In the past couple of months Planned Parenthood Advocates of Virginia has been sending out e-mails about a proposed pro-choice license plate to counteract the CHOOSE LIFE plates that came out last year. As I’ve stated previously Virginia may be the personalized license plate capital of the world. It’s fairly easy to get a new plate-propose the idea, get a set number of people to buy it, and it goes over. Here’s what the plate will look like:
Looks pretty spiffy, doesn’t it? I’d been thinking about getting a new license plate anyway-yes, I have a personalized one but the novelty’s worn off it for me-so here’s two birds with one stone, right?
Then I read the proposal and did a classic :headdesk:.
Please note: no revenue generated from the sale of these plates will be used to provide abortion-related services.
Then there’s this, from the Advocates’ most recent e-mail:
Absolutely no revenue will go towards abortion-related care. Instead, the money will be used to provide annual gynecological exams, sexually transmitted infection testing, and follow-up care for underinsured and uninsured patients.
So let me get this straight-the new license plate is clearly marketed as supporting choice but yet none of the revenues raised will go towards possibly easing that choice for those who might make it? I’m hoping the “follow-up care” bit is a euphenism for “helping poor women pay for contraception” lest I lose what waning faith I have in PP, but notice that there is absolutely NOTHING in that little blurb that mentions contraception, education, or counseling. I know full well these reason this statement exists is because everybody is so goddamn scared of the word “abortion” or anything that might be associated with the dreaded a-word, including many so-called pro-choicers. How can you in good conscience buy this plate and proclaim publicly that you support a woman’s right to have an abortion but be all panicky that some of the money might go to abortion-related services and so you have to have the caveat put on the proposal because you don’t want to be thought of as somebody who supports Teh Killing of Teh Baybeez? Meanwhile, the “Choose Life” tag happily supports “crisis pregnancy centers” and the false propaganda they spew at frightened girls. This plate is supposed to counteract that but yet PP once again does the Political Correctness Boogie and makes very sure everyone knows you’re not going to be inadvertently paying for someone’s abortion by buying a license plate that … uh, supports making that choice.
It never fails to disgust me that the same organizations that send me flailing e-mails about writing my senators and congresspeople to protect choice are the same ones who nearly trip over themselves backpedaling when the subject of abortion is mentioned. How often do PP talking heads proclaim that the majority of PP clinics don’t do abortions? How often is the health care aspect mentioned, the need for cheap gynecological services in poorer communities, and it’s not mentioned that abortion is often part of that health care? For every poor teenager who goes to PP for her pills or maybe condoms there’s twenty others for whom PP = where you go for an abortion. And just like McDonald’s featuring lettuce and cherry tomatoes in their commercials and trying to make like they sell real food when the majority of their customers are chomping on Big Macs, PP is frantically waving its pretty pink placards and bleating about annual exams in a desperate effort to distance itself from the Dirty A Word. It might work one day.
In the meantime, maybe I’ll just stick with my old license plate.
