BREAKING: Hobby Lobby Ruling Today In
I’m not sure what to expect, but I’m leaning towards the Supreme Court, yet again, not doing their job. My guess, and I could very well be wrong, is that they rule in favor of Hobby Lobby, but pull a Bush v Gore cop out – meaning that the enforcers of the law of the land will make their ruling extremely narrow.
But one of my biggest problems with this case is that it’s not based on facts. Hobby Lobby doesn’t want to cover emergency contraceptives like Plan B, Ella and IUDs. Hobby Lobby says their “religious beliefs prohibit them from providing health coverage for contraceptive drugs and devices that end human life after conception.”
Um… okay… but… Plan B, Ella and IUDs don’t end life after conception. Plan B and Ella delay ovulation. If you’ve already ovulated when you take them they won’t work. No egg = no pregnancy. The IUD functions by affecting sperms movements so the sperm can’t join with an egg. Hormonal IUDs prevent ovulation. Everybody with me? Hobby Lobby’s reason for denying these contraceptives is medically and scientifically wrong. They base their case on what they “believe” not facts. Kinda scary, no? What if someone “believes” blood pressure medicine causes abortions and don’t want to cover them in their health plan? Should the SCOTUS hear that case? Based on this case, they should.
I’ll update this post when the ruling comes down. Until then… share your thoughts on this case.
UPDATE: Supreme Court rules that closely held corporations cannot be required to provide contraception coverage. Win for Hobby Lobby. Get ready for employers denying blood transfusions and vaccines.
Update/Update: I was correct. The court’s ruling was extremely narrow, applying only to women’s health. Anyone surprised? Get ready for corporations to convert to religious beliefs. Science and women lost today. And the court is kidding itself if it thinks this doesn’t set precedent, because it does.
Tags: contraception, Featured, Hobby Lobby, Women Issues
Employers need to get out of the business of providing health insurance altogether.
The Court is not done yet, there is still supposed to be a ruling on union agency fees. That will be potentially even bigger news.
That verdict came out already, and I guess its bigger news if you’re not a women. 😉
Insurance companies should charge Hobby Lobby (and the other birth control exempt companies) more. There was a financial reason insurance companies didn’t have a problem with covering contraceptives – they cost significantly less than covering pregnancy.
And the SCOTUS needs to stop kidding themselves. They set precedent today.
Insurance companies should charge the birth control exempt companies more money for their policies — making sure that these companies pay the greater costs for pregnancies.
This week, the Surpreme Court made it just more acceptable to make the world more difficult for women.
Get ready for corporations to convert to religious beliefs.
If corporations have “religious beliefs” it means we are legally saying that there is direct link between the people who organize them and the corporate entity, which flies in the face of the fiction of “corporate personhood.”
If the stockholders/owners religious beliefs can be used as a defense of corporate policy, then the limited liability exemption should go right out the window as well.
Yep, there’s a war on women, alright. Look at this ruling and tell me this isn’t just about women. The SCOTUS went out of its way to say… don’t worry about blood transfusions, vaccines and other procedures, we’re just dealing with those naughty girls.
I really hope Hobby Lobby (and others like them) get hit with a HUGE premium increase. They deserve it.
“If the stockholders/owners religious beliefs can be used as a defense of corporate policy, then the limited liability exemption should go right out the window as well.”
Love that. Too true.
Sorry, Jesus, but there are so many of your followers jammed in my uterus on a daily basis there is just no room for a baby.
LOL! I can’t remember where I read this, so I can’t give credit… It’s not a U-terus, it’s a We-terus. Any women who votes Republican is a fool.
And unborn baby is a person. A corporation is a person. A woman? Meh.
Exactly, Rob.
This is done, the next step is to move forward. Two immediate options outlined today by the majority were: have the Fed’s pay for the contraception, or offer the very limited people corporations the same options that private owners have in having their insurers pay for the contraception…
I like the first idea. A step to single payer. Why not have the Federal government pay for all contraception and pass the bill on to the top 1% to keep the budget balanced? Just show the pharmacy or drug store, or doctor’s office person your ID, and grab and go.
