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In 1872, Comstock went to Washington with an anti-obscenity bill, which included a ban on contraceptives that he drafted himself. In 1873, Congress passed the new law, which came to be known as the Comstock Act. The statute defined contraceptives as obscene and illicit, and made it a federal crime to provide birth control through the mail or across state lines. Because of one man’s beliefs that contraception was some kind of societal "evil," women were prevented from gaining access to any methods of stopping unwanted pregnancies, and many of them became pregnant as a result. The efforts of Karen Brauer and her organization Pharmacists For Life, is a similar – and frightening – duplication of the Comstock crusade to deny access to contraception. Recent interviews of Brauer in the media have recorded some rather disturbing statements. In a Washington Post story on March 27, Brauer defends the right of pharmacists to not only decline filling prescriptions for contraception themselves, but also to refer customers elsewhere or transfer their prescriptions. "That’s like saying, ‘I don’t kill people myself, but let me tell you about the guy down the street who does.’ What’s that saying? ‘I will not off your husband, but I know a buddy who will?’ It’s the same thing," said Brauer. She now works at a hospital pharmacy after being fired by Kmart for lying to a customer about the store not having the prescription she wanted in stock. The Associated Press reported on September 16, 2004, that Brauer does not believe there should be any obligation to refer rebuffed customers to another pharmacist who would fill their prescription. "Forced referral is stupid," Brauer said. "If we’re not going to kill a human being, we’re not going to help the customer go do it somewhere else." Pharmacists For Life goes even further, denouncing pharmacists who refer patients to other pharmacists who will fill their prescriptions: "A pharmacist by virtue of properly understood conscience cannot be licitly compelled to cooperate in such a fashion with what he knows will result in a chemical abortion and, hence, a dead baby. Such activity is called material cooperation. Further, it is not an inconvenience to refuse to refer such a client, since the pharmacist is doing the woman and preborn child a favor in terms of physical and spiritual health." "Material cooperation with such an evil can never be licit even if it may be lawful, as it is in today's society. In fact, pharmacists aware of the evil nature of such a scenario would have a duty as a pharmacist and a person not to cooperate in such an evil even under pain of serious adverse ramifications. Some authors, hiding their publicly stated support for any and all baby killing, have erroneously stated shameful opinions which equivocate on the rights of conscience and thus claim a pharmacist may have a right of conscience, but if all else fails, he must cooperate with the evil in our example. Such thinking shows the irrational absurdity and confusion in the minds of those who adhere to such ideas." Continued On Next Page (pharmacist, Page 3) ... AUTHOR: Susan Levine  TAGS: Opinion world america war Family government living society relationships BOOKMARK: Digg it | Add to Del.ICIO | Add to FARK ACTIONS: Comment Save Print Register free acount  |
