Been Raped Lately?
Condom broke? Need a morning after pill?
Well, praise Mary somebody's exercising their God-giving right to Freedom of Choice. Not just somebody - three major Chilean pharmacies have chosen to stop selling the morning after pill because it goes against their corporate conscience.
Alex's Chile blog displays a graph of how sales of the morning after pill in Chile recently screeched to a halt. This the result of a "coincidental" decision by Salcobrand, Farmacias Ahumada and Cruz Verde, which according to Alex represent 90% of Chilean pharmaceutical sales.
I've already written about how not only is abortion illegal in Chile but the morning after pill - even regular birth control pill - are barely hanging on. This latest development a case in point.
The government has responded by slapping each company with a, i mean, devastating fine of $67,000. Santiago Times reports: "Salcobrand stores displayed signs that read “selling the morning after pill goes against our conscience and violates our rights and freedom as a company.”
Alex also points out that "Surprisingly, some have argued that the government telling businesses what products they have to sell is a violation of the freedom of enterprise." He goes on to present a common-sense defense of why, obviously, people should have the right to choose and access this basic necessity, finishing his post with "It's a war of ideals, where freedom for some means the subjugation of others."
His argument is totally right but it kinda falls flat, preaching to the choir. Here's how I'd put it:
Salcobrand, I will torch every one of your pharmacies, bomb your corporate headquarters and slash the throat of your executive officers after forcing them to watch me violently rape every last member of their families, because I am selling pot, and I believe that certain products you are selling compete directly with what I am selling, and I am exercising my Freedom of Enterprise to secure my market share.
Salcobrand, shut the fuck up. You are breaking the law and forcing women into unwanted pregnancy, aiding and abetting rapists, promoting societal filth and not providing the necessary antidote to a brutal lack of sex education in Chile.
Bachelet, do you even have a vagina? $67,000??? These companies make 12 million a year for Christ's sake.
Chile blogger Kyle recently posted about how she faces a Herculean struggle leaving the house everyday because of sexual harassment on the streets of Santiago. One reader there who goes by "Chileno" made some very insightful comments, supposing the worse case scenario if one were to carry random and obscene sexual harassment to its logical conclusion.
I mean - what kinda treatment do rape and femicide victims have in a society so blasé about sexual harassment? Any society. OJ Simpson joked about beating his wife yet that somehow didn't carry over to a wife killing scenario (it's been speculated that was because the image of the lynching is now archetypal and so a racist cop condemning a black man was more plausible to the jury than a wife beater killing his wife, in other words, as John Lennon put it: Woman is the Nigger of the World).
In Chile, pregnancy is a one-way track. Abortion is illegal and now the morning after pill is very, very hard to get.
Chileno ends up recommending a bottle of mace to be used against sexual harassers and, more importantly, as a necessary accoutrement to any woman who spends any amount of time in Chile, and who wishes to have some sort of say on who the father of her child might turn out to be.
Well, praise Mary somebody's exercising their God-giving right to Freedom of Choice. Not just somebody - three major Chilean pharmacies have chosen to stop selling the morning after pill because it goes against their corporate conscience.
Alex's Chile blog displays a graph of how sales of the morning after pill in Chile recently screeched to a halt. This the result of a "coincidental" decision by Salcobrand, Farmacias Ahumada and Cruz Verde, which according to Alex represent 90% of Chilean pharmaceutical sales.
I've already written about how not only is abortion illegal in Chile but the morning after pill - even regular birth control pill - are barely hanging on. This latest development a case in point.
The government has responded by slapping each company with a, i mean, devastating fine of $67,000. Santiago Times reports: "Salcobrand stores displayed signs that read “selling the morning after pill goes against our conscience and violates our rights and freedom as a company.”
Alex also points out that "Surprisingly, some have argued that the government telling businesses what products they have to sell is a violation of the freedom of enterprise." He goes on to present a common-sense defense of why, obviously, people should have the right to choose and access this basic necessity, finishing his post with "It's a war of ideals, where freedom for some means the subjugation of others."
His argument is totally right but it kinda falls flat, preaching to the choir. Here's how I'd put it:
Salcobrand, I will torch every one of your pharmacies, bomb your corporate headquarters and slash the throat of your executive officers after forcing them to watch me violently rape every last member of their families, because I am selling pot, and I believe that certain products you are selling compete directly with what I am selling, and I am exercising my Freedom of Enterprise to secure my market share.
Salcobrand, shut the fuck up. You are breaking the law and forcing women into unwanted pregnancy, aiding and abetting rapists, promoting societal filth and not providing the necessary antidote to a brutal lack of sex education in Chile.
Bachelet, do you even have a vagina? $67,000??? These companies make 12 million a year for Christ's sake.