Sorry Republicans. Majority rules.
Let’s not move on so quickly, Kavips. Hobby Lobby nailed itself to the cross by pretending that their flippin’ policy didn’t already covered Plan B and Ella. It did – they were fine with it until Obama. And let’s not forget, when it comes to investments, Hobby Lobby says, “‘Eff Jesus” by:
Hobby Lobby is a bunch of Pharisees who would crucify Jesus in the name of profit – in a heartbeat (and I don’t even believe in that crap, but they do – or they profess to, but their words do not match their (investment) actions). No doubt about it. Yeah, I’m pissed. I’m right, but I’m pissed.
I fear this decision will resonate much farther than the short sighted members of the USSC anticipated.
When you come down to the core of it… We just established Sharia law in the US… and that’s not a good thing.
Thanks again, Ralph.
I expect the worst from the Roberts court and am rarely disappointed, I also expect the gang of five to be endlessly on the side of business to the detriment of the common man. As noted corporations can now have religion on top of “personhood”, an astoundingly bad idea and as noted a step towards theocracy. The Republicans are claiming victory, but I suspect this decision will resonate far beyond the hated Hobby Lobby and reach the voting booth in 2014.
Plenty of Hobby Lobby’s goods are imported from China — and that is a country that *does* mandate abortions. Hypocrites.
Mr Elite wrote:
[laughs derisively] Uh, huh, right. A decision which states that what are essentially family-owned companies don’t have to provide contraceptive coverage as part of their health insurance plan — but can if they choose — is tantamount to stoning women for adultery. That’s utter silliness.
But this ruling only applies to women and their health care. In typical lazy fashion the conservative justices make another limited ruling claiming that they aren’t setting precedent. So… “religious” beliefs apply to birth control, but not to blood transfusions, vaccines, HIV treatment, etc. because… why? Why wouldn’t “religious” corporations that don’t believe in those treatments not be given the same exemption? What’s the difference?
One of the things y’all have ignored is that the contraception mandate will increase the costs of contraception. Planned Parenthood stated that birth control pills run between $15 and $50 a month.
That’s pretty inexpensive, but it also reflects the fact that these are primarily cash sales. Once the mandate is in place, requiring most insurance plans to cover oral contraceptives on a no-copay basis, rather than a woman going in and buying a three month supply from the WalMart pharmacy for $45.00, she will go in, present her prescription form and her insurance card to the pharmacy, and her insurance company will be billed $45.00.
And there’s the rub: rather than just taking the lady’s cash or debit card, the pharmacy is going to have to check her insurance card to determine if it is good and she is eligible, and then generate an invoice to the insurance company. That extra labor costs money, which WalMart will eventually have to pass on to the insurance company, charging them, say, $45.50 for the prescription.
Then, when the insurance company receives the bill from the pharmacy, it will have to check, yet again, to see if the bill is legitimate and the cardholder was really covered. That, too, costs money, money that the insurance company will have to recoup somehow. Maybe we’re up to $46.00 for that three month supply.
Eventually, the WalMart pharmacy is paid, but then the question becomes: how long is eventually? WalMart will have had to, in effect, extended credit to the initial customer, over the period between when the customer bought the pills and WalMart got paid. In business terms, the time between when WalMart had to pay the pharmaceutical company for the pills, and when WalMart got paid for the sale, will increase, which means increased inventory costs to WalMart; those will have to be passed on.
And who will wind up paying? The customer, that’s who! In the end, all of the increased costs will have to be tacked on to the insurance premiums that the customer has to pay. She will have picked up her three-months’ supply without putting out one dime at WalMart, but eventually she’ll see it in reduced take-home pay in her wages.
But, of course, there’s more! As a primarily cash sale item, there are discount brands of birth control pills, and some women choose those because of the cost. If the customer does not bear the cost directly and immediately, the economic pressures to choose the generic brand are reduced, and more women will start to demand the name brands, the more expensive pills. The same overhead costs apply, but now the insurance company has to pay a higher amount to the WalMart pharmacy, and that means that insurance company actuaries will have to calculate an average cost that they will bear, meaning that premiums won’t necessarily increase by, say $16 a month, but perhaps $30 a month.
