It's really too bad that the word FAIL emblazoned across a picture of something failing miserably has become a cliche, because America's floundering but tenacious Personhood movement is perfectly suited to be meme-ified. In 2008 and 2010, voters in Colorado rejected a Personhood amendment that would have defined human life as starting at the moment of conception and given all rights pertaining to human life to single-celled zygotes. In 2011, voters in Mississippi also said thanks, but no thanks to a similar measure. In Ohio, a Personhood amendment failed to get the necessary number of signatures to appear on this fall's ballot, and in Oklahoma, the state Supreme Court unanimously declared that personhood amendments are really, terribly fucking stupid (at least, that's the technical legal term). But Personhood advocates are undaunted! They're going to keep fighting for the microscopic babies we may all be pregnant with right now all the way to the Yoo-nighted States Supreme Court.


To review: Personhood is a terribly stupid idea that would outlaw all abortion and threaten the legality of many forms of birth control and some fertility treatments. It would give fetuses more rights than pregnant women, as it would prioritize rights of non-sentient bundles of cells over the rights of women not to have other people living inside of them after they have sex. It treats the penis like a magic wand that makes life happen and the female body like a passive baby holder.

The right wing yokels who run the state government in Oklahoma are mostly in support of a measure that would force women who become pregnant to stay that way, but the State Supreme Court didn't agree, as the measure was "clearly unconstitutional." But proponents of Personhood want to take this to Washington. Says Nancy Northup, president and CEO of the Center for Reproductive Rights, via press release:

The proponents of this measure have made explicit the ultimate objective of the anti-reproductive rights movement: to strip all Americans of their constitutional right to make their own decisions about whether and when to have children. The scope of the fundamental rights and longstanding court precedents under attack by the opponents of reproductive rights is stunning.


In other words — the goal of the Personhood movement is to bring America back to the dark ages, from coast to coast.

No need to get your Fallopian Tubes in a twist just yet, though — it's highly unlikely that the High Court will even agree to hear Oklahoma's goofy argument, and even if they do, the only way they'd win is if Justice Scalia clones himself 4 times and disguises the clones as Justices Bader Ginsburg, Kennedy, Kagan, Sotomayor and somehow knocks the real Bader Ginsburg, Kennedy, Kagan, and Sotomayor out for a few days, which is way too Scooby Doo dastardly even for a guy who goes hunting with Dick Cheney.

[CRR]