Here’s the letter I’m sending to relevant politicians in Tennessee regarding a bill to collect very specific abortion data, with little consequence for those who disclose it illegally, and creating targets for violence out of women, their children and spouses, and providers, their families, coworkers, and other patients.

I am writing to express my opposition to HB 3808, the so-called “Life Defense Act,” which requires the collection and reporting of detailed data about women having abortions and their providers.

Data is already collected about the number of abortions provided in the state. It is reasonable to make that data available in aggregate, as the state already does. Reporting more specific data by the county level is much more likely to allow identification and targeting of specific women and their families, as Tennessee has many rural counties in which crossing the categories of race, education, age, and other demographics can get you close or exactly to a specific woman if you have an interest in terrorizing her. Such identification is a violation of privacy, and likely to incite harassment of women and their families.

Although the proposed law includes some provisions that are superficially intended to protect privacy, it also makes clear that the consequences of disclosing such data is simply a misdemeanor, a relatively mild consequence when we’re talking about people whose plans may include harassment, stalking, and violence. The barrier between collection and disclosure is thin, and the consequences for any leaker of the data are small. Regardless of the final form of the actual data reporting, though, the law will serve the purpose of intimidating women seeking a legal medical procedure with implied threats of these consequences.

Publishing the names of all providers is also likely to result in violent consequences. Just in case you think that people who provide abortions are bad, made a choice, and deserve whatever consequences they suffer – these are not “shunned at the church supper” consequences. These are “shot in the face at home” consequences.

Anti-abortion extremists are well-known to have threatened, stalked, kidnapped, assaulted, and murdered providers and have committed crimes against their homes and family members. They make online hit lists of providers to make it easier for anti-abortion terrorists to target, harass, and murder doctors throughout the country.

These expected violent consequences will not just affect abortion providers themselves – they will affect spouses, children, and other loved ones. The children of known providers have been barricaded into their homes, stalked at school, and subjected to other harassment and threats, and this bill endangers them, their friends, and their families. While supporters of bills like this often claim to be protecting “babies,” HB 3808 could in reality incite a threat against the born children of both women choosing abortion and their providers.

It would also not just affect the much-demonized providers at Planned Parenthood. When a woman experiences a pregnancy complication, in some cases a non-clinic provider will perform a necessary abortion out of compassion for and duty to the patient. This might occur in a hospital or private medical practice. These are providers who have not elected to life a life of wearing bullet-proof vests and constantly worrying about threats of violence. They are physicians who provide a legal service to a single woman in a time of need. Making their names potentially public will cause some of these providers, their spouses, their children, their everyday non-abortion patients, and their coworkers to be subjected to the same threats of and actual violence.

This is of course the point of this provision in the bill – to intimidate doctors into not providing needed medical care, and it is unacceptable. When a physician is deciding how to best provide care for a woman with a pregnancy complication, his or her first thought should never be, “If I provide needed and legal medical care, that my patient and I both agree is the best course of action, will I be putting myself and my family in danger because of the Tennessee state legislature?”

There are other problems with this bill. Because threats of violence have so limited the number of providers in the first place, many areas of the country only have providers who travel in to perform this legal medical service. The admitting privileges provision is not for a medical purpose, as facilities and providers capable of handling unexpected complications exist throughout the state. This provision is specifically designed to prevent such providers from offering legal abortions to under-served areas.

I urge you to reject HB 3808. Let’s be clear – the intent of this bill and bills like it has never been to collect better data about abortion. It has always been to intimidate women and providers making personal, legal choices with implied threats of privacy violation and violence. The Tennessee state legislature should not be in the business of harassing its citizens and making them targets for anti-abortion terrorists. Vote no on HB 3808.

I’ll be sending this letter to the members of the Health and Human Resources Committee, who are expected to consider it tomorrow (including bill sponsor Matthew Hill), as well as my own House reps. Find your TN legislator here.

Filed under: Abortion, Abuse, Rape, & Safety, Access, Rights, & Choice, Ethics, Government, Laws, Legislation, & Courts

A couple of weeks ago, I posted that I sent a letter to various Tennessee state Democratic and Republican leaders asking them to publicly denounce the comments made by state Rep. Richard Floyd, in which he threatened violence against transgender women.

