I think that Planned Parenthood is amazing, and they do a lot more then you might realize. Planned Parenthood combines health centers all over the country with amazing national and local advocacy and education. Planned Parenthood is running TV ads on Health Care, and running really great campaigns like this one where you can send a letter to your elected officials telling them not be let anti-choice activists hijack health care reform. The DC office attends White House meetings advocating for young people and advocating for choice and women’s rights and comprehensive sex education.
The health centers provide affordable and sometimes free birth control to literally millions of people, and they provide safe, affordable abortion services to women all over the country. If a friend tells me that they want to get on birth control, I tell them to go to Planned Parenthood and I know that they will be taken care of, treated with respect, and that everything will be confidential. If I know someone who has had unprotected sex and is scared and needs advice, information and tests, I know that I can tell them to go to Planned Parenthood and trust that they will get everything they need. I am so grateful that this organization has invested so much providing services to young people and Planned Parenthood is a great example of living up to the message of Rights, Respect, Responsibility message that Advocates For Youth talks about. Check out this video of Planned Parenthood supporters, patients, and staff talk about why reproductive health care services are important in their lives and communities:
Planned Parenthood does amazing local work with lobbying, grassroots organizing, and education. I was trained by Planned Parenthood two years ago to become a peer educator (in their Teen Voices program), where I was paid to take a 30-hour class on sexual health, STI’s and HIV/AIDS, safe sex, mental health and eating disorders, and drug use among young people. I then had to make 30 “contacts” where I shared all this information with my friends and peers at school. This class is offered in both English and Spanish, and the outreach to the Latino community in North Carolina is much needed and highly commendable.
Planned Parenthood was central to in passing the Healthy Youth Act, which was a law that will put comprehensive sex education in all NC public schools next year. They had a grassroots organizer who led phone banks, lobby days and E-campaigns that made a huge difference. They did research and polls in North Carolina, and organized young people and activists to make their voices heard.
Planned Parenthood is doing so much work to better the lives of young people, and right now they are one of the few sane voice in the debate on Health Care Reform. if you are looking for a group to donate money too, I would defiantly put Planned Parenthood on the top of the list.
*Just a quick note, I do not work for Planned Parenthood and am only writing about this as an individual who appreciates the work that PP does.
Comments
Thanks for front paging this
I appreciate it :)
Check out Amplify, youth driven community dedicated to changing society's dysfunctional approach to sexual health issues
www.amplifyyourvoice.org
Thanks for writing it. Our job was easy.
:)
word
Props to Planned Parenthood for publishing a number of good posts recently.
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http://twitter.com/Jerimee
My wife and I are helping out
My wife and I are helping out with a series of Planned Parenthood fundraisers this fall which we're quite excited about. A great organization and great cause.
question
teenadvocatedan:
I'm assuming part of the reason you're "pissed about health care reform" is because of the extreme profits the insurance companies are making for providing services to paying customers. Why then is planned parenthood to be celebrated for making the extreme profits they make for providing their services to paying customers? Especially considering that if it weren't for the massive amount of subsidies planned parenthood received from the government, they wouldn't even be in business.
my answer is...
Yes, part of the reason I am pissed off about Health Care reform is that the insurance companies have made extremely large profits, and they don't want to see that go away, so they are very opposed to a public option that would compete with them.
Planned Parenthood, however, is not an insurance company, and they do not make excessive profits. Even if they did, they are part of a sane, reasoned argument that fights for my rights as a young person to receive quality care. I am not celebrating the extreme profits they are making, I am celebrating the services they provide and the education and advocacy they do. ...did you even read my post?
Check out Amplify, youth driven community dedicated to changing society's dysfunctional approach to sexual health issues
www.amplifyyourvoice.org
Interesting...
planned parenthood doesn't make excessive profits, but even if they did it wouldn't matter? That doesn't seem logical. Is $115 million excessive? Because that's approximately how much they made in 2007.
I did read your post and I understand it was directed at the overall services planned parenthood provides, but it seemed to me your argument contradicted itself. planned parenthood does provide valuable services (besides abortions) and information, but so does your county health department. Most college campus health centers also distribute free condoms and other forms of inexpensive birth control, without the "excessive profits" of planned parenthood.
It's also interesting that you attend an elite, expensive private school in North Carolina, yet you applaud planned parenthood for their efforts in expanding sex ed in public schools. Would these same efforts at expanding sex ed be welcomed by the Quakers?
Planned Parenthood Profits
What on earth are you talking about? If you're against abortion and comprehensive sex education, just say so.
The 2008 figures in the Planned Parenthood annual report show more than a billion in income with a hundred million in profits. With more roughly $250 million in private contributions, and $350 million in government grants and contracts. Looks like a net operating loss to me.
