Letter: America going backwards on basic women’s rights

Editor:

This is one of the few times in my life I am thankful to be a man and not a woman. It is hard for a woman to not be afraid for her life and health in this era in which conservative/reactionary religious men can control her health, determining whether she lives or dies.

This country is returning to a time when medically uneducated religious men have more control over a woman’s fertility and sexuality than she does. It is a time when harsh and heartless ideologues are taking control of the natural process of reproduction with all its hazards and imperfections, making decisions only a doctor should make.

That conservative judges have become involved in basic women’s health care decisions is a moral and social abomination not seen since the days when women were merely property of men with fewer rights than an acre of land or a cow in a barn.

I look forward to the day when a man’s reproductive health decisions are made by religious women. It would be ironic if a man cannot get prostate surgery, treatment for testicular cancer or a vasectomy because it compromises the possibility of the birth of a child.

Richard Gardner
Upper Bern Township

Source: Berkshire mont