Dear White Dudes:
Yeah, I'm talking to you, old white dudes. January 25, 2012 - Photo by Joe Raedle/Getty Images North America
For the past few weeks, my mom kept calling me, all riled up mainly about you, old white dudes. She found you painful during the Republican debates, we’re really lookin’ at you, Newt Gingrich, but then the Komen disaster took some of her attention off old white dudes and refocused it on crazy white chicks. (I mean – WTF on that). But see, I was taking the high road from you old dudes. I just kept agreeing with her but ignoring it. I’ve been in denial. Surely, our national discourse was going to right itself and we were going to resume talking about issues that need to be addressed RIGHT NOW, I reasoned. Surely we weren’t going to keep shitting all over women’s healthcare and the importance of access to medical care and tests for women when the foreclosure rate is expected to rise 25 percent this year, to one million homes? Up from last year.
Right?
Right. Surely we were going to refocus back and stop this madness. I mean – people are losing their homes every day. Why aren’t we talking about that more? Why am I surprised considering one of you old white dudes admitted to not caring about poor people – seems not just poor women – but poor people – yet I still kept naively thinking the spotlight was going to come off women’s healthcare and back onto broader issues.
But then, then, I’m driving home the other day only to hear Santorum’s donor on NPR mouthing off about how women should put an asprin between her knees as a form of birth control (was that “joke” even funny to the 70+ crowd?) and then Santorum ticks up in the polls and suddenly he’s questioning the necessity of prenatal tests. And I
JUST
CAN’T
TAKE IT
ANYMORE.
Sure, old white dudes, keep on talking about women’s bodies and women’s healthcare, and cloaking yourselves behind “right to life” language. It’s not hypocritical at all that men receive health insurance coverage for the much needed penile implant while women should have to even think to justify why they should be given access to the broad array of prenatal tests which are used to evaluate the viability of the fetus. Or free access to life saving mammograms? Where along the way did the people so concerned about health care costs think that letting women with breast cancer go undetected, costs anyone less money, than early prevention? Huh?
Will the aspirin between our knees protect us from other diseases, not just pregnancy?
And old white dudes, you are given health insurance coverage for your vacuum erection devices while prenatal coverage for women is being dissected in grave detail? Really? And you want us to vote for you? If values are what this is about – what’s the family value you’re teaching young girls here? That the penis deserves to be erect but the vagina and the breast don’t warrant medical coverage? And better yet – the health and viability of a fetus in the womb shouldn’t be given the same kind of attention as your vasectomy? Is that a strong family value?? So we care only about the fetus when the mom has a right to choose whether to keep it – but beyond that point – we don’t really care about what happens? Is that the family value?
Then fueling my fire, is the recent study in England revealing that women, in fact, need an entire year to recover properly from child birth. So across the pond, the dialogue is on evaluating their own weaknesses in postpartum care and listening to what women need to recover while here, we question giving women the access they need to life-saving tests (ahem, Komen) and prenatal coverage (umm, Santorum).
Here’s the lesson my kids are learning from our national dialogue, if I’d let them listen: only men matter. I see how that’s cloaked in Christianity and humanity.
I hope we’re about done falling down Alice’s Rabbit Hole and will instead land back on our feet and resume discussions on national issues that warrant so much of our time and attention, like the foreclosure rate, like the employment rate and the reality that prevention costs our country much less than treatment, in healthcare.
Keepin’ it real, old white dudes,
Wired Momma
PS – You don’t get my vote. And I’ll keep talking about you to anyone who will listen.
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Thank you for raising this issue of the horrific damage the old dudes want to impart on women. I have no idea what universe these crazy men are living in. However, they are all monsters including the hierarchy of the church which are not speaking for God when they denounce the preventive health care with women. What is wrong with these politicians are they so ill informed as to say that prenatal screenings should not be done? What century are they living in?
I agree 100% with your overall message but can’t understand why you would bring such a racist perspective to an important subject. Is it really necessary to note the color of their skin? It only serves to cheapen our message. Come on let’s move past the race baiting and keep our eye on the prize!
I think we have fallen down the rabbit hole. By the way, I don’t like any of the candidates. None of them seem to have a true grasp on what’s going on. How can they expect to stand up and fight for us if they don’t really see us. They’re more interested in winning than making the lives of the American people better and that means making it better for all the classes.