Chile blogger Kyle recently posted about how she faces a Herculean struggle leaving the house everyday because of sexual harassment on the streets of Santiago. One reader there who goes by "Chileno" made some very insightful comments, supposing the worse case scenario if one were to carry random and obscene sexual harassment to its logical conclusion.
I mean - what kinda treatment do rape and femicide victims have in a society so blasé about sexual harassment? Any society. OJ Simpson joked about beating his wife yet that somehow didn't carry over to a wife killing scenario (it's been speculated that was because the image of the lynching is now archetypal and so a racist cop condemning a black man was more plausible to the jury than a wife beater killing his wife, in other words, as John Lennon put it: Woman is the Nigger of the World).
In Chile, pregnancy is a one-way track. Abortion is illegal and now the morning after pill is very, very hard to get.
Chileno ends up recommending a bottle of mace to be used against sexual harassers and, more importantly, as a necessary accoutrement to any woman who spends any amount of time in Chile, and who wishes to have some sort of say on who the father of her child might turn out to be.
posted by Chileno @ 8:45 PM
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11 Comments:
> $67,000
is this USD or CLP?
The chemists' refusal to sell the morning after pill based on 'moral' objections is completely absurd. Firstly, they appear to have no objections to selling the pill in their subsidiaries in foreign countries. Secondly, if they really objected morally to birth control they should follow it through to its logical conclusion and also stop selling condoms and the regular birth control pill.
Anyway, you can use the normal everyday pill as an emergency contraceptive if needs be, but that's not really the point. Also, you can get an abortion and access to the morning after pill if you're lucky enough to have some money and access to private healthcare (but remember: abortion is illegal so this never happens). If you're poor, you're screwed, of course.
34 million pesos which as of yesterday was US $67,000. Pretty obvious though cuz I followed that directly with "these companies make 12 million a year" one would hope that's not in pesos ;-)
It's true regular birth control can be used as a substitute but that's yet again another educational barrier to contraception. The Clinic had a nice run-down of morning after dosages using regular birth control (although I think most poor people read la cuarta, if they can afford even that) and, as I wrote about months ago in the post I cited, conservatives have been moving the normal birth control pill closer to the chopping block.
Emotional ranting comes easy to me but I gotta say I'm stumped by Chile's reproductive rights situation because it's wrong on both the gender and class levels, and I generally just stick to the first. But to address the class issue: basically Chilean doctors are versed in abortions and they service rich kids all the time. Similarly the rich will always have access to contraception, a lot more easily. The rich find their way around the law while the poor are fucked by it.
I'm not going to ascribe any larger conspiracy designing the obvious outcome -- that the poor breed more prolifically and delinquency skyrockets -- but rather just the shortsighted wrongheadedness by conservative fucks looking to stay in good graces with the church. The church being a monolithic crustacean stuck somewhere in the 13th century, along with most of Chile.
I meant to answer your question a while ago, but yes, you can get mace, pepper spray and tasers in Chile. They're cheaper in the U.S. though (what isn't?).
The morning after pill is still easy to get if you know the right people. Unfortunately, most lower class citizens don't have friends in med school who know someone who knows someone. Like Matt and Chileno have already said, if you're poor, you're screwed.
Do you know the right people, Kyle?
A big part of the problem is the fact that there is almost no sex education at all in schools, even the rich, white ones. There are so many teenage pregnancies here, most of which could have been avoided without the need to resort to the morning after pill with a simple chat...along the lines of:
"You can get pregnant the first time and, no, sperm doesn't always follow the laws of gravity so you can also get pregnant if you're on top."
The girlf and i had the sex chat with her 14 year old sister a few weeks ago (it was never going to come from the mum) and it was slightly shocking to hear the kind of "information" that is passed around the school yard...
Gravity...what else?
Do tell.
this is ambitious, but maybe we should make a resource, like a directory of all the pharmacies that still DO stock the morning-after pill and do a massive postering campaign and poster the fuck out of every salco/cruz verde/farmacia ahumada in sight?? cos i remember when the morning after pill became available to 14 year olds and the pharmacies in the cuico barrios decided that they wouldnt stock it, so Bachelet responded with a national toll free hotline that women could call to find out where their nearest hellfire and sinful pharmacy was...just a thought
ooooh, ooooh, I have a sex myth gem that I got when I was in colegio here when I was 14...
"You can get pregnant by using a tampon."
Straight from the mouth of a gym teacher in Puente Alto.
Actually, Teach, there is a subtle distinction between "losing your virginity" and conceiving.
That's a good one. Any others?
Maybe Bachelet is a bit too "butchie" to empathize with other women and realize the wonders of having a vagina in the first place.
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