by Tracee Sioux

The American Government participates in legislating morality with unconstitutional things like the Global Gag Rule, which doesn't make us very popular in certain parts of the world.

The Global Gag Rule denies all funding (for every kind of aid including food) to any and every medical professional or organization if they say the word abortion. The Global Gag Rule is blatantly selective moral legislation. Aren't we supposed to be the beacons of free speech and democracy and freedom around the world? It completely contradicts itself. The Global Gag Rule is blatantly unconstitutional because we supposedly believe in the principle of freedom of speech, yet we deny funding to anyone who practices it. I question whether other countries hate us because we believe in freedom or because we insist on enforcing two-faced International policy like this.

It is absolutely not America's place to go around telling the rest of the world what the boundaries of morality are. We shouldn't go around demanding that every country on the planet adopt "right to life" policies. It's not our place to legislate their cultures. They are not so stupid as to believe it is our right - which is why it pisses them off.

It's anti-woman and anti-girl selective morality to ignore mass rape via ethnic cleansing and the selling of millions of girls and women for prostitution around the world, but then drawing a moral line at abortion. Perhaps if the United States wants to legislate morality we might decide to step in on behalf of women before the abortion is in question? You know, before they are beaten, raped and sold and become pregnant and infected with HIV and other STDs. Since we're not going to claim the human rights of women as our responsibility, we should just stay out of the morality legislation business all together.

The Global Gag Rule requires women and girls to carry their rapists' babies to term.

Population Control, a watchdog group monitoring reproductive freedom, sent me an email saying there is currently legislation before congress to finally do away with the Global Gag Rule. Below are the details and a link.

"A new bill, the Global Democracy Promotion Act (S. 1744), has been introduced by Sens. Barbara Boxer (D-CA) and Olympia Snowe (R-ME). This bill sets a simple standard: Restrictions we dare not impose on Americans should not be imposed on those who happen to live outside our borders. It will end the punishment of health care providers that observe the same standards of medical ethics and seek the same freedom of speech that apply in the United States. And it will end the use of American aid as a tool to stifle free speech and undermine medical ethics." via PopulationControl.org.

Do the right thing - Practice your Constitutional right to free speech and Open your mouth to stop the anti-girl, anti-freedom of speech, two-faced and hypocritical International policy of the Global Gag Rule. Sending a letter takes two seconds - just click here.

Read about how certain US Senators wanted to be so anti-girl as to forbid contraception as part of the Global Gag Rule. Then read how letters like yours and voices like yours stopped it from happening. You can and should make a difference.

Global Gag Rule IS Anti-Girl

By Tracee Sioux

There is an amendment to the Global Gag Rule before congress right now. The Gag Rule is where the United States has decided to withhold money from International organizations like The Red Cross if they fund contraceptives or reserve the right to say the word "abortion" to any of their patients.

Ever wonder how Africa developed such an extreme AIDS problem or why there are so many starving orphans in poverty stricken countries? Global Gag Rule.

It's hypocritical and undemocratic for the United States to make a moral judgement about abortion and contraceptives for every country on planet earth. Sounds more like a hegemony than a democracy to me. We end up paying for the Global Gag Rule through other funding, like feeding their orphans anyway, so it's really rather like shooting ourselves in the foot.

Plus, any and all global restrictions on any kind of contraceptive information is anti-girl and anti-woman. Because it's not abortions the U.S. is refusing to pay for it's reproductive information we are refusing to pay for. Where's the democratic ideal of freedom of speech in that? Hence the word Gag in the Rule.

Right now before congress there is an issue that gets all convoluted. It's an amendment to a foreign operations appropriation bill called the Stupak-Smith amendment. The issue has nothing to do with pro-choice or pro-life camps because abortion is not at stake - only contraceptives.

In America, whether you are pro-life or not you most likely appreciate your access to condoms and birth control pills. Especially, if you feel your family is perfectly complete as it is, but perhaps have 10 or 20 more childbearing years in you. Well, imagine you had no access to these simple contraceptives because you had no money or some foreign country, like the U.S., forbade the distribution of them. If I was that girl or woman I would wonder why the U.S. wanted to ruin my life by forcing me to have more children than I could afford to care for.

No matter what your stance on Row vs. Wade, surely you can see the difference between abortion and contraceptives. Globally, millions of girls and women are in a precariously unempowered position by being denied access to birth control.

You can participate in empowering girls and women all over the world by following this link to write your representative. The letter provided encourages law makers to ease the Global Gag Rule to allow the distribution of contraceptives by voting NO on the Stupak-Smith Foreign Ops Amendment.