 003 Series of 2000) and as a consequence had 3-10 children. The women were either outrightly denied access to family planning supplies and services or were denied access to information to effectively control their fertility.” (Related: Bishops told: get real, visit Tondo)
Fidel Ramos, GMA’s population policy lacks political will: “Studies here and elsewhere confirm the enduring link between family size and poverty… ‘rapid population growth was more likely to hinder than foster economic development.’… A recent ADB study shows only 23.8% of Filipinos families with 4 children are poor, compared with 48.7% of families with 7 children. The poverty gap and severity of deprivation in basic needs further worsen as family size increases. If population growth is so crucial to human development, why then has PGMA muddled population issues by her anachronistic policy of providing Government support only for natural methods? PGMA’s ambiguousness has put mothers’ lives and health, together with their babies, at risk for the sake of political expediency and religious traditionalism.”
Bonk!
Am now listening to Mary Roach’s newest book, Bonk: The Curious Coupling of Science and Sex. You can tell from my previous review of Roach’s first book that I am a slavering fan of her work; so far, book #3 does not disappoint.
For starters, I know now that female lubricating fluid is not glandular in nature, but has something to do with blood plasma; that Pyrex glass is very useful indeed in giving vaginas to women who had none, a condition called vaginal agenesis; and that Virginia Johnson’s son (she of Masters & Johnson fame) does not approve of semi-serious science writers sniffing around his mother’s work, particularly when his mother’s work involves a functioning sex machine with a camera attachment.
Listening to Roach’s work, as opposed to reading it, gives me the sensation that I’m a not-too-willing passenger on a thrill ride - I never know what new odd fact will come at me around the next blind turn, and I’ll both smile and cringe as it comes flying into my face. (Dr. Kinsey once stuck a toothbrush up his urethra… bristle end first! Aaaaah, too much information!)
If you see a guy on the train with white earbuds, alternately chuckling and wincing, maybe both at the same time, that’ll be me.
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