Saturday, May 12, 2012

John and Paula: Keep your Hands off our Bodies and our Babies!





The Government has announced its plan to "offer"  "free" long term contraceptive devices such as implants or IUD's to beneficiary women and their 16 year old  daughters!  When this is combined  with the threat of having to  leave your 12 month old  baby  to do full time paid work ; or  the threat  of   losing  your  benefit if you don't ,  this is no "free" offer, but a coercive measure where the state is aiming to take control of women's bodies. 

We say to  John Key and Paula Bennett- keep your hands of our bodies and our babies!  If the government really wanted to help low income people to get contraception that they otherwise could not afford, they would  make it free for all  people, male and female,  both in and out of work;   and not target women and beneficiaries. The method   of contraception needs to be the choice of the person using it  -whether condoms, diaphragms, the pill, etc as well as the long term devices.  The  long term methods are known to have poor health side effects for some women and should not be forced upon women  simply because they are the only free methods or because the woman fears to be punished if she has a baby.

Mothering is working and is a tremendous contribution to society. We are raising the next generation of workers! In Australia all parents get a gift of a several thousand dollars when they have a child. This government is  discriminating against  the children of beneficiaries, treating them  as unwelcome and  as  second class citizens, indeed as hardly human.  This is an abuse of the human rights of babies and of mothers.  Paula Bennett openly says that the work requirement for mothers of babies is a penalty for having the baby! And she has not ruled out compulsary contraception in the future- just saying that we "sort of" aren't yet at that stage. 
When children up North search for food in chicken scraps bins and antibiotics bottles, 
we need to remove this government that sacrifices the welfare of women and children for the sake of corporate thieves!

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Well said Janet.

Sarah.

Anonymous said...

Now John and Paula want to impose forced vaccinations on us as well. The health impact of two sets of forced injections on young teenage girls; both Gardasil and long term contraception have not been proven to be safe, and in the view of some commentators could cause severe damage or even death in some cases.