I noted at that time who had received the message (sent Jan 22), and am repeating them now simply to illustrate who has not bothered to respond – which was all of them, Democrat and Republican alike. I would count a dismissive email from a staffer as a response, although I’d probably post that here. Here’s who still couldn’t be bothered:

• House Speaker Beth Harwell, Republican
• TN Republican Party Chair Chris Devaney
• TN Democratic Party Chair Chip Forrester
• House Democratic Leader Craig Fitzhugh
• House Republican Leader Gerald McCormick

The silence is deafening. There is something seriously wrong when not one of these folks can manage to state publicly that having our Reps threaten segments of our citizenry is egregious. It’s even worse when it’s the Democrats doing it.

It’s no wonder we keep losing ground on women’s rights in this state, when an explicit threat to harm transgender women doesn’t even merit a strongly worded “this is unacceptable” message, and Dems in charge can’t find a way to spin *explicitly threatening violence against constituents* into an example of dangerous Republican narrow-mindedness they can use for political gain.

Filed under: Abuse, Rape, & Safety, Government

Recently, TN state rep Richard Floyd declared he would “stomp” any transgender woman who happened to be around him and his family. This past week, he complained mightily about the reaction he’s getting, and declared,

I never said anything about violence. I said what I would do personally if my family was involved, and I meant every single word of it….Do I regret saying it? No, I don’t regret saying it. Would I do it? Yes I would.

No, you don’t get to threaten to “stomp” a segment of your constituency just for being around, then claim you “never said anything about violence.” You did, on the record, to a reporter. And then you immediately reiterated that you would in fact attempt violence and don’t regret saying so.

I’m also extremely bothered by the silence from other politicians on this matter. I sent a message to leadership folks in *both* parties encouraging them to denounce his statements, which read in part:

It should not be controversial in the least that politicians should expect rebuke when threatening physical violence against our citizens simply for existing. When an elected state Representative declares publicly his plans for violently attacking certain types of Tennessee residents because of his own discomfort with how they are, that should be an obvious target for disapproval, from either side of the aisle… all people deserve to be free of threats of violence from the people who are expected to represent them.

Here’s who hasn’t bothered to respond:

• House Speaker Beth Harwell, Republican
• TN Republican Party Chair Chris Devaney
• TN Democratic Party Chair Chip Forrester
• House Democratic Leader Craig Fitzhugh
• House Republican Leader Gerald McCormick

That would be everybody who received the message in the first place.

I see that someone has also put a petition online asking that Floyd resign.

Meanwhile, state senator and misogynist-in-chief Stacey Campfield (R) claimed that it’s “virtually — impossible to contract AIDS through heterosexual sex” (among other misinformation he spread while speaking on the topic).

Let me be clear: this is absolutely, demonstrably false. In our own state, heterosexual transmission is thought to account for nearly a quarter of AIDS cases, and if you look at women living with HIV/AIDS specifically, it accounts for 65% of cases among white women and 74% of cases among black women. While men having sex with men have been disproportionately affected by HIV/AIDS, transmission via men and women having sex is a significant and growing category, one that puts women and especially non-white at risk when we ignore it. Or, as B notes, “Oh, I See. ‘You’ Doesn’t Include Women.”

Campfield has been called on it by local public health and AIDS education folks – people who know HIV/AIDS and know the stats.

In the face of being corrected by experts, Campfield responded: “I didn’t say I was a gay/AIDS historian. I didn’t say I know the facts backwards and forwards I just said what I’ve heard and the facts back me up.”

Well, actually the facts don’t back him up. That’s the whole problem.

Send ‘em a letter:
Campfield’s contact info
Floyd’s contact info

In other state issues, I’ve been mulling over how to prevent a bill barring telemedicine for abortion from taking effect early, and then how to overturn the already-passed law doing this. See my Blog for Choice Day post for background and why I think this law is a bad idea. Are any of you readers part of medical, nursing, reproductive health, telemedicine, informatics, or other health or technology organizations (either in Tennessee or nationally) that might sign on to a letter framing it as inappropriately stifling technological innovations in healthcare delivery and inappropriately interfering with clinical practice?

Filed under: Abortion, Abuse, Rape, & Safety, Access, Rights, & Choice, Government, HIV/AIDS, Laws, Legislation, & Courts, News Round-Ups