It’s Economics 101: nothing is free; everything has to be paid for, by someone. So many of my good friends on the left seem to think that, somehow, some way, the costs will just disappear, but that’s never been the case before. Every cost born by a good or service has to be paid by the end consumer of that product. Every penny of tax, every kilowatt of electricity, every dollar of diesel fuel, and it’s tax, every shilling of insurance, all has to be paid for, in the end, by the person who can no longer pass the good or service down the line to someone else.
Birth control is cheap in this country, and readily available in every town, village and hamlet across the country. What the contraception mandate will do, because it must, is to make birth control more expensive.
Pandora “you are leaning towards the supreme court once again not doing their job”,
which is what, agreeing with president obama. Did you ever thank that maybe the reason you were leaning ahead of time towards the view that hobby lobby would win on this one is because it is obvious that this part of the law is unconstitutional. I bet that is why you were leaning that way. But, your liberalism demands that you make up a phony argument to conceal the real reason you were leaning towards hobby lobby winning. Remember, every liberal argument contains or is based on a false premise
Pandora wrote:
That’s a wholly superficial notion, because no woman gets pregnant without a man in the picture somewhere. Most contraception is something the woman more directly uses, but it’s an activity which relates to heterosexual couples, not just women.
Dana… I don’t think you understand what’s involved in getting birth control. You’ve left out a huge step. The doctor. Women don’t demand “designer” birth control.
Rusty… Shhhh, grown ups are talking.
We’ve already established that you can’t manage numbers or economics:
One of the things y’all have ignored is that the contraception mandate will increase the costs of contraception.
In increases the *overall* cost, but the costs of individual contraception methods don’t increase because more people are using them.
And you know what’s expensive? Pregnancies. ALOT more that pills every month. And you know what?
As will we all. Because we all pay more when medical costs increase. And when women are forced into bearing children rather than being able to choose to manage their own choices, we all pay more for all of this new medical activity — none of which is ever going to be cheaper than monthly birth control pills.
Hobby Lobby — and their effort to impose sharia law on their employees — will restrict (for now) only a couple of birth control choices, but those are still better choices for some people or situations.
Whew… the extreme left wing is out in force today. Buy your own birth control!
Pandora wrote:
Actually, some do; I’m sure that you’ve seen commercials and advertisements for specific brands of oral contraceptives; perhaps you’ll recall the Yaz commercial? These advertisements are aimed a getting women to ask their physicians for a specific brand of contraceptive. If women never did that, pharmaceutical companies wouldn’t advertise the products.
Cassandra wrote:
According to the Guttmacher Institute, a very pro-contraception organization,
• More than 99% of women aged 15–44 who have ever had sexual intercourse have used at least one contraceptive method.
• Some 62% of all women of reproductive age are currently using a contraceptive method.
It sure doesn’t sound like you’re going to get more women using contraception!
I have not argued that “the costs of individual contraception methods . . . increase because more people are using them,” but that the mandate for co-payment free insurance coverage of contraceptives will increase the costs, due to the additional overhead. Those costs will have to be borne by someone.
that the mandate for co-payment free insurance coverage of contraceptives will increase the costs, due to the additional overhead
Which is *still* way less expensive than pregnancy. Due to the additional overhead.
A new report from the Obama administration finds that women saved more than $483 million on prescriptions for oral contraceptives last year, thanks to an Affordable Care Act provision that requires certain medications to be covered at no cost to plan members.
The ACA prescribed what services had to be covered — some with no co-pay and others with. The contraceptives are already priced in the policies people have now. Just like your Viagra is priced into your insurance now. And the biggest reason why insurance companies covered birth control with no co-pay is because pregnancy costs so much more. Last point here — birth control isn’t always about preventing pregnancies. Women who were using IUDs as treatment for, say, endometriosis, are now SOL.
Cassandra, contraception is widely available and inexpensive now. If women aren’t choosing to use it now, they won’t be choosing to use it under the mandate.
