Sandra Fluke’s SMU Visit is Next Week

Sandra Fluke will be at SMU on Sept. 25 for a talk about women’s health care. The free event begins at 6:30 p.m., in the Hughes-Trigg Student Center.

Fluke — the Limbaugh-targeted Georgetown law grad who advocated birth control coverage in the Affordable Care Act and made an appearance at the DNC — “is emerging as one of our most outspoken advocates for reproductive rights and women’s health issues,” SMU professor Beth Newman said in a press release.

“Our goal is not to stage a debate between adversaries who hurl worn-out sound bites at one another,” added Newman, who directs the university’s Women’s and Gender Studies program. “We want to offer students and the community an informed discussion about the relationship between reproductive rights and women’s health and how the conversation plays out in the media.”

By Georgia Fisher Sep. 18, 2012 | 3:20 pm | 22 Comments | Comments RSS
22 comments to "Sandra Fluke's SMU Visit is Next Week "
  1. Moe Skeedo @ September 19, 2012 at 9:18 am
    hopefully will be earning some money for speaking and start supporting some other 30 years olds that are still dependent on everyone else to care for them.

  2. Nfw @ September 19, 2012 at 10:42 am
    Have to say I don’t get this “issue” of “reproductive rights”. Have a baby or not, but can you make a decision based upon what YOU can afford to do? It’s not my job to pay for your “choice”. As a woman, I find Ms Fluke a whiner.

  3. A. B. @ September 19, 2012 at 11:30 am
    If Rush hadn’t called her a slut we wouldn’t have to endure her campus tour. Geez.

  4. Another Mother @ September 19, 2012 at 11:48 am
    Paying for “choice” is far cheaper than paying for more children on welfare or Medicaid. And there are lots of other “choices” we are already paying for.

  5. Bibliomaniac @ September 19, 2012 at 12:39 pm
    Insurance coverage of birth control is paid through premiums. Your premiums will contribute to someone’s contraceptives the same way you would contribute to costs of childbirth, or a smoker’s lung cancer or a man’s Viagra.

  6. Neighbor @ September 19, 2012 at 2:01 pm
    Paying for birth control is much, much cheaper than paying for a child. Birth control used to be a Republican issue with the fiscal conservatives believing birth control was better than supporting unplanned pregnancies and better than legal abortions (or the damage done by illegal abortions). Society wins when women and their partners can control their own reproductive rights.

  7. XT @ September 19, 2012 at 2:56 pm
    She had a lot of nerve getting herself called a slut, how dare she.

  8. NFW @ September 19, 2012 at 3:07 pm
    Can some one please explain how everyone’s “reproductive rights” are threatened? Abortion is legal, and there are numerous alterntives for birth control including, OMG, abstinence. Who’s not in control of their own ability to reproduce or, dare I say, not? Roe V Wade has been the law of the land for decades, and that genie isn’t going back in the bottle. If you choose to have sex, you have also chosen the possibilities that come with it.

  9. Another Mother @ September 19, 2012 at 3:18 pm
    NFW: Here’s some reading for you.

    http://www.raisingwomensvoices.net/storage/InGoodConscience2010.pdf

  10. Interested Reader @ September 19, 2012 at 4:10 pm
    Another Mother: Thank you for an intelligent response.

  11. XT @ September 19, 2012 at 4:43 pm
    Forgive me, but I’m not interested in the Catholic Church’s opinion on conscience. Back in the day, yes, but not anymore.

  12. Another Mother @ September 19, 2012 at 5:03 pm
    XT: There are tons more articles available that can outline the issues regarding reproductive rights. Here is one by NOW.
    http://www.now.org/issues/abortion/031704states.html

  13. Edward @ September 19, 2012 at 6:42 pm
    It’s actually kind of embarrassing to read the comments that expose people’s total ignorance of the issues that Miss Fluke was speaking about.

    I guess it goes to show that if you only get your news from Fox and Rush Limbaugh, you don’t really learn the truth.

    Today’s young women need to pay attention to Miss Fluke and others, and learn that the Roe v Wade and other battles that supposedly were fought and won decades ago by their grandmothers are apparently back up for discussion today.

