A recent conference challenged participants to try to understand different perspectives on abortion, to see disagreement as an opportunity, and not to attack. Here are my thoughts in reflection on the meeting.

Written by Aimée Thorne-Thomsen for RHRealityCheck.org – News, commentary and community for reproductive health and justice.

South Dakota’s most prominent anti-choice advocacy group is putting out an unheard of endorsement in the Secretary of State race, leaving voters to wonder why?

Written by Robin Marty for RHRealityCheck.org – News, commentary and community for reproductive health and justice.

Weekly Pulse: The Religious Right vs. Birth Control

by Lindsay Beyerstein, Media Consortium blogger

Does health care reform’s promise of preventive care extend to free birth control? Officials at the Department of Health and Human Services have 18 months to decide whether to require insurers to provide oral contraceptives, IUDs, and other prescription birth control with no co-pay. With pro-choice Secretary Kathleen Sebelius at the helm, HHS is expected to say yes.

[Update: The Wall Street Journal is reporting that birth control will not be on the White House's preliminary list of free preventive services, to be issued today. However, as Miriam Perez of feministing explains, HHS will ultimately have the final word. Observers, including Dana Goldstein who covers reproductive rights for the Daily Beast, are optimistic that the pro-choice side will carry the day at HHS.]

A bill passed this spring in Nebraska, the Orwellian-named “Women’s Health Protection Act,” does nothing to protect women’s health, but instead flouts medical practice and standards of care to achieve an anti-choice end. 

Written by Carol Joffe for RHRealityCheck.org – News, commentary and community for reproductive health and justice.

Elena Kagan’s Supreme Court confirmation hearings kicked off on Monday. Her nomination has been met by glum resignation on the left and indifference on the right, as Adam Serwer notes in the American Prospect. Kagan is hoping to replace the Supreme Court’s most prominent liberal, Justice John Paul Stevens, who stepped down earlier this week. Progressives are counting on Kagan to shore up the pro-choice faction on the court.

Anti-choicers claim that forced childbirth, even at the hands of an abuser, is somehow pro-woman. But forcing an abuse victim to have a baby against her will by her abuser is doing the abuser’s work for him.

Written by Amanda Marcotte for RHRealityCheck.org – News, commentary and community for reproductive health and justice.

A legacy of the Civil Rights movement is the struggle for rights and access without fear of violence. But those who oppose abortion rights are not fighting for anything; rather they are fighting against women’s freedom.

Written by Pamela Merritt for RHRealityCheck.org – News, commentary and community for reproductive health and justice.

Sarah Palin is rallying conservative women around the country to unify around her special brand of feminism. But it’s feminism’s cheap knock-off and it doesn’t exactly withstand the test of – well – anything.

Written by Amie Newman for RHRealityCheck.org – News, commentary and community for reproductive health and justice.

I recently had the honor of addressing a group of abortion providers on “Resurrecting Our Moral Center.” I do not think it was coincidental that less than a year after Tiller’s murder, we were talking about resurrection. God, how much we miss him.

Written by Trusting Women for RHRealityCheck.org – News, commentary and community for reproductive health and justice.

On the one year anniversary of his murder, remembering the life and death of my friend and collegue, Dr. George Tiller.

Written by Julie Burkhart for RHRealityCheck.org – News, commentary and community for reproductive health and justice.