[imc-st.louis] Check out 2005 -- Pro-Choice Missouri

[DeborahLS at aol.com]

Click here: 2005 -- Pro-Choice Missouri 


Dear Friends:

I want to let you know about an exciting event scheduled for Wednesday night. 
 While many of us have been concerned about other germane issues such as the 
Gulf Coast Disaster and the loss of life in Iraq our lawmakers and religious 
fundamentalists continue to erode a woman's right to control her own body.

This play, "Words of Choice" sends its message home with a humorous touch.  
It has a talented caste of three women who play an array of characters.  You 
will laugh, cry and have a chance to tell lawmakers, "No, we still believe it is 
our right to make choices about our bodies and in we support other women's 
rights to choice too."

The playwright is Cindy Cooper and the Artistic Director is Joan Lipkin of 
That Uppity Theater Company.  This play will leave St. Louis and tour some of 
the "Red" states.  Come out and support this production and NARAL on opening 
night at 7:00 pm at the CRC on Wednesday, September 14th.

Discounted ticketing is available for individuals or groups with special 
needs.

For additional info hit the link or review the info below.  Also, if you can, 
please circulate and/or post this information.  Thanks for your interest.

All my best,

Deborah Stoddard


READ MORE BELOW ABOUT WHAT'S HAPPENING IN MISSOURI!  A press release from 
NARAL Pro-Choice Missouri, an article from the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, and links 
to a BLOG entry!

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact: Angie Postal or Pamela Sumners at (314) 531-8616
 
"WORDS OF CHOICE" TO BENEFIT NARAL PRO-CHOICE MISSOURI AS LEGISLATURE MEETS 
IN SPECIAL SESSION TO RESTRICT ACCESS TO REPRODUCTIVE HEALTHCARE
 
On September 14th, 2005, the eve of a special legislative session to consider 
anti-choice bills and with Roe v. Wade hanging on the nomination of John 
Roberts to the Supreme Court, NARAL Pro-Choice Missouri offers the one-night-only 
performance of "Words of Choice," at 7:00 p.m. at Central Reform Congregation, 
5020 Waterman at Kingshighway in St. Louis.  The performance will benefit 
activities of NARAL Pro-Choice Missouri and also offers an opportunity to meet 
new executive director Pamela Sumners.  The ensemble cast, directed by  Joan 
Lipkin, artistic director of That Uppity Theatre Company, will tour Kansas to 
spread the message about women's experiences before Roe v. Wade and to underscore 
the importance of taking seriously the current threats to overturn Roe.
 
"Words of Choice," created by Cindy Cooper, weaves together the comic and 
serious thoughts of 14 writers including Justice Blackmun, Kathy Najimy, Kathleen 
Tolan and Emily Lyons among others..  The play tells powerful and passionate 
stories from the heart-hot-button topics include emergency contraception for 
sexual assault survivors, abstinence education, and access to safe and legal 
abortion.  That Uppity Theatre Company and director Joan Lipkin are noted for 
exploring political and social issues through the arts and for a bold style.  
NARAL Pro-Choice Missouri is the political arm of the pro-choice movement and 
protects women's privacy and reproductive health throughout the state of 
Missouri.  
 
"Words of Choice" has toured colleges, community centers, faith-based 
institutions and theaters in 18 cities.
 
"I wanted to break open the conversation on reproductive rights," said 
playwright Cooper, who will be on hand following the performance for a panel 
discussion with Washington University Law Professor Laura Rosenbury and NARAL 
Pro-Choice Missouri Access Project Director Melissa Kimball. Kimball's 2005 survey of 
Missouri pharmacies revealed that 9 out of 10 of them in rural areas do not 
stock emergency contraception and that of those who refuse to stock or order 
it, 59% cited a "moral objection."  The panel will discuss the real-world impact 
of legal decisions and the personal choices of individual pharmacists on a 
woman's constitutional right to choose.
 
Because this is a benefit performance, ticket prices above the $20 general 
admission price are gratefully accepted.  Student and senior discounted tickets 
available at $10.  Any excess donations will support NARAL Pro-Choice's 
Missouri's efforts to defeat anti-choice bills in the special session and grassroots 
organizing throughout Missouri.  
            
For more information and to order tickets call (314) 531-8616.  To order 
tickets online visit www.prochoicemissouri.org. 
  
=======================================
An Emergency SESSION IN MISSOURI costs $100,000 Minimum!

