Forced Sterilization and the New Right

For anyone inclined to think that the play-nice, feel-good pretensions of the GOP is a harbinger of a new moderation, check out Dr. Tom Coburn, Republican Senate candidate from Oklahoma.
In 1990, Dr. Coburn saved Angela Plummer’s life, removing a fallopian tube in response to ectopic pregnancy. However, she was “stunned” to learn that he also removed her other fallopian tube. Dr. Coburn claims she gave him oral consent for the procedure. Ms. Plummer has publicly disagreed:
“Dr. Tom Coburn sterilized me without my consent — verbal or written — and I know he’s stating that he got oral consent. That is not true… I’m not up here to smear him. I’m up here because I wanted to have more children, and he took that away from me.”
Is oral consent enough for decisions like this? Given the stress and duress Plummer was under in this situation, what kind of judgment skills does this guy have? More profoundly, what entitles someone to be so flippant about the reproductive rights of a woman?
While Coburn’s campaign has dismissed this story as a smear campaign, it is important to view this as the flip-side of a broader debate about the ability of women to control their own bodies. Coburn and other Republicans have rhetorically grounded their anti-choice politics in the language of “compassion” and “protecting life.” And yet on the flip-side he has shown little respect for his patient.
In a radio interview this week, Dr. Coburn was asked to clarify whether this was an isolated incident, to which he replied: “I’ve done this lots to women who have come in with emergency things who have asked me to sterilize them, under-age. When they’ve already had three babies.” What the hell?
Oh yeah, and then there is that whole problem of America’s legacy of FORCED STERILIZATION, particularly of women of color, but I’m sure that clearly has nothing to do with this story…
What this case reminds us is that while the Republican party can talk a good game about being “pro-life” and promoting a “culture of life”, the history of right-wing America reveals its profound disrespect for the rights of women.
–Contributed by Brendan Sweeney