Doonesbury Day #6 : the U-T San Diego Blackout Continues, Trudeau Talks Comedy Malpractice, And No, We Won’t Shut Up

Sen. McDougle, I was assured that you were making Virginia safe for men at long last, but I still see ladies every time I go out. Ladies with, presumably, vaginers. Explain yourself, sir.

Zack Foley on VA state Senator Ryan McDougle’s Facebook page (subsequently scrubbed….)

 “What’s the difference between a fertilized egg, a corporation and a woman?One of them isn’t considered a person in Oklahoma.”

Kristen Schaal

 This is the sixth and final day in which “Doonesbury creator” Gary Trudeau satirizes Texas’ state mandated health care requirements for women seeking an abortion. Trudeau depicts a woman in the first trimester of an unwanted pregnancy as she undergoes a state mandated transvaginal sonogram, listens to her physician provide a state mandated detailed description of her possibly 2 ½ inch fetus, and then waits another state mandated 24 hours before having the abortion.

Are these really the same people who are frothing at the mouth about “big government mandated Obamacare?” My shit detector just hit “10.”

In an interview  earlier this week with the Washington Post Trudeau explains the impetus for this week’s strips:

“For some reason, the GOP has chosen 2012 to re-litigate reproductive freedom, an issue that was resolved decades ago. Why Santorum, Limbaugh et al. thought this would be a good time to declare war on half the electorate, I cannot say. But to ignore it would have been comedy malpractice.”

 Trudeau lampoons the heavy handed paternalism of the state, right wing style. And he lampoons the prurient slutty-slut-slut misogyny of right wing politicians, pundits and shock jocks. The terms “shaming room,” “shaming wand” and “Rick Rolled” are now part of our collective vocabulary.

Satire and humor are incredibly powerful tactics of offense strategy. That explains why the U-T killed the Trudeau cartoons this week while maintaining their own preferred tacticians. On the left we are seeing a pushback that goes beyond playing defense. (No, we are not going to play defense on this stuff.) That pushback is teeth gnashing funny, head banging funny. But it is funny.

Bob McDonnell, the governor of VA has been brought up as a possible Vice President choice on the Republican ticket this year. Alas for the man, we have come to know and loathe him as definitely VP material, as in Vaginal Probe. His republican colleagues in the state legislature have likewise taken hits for supporting transvaginal shaming rods as a requirement for an abortion. The most extreme part of the legislation went down and so did McDonnell’s shot at the republican ticket.

Republican VA state Senator Ryan McDougle took a major hit on his Facebook page. Comments were scrubbed but of course someone out there had screen shots.  Jeremy F. Clark posted “I can’t find my vagina ? Have you seen it?” Perhaps that message will appear on milk cartons across the state of Virginia.

Women were of course thrilled to be able to consult a real life vagina expert in their Virginia state capitol. A woman commenting on his facebook left the following message:

“I am so excited that you have taken such an interest in my health. I just wanted to know your thoughts on a possible yeast infection. I can’t afford health insurance even with my three jobs so since you’re so tuned into women’s bodies I thought you might have some natural remedies…let me know!”

We push back every way we can, everywhere we can.  In the state legislatures, women have fought against the republican majorities by introducing their own bills. In Ohio, Illinois and Virginia, women take men’s reproductive health very seriously. They have therefore introduced bills that would have government mandates regarding the dispensing of Viagra. Those mandates include rectal exams, psychological counseling, watching videos about the drug’s possible side effects, and receiving a state scripted lecture from the physician.

In Oklahoma a state senator proposed a “spilled seed” amendment, and in the city of Wilmington DE a councilwoman authorized a resolution that declares “each ‘egg person’ and each ‘sperm person’…equal in the eyes of the government.”

Doonesbury will resume its place in the U-T’s Sunday comics and the status quo will be resumed within the U-T’s musty pages. And no, we won’t shut up.