Being a rock star in real life doesn’t mean it translates to journalism. Former pop sensation Cyndi Lauper lambasted the Supreme Court with twisted facts and ineffective rhetoric, amounting her entire argument to a big emotional tantrum like the lead in her song “Girls Just Want to Have Fun” who complains her parents just don’t understand her.
Her piece of propaganda for Planned Parenthood was really a lament published in The Daily Beast is filled with pathos which is unsustained by facts, as well as poor writing. Entitled, “Girls Just Want to Have Birth Control,” Lauper writes:
“On Monday, the Supreme Court issued a decision in Burwell v. Hobby Lobby that I can’t keep quiet on. I’ve always believed that women should have the autonomy to make our own choices and blaze our own trails…. With one ruling handed down this week, five men in black robes decided that we should return to policies of the 1950s and ask our bosses’ permission to receive basic preventive health care. These are five men who have never had to worry about how they’d pay for birth control, deal with an unplanned pregnancy, or face going to work with crippling migraines and premenstrual pain.”
First, her hyperbole is just that. Acting as if she knows more than those appointed to the highest court in the land, simply because they’re men, is arrogant at best. Those men never indicated we should “return to the policies of the 50s,” nor does she cite what those policies are to which we have now returned.
Her comments that these men never had to deal with paying for birth control or unplanned pregnancies is sexist, implying no man endures anything when a woman is pregnant or takes any part in a woman’s life that way, which is untrue. While she’s correct they don’t experience physical symptoms, her comments are emotional exaggeration unfounded in facts about the case.
“Women throughout America know that birth control is an important factor in allowing us to contribute to the workforce, determine our own destiny, and guarantee our economic independence.”
A comment like this might be true—if it were true. See, no one anywhere in any way has denied a woman birth control. No laws have been changed. Instead, a new law made by mandating people do things they never had to do before the Affordable Care Act, such as providing absolutely free medical care, was found to be partly unconstitutional because it removed choice from some people.
Lauper’s lament continues:
“Because of birth control, a woman can stay in school and earn her degree. Because of birth control, a hard-working woman can go out on a limb and live her dreams of being a musician, or she can plan her family in a way that allows her to have the career she wants while also providing a loving and safe home for her children.”
Again, these comments are misleading. Birth control isn’t that powerful that it can control a woman’s life and destiny that way. A pill isn’t the reason a woman can stay in school, pursue a dream, and live her life. Women have a choice. They have a choice to have sex; they have a choice to have any birth control they want; if they do have sex they even have a choice to take abortifacients, as long as they are legal, which, sadly, they are. No one has removed a single right or choice. It’s a sad commentary on us all if we think that the sheer existence of a pill is what provides opportunities.
Lauper says, “what matters is that women are allowed to make these choices for ourselves.” One must ask in response: What choice have you not been allowed to make? Since when do I get to ask someone to pay for my choice?
She concludes her (lack of) argument:
“Yet here we are in 2014, still arguing over our right to have access to this important preventive care.”
We’re not arguing over access. We’re arguing over making someone else pay for another person’s access. Planned Parenthood, who has made the loudest noise about the decision, says often it helps women who can’t afford these services to obtain them. The actual issue here is that now Planned Parenthood may have to help Hobby Lobby employees who want this birth control—you know, because they have a choice to have it.
What the real issue boils down to is that now Planned Parenthood may have to use some of its $540.6 million in government money to help these women get their abortifacients instead of having the government give them even more money as providers through the insurance mandate. This isn’t about choice; it’s about money.
Finally, Lauper plugs Planned Parenthood, serving as a celebrity advertisement for the abortion giant, as if Planned Parenthood somehow functions as the Rosa Parks of the women’s rights movement. She says:
“I’m standing with women across the country to fight back against discrimination, and I urge you to join me. Planned Parenthood, of whom I am a staunch supporter and a firm believer, has created an opportunity for men and women across the country to join Justice Ginsburg’s dissent. I’ve signed my name, and I strongly encourage you to join me…. Now is the time to let our collective voices be heard. Women are watching, and we will take action to ensure this backwards decision doesn’t become the status quo.”
So much is wrong with her conclusion. The first is that The Daily Beast let her write it as a Planned Parenthood promotion, even including the “women are watching” line Planned Parenthood has coined. But this idea Planned Parenthood has been fostering, that somehow it can be part of a Supreme Court Justice’s dissent and insert itself into the legal matters of the nation is arrogant also. We don’t get to dissent to the Court, though because of decisions like these, we do get to voice our opinions.
Free speech goes alongside freedom of religion. In fact, the court has shown the real discrimination occurred by an administration who mandates people violate their own conscience. The whole #jointhedissent movement from Planned Parenthood is actually a disrespectful diatribe against the United States justice system.
If you aren’t a thinker and you read the rhetoric propagated by Planned Parenthood, the emotional language may cause you to question all of our justice system. But think about it. Has choice been taken from any of us? Does forcing someone to pay for what I want sound like freedom of choice? In fact, it is not. Choice must go both ways or it’s control. Lauper and Panned Parenthood want certain people controlled so they have their wants met.
If you think you need these pills and work for these corporations who won’t pay for them, Lauper is wrong; your access isn’t denied. In fact, you should immediately make an appointment at Planned Parenthood who will provide you with free abortifacients. They can take it from their $540.6 million of government money. After all, they care for women’s health, don’t they?