I've worked to support Planned Parenthood for two decades. They survive on contributions from individuals. Their high-volume clinics subsidize expansion of services into under-served areas and they operate on shoe-string budgets. Show me a state PP director earning $10 million in annual compensation and then we can have a reasoned discussion. Until then, you seem to be offering nothing but noise.
And you also seem to be either uninformed or purposefully ignorant about the hundreds of thousands of women who depend on Planned Parenthood for subsidized birth control, pregnancy counseling, and, yes, safe abortion services.
Sex ed and the quakers
I do attend Carolina Friends School, and I have been fortunate enough to take an evidence based, comprehensive sex education class at school. Carolina Friend school (and the quakers) believe, as I do, that censoring information about sexual health, denying young peoples right to complete information, and just preaching abstinence doesn't work and is in fact wrong.
I knew that at CFS I received comprehensive sex education, but my friends at public school received abstinence only. I went to Raleigh 3 or 4 times over the last year talking to different legislators about the importance of Comprehensive Sex education, and I made the same point with them many times. ALL young people should learn about the benefits of abstinence AND contraception, not just those lucky enough to attend an "elite, expensive private school." (your words). When I was lobbying for the passage of the Health Youth Act, (the bill that puts comprehensive sex ed. in all public schools) I was very grateful for all the efforts that Planned Parenthood made to help. I still can't understand why you are opposed to giving them money...
All their services are on a sliding scale (so that people who otherwise would be left with NO medical coverage can get quality care), and all services at half off if you are under 18. This is funded by DONATIONS. It's a good cause.
Check out Amplify, youth driven community dedicated to changing society's dysfunctional approach to sexual health issues
www.amplifyyourvoice.org
PP, sex ed., and social dysfunction
I support Planned Parenthood, sex ed., and womens right to choose. Our society has a problem with discussing sex in any aspect of the topic. Unlike most other countries, sex is a fairly taboo subject in our culture. Maybe if we embrace discussing the subject and the fact that all women have a right to choose then we can move from a society that thinks it is evil or wrong to discuss such things will learn that it is a natural part of being human. For some reason, even though it is a womans body, men have weighed in on the discussion nationally and it has turned into a political issue.
James,
This is what I'm talking about. teenadvocatedan wrote a story imploring people upset with health care reform to donate to planned parenthood. I didn't see the connection because planned parenthood makes a profit just like the health insurance providers do. If it's wrong for health insurance providers to turn a profit, why is it ok for planned parenthood to profit from their services?
Further, how can someone be an advocate for both planned parenthood and government run health care? planned parenthood is a private organization that is heavily subsidized by taxpayer money. They perform many of the same services county health departments do. If health care is a right and only government should be trusted with running it, why does an exception exist for planned parenthood?
It's about need
The need for abortion services is real, in my view. And the only reliable source I'm aware of is Planned Parenthood. No "public plan" I've seen goes anywhere near covering abortions.
It's an example of where the free market is doing something government won't do.
Also, I don't know anyone who thinks "only" government should be trusted to manage health insurance. Even single payer advocates recognize that there will always be a private market for health services. Always.
You've leapt to a general conclusion because of the tyranny of "or". This or that. Public or private.
Why not both?
I want the government to create a plan so great and effective that everyone in America wants to use it for their basic care. I don't think that's going to happen, though. I fear we'll end up with the worst of both worlds, another government program designed by anti-government forces to fail.
Tell you what. Create The American Plan I'm looking for and I'll help you put Planned Parenthood out of business.
Abortion needs to be taken out of the mix
If there is to be a "public option" or even a "co-opt" scenario, Abortion needs to be taken out of the mix. This is just too volitile an issue to include in either/or. Regardless how anyone believe with regard to abortion, the majority of people (by many polls) in America are against taxpayers paying for abortions. If we're to get some kind of insurance reform initiated in our country, we must know where we have to draw the line. It isn't about whether or not conservatives are against abortion and democrats are for it. It is about what will make our need for reform happen. I think this issue needs NOT to be part of whatever eventually becomes the reform bill.
I agree
and can continue to support Planned Parenthood!
Also...
When i was lobbying for the Healthy Youth Act, we also asked legislators to expand funding for school health centers and county health centers that provide contraception and STI/STD tests to young people. Its not an either or, i think we need both.
Also, try getting a public health clinic at a highschool to perform abortions. If a teenager needs an abortion, they go to planned parenthood, and thats something I support.
Check out Amplify, youth driven community dedicated to changing society's dysfunctional approach to sexual health issues
www.amplifyyourvoice.org
A few things
James,
You're smart enough to know planned parenthood isn't the only provider of abortions in the country, they're just the largest. Obviously, some would disagree with you that it isn't a question of the private sector doing something the government WON'T do, it's a question of whether providing funding for abortions is a proper role of the government to begin with. As far as creating the plan you're looking for, I'll leave that to the "experts" we sent to Washington. I guess I'm just not as optimistic as you that the same government that created a bankrupt ponzi scheme (aka social security) and a "cash for clunkers" program that ran out of money in a week is somehow going to come up with a national health care plan that will work as intended without adding to the deficit.