And, of course, if “women saved more than $483 million on prescriptions for oral contraceptives last year, thanks to an Affordable Care Act provision that requires certain medications to be covered at no cost to plan members,” then who paid that $483 million? Somebody had to, and, in the end, it was the women themselves, in higher insurance premiums.
It won’t come as any shock to you that insurance companies are in the business of making money, and they don’t just willingly absorb additional costs; they pass those costs on to their customers, just like every business does.
And, of course, the poorest women, the ones for whom the benefit might seem more attractive, don’t have insurance in the first place! If you work for a company which provides health insurance, you almost certainly make more than minimum wage. The real minimum wage employees work at locally-owned bagel shops and thrift stores and the like, and an insurance mandate doesn’t help them in the slightest.
The families which might be able to take advantage of the mandate are the families which already make enough money to buy contraception without the mandate, and what they will see is an increase in their health insurance premiums.
First and foremost this ruling only banned certain types of birth control not all forms. Folks, the liberal left is destroying the traditional Democratic Party.
Pandora, good on you for telling Rusty to “ssshh, the grownups are talking”. I wonder if he is watching the world cup, or, did he buy into Ann Coulter’s premise that it is totally un-American?
Cassandra, contraception is widely available and inexpensive now.
Not true and certainly not true for poor women. Contraception is available if you can afford it and items like IUDs require routine follow up visits.
It won’t come as any shock to you that insurance companies are in the business of making money, and they don’t just willingly absorb additional costs; they pass those costs on to their customers, just like every business does.
And it comes as no shock to me that instead of patronizing me with this bullshit, that you wouldn’t better spend your time in educating yourself on how the ACA and its prescribed services actually works.
I’m still wondering how Hobby Lobby (the corporation) gets to have religious beliefs in the first place.
The shareholders/owners of even a “closely held” corporation consciously and intentionally created a business organization that entails creating a “fictitious person” with a legal existence separate from them. This serves the purpose of insulating their personal liability from things like negligence, bad credit, bankruptcy, lawsuits, etc. They can’t be personally sued; only their fictitious corporate persona can. So they asked the State to use its authority to absolve them of personal liability because the corporation is, you know, NOT THEM. It’s a separate fictional entity.
IF we are going to then argue that the owner’s religious (or other beliefs) may then be channeled into that fictitious entity for purposes of invoking a personal conscience exemption from this kind of sale or that kind of policy, I would argue that they have voluntarily pierced their own corporate liability shield. The corporation is no longer an entity distinct from its shareholders/owners, and they should no longer have their personal liability protected by the State.
I’d have a lot more sympathy for a sole proprietor or a partnership organization where people who wanted to stand on their religious convictions didn’t hide behind the State for liability protection. I might not agree with them, and I might not patronize their business, but at least I wouldn’t think they were complete hypocrites.
About time the Supreme Court got something right.
Somehow I remember those famous words of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. What does it say about a society that does not value life?
Moral decay in society where majority believe it is the woman’s right to end life.
This ruling had nothing to do with abortion. Try again.
@D “That’s utter silliness.”
You seem to have no clue as to what Sharia law is all about. The USSC today opened the floodgates for all sorts of future religious claims.
Sharia law is based on the powerful controlling the weak using religion as an excuse for exercising control.
If you can’t see that this is happening here, then you’re the host of utter silliness.
@D “Birth control is cheap in this country”
Clueless… Totally clueless. Tell that to someone working at minimum wage who needs emergency contraceptives!
Substitute any other medication — statins for cholesterol control, for example — into this discussion in place of birth control, and listen to how stupid the arguments sound.
Here’s my question: Why should religious opinions be valued more highly than any other sort? Pregnancy does not begin at fertilization but with implantation — so religious belief trumps scientific fact. Why do we allow that?
If I believe something on faith — Marxism, for instance — why is that unprivileged belief, but believing in Scientology is privileged? This is a logical land mine in the Constitution, and this decision lays it bare.
“This ruling had nothing to do with abortion.”
It had everything to do with abortion. They see birth control as the thin edge of the wedge. They will do whatever necessary to control women and their slutty, slutty bodies.
