I guess you don’t need a medical degree to run for office, and heck, you don’t even need grade school anatomy.
An Idaho lawmaker received a brief lesson on female anatomy after asking if a woman can swallow a small camera for doctors to conduct a remote gynecological exam.
The question Monday from Republican Rep. Vito Barbieri came as the House State Affairs Committee heard nearly three hours of testimony on a bill that would ban doctors from prescribing abortion-inducing medication through telemedicine.
Just so you know: things that enter the mouth can then pass on to the esophagus, stomach, small intestine, large intestine, and rectum, and then exit through the anus. That path does not connect to the ovaries, fallopian tubes, uterus, cervix or vagina. It doesn’t even run through to the kidneys or urethra.
It’s only in Republicans that there is a major loop from the colon up through the spine, in through the foramen magnum, and then terminating directly on the forebrain, so we could conceivably do brain scans by feeding them small remote cameras. If we thought they had a brain worth examining.
Explain that, evolution!
By the way, after demonstrating his ignorance, Barbieri of course went on to vote for a bill prohibiting the use of telemedicine in prescribing abortion medication.
How could anyone be that ignorant of basic anatomy?
we could conceivably do brain scans by feeding them small remote cameras. If we thought they had a brain worth examining.
The camera would have to have some pretty serious magnification.
@#1:
How could anyone be that ignorant of basic anatomy?
I have a friend who was home-schooled by a crazed fundamentalist; that’s actually par for the course. Fundagelicals like ignorance; it’s their food.
Anne… @ # 1 – Your question is three words too long.
I do not know anything, I do not listen to anyone and I never learn anything new. But I do have a very loud voice and strong opinions, so my guidance counselor suggested I go into politics…
He must have been told that the baby grows in the mommy’s tummy. His education never progressed from that…
Next session, a proposal to stop pro-choicers shooting storks.
One of my profs, years ago, told of a couple he had counseled for infertility. All tests were normal, but they could not conceive. Not until he brought out the anatomy dolls did he find out they had (innocently and ignorantly) been an anal-only couple. So Vito might not be the only one thinking this is the appropriate route…
My lord, Cuttlefish! You would think that couple would have had bunches of little lawyers around the house!!
It strikes me that that girl with the power of fecal kinesis could make these people’s heads explode.
It’s a fundie xian and/or Mormon thing. There are lots of both in Idaho.
I thought Rheobatrachus silus was extinct…
So you’re saying their canalis neurentericus never closes? That makes sense.
Just beating up on women some more.
What other branch of medicine has weird, old, ignorant white males setting the rules without the slightest knowledge of medicine or anatomy?
FWIW, there is a black market in medical abortion drugs now, RU 486 and/or prostaglandins. Idaho is one place that uses this market. Not good, but an improvement over the older black market in…coat hangers.
Idaho tries to make abortions all but impossible but will let you kill your kids by medical neglect without any problems. You can call this hypocritical but I just call it evil.
It was then that Vito Barbieri(R) learned that all of those late nights spent sobbing and expensive fertility treatments he had paid for were in vain.
Did you plan it so this post is between two others about shit in an effort to make it more appealing? (which posts is/are the “it” is up to you)
I think a lot of fundamentalists are actively proud of how stupid they are. There is a strong anti-intellectual streak, and the goal of their flavor of Christianity is to believe – to not think – like they have offered up their mind as a sacrifice to their god.
As I said about one awful smutfic, “That’s not just anatomically impossible, it’s topologically questionable!”
@16, Menyambal
As a former fundamentalist, I think this is correct. In a way, at least, even if not literally or consciously.
There were numerous instances where I instinctively opposed certain knowledge. The examples I recall the most:
1) (grade 8?) learning that light bounced off of things, and this is why we can see. I somehow thought this just had to be wrong, and I think my mind connected this to religion slightly. I’m guessing now that’s because the actual explanation involves a mindless process (bouncing), instead of involving magic vision, like I had previousy thought. Though it’s possible my older brother influenced me on this one.
2) (grade 6) learning about sex. When I did, I became very upset, and somehow felt as though my friend (nearby at the time) ought to have somehow prevented me from learning about this. I’m sure my household’s heavy taboo around sexual topics (including secrecy about anatomy) influenced me here.
However, this sort of thing only happened sometimes, and I was otherwise brilliant, happy, and quick at learning science in school. I even scored the highest in my class on the evolution exam (grade 11 or 12), even though at the time I didn’t think it was true. Though that was high school, I was somewhat different by then.
