Minnesota Senator Al Franken has released a new video in support of the Student Non-Discrimination Act, a bill that would protect public school students against discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity. Senator Franken and Representative Jared Polis (CO) introduced the federal legislation in March 2011.

In the video, Franken reminds us:

"Nine out of ten LGBT kids are harassed or bullied in school. A third skipped school in the past month because they felt unsafe. And study after study has shown that LGBT kids are much more likely than their peers to attempt suicide. This is a tragedy and it's happening right now.

But the sad truth is that our federal laws…do not protect these kids."

Here's what you can do: Visit the Amplify Take Action Center and take one minute to email your Senators. Tell them to support the Student Non-Discrimination Act.

Thank you!

As a former long-time California Bay Area resident, this news makes me happy:

From Ms. Magazine:

To ring in 2012, the Silver Ribbon Campaign to Trust Women, a coalition of 42 national and local pro-choice organizations, has launched a high-profile campaign in the streets of San Francisco to build momentum among supporters of women's rights.

Several banners advocating reproductive rights and justice are now flying on Market Street in San Francisco. The slogans vary but the message is the same: Women should have access to basic health care services and should be allowed to make their own decisions about reproductive health care, including family planning and abortion. Or put even more simply: Trust Women.

Some might argue that this campaign is simply preaching to the choir. (Why lefty San Francisco? Why not Boise or Colorado Springs — why not unfurl these banners in a true conservative bastion?) But, I think you have to start somewhere. Plus, I saw plenty of anti-choice car bumper stickers during my six years in the Bay Area. There are hearts and minds to be changed everywhere.

Finally, I bet this campaign will inspire those who already count themselves as women's rights and reproductive health advocates. With our wonderful 2012 presidential candidates savagely attacking — of all things — contraception and contraceptive access, now is the time to fight back. Kudos to the Trust Women organizers.

A good reminder from Andy Kopsa on the Ms. Magazine blog on why we should worry about Congress' newest attempt to revive abstinence-only-until-marriage funding (read our recent press release for more info):

...This should worry Americans. In addition to their ineffectiveness, abstinence-only programs have also come under fire for questionable instructional methods and regressive curricula. Periodic in-depth reviews of abstinence-only programs by the Sexuality Information and Education Council of the United States (SIECUS) regularly find that the programs often rely on messages of fear and shame—directed almost entirely toward girls—and promote biased views of gender, marriage and pregnancy options.

Take the Denver, Colo.-based WAIT (Why Am I Tempted?) Training, now known as The Center for Relationship Education, an abstinence-only group that has received over $8 million in federal funds since 2005. During an assembly in a Colorado high school, a WAIT/CRE motivational speaker told her audience:

• "This (holding up a waffle) is (like) a high school boy's brain…we use waffles because waffles have all these little compartments…You guys have very cool brains. You can stick stuff away in your thinking…Guys can tuck stuff away. Girls aren't like that."
• "Girls' brains are like spaghetti noodles. If I pull these noodles up, what do the noodles touch? Everything. So girls, when you have sex with a guy what does it affect? Everything."
• "As soon as a guy gets an erection you have viable sperm at the end of your penis. You do not have to have intercourse to get her pregnant, you just have to get that viable sperm close to her vagina and she turns on the little Hoover vacuum, because girls are very, very fertile."

This is what you get when you don't have science and common sense on your side: horrible metaphors (brains = noodles and waffles?) and dangerous mistruths.

We just sent out this message to our Advocates for Youth/Amplify community. It's a great story about the power of grassroots activism.

---
Dear Advocate-

My name is Ernesto, and I have a story to share with you.

In May 2011, a close friend of mine was attacked by two men for holding hands with his boyfriend while crossing the Hawthorne Bridge in Portland, Oregon. Although a few folks saw it happen, no one stopped to help.

Outraged by this hate crime, I wanted to create a way to fight back. I wanted to show support for this couple — but I also wanted to prove to the greater Portland community that we refuse to be defined by homophobia and violence. Instead, we will define ourselves through empathy, respect, and love.

Through Facebook, I asked people to email me photos of themselves holding hands with someone else. I honestly expected a moderate response, maybe a few dozen photos at most. But, when I received more than 200 photos in the first 42 hours, I knew we had an opportunity to take greater action.