Foxtrot,
I also agree that any efforts at government run health care will have a much higher likelihood of failure if funding for abortions is included. Even though the government already uses taxpayer dollars to subsidize abortions, H.R. 3200 has enough flaws without adding abortion into the mix.
What a joke
Social Security has lasted 70 years. It won't go bankrupt for decades if we do nothing, and to fix it will require small changes.
The Cash for Clunkers program was incredibly successful, and is directly responsible for the sales of almost a half million cars. If that is a failure in these economic times then sign me up as a supporter of another 5 billion for the program.
Go back to Fox News for more talking points please.
"Keep the Faith"
Cash For Clunkers
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parable_of_the_broken_window
If you think that this program stimulated the economy you need to learn some basic economics.
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"The natural wage of labor is its product." -- Benjamin R. Tucker
A liberal is someone who thinks the system is broken and needs to be fixed, whereas a radical understands it’s working the way it’s supposed to.
It wasn't about stimulating the economy
in its first mission, it was about propping up the automobile industry, which may, as you say, have unintended consequences. We'll never know. Maybe it gave some undeserving companies some badly needed breathing room. There are worse things. Many worse things.
Maybe it made it harder for the poor to purchase used cars
which are now being destroyed per government orders. Haha, it's just absurd. But like you point out, this is just par for the course when it comes to ridiculous government policies. How can you still take this institution seriously?
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"The natural wage of labor is its product." -- Benjamin R. Tucker
A liberal is someone who thinks the system is broken and needs to be fixed, whereas a radical understands it’s working the way it’s supposed to.
This is basic, Dr. Quigley
This "cash for clunkers" program has been extremely successful in that it has made it possible for many Americans to purchase a new vehicle, made it possible to somehow reduce gasoline usage abeit on a small scale and made it possible for many automobile dealerships to stay afloat. In addition, in the long run, it will mean that our auto industry in the U.S., even the Japanese companies that build autos here that employ our citizens, succeed and continue to employ people.
Wouldn't it be nice if our current administration had vastly MORE programs that helped other industries in our country to improve our unemployment numbers and help our small businesses and so forth?
Hundreds of billions of dollars that aren't accounted for to "bail out" financial institutions and so forth doesn't help the average person stay employed and doesn't improve the economy. It only helps the particular institution that get the unaccounted for bucks.
Thanks
Thanks for proving yourself to be a waste of my time. I said one thing, and you claimed that me saying something else made me a fool.
Its good to know who is here for conversation and who is here to waste everyone's time.
"Keep the Faith"
Was that for me?
Blue South, I'm not sure if your remark about "yourself to be a waste of my time" was for me or another presentation. If it was for me, I would like further clarification on that.
Thanks.
It wasnt
It was for "Dr" Quigley
"Keep the Faith"
Health Care Reform
I am just new to the political scene. I have always known that the government over pays for nearly everything it purchases. Health insurance to start with in my opinion, should be mandated to everyone making over 50,000 a year. We could expand Medicaide to help those that supposedly do not qualify due to problems with their health. I say that because insurance companies should cover all. I remember the fight over auto insurance and how premiums would go up. Well, we all have auto insurance or get fined. Simple lets regulate Health insurance the same way. Let us go after the low hanging fruit to start. I have a sister, her husband and her make 90,000 a year. Why do they not have health insurance. I have a good friend, he and his wife make over 100,000 a year. They also do not. However these same people will run to the emergency room and never pay the bill. I am tired of people like this. And, these are the people that they want to give my tax dollars to, to help them get insurance. Wrong answer. Let us all get health insurance and the rest of us then can help those through expanding the government programs to help them.
Krush1961
Okay, great
The way it came down it looked like it was for me. Sorry.
This dr. Quigley character is a "pot stirrer". Nothing more.
Reply
if you hit the "reply" link under any given comment, it threads back up to the appropriate place ... most of the time. :)
Cash for imports
It is bad enough that we had to bail out the GM and Chrysler, because they can not stand on their own, then we had to do it again by having this program. I do not agree with a lot of government bailouts and this was one where 4500 dollars of our (Americans) money was spent to help out the unions that sent these companies into turmoil. Now, we find out that they did not even purchase the majority of American made steel, they went for the foreign brands. I do not go out and over spend my income, nor should my dollars go to others to help them overspend their income. That was billions that could have been used to help some family get health insurance. Now that I can agree to. Helping someone that needs it. Not wasting my dollars.
Krush1961