Yesterday, Rick Santorum fundraiser Foster Friess went on MSNBC and told an old, corny joke about how “gals” used to put aspirin between their knees as birth control. The implication was that if you keep your knees together all the time, you’re not going to be getting pregnant anytime soon. Get it? (Yes, it’s dumb).
But the joke was apparently lost on liberals, some of whom thought Friess was literally proposing women use this as a form of birth control. Even though it isn’t medically effective! And they were accordingly outraged.
Mediate cites a couple of good examples of people taking the joke way too seriously. Here’s one from Crooks and Liars that blames Friess for spreading “myths” that lead to teen pregnancy:
It was pretty horrifying to hear. Diane Sweet, who runs our Occupy America Blog found this Dear Abby article from July 18, 2007, which puts a chilling story to this anti-choice neanderthal’s words and chuckles.
DEAR ABBY:
Here’s one for the books on parental stupidity. When my daughter, “Marissa” began to reach her teen years, her father — in an attempt to be funny — advised her that she could keep from becoming pregnant by putting an aspirin between her knees and keeping it there.
My stupidity was assuming that sex education and pregnancy prevention were taught in her school. I never broached the subject with her.
Larissa became pregnant at 15. …
What a joke it must have been to Foster and his pals after he left the set. He probably thought he set Andrea Mitchell straight on the idea of how silly birth control is when all you have to do is grab an aspirin and squeeze.
And another flagged by Red State’s Caleb Howe:
I couldn’t tell whether Mitchell was baffled or taken aback, but the reporter who wrote that article was clearly baffled. The above is followed with:
It is totally unclear what Friess is talking about and a quick Google search on links between Bayer aspirin and contraception was unhelpful, although Bayer does manufacture birth control pills.
And here’s Think Progress fuming that Friess only put the aspirin burden on women — a clear sign of sexism:
Given that aspirin is not a contraceptive, Friess seems to be suggesting that women keep the pill between their knees in order to ensure their legs stay closed to prevent having sex. Conspicuously, Friess doesn’t put the same burden on men.
It’s hard to tell if the outrage is genuine, or if some of these writers are simply pretending to take this literally in order to attack Santorum. Either way, the responses are still entertaining.
From a political standpoint, Friess’ comment was stupid. It was a distraction for Santorum, and highlighted his outside-of-mainstream views on contraceptives. On the other hand, the firestorm of indignation about the joke is even sillier, and blaming Santorum for it is just nonsense.
"On the other hand, the firestorm of indignation about the joke is even sillier, and blaming Santorum for it is just nonsense." Especially coming from the left. After all, if Obama, while sitting in his pew, isn't responsible for the offensive things that Jeremiah Wright said – and said whole heartedly – why hold Rick Santorum to the completely opposite standard? Oh, yeah. We're talking about the left.
Yes, it's quite funny to make light of the need for women to have access to contraception. Of course we know Santroum doesn't think it a joking matter. He quite seriously believes that in the ideal world women would not have such access.
Alana, chances are you've used birth control and/or plan to. If you didn't, you wouldn't have much of a career. The attack on birth control, as ludicrous as it is for conservatives to use in this presidential race (or any other race), has a bottom line—-get women out of the work force, back home raising the (innumerable) kiddies. Considering the high percentage of Catholics why practice birth control, this direction for the Republican party is a desperate (and insane) move, guaranteed to infuriate any thinking woman.
correction: That's "who" practice birth control.