Exactly one week after the attack, I partnered with several local non-profits to organize a day of solidarity. Again using Facebook, I invited family and friends to the event, and within 24 hours, we had over 1,000 RSVPs! Again, taking Facebook RSVPs with a grain of salt, I was thrilled by the prospect that we might have a few hundred people turn out for the actual event.

I've never been more thrilled to be proven wrong.

On the day of the event, 4,000 people held hands across the Hawthorne Bridge. Hands Across Hawthorne, as the event has come to be known, was one of the most amazing displays of respect, solidarity, and love that I have ever seen.

As a result, the Portland community came together and national media attention was finally given to this hate crime and to discrimination against LGBT people in general.

Why am I sharing this story with you?

I would never have known that I could have such an important role in my community if it weren't for the organizing skills provided to me over the last five years by Advocates for Youth. The training I have received at Advocates' annual Urban Retreat — along with the ongoing support and assistance throughout the year — prepared me to step up in the wake of this attack.

As you consider your end-of-year donations, please remember to support Advocates for Youth — an organization that respects young people and includes them as partners in adolescent sexual and reproductive health issues.

Advocates' vision of Rights.Respect.Responsibility.^® has not only infused my work, but many other aspects of my life as well.

Click here to donate online.

Thank you in advance for ensuring that young people like me can continue to receive the knowledge and training they need to become effective activists in their local communities.

Best wishes,
Ernesto Dominguez

Dr. Susan Wood never thought that she'd see this day again.

In August 2005, Wood resigned from her position as Assistant Commissioner and Director of the Office of Women's Health at the Food and Drug Administration in protest of the Bush administration's refusal to grant Plan B One-Step emergency contraception over-the-counter status.

In an interview earlier this week with MSNBC's Chris Hayes, Wood discussed the Obama administration's new politically motivated restrictions on Plan B and its unprecedented overruling of its own top medical scientists. The interview is a must-watch:

Also check out Wood's recent Op-Ed in The Washington Post. Here's an excerpt:

In his scientific integrity memo [from March 2009], [President Obama] stated:

---
"When scientific or technological information is considered in policy decisions, the information should be subject to well-established scientific processes, including peer review where appropriate, and each agency should appropriately and accurately reflect that information in complying with and applying relevant statutory standards."
---

In overturning the well-considered, scientifically based decision of the FDA, Sebelius and the Department of Health and Human Services certainly did not "appropriately and accurately reflect" the available scientific information. Her precedent-setting action undermines the principles of scientific integrity and science-based policymaking — and could pave the way for a future HHS secretary to overrule the FDA in other areas.

The president should stand by the principles of scientific integrity and restore science to its rightful place. He should support the FDA commissioner and direct the secretary to allow the agency to do its job. By doing so he will fulfill the promise of that beautiful day in March 2009 when he pledged that science would trump politics, not the other way around.

By now, the Obama administration must realize the political firestorm that it has created for itself by overruling the Food and Drug Administration and refusing to expand the availability of emergency contraception to women of reproductive age.

Here, President Obama and Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius are the objects of outrage for good reason: their decision to reject the clear-cut medical science in this case exposes their willingness to sacrifice young people and women's health in the interest of continuing a cowardly brand of politics.

Earlier today, President Obama publicly defended the sudden restrictions on over-the-counter emergency contraception (while simultaneously deflecting blame for this decision). Watch him explain his thinking by citing the non-reason that he is the "father of two daughters" (wait — I am the father of two daughters, and therefore I'm happy to support something that degrades their long-term health?):

(Video from ThinkProgress)

The President may think that this petty maneuvering improves his 2012 election chances, but to this we can only say: you should read and listen to all of the condemnation today. Editorial boards across the country, basically the entire progressive movement, and countless women's rights and reproductive health organizations and advocates have denounced this administration for selling out and bartering away our health care. This isn't something that anyone's going to easily forget.

Below we've compiled some must-read reactions to the Obama administration's emergency contraception reversal:

---
Jodi Jacobson via RH Reality Check:

Why?

I have one word. P.O.L.I.T.I.C.S.