Only in the sense that everything is about abortion to Republicans and it’s always their end goal. But the ruling addresses Plan B, Ella and IUDs – none of which are abortifacients, no matter what Hobby Lobby believes. (and that was my point to GTW)
This ruling is about contraceptives, and not just the ones I mention above. My guess is the Pill is next, mainly because Plan B is the Pill, just in larger doses. So… why wouldn’t banning the Pill be next? If you “believe” Plan B is an abortifacient then you believe the Pill is one too.
And we know the next step for businesses like Hobby Lobby and the Right is to stop covering the Pill – they’re quite open about this. So while this ruling is linked to abortion it’s more like step two for the forced birth crowd. Step 1: Make abortions extremely difficult to get while working on outlawing it. Step 2: Make contraceptives expensive and difficult to get while working on outlawing them. Presto! More unwanted pregnancies resulting in forced birth.
All these roads lead to controlling women.
Okay, I was typing while you edited. LOL! We end up in the same place.
When you get down to it, it’s not even about abortion. It’s about sex. They believe wholeheartedly that there are madonnas and whores, and that one is for marrying, the other for fucking.
Mr Kline wrote:
This ruling didn’t ban anything; it simply stated that family-owned companies which have religious objections to paying for contraception through their company-sponsored health insurance plans do not ave to do so. The employees are still perfectly free to use contraception.
Mr Elite wrote:
Dude, I not only made that claim, but I cited my source, which was Planned Parenthood.
Of course, a woman working at a minimum wage job will probably not have health insurance anyway, even under Obaminablecare, because most of those people work for companies with fewer than 50 employees. Even the workers for McDonald’s don’t work for McDonald’s corporation, but for a small franchise holder.
Mr Geezer exhibits typical liberal projection:
Silly stuff. None of this was about somehow making contraception illegal, but simply not making those people who have moral or religious objections have to pay for it for others. What is it about the left that y’all seem to think that you simply must try to force other people to behave your way?
Mr Geezer asked:
The Framers, who were very familiar with compulsory religion, and what it was like to belong to a non-favored church, thought it important enough to enshrine in the Constitution, that’s why.
To me, the obvious question is: why do you want to force people to do things against their faith?
And Pandora gets silly:
How, I have to ask, does allowing a family-owned company to adhere to its religious convictions “Make contraceptives expensive and difficult to get while working on outlawing them?” Contraceptives are inexpensive and widely available, and were before the Obumblecare regulations, and there was no support, none at all, for outlawing contraception.
A clue for you: most conservative families use contraception. Why would conservatives want to outlaw something that they use themselves? We simply think that if people want to use something, they should pay for it.
@D “We simply think that if people want to use something, they should pay for it.”
That’s a lie. The cost in this case is less than zero.
It’s all about denying women…
“We simply think that if people want to use something, they should pay for it.”
Most employers do not cover the entire cost of insurance for their employees, so that means employees are paying for part of it.
“How, I have to ask, does allowing a family-owned company to adhere to its religious convictions “Make contraceptives expensive and difficult to get while working on outlawing them?” ”
How does a company, a non-human legal entity, have religious convictions?
“The Framers, who were very familiar with compulsory religion, and what it was like to belong to a non-favored church, thought it important enough to enshrine in the Constitution, that’s why.”
In logical terms, this is a fallacy, specifically the appeal to authority. It boils down to, “because they said so.”
Try to think for yourself here. Why is your belief, which is tied to your “faith,” privileged over the beliefs of an atheist? The framers lived in an age in which atheism was unknown, and they came here from a country and continent wracked by over a hundred years of religiously inspired warfare. They could only imagine a nation in which all religions were equal, and so sought a solution to that problem.
“To me, the obvious question is: why do you want to force people to do things against their faith?”
Because I have to take their “faith” on, well, faith. We’re in thought police territory here. How do we know, without Sam Alito’s mind-reading ability, that a corporation holds its beliefs “sincerely”? Why are Hobby Lobby’s factually incorrect claims about certain forms of birth control allowed to dictate its response to public policy?
“We simply think that if people want to use something, they should pay for it.”
They already paid for it in their insurance premiums.
