Senator Wants Women to Take Pregnancy Tests Before Drinking at Bars

A state senator in Alaska who wants women to take pregnancy tests before drinking in bars also decried birth control as something only taken by irresponsible people.

The ~~absolutely batshit crazy man~~ Alaskan lawmaker who says he’s on a mission to eradicate fetal alcohol syndrome is defending his plan to provide state-funded pregnancy tests in bars. He says if women find out they are pregnant at a bar it will stop them from drinking, thereby decreasing the incidents of fetal alcohol syndrome throughout the state. That is totally nuts, obviously. But wait, there’s more insanity! Via Talking Points:

State Sen. Pete Kelly (R) said Monday before the Alaska Senate that birth control may not protect Alaskan women who drink regularly from getting pregnant.

“If you have people who are binge drinking or chronic drinkers, we’re hesitant to say ‘use birth control as your protection against fetal alcohol syndrome,’ because again, as I say, binge drinking is a problem,” he said. “If you think you can take birth control and then binge drink and hope not to produce a fetal alcohol syndrome baby, you may be very wrong. Sometimes these things don’t work. Sometimes people forget. Sometimes they administer birth control improperly, and you might produce a fetal alcohol syndrome baby.”

I guess he’s saying “all you drunk ladies will be too drunk to use your birth control.” Oh, OK. When he was done speaking, State Sen. Berta Gardner (D), who might be my new favorite person in the world, asked that the record be corrected to show that birth control is used to prevent pregnancy, not fetal alcohol syndrome.

Reading his comments, it feels like he really doesn’t understand birth control or how it works or that there’s already plenty of birth control options that require little more than monthly maintenance. Actually, Kelly doesn’t really seem to understand much of anything outside of policing women’s bodies and condemning people who choose to utilize those birth control options:

Kelly told the Anchorage Daily News last week that the assumption behind his push to put pregnancy tests in bars and restaurants is “if you know you’re pregnant, you won’t drink.” But he said he would oppose making free birth control similarly available.

“This assumes that if you know (you are pregnant) you’ll act responsibly,” he told the Anchorage Daily News. “Birth control is for people who don’t necessarily want to act responsibly.”

LOL WHAT, DUDE???

There you have it, folks. Birth control, like for example the pill, is only for people who “don’t necessarily want to act responsibly.” And not, say for the umpteen other fucking reasons the medical community has tried to tell lawmakers like this over and over and over the pill is necessary for. It’s just for people who “don’t necessarily want to act responsibly.” Yes, only a totally irresponsible person would make sure they are safe and protected during sex by using a condom or a dental dam.

Sen. Kelly may say he’s an advocate to help stop fetal alcohol syndrome, but that is bullshit. The idea that something like putting pregnancy tests in bars is actually going to curtail fetal alcohol syndrome is nonsense. No one in their right mind believes that would work.

This is just another example of a lawmaker using an emotionally charged issue to hide the fact that he wants to control women’s reproductive rights. Talk about policing women and their bodies—this guy doesn’t even think you’re responsible enough to take your own birth control. But that doesn’t matter, because he doesn’t even think you should have it in the first place because all you’re going to do with it is act like an irresponsible, whoring, drunk idiot, I guess.

Never forget, ladies. All you are to men like this is a goddamn incubator for their precious seed, so GOD FORBID you dare do anything that might in some way interfere with that role. Margaret Atwood could not have imagined bullshit like this.