Letter: Women should stand up for feminie-friendly laws

To the Editor:

Women in the United States compose 52 percent of the voters. That makes it puzzling that they do not compel or insist on laws that are more feminine friendly. Since the election of 2010, both in the statehouses and Congress, women have been victimized, excluded, beaten up and at best, ignored.

Many of the state legislatures, which the Republicans gained control of, including Minnesota, have passed dozens of pieces of legislation which have harmed women’s rights, one of the worst being Congress putting family planning out of business, because of the mistaken belief that it was responsible for the major efforts to favor abortion.

In fact, their clientele were poor, black, or Hispanic, and 93 percent of their services was to give early detection to female problems, including the most serious, cancer. The organization was doing a responsible and effective job at the front line of disease detection at an early time, but the Republicans pulled the funding without a whimper from the larger women’s population.

Maybe they felt that if they were not poor or a minority the loss of the service would not affect them. They should realize not to count on men to protect their interests.

President Barack Obama has achieved passage of numerous pieces of legislation protecting and preserving their rights, including the Lillian Ledbetter Law (glass ceiling), minimum wage protections, discrimination in the workplace and others.

Women are going to be put to the test in this next election. If they wish to revert to second-class citizenship status, then they should either vote Republican or ignore supporting the Democrats, particularly, Obama.

Women like to refer to themselves as the largest minority. They would be helping their cause if they worked hand in hand with the other minorities.

It was less than 100 years ago that women gained the right to vote. They need to protect that right or it will be diminished! It will not be enough to simply show up on Election Day. They need to get involved!

Richard W. Johnson

Wacouta

Tags: opinion, letters