This is a consequence of the anthropromorism of corporate entities. If corporations are people too, then it follows that they would have rights and freedoms, especially when they are closely held and are viewed as extensions of the individual holders. After religious freedom, what’s next, the right to vote, hold elective office, life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness? If corporations are people, then we have entrusted those people with providing a vital element of people’s well-being – health insurance.
I think it would be a good discussion topic about how much closely held corporations can or should reflect or accrue the rights of their individual holders. To me corporations are corporations and people are people. No corporation should be an extension of the individual, at least regarding the rights and obligations but we seem to be on slippery slope to some place where we may not want to go.
Employees should have the ability to opt out of a corporation provided health insurance and use the exchanges, which they may already be able to. Unfortunately, many corporations do not adjust employees compensation when they opt out. Perhaps this could be remedied by legislation that requires makes participation in company sponsored health insurance optional and require corporations to state a per employee cost for the plan, which is then added to the employee’s salary/wage. Though that idea has its own set of issues since salaries are individually established. My company actually did compensate employees who opted, but it went by the way side a few years ago as a cost cutting measure. Still it is something worth pursuing. Maybe making the exchanges more attractive in terms of benefits than what the corporations provide, the trend might move away from corporation provided health insurance and more towards a standardized model through the exchanges.
I think employees being able to opt out if the company they work for can opt out of covering certain medicines/procedures/conditions is a really good idea. I also think any company not covering birth control should (and probably will) be charged a higher insurance premium based on risk and cost of pregnancy.
To me, the obvious question is: why do you want to force people to do things against their faith?
Because now it is compulsory faith for all of the rest of us.
Pandora. Sadly, the way the decisions are falling these days, I fear we may be back here in a year or so outraged that a Ginsberg-less SCOTUS ruled in favor of passing that cost on to the employees.
“If you have a functional uterus, the risk to your employer is your own” It is essentially what they just said. There has to be another way to fight this.
These companies need to be outed. Companies who discriminate against the LGBT community dont get to continue with those practices for long, before public shaming forces them to change their tune. It, amazingly, works. There are a lot more women than those who identify with the LGBT community, and it seems logical that overwhelming pressure on some crappy little welding shop in Michigan (I looked at the list, a lot of them are in Michigan) would have a hard time weathering a focused attack (media/ business). It shouldn’t matter how long it’s been in Jim-Bob’s family. You join the 21st century, or you get out of the way for someone who can contribute better.
“To me, the obvious question is: why do you want to force people to do things against their faith?”
If their faith says they need to force their faith on others, I dont see any reason to honor or respect their faith.
The very nature of Christianity (as far as I can tell only from the people arguing FOR this… and forgetting everything else i know about Christianity) Is that you are only being a real “Christian” when you arent letting other people NOT be Christian. Therefor, in order for a Christian to not feel oppressed, he (it’s he, because women have no rights) must oppress everyone else around him.
It’s a contradiction to demand religious liberty if it only means you get to take liberties away from others.
So I guess to answer the question…. I want to force others to do things against their faith, because those things negatively effect me and other people. No real good comes from the things they want to do. Their faith is a negative force in the world…. just like ritual virgin sacrifice… and needs to be eliminated from the human experience.
Sad, but true, Ben. I can see this court upholding a uterus risk tax. It was one of the things the ACA tried to get rid of – charging women more for health insurance because they were women.
These past years have been so exhausting. It’s hard to keep up with all the BS. I still have trouble believing contraception is an issue – thanks Rick Santorum and the Republican Party!
What is also stunning is the lack of knowledge about female bodies. Go read Dana’s comments. He truly doesn’t understand female biology. Notice how he’s concerned about women asking for designer birth control (what the hell is that?) but completely ignores every other pharmaceutical ad that tells people to “ask their doctor” about the little purple, green, yellow pill. Why did he leave those medicines out? What’s different about them? Why don’t they concern him? Yeah, I know the answer.
And that’s why women are really, really upset. We are always the exception, the narrow ruling. “Oh, this won’t apply to any other medical procedure/medicine. This only applies to birth control.” It’s depressing.
