…that the Pill was developed in no small part by a Catholic?

Read Malcolm Gladwell, here:

Today, the Pill is still often sold in dial packs and taken in twenty-eight-day cycles. It remains, in other words, a drug shaped by the dictates of the Catholic Church–by John Rock’s desire to make this new method of birth control seem as natural as possible. This was John Rock’s error. He was consumed by the idea of the natural. But what he thought was natural wasn’t so natural after all, and the Pill he ushered into the world turned out to be something other than what he thought it was. In John Rock’s mind the dictates of religion and the principles of science got mixed up, and only now are we beginning to untangle them.

A book by misogynists? By women-hating, anti-science cretins?

No. A book by feminist Barbara Seaman, who wanted to draw attention to the negatives of the Pill. Because she favoured–wait for it–full information for women. Because she knew that women died in the testing of the Pill and instead of discontinuing trials, they pushed on. Because she knew the history of the development of the Pill, which had little to do with women’s empowerment (read Malcolm Gladwell’s essay on this if you can get your hands on it, fascinating stuff).

Information is power. And if three Ottawa doctors have more information than the rest and the chutzpah to withstand attacks in explaining their views, then more power to them.

I will likely be discussing this on Monday morning on AM1310 News in Ottawa. Yet to be confirmed. They’d like someone from Planned Parenthood and/or the Radical Handmaids on. I would like that too.

“This” is a story about how three Ottawa family docs, one of whom I know personally, do not prescribe the birth control pill. They tell their patients this up front, in a letter. The Ottawa Citizen article linked to above strongly implies this is anti-woman and anti-science. But is it?

Here’s some stuff I’ve written:

About the Pill and cancer

About the Pill and other side effects

About the Pill and hypocrisy in Pink Ribbon campaigns

Finally, when we did a “roundtable” about the Pill with the PWPL team, here’s what we got. This included non-religious folks and people of different faiths.

Those are my views, passionately and publicly held, on the Pill. My points that I would like to see addressed are that a) the Pill has negative health repercussions that women are not told b) big Pharma has a vested interest in ensuring we are not told said negative effects and c) there are other, more female friendly ways of doing birth control, again, that we are not told.

I believe there ought to be a lot of common ground with those who are concerned about women’s rights being eroded here. Let the discussion begin.

I look up to Stephanie Gray. If you watch this talk she gave recently in DC, you will too.

Stephanie is tireless, tireless, tireless. I recall once telling her this here whole abortion problem is getting me down. I got a talking to, in a good way, along the lines of bucking up. She’s been doing this for years and she simply gets better at it. When she debates, the only response her opponents have is to leave, whimpering, with their tails between their legs.

It is very, very good to witness someone doing their God-given calling.

I forwarded this talk to someone who said this: “She is in a class with the best speakers I have ever heard, Churchill, Reagan, Billy Graham included. Makes you feel there is hope after all.”

It does make you feel that there could be hope after all.

You’ll recall Wendy Davis. She became a pro-choice superstar in Texas when she filibustered a bill to stop abortions after 20 weeks. Twenty weeks. These are the abortions that are only done in terribly terrible difficult, extenuating circumstances, or, according to the pro-choice Guttmacher, for 70 percent of them, when you don’t realize you’re pregnant.

She painted herself as a woman who had lived a hard life, a single mom–very compelling. Really feeds into the idea that pro-choicers actually support choice. (Which is easier than publicly supporting dismemberment.)

Turns out the reality is different:

That came back to bite her Jan. 20, when the Morning News found Davis had “blurred” key facts of her biography. Among them: She only spent a few months in a mobile home, after separating from her first husband, and she was 21, not 19, when they divorced. The report also said that her second husband, Jeff Davis, cashed in his 401(k) to help fund her education and cared for her children while she was in law school. He told the Morning News it was “ironic” that Davis left him the day after he paid off her Harvard loan in 2003. Also thrown into the mix were revelations that initial divorce filings including an allegation of infidelity (although the final decree did not) and that Davis had ceded custody of her daughter after the divorce.

A good post from National Campus Life Network to better acquaint you with the Morgentaler decision. We mourn this anniversary today.

The lovely Véronique, her husband Paul, and all the rest! What a cool family. And what an honour to know such a cool family. I remember when Véronique contacted me shortly after this blog started. We met for coffee and the rest is history.

A follow up on an earlier story. Touching. I note that tiny, two-year-old Christian has a Tennessee accent. Cute.

[youtube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OtJ9_-WOXik]

When I saw an email in my inbox, asking me to promote the March for Life, I assumed it was for the Canadian March for Life, which made me think, hey Canadian pro-lifers, you are on your game! Advertising so early, since our march is in May. However, turns out it’s an ad for the US March for Life, which is tomorrow. So I post it now, almost too late, and yet standing in firm solidarity with everyone who wants to see life prevail, regardless of where they live.

[youtube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RiHxlJUdSI8]

Comedian Jim Gaffigan, author of “Dad is fat” with David Letterman. Not a new segment, but funny. Gaffigan has five kids, raises them in a two-bedroom apartment in New York City and apparently the book title is the first sentence his son ever wrote.

What’s funny is that in his circles, five kids is a lot. In my circles, it’s roughly the median.

[youtube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t5X95Z6YHsY]

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Faye adds: My husband and I listened to “My Dad is Fat” this weekend as we traveled. Great book. We laughed a lot. There’s much for the pro-lifer in particular to appreciate.