Logging into Twitter today, I noticed something that seemed to be trending a bit, at least in my timeline: Alyssa Milano is declaring a #SexStrike, until women receive what she refers to as body autonomy. If I understand this protest, it’s about a recent bill passed in the State of Georgia that would prevent an abortion, once a fetal heartbeat had been detected. I’m told this is somewhere around the sixth week of pregnancy. I don’t want to argue whether this new law is right or wrong, Constitutional or not, that’s for others in a different forum. What I find amusing about this protest is that I don’t see a lot on the left commenting one way or another and of course, those on the right are outright mocking her.
Here’s her tweet:
Taking this in, several things came to mind but three thoughts about what is being called for here were more prevalent than some others.
First, isn’t calling for women to not have sex, a form of abstinence? I can see how some on the right may actually spin this that way. Many of the evangelical right have advocated for abstinence, especially before marriage, for decades now. A “sex strike” would play into their hands. Or could. I can envision the headline now: Alyssa Milano Advocates for Abstinence.
Second, it seems to me that refusing to have sex with me is actually bodily autonomy, isn’t it? By saying that she’s not going to have sex with a man until her reproductive rights are restored, or whatever it is actually being asserted, that in fact is what is being sought. Do women actually feel compelled to have sex? I think there are laws on the books to prevent that, aren’t there?
Finally, by calling for the strike, I think she assumes the above, and also that women don’t enjoy sex as much as men and believe it is their duty to please the man their with. That seems to me to be a very medieval, okay maybe Victorian, attitude towards sex and says a lot more about women then it does men.
Of course this is just a stunt, a call for attention to herself and not a cause. We see this on either side of the abortion debate all the time. Recently when the State of New York passed a very liberal abortion rights bill, the right went cuckoo. I actually read the bill, and the hyperbole associated with it just wasn’t apparent to me. Now that Georgia has responded in a way that is abhorrent to the left, we see a similar reaction, from a few.
I keep hoping that one day, the absurdities from both sides of that abortion debate will disappear, but I don’t foresee this occurring within my lifetime.
Conservative Skeptic 
I’m sure we follow different people on Twitter, but the harshest criticism I saw came from left-leaning feminists. There were a handful defending her, but most seemed to think that this did more harm than good.
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I don’t exactly, but probably 25% of those I follow on Twitter, in the bio, label themselves as “liberal” or “progressive”. I saw none supporting Milano (I may have missed some), or criticizing her either. With what you are saying though, I now tend to believe many may have been saying to themselves, “Alyssa, please just go away!”
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Hardly Lysistrata, although she is probably stupid enough to think she is.
If women really don’t want to get pregnant and deal with all that entails, then make sure your form of birth control is as absolute as it can be. Use two forms, provide condoms for your male partners. Have your tubes ligated. Have a hysterectomy. Remain chaste.
I was always sickened by the notion, which was promoted by the Left/Progressives and radical feminists that abortion is just fine as a form of birth control and that Margaret Sanger was a “god-send” to women. And the corollary to the pill was that women could be as promiscuous as some men, should they choose to be.
My body…me, me, me. No responsibility and no boundaries and no restrictions and no regrets. Except aborting a baby isn’t that easy and many women had deep regrets for the rest of their lives.
I had two friends in college, who had abortions and relayed to me their regret and sorrow and pled with me to never have an abortion. And they loved the baby’s father and one went on to marry and have other children with him. I often wondered how they fared, knowing that they had chosen to kill their first offspring.
And as for enjoying sex, it seems that an lot of women enjoy the affairs they have with their vibrators more than messing with a man and all the complications that come from those relationships.
I would support a 12 week limit, but 6 weeks…holy shit, most women haven’t a clue, yet.
There are so many forms of birth control, there should not be as many “mistakes” as have occurred over the last decades. Nor should there be women who are allowed to get multiple abortions, in my opinion. But it occurs and is no big deal…like getting your ears pierced, you just go and have it done and carry on about your merry way.
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I remember several years ago (a decade?) two Republican congressmen proposed that birth control pills be available over the counter. That would’ve saved a lot of money for women not only for the pill itself, but it insurance cost by not having to go to the doctor and have a prescription renewed. Democrats refused to even bring it up for debate. If I recall, there was a restriction: the woman had to 18 yrs. old.
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I think it was during the Obamacare debates that a few Republicans floated that idea. I wouldn’t favor it myself, because of the real risks of any hormonal therapy that should be under a physician’s watch. We tend to think of the Pill as innocuous, but it is not.
What bothers me most about the thought processes of women, such as Milano, is that they use the term “reproductive rights” when what they really intend is “unrestricted abortions.”
Nobody is interfering with adult reproductive rights or with any other individual rights they have to do what they want with their own body. Women are allowed to have as many babies as they want or none at all. They can choose to “alter” their gender through hormones and surgery. They can pierce and tattoo themselves all over and add horns if they choose.
If Milano means that all women should be allowed to abort a pregnancy at any time and including during and shortly after birth, then she should say exactly that and stop the foolish terminology that isn’t fooling anybody on any political spectrum.
She wants all women to be allowed to end a pregnancy by killing the unborn human being they have in their womb at any time and she wants taxpayers to foot the bill. That is not “reproductive rights.” That is a “right to murder.”
Birth control is offered free or nearly so. The Pill is not the best form, as there is too much of a chance for human error. Hormonal or non-hormonal IUDs might be a better choice for the government to offer free to women. Or those hormonal implants. But each of these requires medical tracking, yearly exams, etc.
I always agreed with Bill Clinton that abortions should be “safe, rare and legal.” I still don’t see anything wrong with that attitude.
Now…with the Left it is “kill all the babies and take all the guns.” Everybody gets everything free as a right, except for those that are as yet unborn. Those things have no rights.
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