Exactly what does Ms. Goodman's personal life have to do with this? Did *SHE* tell the joke, was it *HER* who advocated that women abstain from sexual activities to avoid pregnancy? n nNo. She describes it as an "old corny joke" and then goes so far as to parenthetically comment about the joke, and what does she say? "Yes, it’s dumb." And does she attribute it to the person who said it (Foster Friess) and place him into context — yes, she does. n nWhat does her personal life have to do with any of this? If she were male, would you be making comments like this? So why is her personal life fair game because she is female? n nAnd how is that not sexist? n nAnd there were women who had careers — of great significance — before abortion and oral contraceptives. Senator Margaret Chase Smith comes to mind. There are thousands upon thousands of more anonymous women who had careers as authors (Emily Dickinson – the only good thing to ever come out of Amherst), schoolteachers and nurses. Well into the 20th Century (until 1970 or so) a female schoolteacher was fired when she got married (hence the tradition of June brides so she could get her full year's pay) and a nurse fired upon the birth of her first child. Yet there were women who somehow managed not to get pregnant — women who were able to have careers, even under those circumstances. n nThis is a fact — unless all those women we teach about during Women's History Month were fabricated. n nFurther, Ms. Goodman ended her article with this: n n"From a political standpoint, Friess’ comment was stupid. It was a distraction for Santorum, and highlighted his outside-of-mainstream views on contraceptives. On the other hand, the firestorm of indignation about the joke is even sillier, and blaming Santorum for it is just nonsense." n nAnd I will take this one step further — personally attacking Ms. Goodman for writing about it is repulsive. This is beyond even commenting on someone's appearance — it is, in boxing terms, "hitting below the belt" and unseemly. n nIf this is how Team NoBama wishes to play the game, what they are more likely to do is offend women in general than anything else. Ask yourself how many women read the above b/c comments with a visceral cringe thinking "there but for the Grace of God go I, someone could be writing that about ME!" n nI read it that way, and I am not even female…. n nAnd as to women home with the children, there are a LOT of really stressed out women in their 30s & 40s who would LOVE that — if you were to say to them "you can be home barefoot with the kids and you won't loose your house, you don't have to work full time anymore" — I know a lot of women who would pull off their shoes and hand them to you — right in the street. I know more women who would do this than not — folks may be surprised….. n n
We were tellling this joke in juinor high 50 years ago. On the other hand, yeah, the context of the joke was that women didn't actually need contraception since they should be virtuously abstaining from extra-marital sex. (Family planning for mariried women either being ignored or jettisoned for contraception nullifying theology-then the point of the joke was that women don't need contraception period). On the other hand, this is potentially a wedge for federally paid and mandated abortion on demand as contraception for women is not prohibitively expensive. On the other hand, the refusal of institutions to offer emergency room morning after "abortificants" poses risk of unwanted violative pregnancy under a theory of human life absolutely at conception that is not self-evidently rational.
If the woman is taking Beta Blockers — blood pressure meds being prescribed off-label to serve some of the same purposes as Anti Depressants (with far fewer side effects) and if she has taken any of a wide range of stimulants ranging from ADHD meds to Cocaine (not sure about Caffeine) and if she is given a large dose of oral contraceptives, she very likely will wind up in a body bag. n nAlpha increases your blood pressure, Beta increases your pulse — think your house where turning up the thermostat both turns on the furnace (for more heat in the radiators) and turns on the circ pump (to circulate the hot water). When your body calls for more oxygen, it dumps alpha & beta into the blood, except that the beta is blocked. So as her body desperately tries to raise her pulse rate, her blood pressure goes through the roof. In simple English, her heart explodes. n nThis happened at UMass about a decade ago now — young woman decided to go jogging at night during finals and the Police found her at the top of a hill (Clark Hill Road) aspirating blood. There was nothing that they could do for her. n nWe are playing Russian Roulette with women's LIVES to facilitate political correctness. n n
Just one more circus geek in the GOP three ring freak show.
So you want to take birth control away from married women, just like Father Rick? Good luck running on this platform. You medieval Catholics are going to take us right off a cliff politically, all over your desire to deny birth control to every woman. This country is not about to embrace your 12th century morality. Maybe you should try Saudi Arabia. n n
Hate to disappoint you, but I am not Catholic. n nAnd I fail to see why a woman (married or not) can't come up with $20/month for birth control pills when I have to pay TEN TIMES THAT (after insurance) just for the medicines necessary to keep me alive.
One other thing, are you saying it is a good thing for 14 year old to be sexually active? n nMedical science says that a girl's body isn't even fully developed yet, and sex at that age can actually cause her lifelong problems. Doctors say that — not me. n nIt is one thing to teach English Grammar, it is another thing to try to teach it while continually having to go out and stop the 14-year-olds from having sex on the bench outside your classroom. No, I am not making this up. Nor are the other 14-year-olds stupid, and try teaching grammar to giggling girls….