Two hours ago, Intellectual Conservative Arizona, who is blogging on behalf of Yes on 107, posted a little “clap back” on their Tucson Citizen blog in response to me:
The left wing Blog for Arizona/Reappropriate has a post claiming that “Yes on 107 wouldn’t mind if battered women’s shelters and breast cancer screenings closed their doors.” How does the author come to this bizarre conclusion? We pointed out that those services will NOT have to close their doors if Prop. 107 passes, it is a scare tactic used by the left in order to frighten people from voting
(Please note that I changed the title of my post this morning after realizing that the first one was super-long and unwieldy. Apparently IC Arizona did not refresh their cache.)
The logic is fairly straightforward, and in fact taken from Yes on 107’s own words.
Bascially, Yes on 107 says that programs that currently target their services… simply have to open their doors to men. Here’s their quote:
Secondly, any program in risk of being eliminated just has to open its services up to men.
Yes on 107 then goes on to defend the rights of “men’s rights” groups to file lawsuits against battered women’s shelters, presuming that judges will throw them out. Yes on 107 ignores the political and financial costs of such lawsuits against battered women’s shelters, let alone the sheer inhumanity of their argument.
What Yes on 107 fails to acknowledge is that California specifically protects funding for women’s health in their statutes, and that was the basis for the rejection of these lawsuits in California. Arizona, to my knowledge, does not have such protections.
So, if men’s rights groups filed lawsuits against battered women’s shelters in this state, judges could not turn to similar protections to defend shelters in this state. And, as for criticism that this is all hypothetical, I ask: what makes one think that “men’s rights” groups wouldn’t file such lawsuits? This is what men’s rights groups do. Just Google “NCFM” to see the long history of lawsuits they have filed around the country on a wide range of topics.
Bottom line, I say that Yes on 107 appears to not mind the closing of battered women’s shelters because they offered only two options for shelters: accept men, or be ready for lawsuits to determine their status under Proposition 107. Both options are punitively damaging to battered women’s shelters and their very day-to-day operation, but Yes on 107 simply doesn’t acknowledge this fact. Yes on 107 doesn’t acknowledge that battered women’s shelters cannot operate optimally when being sued, or having to accept men. Yes on 107 basically doesn’t care about those concerns, or the thousands of women who do care.
Meanwhile, Yes on 107 deftly side-steps the bulk of my argument: which is the long litany of lawsuits that the state will be needed to establish scope. They haven’t denied their group’s involvement in Connerly vs. State Personnel Board, or that Proposition 107 is carefully worded in order to help support a lawsuit that will expand the scope of this ballot measure against the voters’ wishes. Reams of digital ink have been used defending themselves in regards to battered women’s shelters, but on the subject of whether a lawsuit will be filed to expand the scope of this ballot measure? Silence.
Hmm, I wonder why that is?
Instead, Yes on 107 chides me for exploring the end-game of Proposition 107. The title of their post: “Since there’s a remote chance of a nuclear war if Proposition 107 passes, you must be in favor of nuclear war if you support it.” Apparently Yes on 107 doesn’t believe that voters should actually think through what happens with the passage of a ballot measure, including weighing all the possible consequences of their vote.
If there’s a chance that voting on a ballot measure could threaten battered women’s shelters, shouldn’t voters have a right to know how that will happen? Apparently, Yes on 107 doesn’t think so. They would rather that voters vote, dumbly and without appropriate education and awareness.
I also wonder why Yes on 107 continues to call the chances “remote” that battered women’s shelters would be targeted. 1) I’m actually drawing on legal precedent in California, and 2) Yes on 107, themselves, argue that battered women’s shelters should open their doors to men in order to remain in compliance with state law should Propostion 107 pass.
Yet, in the same post, Yes on 107 argues that battered women’s shelters are unlikely to be threatened by Proposition 107 because: “Well, it happened once in California, so the chances are unlikely that it’ll happen again.” Really, now, don’t you think that Arizona voters are smarter than that?
If you’re still deciding your vote, please Vote No on Proposition 107.
Cross-posted: Blog for Arizona
PS: Gee, Intellectual Conservative Arizona, you call me “left-wing” like it’s a bad thing…
