Letter to a Young Activist: Don't Drop the Banner!

[Vogon_Glory]

1. The Abortion Controversy Is A Working, Successful Right-Wing Trap

At the risk of offending feminists and abortion-rights activists alike, I'd like to point out that the abortion-rights controversy has proven to be a successful, working political strategy that has mousetrapped progressives and benefitted the Radical Right.

Let me explain. The REAL issue here has ALWAYS been reproductive rights as a whole and access to contraceptives. It's a shell game with the Radical Right focusing the marks' eyes on the abortion shell while they pocket the pea of contraceptive access. Radical Right political activists have framed this issue as being about abortion. They have successfully used abortion as their bloody red shirt and as a tool to rally their troops, recruit politicians, and bamboozle the rest of the electorate--and both abortion-rights activists and other people interested in womens' health HAVE LET THEM.

Abortion rights activists and people interested in womens' health in general should stop playing the Radical Right's game and start framing the discussion around access to womens' health. And with the Radical Right successfully gutting funding for womens' clinics around the country, progressives have an issue.