Texas Rep. Jessica Farrar has taken action against a bill that she says “messes with women’s heads.”
The Democrat has proposed her own bill, one that would ban “unregulated masturbatory emissions,” in an effort to highlight state laws that punish women for having abortions.
The new Texas bill would ban “unregulated masturbatory emissions,” as part of a bill that the Washington Post calls “a sendup on antiabortion legislation.” It’s Farras’ an attempt to put a spotlight on the state’s practice of making it difficult for women to receive healthcare.
Farrar filed a Texas House bill on Friday titled, “Man’s Right to Know Act,” which would force men to wait 24 hours after an “initial health care consultation” to receive an elective vasectomy, colonoscopy or even a Viagra prescription.
Farrar admitted to a Texas paper that she knows the “proposed satirical regulations” will not be enacted but that is not the point of the bill.
“What I would like to see is this make people stop and think,” Farrar told the Texas Tribune. “Maybe my colleagues aren’t capable of that, but the people who voted for them, or the people that didn’t vote at all, I hope that it changes their mind and helps them to decide what the priorities are.”
The 24-hour waiting periods proposed by Farrar is similar to a Texas law that forces women to have an ultrasound at least 24 hours before an abortion, which Farrar said “messes with women’s heads.”
#HB4260, “A Man’s Right to Know,” mirrors real TX laws and health care restrictions faced by TX women every #txlege session.
— Jessica Farrar (@_jessicafarrar_) March 11, 2017
“Emissions outside of a woman’s vagina, or created outside of a health or medical facility, will be charged a $100 civil penalty for each emission, and will be considered an act against an unborn child,” the bill states.
Farrar told the Houston Chronicle that “a lot of people find the bill funny,” but she is not among them.
“What’s not funny are the obstacles that Texas women face every day, that were placed there by legislatures making it very difficult for them to access health care,” she told the paper.