MN Congressman Who Sponsored Anti-Abortion Bill Extols the Virtues of Viagra

You can't make this shit up - at least, I can't.  Senator Paul Gazelka (R-Assholeville), the sponsor of the vetoed anti-abortion pill/tele-med bill, when asked by a Democratic colleague why RU-486 should be regulated instead of, say, Viagra, he replied that Viagra was a wonderful drug that helped create life.  RH Reality Check asked him to expand on his comments, and he said:

comparing Viagra to RU-486 was comparing apples and oranges or more like comparing life and death. Viagrais a wonderful medical advancement in that can help couples with sexual disfunction issues...it can even help in producing life. RU486 always destroys life by taking the life of the unborn child.

Let's unpack this a bit, shall we?  I want to take Senator Gazelka at his word that he is advocating taking Viagra to 'produce life'.  If that is, indeed, the case, then I think a bill should be introduced that requires a man who takes Viagra to track what happens every time he takes it.  Did his wife get pregnant*?  If not, why not?  Are the couple using any form of contraception?  If so, why?  Shouldn't they be trying to produce life every time they copulate?  They need to stop with that nonsense and bareback it from now on.  If the couple does not 'produce life' at the end of, say, a six-month period, the prescription for the erectile dysfunction pill should be rescinded.

Oh, asiangrrlMN, I hear you protest, you're being ridiculous.  That's way too much sticking one's nose into a couple's private business.  I would agree, except it's pretty much what the Republicans want to do when it comes to abortion and contraception.  They want to collect information about women who have abortions and perhaps publish said information as a way to intimidate other women who are thinking about having abortions.  So, if Republicans are going to make it unduly laborious for a woman to obtain contraception and/or have an abortion, I think it's only fair that men who want to have boners on command and cannot go through a similarly onerous experience.  What's good for the goose should damn well be good enough for the gander.

I want to tackle the second part of Senator Gazelka's statement as well - the bit about the RU-486 pill destroying life.  He is voicing his opinion when he makes that statement.  It is his right to believe that life begins the second a sperm inseminates an egg, but it's not his right to base legislation on his opinion.  And, if he so chooses to do that as he did with the anti-abortion bill, then it's within my rights to point at him and scoff/laugh derisively when said bill gets vetoed.

Despite the confident proclamation of many on the right, no one knows for sure exactly when life begins.  Personally, I believe that life doesn't really start until the being can breathe on its own and not leach off vital nutrients from its host carrier - i.e., the mother** - but you don't see me crafting laws based on my personal beliefs, now do you?  You know why that is?  Besides me not being a congressperson, I mean - it's because I understand that what I personally believe to be true is not necessarily fact and it's certainly not a good basis for statewide laws.

In addition, Senator Gazelka's sanctimony flies right out the window when you realize that the bill he sponsored would have fucked up actual lives - the ones of the women who would have been denied the right to choose what to do with their own bodies.  This is what all these assholes are neglecting to mention when they prattle on and on about being pro-life;  they are making it difficult for actual living women to live their real, in-this-world lives when restricting said women's rights to choose.   A woman who does not have the right to choose if and when she has children has less economic autonomy, and that certainly doesn't improve the quality of one's life.  Anyone who wants to dictate to a woman if and when she can have children does not have said woman's best interest at heart - period; it doesn't matter what pretty rhetoric in which said sentiment is wrapped.

Finally, we have serious issues in Minnesota that need to be tackled - wimminz being all slutty and having abortions on demand isn't one of them.  The sooner the Republicans realize this and remove their hands from up Minnesotan women's ladyparts, the better off we will all be.

h/t @underwoodchamp for the ThinkProgress article.

*Single men have no need to take Viagra, obviously, since sex is only for procreation.

**Mostly sarcastic, so no angry emails, please!