Conservatives wont say it, but all they care about is the sex. For a bunch of socially prudish vanilla beans, the cant stop thinking about women having lots and lots and lots of sex…. mainly with people who aren’t them. That upsets them. It gets them all sad and God fearing…. (because feigning righteous outrage is less embarrassing than admitting totally baseless jealousy)
But when “the other side” (smart people) talks about the issue, sex… other than the idea that a boss has absolutely no say at all in who their employees take to bed… is usually FAR behind the actual health care issues that have nothing to do with procreation or intercourse. What Dana… who will be the representative for all conservatives for the purpose of this comment…. likely means by “designer birth control” is an IUD, or something else that only prevents pregnancy. He’s willing to throw out all other hormonal treatments that can be taken for years at a great benefit by non sexually active women, in order to allow Christian bosses to decide the social lives of their female employees.
Conservatives are too cowardly and too willfully ignorant to talk about lady-issues other than the sex they dont want them to have.
Sex in the mind of Christian conservatives is about domination not pleasure. It is only to be used for procreation, preferably with the man on top and the woman submissive and nurturing. To that end, contraception (and abortion for that matter) is contrary to that philosophy. It is about power. Women in the home where they belong, raising children, submitting to their husbands. Sex is dirty and nasty and is only to be endured in creating God’s children. And of course, the reason many conservatives find themselves in compromising positions is that their bodies betray them and even fervent prayer doesn’t seem to deflate their stiffening temptations.
Ben, Dana cites Yaz as an example, so he is talking about birth control pills. And while there’s no denying that most conservatives have an extremely unhealthy view of sex it all boils down to controlling women.
Consider what the SCOTUS did. They said that a corporation has more say than a woman and her doctor.
There was talk a few years ago (I think in crazy Arizona) about allowing birth control to be covered if it were for “medical/non-sexual” reasons. Think about that for a minute. A decision, and private conversation, between a woman and her doctor would have had to have been shared with the woman’s employer. Can you imagine if a man had to give his employer a note from his doctor to get Viagra or blood pressure medicine or a penile implant? It’s impossible to imagine because this “debate” only works when it’s about women’s bodies.
“this “debate” only works when it’s about women’s bodies.”
Funny how that works, innit? According to Alito, every other conflict between medical science and faith is decided in favor of science. Only pregnancy gets this treatment.
Is there any religion that, in its foundational documents, talks about pregnancy?
…. Does the ACA requires employers to extend coverage to children of employees? So… if a boss denies his female employees access to medicine, and they go off and “slut-it-up” just like he knows they will.. wont it cost him more in the long run to insure the kid?
Mr Elite wrote:
Really? You mean that a product, which required manufacture, packaging, shipping, etc, has no costs? Apparently you studied economics at a different school than I did!
Cassandra wrote:
It is? How? If businesses like Hobby Lobby have health insurance plans which do not cover contraception, the individual employees can still buy contraception on their own.
Let’s say that an Orthodox Jewish family owned a Kosher foods company, and required that all of the food served in the lunchroom was kosher. Would that prevent the employees from chowing down on a bacon sandwich when they got home. Or would you say that the family was engaging in illegal discrimination by serving only kosher foods in the lunchroom, even if employees were permitted to eat lunches that they brought from home?
@D “Really? You mean that a product, which required manufacture, packaging, shipping, etc, has no costs? Apparently you studied economics at a different school than I did!”
Yes. I learned how to do cost comparisons. Maybe you slept through that…
The cost of insurance without birth control is HIGHER than the cost of insurance with birth control. Therefore, all your highfalutin analysis is FOS.
http://youtu.be/GY1TJ8JazkQ
Dana
Your analogy to Orthodox Jews and kosher food misses the mark. The issue isn’t that one person’s exercise of religion impacts another person. Candidly that happens every day of the week. The issue here is governmental action. That action, in this case the ADA, mandates health insurance coverage. That coverage includes birth control milieu.
Indeed. Dana studied analogies in the same place he studied economics, apparently.
Current law says that if you are offering insurance, you provide birth control to the women on these policies and you provide it with no co-pay. The Hobby Lobby owners have decided that they were more important than the law, they needed to decide for a bunch of other people that the law didn’t apply to them.