If we have been reminded of one thing in the past several months, it is that politicians and religious leaders alike will, when it suits them, marginalize the rights and needs of women to advance their own interests and need for power. And somewhere, someone in the Obama Administration, perhaps the president himself, gave the cue to HHS to overrule the FDA decision. And clearly, as she sometimes did as governor of Kansas, Sebelius did the deed.

Because apparently the health and rights of women do not matter, but placating the far right does. Because apparently helping teens actually prevent unintended pregnancies isn't an authentic a goal of this administration. Perhaps it was among the topics on which President Obama came to "understand the concerns of Catholics [read: the 281 bishops]," as Archbishop Timothy Dolan assured The New York Times after his private meeting with the president.

---
Amanda Marcotte via Reuters:

Teva Pharmaceuticals, the Israeli manufacturer of Plan B, met every standard the FDA uses to evaluate whether or not a drug should be sold over-the-counter with no age restrictions, and they met the standards years ago. In 2005, Bush administration officials also hijacked the over-the-counter approval process, citing vague concerns about the decision-making skills of the under-18 set. The Government Accountability Office excoriated the politicized process that kept Plan B behind the pharmacist counter, noting that out of the 67 proposed prescription-to-OTC switches considered from 1994 to 2004, Plan B was the only one whose application was denied despite the advisory committee's recommendation for approval.

In other words, we're seeing a pattern.

1. Teva applies to sell Plan B over the counter.

2. The medical experts weigh the evidence and agree with their application.

3. But political appointees with ties to the White House block the switch, citing vague concerns about the decision-making abilities of teenagers.

---
The Abortion Gang:

It's hard to understand how the Secretary thought there was good reason to contradict the FDA, especially when many clinicians, members of Congress, reproductive rights advocates and healthcare professionals saw no evidence to prevent Plan B from being over-the-counter. In fact, the effort to make emergency contraception available to all people of reproductive age started six years ago. In 2005, Susan Wood resigned from the FDA because of delays in approving Plan B over the counter. Today, she's quoted in the Washington Post, saying:
"There is no rationale that can justify HHS reaching in and overturning the FDA on the decision about this safe and effective contraception. I never thought I'd see this happen again."

---
Digby:

Good news. It looks like we've finally gotten the long awaited post-partisan achievement: the Democrats have joined the war on science. And women! It's a twofer…

---
A New York Times Editorial:

Kathleen Sebelius, the secretary of health and human services, reversed the decision, arguing that younger girls, those 11 or 12 years old, have different cognitive and behavioral skills than older girls. She offered no evidence to challenge her agency's in-depth analysis. And it is hard not to see this as anything but an effort to blunt Republican criticism in the presidential campaign or shield the FDA budget from retaliation. Unfortunately, the losers will be young girls who need easy access to the pill.

---
Kaili Joy Gray via Daily Kos:

In other words, there isn't enough evidence that a 15-year-old girl has the "cognitive" and "behavioral" ability to read a label and properly take a pill. So, since it's "common knowledge" that girls under 17 are too stupid and/or immature to undertand how to read a label, it's safer for them if they have to first get to a doctor who will write them a prescription they can take to the pharmacy — all within 72 hours. Which should be easy for a kid to do, right?

---
Lorraine Berry via RH Reality Check:

I really thought you were going to hold the football steady this time, Obama. I really did.

I'm an idiot. I keep hoping against hope that you're not going to throw women under the bus. That you can stand up to the ladies who swoon at the Concerned Women for America. You think they're going to vote for you because you said no to Plan B?

---
Matt Langer via Wonkette:

Make no mistake: Sebelius didn't go rogue here; there is no doubt in our minds that she was carrying out marching orders from an administration now fully in re-election mode and — for reasons we're trying and utterly failing to wrap our heads around — fearing backlash from a conservative bloc that regularly sends people like Mark Foley to Congress and Ted Haggard to the pulpit and would sooner undergo voluntary waterboarding than vote for a Democrat anyway.

---
A San Jose Mercury News Editorial:

Despite significant progress in reducing the teen pregnancy rate, about 50,000 girls in California have unwanted pregnancies every year. The FDA conducted extensive research and found that Plan B is safe and effective. It is already sold over the counter in more than 40 nations. Case closed. But not for Sebelius — nor, we can only assume, for Obama.

