FPEP Biased Against Homosexuals? Duh.
The ODE runs a story today about the Family Planning Expansion Project:
Some members of the gay community on campus say a much-lauded federal program that offers free family planning services, among them sexually transmitted infections screening and oral contraceptives, is discriminatory.
The Family Planning Expansion Project, funded by a federal grant, was started in 1999 to provide comprehensive family planning services to low-income men and women and reduce unintended pregnancies, according to the 2005 Oregon FPEP Program Manual.
Reporter Susan Goodwin goes on to describe how many people feel that this is discriminatory. Two points:
- This program shouldn’t exist in the first place. It isn’t the federal government’s job to discourage breeding.
- The purpose of the program is to reduce unintended pregnancies. As far as I know, only heterosexual coupling can lead to unintended pregnancies. Thus, the program targets heterosexuals. Complaining that this is discriminatory towards homosexuals is like a man complaining that his HMO won’t cover birth control pills for his own personal use. Of course it’s discriminatory, but that doesn’t mean it’s insititutionalized bigotry. If the purpose of the program was to reduce reduce STDs, then it would be open to people of all sexual orientations.
Considering the efficacy of other government programs, I’m not sure I’d want my concubine to be on welfare birth-control…
Federal guidelines, I believe.
They want STD testing…give it to them anyways. But let it be out of private funding, and not from government waste.
You know, I’m sure that a homosexual could make perfectly fine use of the program by going in, getting the papsmear, getting the birthcontrol, etc. I’m unclear on exactly why a homosexual couldn’t just go through the same rigamarole as everyone else to get the STD screening.
What is also interesting about FPEP is that it says that it deals specifically with “family planning issues” but one of its main features is a Pap Smear. You don’t need that procedure per say in dealing with contraceptives. It would become an issue if someone was pregnant and they had HPV or cervical caner, but what they are effectively doing is preserving the fertility of women who use this program.
If the goal is then to protect the potential of someone to have children, would that not entitle those who are homosexual to that protection also? (Should they decide to have children by other means or, ahem, change their minds). This would mean that STD screening and other services that would render an individual steril should be extended to all, not only those who are heterosexual if this is indeed the aim of the program. I might be reading too much into this, though.
Or maybe the pill should be over the counter, just like practically everything else. Without the doctor gate-keeper it’d be cheaper. See also: private funding for things like Planned Parenthood.
Despite the ideological underpinnings of how you guys (and I mean guys who like girls) feel about FPEP, you like the program. Alot.
This is mainly because without it, funds that subsides Planned Parenthood (which I believe has localized govermental funding just as FPEP does), women would have to pay a large chunk of change for the same services.
Last time I went in, Kaiser wanted $40/month for pills and that was with partial coverage…I daresay that womenfolk would become far more discriminating (or pregnant) without these services. Practically, this would lead to an undesirable situation on all fronts.
I don’t fuck boys, does that make me biased against homosexuals?
It must of been hard for the writer and editors to not use a single gender pronoun during the entire article!! lol.