The Catholic university I went to gave me a diploma. But when I needed birth control — something just as important for my future — I was on my own. For me and for a lot of people who go to religious universities, this is a common experience. And after the recent Supreme Court decision in Trump v. Pennsylvania, my experience could become even more common. And that’s not good for anyone.
In July, the Supreme Court ruled that universities and employers can deny students and employees health insurance coverage that would allow them to get birth control. This means that if the people in charge of a university or company have a “moral” or religious objection to birth control, they can exclude it from the health insurance offered to students and employees.
I’m accident prone, so when I went away to college I got to know the campus health center staff really well. When it was hard for me to get back to my usual provider, it just made sense for me to ask the campus health center staff about birth control. They shrugged me off saying, “That’s not really our specialty.”
It should be. Birth control is essential health care — no matter what kind of school you go to or who your boss is. Nearly nine in 10 women will use it in their lifetimes. And birth control is so important for students — the ability to get the pill before age 21 is the most influential factor enabling women already in college to stay there. It’s how we build careers after college. And for many people, it’s the medicine they need to treat endometriosis, polycystic ovary syndrome, and other ovarian conditions. It’s how many people manage painful or irregular periods. Birth control is a vital part of our lives.
Yet no other kind of health care is subject to the whims of your boss or your college administration. Sexual and reproductive health care — including birth control — has been the target of political attacks for generations. Policies like my university’s and the Trump administration’s are part of a long history going back to the Comstock laws — when the state dictated what was “moral” in people’s personal lives and made disseminating birth control a federal offense. We should not be bringing back ideologies from 1873.
At my university, it went beyond birth control. The health center there wouldn’t provide prescription birth control, STI tests, or even condoms. Not even when I was sexually assaulted and called the campus health center for help. No emergency contraception, no STI testing, nothing — when I needed it most. When I asked if they knew where the closest Planned Parenthood was, they told me to use my own resources to find out. Thankfully, I have access to the magic of the internet and the means to travel.
But not everyone has the resources to figure out how to get health care in this country. Health insurance is confusing too, especially when you’re a young person navigating it for the first time. I was lucky to find a Planned Parenthood health center near campus, which I continued to visit for sexual and reproductive health care throughout the rest of my time in college. I even got a Pap test there when my campus health center, of course, refused to provide it.
Getting birth control should be easy. Yet, the Supreme Court is letting the Trump administration’s rule affect not just students like me, but women, families, and LGBTQ+ people whose employers have their own moral or religious objections to people accessing this care.
I’m afraid for them. I’m afraid for students who need birth control to focus on their classes and prepare for their futures. I’m afraid for myself, a recent college graduate looking for a job. Will my future employer provide health insurance that covers birth control? I believe everyone should be able to get the health care they need — including birth control — and that we should be working to make it easier to access. I wish the Supreme Court agreed.
Mattise Wood recently graduated from Gonzaga University in Spokane, Washington with dual degrees in Biology, Women and Gender Studies, and Comprehensive Leadership.
Controversial Truths About Ancient Egypt Masterpost
The pyramids were built by contemporary workers who received wages and were fed and taken care of during construction
The Dendera “lightbulb” is a representation of the creation myth and has nothing to do with electricity
We didn’t find “““copper wiring””” in the great pyramid either
Hatshepsut wasn’t transgender
The gods didn’t actually have animal heads
Hieroglyphs aren’t mysteriously magical; they’re just a language (seriously we have shopping lists and work rosters and even ancient erotica)
The ancient Egyptian ethnicity wasn’t homogeneous
Noses (and ears, and arms) broke off statues and reliefs for a variety of reasons, none of which are “there is a widespread archaeological conspiracy to hide the Egyptian ethnicity”
The carvings at Abydos aren’t modern machines but recarvings over old carvings. Sure they look like them but if you can read hieroglyphs and know that Ramesses II will even usurp the carvings of his own father just to be a little shit
‘No soot on the ceilings and walls of the Dendera temple!’ is actually because of extensive restoration works and not because Egyptians were in on shit like Baghdad “batteries”
While the Egyptians were fine-ass astronomers they didn’t align any of their enormous and/or important buildings to modern star constellations, because constellations look very different now than they did ~5000 years ago
The pyramid is the simplest, sturdiest shape with which to build and many different cultures discovered this in their own time. There were never any weird fish humans/aliens involved
The sphinx of Gizah is only an approximate 5000 years old; the 10,000 year/rain erosion nonsense is proven hokum
Speaking of that particular sphinx, the Napoleonic expedition is not responsible for its missing nose
Akhenaten was not a “heretic” by contemporary standards
Ramses II appropriated a lot of his predecessors’ buildings/reliefs and isn’t really deserving of the epithet “the Great”
The Battle of Kadesh ended in a stalemate (twice)
While they had feline deities throughout their history, Egyptians didn’t actually worship cats themselves. This was a later Greek/Ptolemaeic addition
It was not, in fact, practice to shave off eyebrows after cats died; Herodotus lied about that
Herodotus lied about a lot of things and many misconceptions about ancient Egypt can be traced back to his Greek ass
I can’t believe I forgot my favourite Hill to Die On
Seth was not the god of “evil”, and despite his chaos providing a foil to order, he wasn’t completely villified until very late in Egyptian history, when he became associated with despised foreign enemies
Hats off to the few of you who’re reblogging this with tags saying you’re going to check my claims later. You make me not entirely despair of this hellhole.
Here are some vetted Egyptological books/sources (that are by and large appropriate for a lay-audience) you can find most, if not all of the above:
Lehner, M., The Complete Pyramids
Wilkinson, R. H., The Complete Temples of Ancient Egypt
Hornung, E., The One and the Many: Conceptions of God in Ancient Egypt
Dunand, F. & Zivie-Coche, C., Gods and Men in Egypt
Kemp, B., Ancient Egypt: Anatomy of a Civilization
Bard, K., An Introduction to the Archaeology of Ancient Egypt
Stevenson Smith, W., The Art and Architecture of Ancient Egypt
Kitchen, K. A., The Life and Times of Ramesses II, King of Egypt
Sweeney, D., Sex and Gender (in Ancient Egypt)
McDowell, A. G., Village Life in Ancient Egypt:
Laundry Lists and Love Songs
Te Velde, H., Seth, God of Confusion
Guys do me a solid and reblog this version instead of continuously asking for sources on the other versions thanks
I guess I have to add this…
- No Cleopatra didn’t sleep with every other guy she met, that was Greek propaganda.
- She did however have sex with animals, including a bee powered violator, and a horse… but a lot of Egyptians had sex with animals from dogs to crocodiles… make of that what you will…
No, you really shouldn’t have added that, because that’s all wrong.
1. Cleopatra being a wily sex kitten was in the basis Roman propaganda, specifically started by Augustus, and then reinforced by certain Greek historians as well as all the Hollywood movies made about her life. 2. She ABSOLUTELY DID NOT have sex with animals in that way! Nor did “a lot of the Egyptians” engage in bestiality! Cleopatra wasn’t even Egyptian herself! You know what you’re repeating here? Roman/Greek propaganda and/or modern misconceptions! Good lord, the irony.
Seriously I’d love to know what your sources were for this because I need to expunge them from this world.
today i discovered a whole NEW ““““fact”“““ that i get to be mad about until the end of time can people just like please. please stop talking. my life was so much happier before 30 seconds ago.
This blog is mostly so I can vent my feelings and share my interests. Other than that, I am nothing special.
If you don't like Left Wing political thought and philosophy, all things related to horror, the supernatural, the grotesque, guns or the strange, then get the fuck out. I just warned you.
