PSA-Amendment 48- NO, NO

Last week I was asked to shoot the rally kicking off the fight against Amendment 48. I went down to the Tivoli's multi-cultural lounge on the Auraria Campus and just took in everything that was around. I looked at some of the literature and listened to the speakers who were explaining what was at stake. I took some photos.

Amendment 48 is real powder-keg of political and personal impact. This amendment approaches the controversy over the when life starts and like throwing a rock in a pond, the effects move outward from the center. This legislation affects complicated matters such as abortion and in-vitro fertilization, but also affects women of all ages who use birth control. This amendment would outlaw the use of birth control in that it interferes with the creation of life. Get real.

I haven't had many fears in my life, but unwanted pregnancies was at the top of the list for a long time. All my husband had to do was hang his pants too close to the bed and I got pregnant. Being pregnant is a wonderful experience, don't get me wrong, but it effectively consumes your time, attention and energy, saying nothing of raising children for an average of 20 years. That's a real fear, giving away that much time in your life, especially if you're done with the privilege of reproduction. It's time to move on to other phases in life.

Enter birth control.

Amendment 48 would make the choice of using birth control unavailable thereby throwing our society back about 100 years. It makes me cringe, thinking of my daughters being unable to control their reproductive choices. As a grandmother, I'm happy to have a passel of grandkids, as a mother I think my girls would be awesome moms, but as adult women, I'd be sad and angry if their choices were limited by narrow-minded right-wing conservative bucket-mouths.

It's like they fell out of the stupid tree and hit every branch on the way down.

This amendment puts the quality of women's lives in jeopardy. Not just women who have decided or need to terminate a pregnancy, but couples, men and women who wish to use in-vitro fertilization to create a family, and the amendment would limit research that tries to ferret out the secrets of human physiology. These are all complicated situations, with no easy answers. The answer is easy on this amendment. Like the sign says, "48, No, No."