Ignorance on CNN
SERIOUS FEMINIST RANT
Mike and I were watching Anderson Cooper on CNN last night, when something came on that made me flip out. A female correspondent was doing a segment on the recent deaths that may have been caused by RU-486. The headline on the screen read "ABORTION PILL DEATHS" or something like that, but the reporter said "... two recent deaths from taking the morning after pill." I immediately sat up and was like, "Hello? Which is it?"
Those are two entirely separate drugs. The morning after pill is Plan B (levonorgestrel). It is an emergency contraceptive, NOT an abortion pill and in fact will not work if you are already pregnant. The abortion pill is RU-486 (mifepristone). Since the correspondent stated the WRONG DRUG on air, the only way I knew which one they were actually talking about was seeing the close-up shot of the pill bottle which clearly read "RU-486."
This kind of carelessness has the effect of grievously misinforming the public about an important women's health issue. Conflating these two drugs is NOT OK. This is all we need, some ignorant teenager seeing CNN and thinking it is not safe to go and get emergency contraception. I have taken Plan B, and it is more like a large dose of birth control and NOT NOT NOT the abortion pill. It so safe the FDA is considering making it over-the-counter. I knew what they really meant because I am very familiar with this issue and recognized the name of the drug. Casual viewers might not. This mistake was extremely upsetting to me. It almost makes me think it's not a mistake and part of a huge conspiracy by conservative America to equate birth control with abortion... I mean, geez.
I emailed CNN to that effect today. (But didn't mention the conspiracy.)
/SERIOUS FEMINIST RANT
2 comments:
Heh. They mix up medical stuff on CNN all the time. So this doesn't qualify as a feminist rant. They shouldn't talk about medical stuff at all on the news unless they have Dr. Sanjay Gupta talk about it. He's never wrong and is a good-looker to boot.
Too bad he's way too young for me, I'm already married and have kids. But if I were mumble...mumble... not married, without kids and he weren't married and probably has kids...well, he'd just have to watch out.
Sorry. I digressed. What was the question?
Yes. Morning after pill, fine. RU-486, a drug that is not benign. Better to take the morning after pill than to need RU-486.
This is why I didn't mention my conspiracy theory in my email, just the factual error.
What can I say? I've been watching too much X-Files lately...
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