---
Finally, the last word goes to the actual health care providers. Three expert groups that represent well over 100,000 medical professionals condemned the Obama administration for prioritizing political gamesmanship over the health and well-being of countless Americans:

The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP), the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (The College) and the Society of Adolescent Health and Medicine (SAHM) denounce the decision today by the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) to overrule an evidence-based decision by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to approve an application for over-the-counter access without age restriction to the emergency contraception (EC) product Plan B One-Step. This move defies the strong data that EC is safe and effective for all females of reproductive age.

"We determined we could not put our children at risk."
-The Milton Hershey School, on their decision to
deny admission to a 13-year-old HIV-positive student

My colleague Sarah just sent the following alert to our Youth Activist Network. Will you take a minute to speak out against fear and stigma? Help us tell this Pennsylvania school to stop discriminating against a 13-year-old HIV-positive student.

Dear Advocate-

The Milton Hershey School promises to "nurture and educate children in social and financial need to lead fulfilling and productive lives" — unless you happen to be living with HIV.

The school recently rejected the application of a 13-year-old young man — publicly citing his HIV-positive status as the reason for his rejection. In a written statement, the school attempted to justify their illegal action, saying "In order to protect our children in this unique environment, we cannot accommodate the needs of students with chronic communicable diseases that pose a direct threat to the health and safety of others."

TAKE ACTION: The Milton Hershey School must stop discriminating against HIV-positive students. Tell them to reverse their decision and admit this student NOW!

People living with HIV do not pose any kind of health threat to those around them. Educators, in particular, should know better — this is 2011, not 1985! I don't know what kind of sex education they teach at the Milton Hershey School, but it might be time for the administrators and admissions staff to retake the class.

Thankfully, the AIDS Law Project of Pennsylvania has joined this young man and his family as they fight for his right to education unhindered by ignorance and fear. It is particularly disappointing to see such small-minded bigotry promoted by an educational institution.

TAKE ACTION: Take a stand against discrimination, stigma and fear. Demand that the Milton Hershey School publicly apologize for discriminating against a 13-year-old HIV-positive student.

We were outraged to hear about this young man's situation, but — as we observe World AIDS Day this week — this story of blatant discrimination serves as a shocking reminder that people living with HIV and AIDS still face stigma each and every day across the U.S. and around the world.

Together, we can make a difference — for this young man and so many others. Let's get to work.

Sincerely,

Sarah Audelo
Senior Manager of Domestic Policy
Advocates for Youth

The Texas Tribune on what happens when you gut state family planning funding:

"Operating in a region with a limited donor base and high need for health services, Gonzales said, the [Texas] clinics have relied heavily on government financing. So when state cuts to family planning took effect in September, the Hidalgo County network lost a $3.1 million contract and was forced to lay off half its staff and shut down four of its facilities. (Another five clinics have closed around the state since the beginning of September.) Gonzales estimated that the closures would affect approximately 16,000 low-income men, women and teens in the Rio Grande Valley."

Read the full article here.

Today, Advocates for Youth, RH Reality Check, and Feministing are hosting a blogathon to mark the 35th anniversary of the Hyde Amendment — a measure that restricts the use of federal funds for abortion care. We're coming together to raise awareness of the horrific history and continuing impact that this policy has had and continues to have on women across the country.

If you'd like to publish your own blogathon commentary — whether that involves analyzing Hyde's impact in your own community, sharing ideas for how the reproductive justice movement can fight back and finally end Hyde, or more simply sharing your own personal story in regards to abortion care — please don't hesitate! We'll be tracking and re-publishing blog posts and comments on each of our respective websites throughout the day and this weekend.

Here are a few of the blogathon contributions that have been published so far:

"35 Years After Hyde, It's Time to Start a New Conversation on Abortion"
By Debra Hauser, Executive Vice President at Advocates for Youth

Excerpt: "Once I began telling my story, I found that other people — some of whom I have known for years — began sharing their own stories in return. What we found was a shared history — that came with support — not judgment. In sharing our stories we began to splinter the stigma that had kept us silent."

"The Hyde Amendment at 35: Lessons for Activists"
By Marlene Gerber Fried, Faculty Director of the Civil Liberties and Public Policy Program at Hampshire College

Excerpt: "Paradoxically, the debate over abortion is not primarily about abortion itself. Rather, as Dr. George Tiller so eloquently put it, "This battle is about the self-determination of women over the direction and course of their lives. Abortion is about women’s hopes and dreams. Abortion is a matter of survival.'"