Read  how 'ANTI-ABORTION 'EMERGENCY' SESSION MOCKS KATRINA SURVIVORS FACING A 
REAL EMERGENCY' ...
http://talk2action.blogspot.com/2005/09/anti-abortion-emergency-mocks-katrina.
html
======================================= 
These days, abortion rights groups are kept scrambling 
By Jo Mannies 
Of the Post-Dispatch 
Monday, Sep. 05 2005 

HUNDREDS OF abortion rights supporters, many of them from St. Louis, are 
planning to converge on Jefferson City to protest against the Missouri 
Legislature's special session that begins Tuesday. 

Their aim is to attack the session's focus on the further restricting of 
abortion. 

But by the time their abortion rights rally is held on Sept. 14, legislators 
are likely to have already passed the anti-abortion bill and placed it on the 
desk of Gov. Matt Blunt, who is eager to sign it into law. 

Once again, the abortion rights forces have found themselves outmaneuvered by 
the opposition. For apparently unrelated reasons, Blunt moved up the special 
session's starting date by more than a week. The rally's timing, planned for 
the initial opening day, now will come near the session's end. 

Paula Gianino, president of Planned Parenthood of the St. Louis Region, said 
the rally would have an impact "even if the deed is done." 

She also cited her side's other efforts. Since last week, Planned Parenthood 
and NARAL Pro-Choice Missouri have been conducting a phone-bank operation to 
galvanize allies against the bill. Planned Parenthood also is sending out 
190,000 fliers this week that call the session "shameful." 

On Wednesday, about 30 clergy and church representatives with the Religious 
Coalition for Reproductive Choice are traveling to the state Capitol to lobby 
for changes in the bill. 

All that activity underscores how the state's abortion rights camp has had to 
scramble ever since it lost its last bastions of political support. 

The Missouri Legislature always has been made up largely of abortion 
opponents, 
even when the Democrats ruled. But abortion rights forces wielded clout 
because 
they had powerful legislative allies, often the state House speakers. Term 
limits ended that marriage. 

The late Gov. Mel Carnahan has arguably been the state's most powerful 
defender 
of abortion rights. After taking office in 1993, he shifted the focus to 
abortion prevention and persuaded legislators to set up a state-funded family 
planning program for the poor. 

Abortion opponents launched legislative and legal battles against the program 
because it sent state money to Planned Parenthood, the state's largest 
private 
provider of reproductive health services. The agency set up a separate arm 
for 
its abortion clinic operations, to back up its claim that no family planning 
money was supporting abortion. Abortion opponents remained unconvinced. 

Although Carnahan's own political career survived such controversies, he 
openly 
acknowledged that abortion was becoming a powerful club - especially in rural 
areas - that increasingly was knocking off fellow Democrats. 

His successor, fellow Democrat Bob Holden, backed abortion rights but 
couldn't 
block opponents who succeeded in killing off the family planning program and 
passed more restrictions. 

With an abortion opponent now as governor, Gianino's aim is revive the 
"prevention first" campaign. She believes that the public is becoming 
concerned 
by conservatives' efforts to eliminate public spending on contraceptives for 
the poor, and to remove contraceptive information from school sex education 
programs. 

The state Republican Party is somewhat split over the contraceptive debate. 
But 
the party has become so identified with the anti-abortion camp that there's 
no 
longer any high-profile GOP figures, such as former state Treasurer Wendell 
Bailey, who publicly back abortion rights. 

That history provides some context to the political problems that face both 
parties as they prepare for the statewide elections next year. 

State Auditor Claire McCaskill didn't mention abortion when she announced her 
Democratic bid for the U.S. Senate in front of her family's old feed mill in 
Houston, Mo. Afterward, she acknowledged that she backed abortion rights but 
said that she wanted to return the focus to abortion prevention and making 
adoption easier. But reporters wandering around Houston found few locals who 
didn't mention abortion right off the bat. 

Abortion rights groups who likely will back McCaskill in the Senate are now 
faced with the prospect of having to go underground with their support. 

A similar situation, though, confronts some Missouri Republicans - including 
the governor - who oppose abortion but are splitting with anti-abortion 
groups 
on the matter of stem cell research. 

U.S. Sen. Jim Talent, McCaskill's Republican target, has sided with those 
groups against embryonic and therapeutic stem cell research. But he's said 
little publicly, especially since certain key Republicans - notably former 
Sen. 
John C. Danforth and donor Sam Fox - have emphasized their support for stem 
cell research. 

Missouri Right to Life President Pam Fichter predicts that stem cell research 
will become "the biggest pro-life issue" in next year's legislative session 
and 
the November election. 

However, Republican legislative leaders have agreed not to bring up stem cell 
research during the special session. It's too divisive. Better for the GOP to 
stick to abortion. 

E-mail: jmannies at post-dispatch.com 














For further information - 212-560-2616 
www.wordsofchoice.org 
Words of Choice ~~ dynamic pro-choice  theater~~ wordsofchoice at mindspring.com 
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