    Several legislators (both state and national) are actively trying to make birth control illegal. Not just abortions, but actual, basic birth control. It’s not a fantasy folks. The same people who think a woman can’t get pregnant from a rape are legislating women’s rights away across the nation.

  14. NFW @ September 19, 2012 at 7:04 pm
    Another Mother, I appreciate your effort, but NOW is not an organization that represents the interests of ALL women–unless they have a liberal opinion. The Catholics for Choice organization is a pro-abortion group that supports its opinion by using the “conscience clause” to knock religious organizations for upholding their religious beliefs. Reproductive rights trump religious rights? Sorry, but no one is trampling on anyone’s reproductive rights here. Everyone has a plethora of birth control choices, and there is a never-ending number of places where you can fufill them. If Ms. Fluke is offended by the local church-funded hospital not offering what she wants, try Planned Parenthood.

  15. NFW @ September 19, 2012 at 7:09 pm
    Oh, and Edward, please site some actual instances where legislators are pushing to outlaw birth control. Unless they want women marching on the Capitol, that is completely ridiculous. We vote, and we vote big. The war on women is a crock.

  16. A Great grandmother @ September 19, 2012 at 7:44 pm
    @NT, if you actually read the article it is not about the Catholic Church’s opinion on anything.
    Edward, I am with you. These rights were supposedly won long ago. It’s quite sad really.

  17. UPDad @ September 19, 2012 at 11:52 pm
    Compare the number of responses to this post vs. all the other posts on the page combined, and you’ll see why Fluke (and Rush) and anyone else who wants to talk about anything close to this subject will have a long speaking career–whether they add anything of value or not.

  18. Peggy Noonan @ September 20, 2012 at 8:34 am
    “‘Republicans shut me out of a hearing on contraception,’ Ms. Fluke said. But why would anyone have included a Georgetown law student who never worked her way onto the national stage until she was plucked, by the left, as a personable victim?
    What a fabulously confident and ingenuous-seeming political narcissist Ms. Fluke is. She really does think—and her party apparently thinks—that in a spending crisis with trillions in debt and many in need, in a nation in existential doubt as to its standing and purpose, in a time when parents struggle to buy the good sneakers for the kids so they’re not embarrassed at school . . . that in that nation the great issue of the day, and the appropriate focus of our concern, is making other people pay for her birth-control pills. That’s not a stand, it’s a non sequitur. She is not, as Rush Limbaugh oafishly, bullyingly said, a slut. She is a ninny, a narcissist and a fool.”
    WSJ 9/7/12

  19. Bibliomaniac @ September 20, 2012 at 9:33 am
    @NFW. The proposed “Personhood” laws, which even Romney has said he supports, do not mention contraception but as written would outlaw forms that prevent implantation. That includes common birth control pills, which act to prevent ovulation, fertilization, and implantation.

  20. NFW @ September 20, 2012 at 10:43 am
    Bibliomaniac, it appears that Missouri is the only state with such a law on its books. Has the sale of birth control pills been halted there? I would think that the women rioting in the streets would have been covered by the media. Yes, laws are being considered in some states, but many have backed off (Virginia being one of the most recent to table theirs). If we are going to make the argument, let’s look at the state that actually has such a law. This notion that evil politicians want women barefoot and pregnant doesn’t fly. We have come a long way, baby, and, if politicians don’t fear us as a voting block, they still have to deal with the pharmaceutical lobby. The only one who is winning here is Ms Fluke, who now has her 15 minutes of fame due to a Rush
    Limbaugh rant.

  21. XT @ September 20, 2012 at 12:50 pm
    @Peggy Noonan
    Agreed, although your description of Ms. Fluke (ninny, narcissist) is also an apt description of Mr. Limbaugh.

  22. Another Mother @ September 20, 2012 at 1:53 pm
    NFW: Neither you nor I will be affected by any of this. However, more than 60 clinics have closed across Texas, 12 were run by Planned Parenthood. This leaves low-income women in rural areas of the state without access to contraception or health care. This isn’t just about birth control. It’s about women’s health. I believe the health and wellbeing of ALL of our women should be a top priority, and I commend those who fight for our rights.

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