35 years of Hyde: Why the Fight for True Abortion Access Has Only Just Begun
By Miriam Zoila Pérez, Feministing

Excerpt: "The bottom line is that unless you live in one of the few states (it used to be many, and over the years has been whittled down) that puts its state dollars toward covering abortion care for low-income people, you are on your own…Let's not let anyone forget how far we are from true access for all."

More soon!

Earlier today Congressional Republicans on the House Appropriations Committee released the details of their annual funding bill covering both health and education programs. The GOP is already trumpeting the measure loudly and proudly: Representative Denny Rehberg, Chair of the House Subcommittee on Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education, calls it a "common-sense plan" that "invest[s] in people and creat[es] the jobs they need."

But this bill contains zero job creation programs. In reality, it's simply the latest catch-all product of the House Republicans' slash-and-burn strategy, which operates via the axiom that it's o.k. to selectively devastate women and young people if it means that you can provide that much more greasy patronage and taxpayer money to your ideological backers.

Putting it another way, it's deficit hypocrisy at its finest.

Take for example, the bill's gutting of the Teen Pregnancy Prevention Initiative (TPPI), a program enacted in 2010 under President Obama's budget. TPPI provides funding for community-based and science-based education to reduce teen pregnancy. It is, through and through, an economically sensible initiative, given that teen pregnancy currently costs U.S. taxpayers $9 billion each year.

House Republicans, though, are seeking to cut TPPI funding from $105 to $40 million. What's more, they've mandated that 50% of this new funding — $20 million — go towards further disseminating abstinence-only-until-marriage programs in schools across the U.S., despite a definitive 10-year Congressionally mandated evaluation which emphasized that these programs have no impact on teen behavior whatsoever. In real terms, then, what we actually see proposed here is a drastic $85 million cut to TPPI alongside $20 million in new careless spending.

These politicians — whose leadership earlier today bragged that they are yet again "taking decisive action to cut duplicative, inefficient, and wasteful spending" — are the current standard-bearers for an ideology that has so far pumped $1.5 billion of taxpayer money into a veritable abstinence-only-until-marriage boondoggle.

Instead of supporting fiscally responsible comprehensive sex education, Congressional right-wingers have repeatedly bankrolled a false pedagogy which has involved, among other lessons of moral upbuilding, forcing young students to drink their own spit in front of their classmates (literally and we kid you not — see the video below for a transcript from an actual abstinence-only lesson plan):

And that's only one thing. If passed, the GOP's health and education funding bill would also zero out Title X completely. Title X grantees provide crucial services (including STD testing; pelvic exams; HIV testing; pregnancy testing; screenings for cervical and breast cancer; and screenings for high blood pressure, anemia, and diabetes) to more than five million individuals across the country.

The House spending bill also specifically goes after the largest Title X provider, Planned Parenthood, eliminating all funding to any Planned Parenthood affiliate unless the organization "certifies it will not provide abortions." Such a move represents a replay of the GOP's brinksmanship from this Spring, when Congressional Republicans tried to kill off Planned Parenthood and marginalize the millions of women, men, and families that it serves.

Finally, the bill extends the Hyde Amendment (which all but forbids the use of federal funds for abortion, therefore blocking needy women in particular from accessing affordable care) to cover the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. President Obama already issued an Executive Order in March 2010 asserting that the federal government would not allow federal funds to be used for abortion services, but the above-mentioned proposal would further cement this prohibition as the legal status quo.

While one can doubt that Congress will approve any of the above — i.e., assuming that anything above reaches the firebreak of the Democratic-controlled Senate — it's not difficult to imagine a scenario in which House Republicans successfully undermine at least some of these comprehensive health programs (either through procedural stealth or else a fake appeal to shared economic sacrifice). Yes, millions of people told truth to power when Planned Parenthood's life was at stake earlier this year, but the same kind of nationwide awareness just isn't there yet in regards to vital and unsung programs like the Teen Pregnancy Prevention Initiative. Those who care about their reproductive rights and their right to basic health care must pay all due vigilance to the entire horizon of attack. And we must do everything we can to bring attention to the GOP's deficit deceptions.