That guy is involved in law making, right?
Wow. Just. Wow.
Pharyngula never ceases to enlighten me about the infinite impossibilities of pure ignorance. Seriously, even if I wanted to make up crap like this , I couldn’t.
Get a grip, folks. Barbieri was making a rhetorical point about telemedicine. An irrelevant point, but rhetorical, nonetheless.
Time to recycle and modify an old lawyer joke.
A woman goes to her doctor for advice. “My husband wants to try anal intercourse. Is that OK?”
“If you are careful and take the right precautions then it won’t hurt you.”
“So I don’t need birth control any more?”
“No, you still need birth control, where do you think Republican politicians come from?”
So I went and looked this dude up; he’s in his 60s and is a reasonable-looking human being.
That means that it is essentially certain that he has had sex, probably a number of times into the thousands.
…wtf? I would be fascinated by an interview with one of his partners.
He says it was a “rhetorical point” to show that telemedicine can’t apply to abortions. As if there were only one way to conduct telemedicine.
Politics annoys me. “Doesn’t matter if it’s a lie, a distraction or improperly frames the argument – if it helps my side, I’ll say it!”
After the lesson Barbieri went to say, “But I remember the documentary Innerspace with Martin Short“
So, basically you’re saying they have shit for brains?
That is insulting to all coprolites everywhere.
Rachel Maddow produced a great segment on this subject: Vagina Confusion in Idaho Outdone by Congress.
Well, if so, then he’s really, really good at deadpanning his sarcatic jokes. Listen to the recording linked to from comment 27.
More background information on Barbieri:
That’s right, fundamentalist christians (and sometimes mormons) run these so-called “crisis pregnancy center” where no qualified doctors or nurses preside, only fundies, often volunteers, who try to intercept women seeking abortions in order to pressure them into carrying the fetus to term. The centers are guilty of multiple forms of false advertising.
Barbieri’s stupidity-on-display act took place during a “hearing on legislation intended to “ban doctors from prescribing abortion-inducing medication through telemedicine” – a practice that does not currently exist in Idaho. The state committee approved the bill on a party-line vote in the Republican-dominated legislature, and it now heads to the state House floor.”
Barbieri’s excuse for his mistake was: “[Dr. Julie Madsen] made the point that you could swallow a camera and from thousands of miles away, you could detect the state of that colonoscopy…. My question was then, are you saying that you can swallow a camera and get the same results? Which is of course rhetorical. But she responded that of course you can’t swallow a pill and have it end up in your vagina. So my point was made.”
No, that makes no sense. No, that excuse makes no point. Link.
We had a YEC here not long ago who suggested, in response to the argument that we see stars millions of light-years away, that if something shines brightly enough, it’s visible without the light actually having to travel from it to your eyes.
maybe this man actually knows all this but is really evil and wants the cameras to be fitted with drills so they can go anywhere in the body they want
it would be horrible for a patient but I don’t think he cares about that
Lynna made the point I was going to make:
” after demonstrating his ignorance, Barbieri of course went on to vote for a bill prohibiting the use of telemedicine in prescribing abortion medication.”
…a practice which doesn’t take place in the state.
The bill which limits women’s choices was supported by a group ironically called Idaho Chooses Life.
A guy I work with laments that his girls are growing up. He doesn’t know jack about female anatomy, biology, or ‘women’s issues’ and really doesn’t want to know. He used to brag about how he didn’t know anything about the subject. Now he feels put upon having to learn this stuff.
I grew up with older sisters and an interest in medicine. So I walked him through some of the basics. I sketched out female anatomy and covered the basics of menstruation for him during lunch. He came back the next day very proud that he had surprised his sister by knowing such things and had bought sanitary napkins for his daughter.
For him, growing up, females anatomy and biology were something a male should never need or want to know and knowing about such things brings any man’s credentials as a male into question. I see this attitude here when I mention anything about guns, police procedure, or the military. There are, evidently, some areas of knowledge within every culture that are verboten. (Knowing is a black mark on your character and ignorance gives you bragging rights) For many conservatives, particularly religious ones, one area of forbidden knowledge is female anatomy and function.
Iorn:
Evidence please.
@16, Menyambal
I see you’ve met my in-laws.
Why are people being so hard on this guy? He’s just a State Representative, and is not, as I’m certain he would tell you, a scientist. /snark
The gentleman in question has probably been informed that women can get pregnant from giving oral sex and is only putting two and two together.