Damn the Big Pharma

In my Sociology class we have been watching films on the IUD, Norplant, and various forms of the pill. Pharmaceutical companies do all the testing for these on women overseas in developing countries....the women are NOT given informed consent (which is illegal!), told the drug is safe, has passed all trials and are given it. They are then watched like guinea pigs for side effects over a year. Women developed eyesight problems, became severely anemic, developed chronic fatigue syndrome and bleed for MONTHS! With no access to tampons and using rags for pads this is a serious issue when there is no clean water to wash them in. It showed women in India washing their rags in sewer water! One woman had been begging to have her IUD removed and the doctors kept telling her it would pass, shed be fine. She couldn't even get out of bed anymore she was in such pain and so severely anemic!!!!. A human rights observer/anthropologist told of a woman whose Norplant was inserted without sanitization, festered and became extremely infected. She pleaded with the doctor to have it removed due not only to the pain but to the depression it was causing her...They refused. On her fourth visit demanding they do something, they grabbed a scalpal and cut it out while she stood there and screamed in pain! They called her an "ungrateful animal" and tossed her into the streets. There was numerous examples of women given the pill as well with no informed consent causing many of the same symptoms women complain of on

/">this discussion of Birth control pills and women's health

. IT IS ALL CONNECTED LADIES! Their suffering is ours...They suffer at our expense so we can have reliable birth control. Then, we too wind up suffering the very effects that the pharmaceutical corporations over look in the name of science and profit. One of the films told of a woman here, in Toronto, who became legally blind due to complications with her Norplant insertion. Out of solidarity for the women who have suffered so much for our reproductive freedom I refuse to use hormonal based contraceptives that mess with my body and theirs. As women we need to recognize the growing patterns of globalizations complex effects on our health. The patterns are there, do not ignore them as being merely coincidences!

Too poor to buy a lousy potato

There is something wrong with our economy, our state, our so-called 'social democracy' Because someone working for student loans is to dumb to enter in numbers on a computer screen my $3500 was deposited into someone else's account. Their response...Oops maybe we'll have a cheque for you by mid November. For fuck sakes even Starbucks can figure out how to deposit money in a persons account and our government can't? Meanwhile I am making 'mother Hubbard soup'-you know scrape together all the leftovers, boil it in a broth and hope to hell it tastes good so you can feel like you had some what of a meal. I dug for change in the couch and walked to Dominion with my .88 cents to buy a potato to throw in, but nope, sorry, too bad, so sad that potato is gonna costs you $1.30!!!! Do you have any idea how embarrassing it is to be short fifty cents for a lousy potato..."uhhhh Ill just run out to my car and get some more change"....I mumble as I leave to walk home in tears. Too broke to buy a potato, Im going to school to better myself and become the basis of the future economy, pay my taxes, do my part yadda yadda, but Im too broke to buy a potato. Thanks student loans, thanks for making this day really shitty.

If you can hold a fork you can go to York

Man...school is a drag so far. I mean I was expecting UNIVERSITY not college all over again. I mean seriously should you have to explain to people what the WTO, IMF and World Bank are in a FOURTH YEAR WOMEN IN DEVELOPMENT class!!! Not to sound condesending its just that I learned that shit 3 years ago...why didnt they? And why am I paying 4grand to learn the same shit all over again? I have yet to learn anything new in any of my classes. I feel like the kid who should have skipped a grade but was held back...it sux. To make matters worse no one writes political grafiti on the bathroom stalls. There is a HUGE add for birth control on the back of every bathroom stall door at York. i watched for a week as no one questioned this or challenged it. MAN! At cap that shit would've been covered in anti-corporate, pro-feminist/womens health grafiti before you could bat an eye. So I have taken it on myself to draw womens symbols over as many i can in a day....hoping to incourage bathroom dialouge other than "oh my god look at my new purse/Ipod/lipstick/shoes...." And the Womens Centre is sooo frustrating to work with they are not on the ball, procrastinate too much and are really bad about getting back to people. They asked me to design posters and organize speakers for their open house by thursday. Well today is thursday, all the info has long since been mailed off, and they havnt gotten back to me. Mean while I have speakers wanting to now more info and no info coming at me.....GRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!
Today I feel like shit and I REALLY miss Cap College! It may have been a community college with only 1st and 2nd year corses but i learned waaaaaay more there and found inspiration in its hallways!