Just made my first donation to Planned Parenthood

I was raised in a family that taught me the value of giving to others. My dad donated both time and money to several charitable organizations.

I work in the private sector, but sit on three charitable boards. I don't make a lot of money, I just care about some things and support them with my time and small donations.

I've known that Planned Parenthood exists for years. But I never really thought about them. They were just some big organization that did a bunch of stuff. I never needed their services. I've had health care coverage my whole life. I was lucky as a child and grew up in a home with access to health care and I've been fortunate thus far as an adult and have been able to afford anything I've needed including a major operation a little more than a decade ago.

I've seen more and more on Planned Parenthood in the last year or so. This morning I was appalled to see that Susan G. Komen defunded breast cancer screenings for poor women provided by Planned Parenthood. How the hell does a breast cancer organization help prevent breast cancer and its more awful consequences without actually using some of the money it gets for breast cancer? Idiotic.

Let's see, Susan G. Komen can plaster the entire grocery store with pink ribbons. You can't avoid the pink shit all October. But, because a small part of what Planned Parenthood does is anathema to social conservatives, poor women will have less access to an important cancer screening.

Great.

I've avoided the pink crap for years. I don't see how buying pink stuff helps cancer. But I do see how breast cancer screenings help.

So, I just made my first ever donation to Planned Parenthood.