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Live from Wisconsin across the Civic Media Radio Network, you're listening to Mornings with Pat Crichtlow.
Sitting in for Pat, we have the one and only Dr. Kristen Lyerle.
And the one and only Greg Bach on the board.
We're Bach and the Doc.
Welcome back to the second hour of Civic Media Mornings.
I am Dr. Kristen Lyerle here with Greg and the incredible, wonderful award-winning Brittany Merleau.
Oh,
good morning.
How are you?
Good
morning.
I will.
How was your weekend?
It was a little chilly.
It felt a little bit like fall.
How about you?
Yeah, I was in the Twin Cities and it was chilly and I have to tell you, we had this.
big the tornado warning came through and I was in a meeting and it was in a room with a bunch of glass windows and it was with doctors from all over the country and all of our phones went off at the same time and those of us from the Midwest went oh we have to go seek shelter and some of our colleagues from the coasts were like why they didn't know they were not knowledgeable about how to handle a tornado warning because they don't have to deal with it.
Oh my gosh, that's scary.
I can't imagine not, you know, being from somewhere else, being in that situation and having the siren sound in your phone going off.
Um, were they okay?
Did they kind of panic or what were they like?
We shepherded them to an interior room and they were fine.
But to me, it was really interesting because I grew up with this, you know, growing up in Wisconsin, we would leave our classrooms and go out in the hallway and sit on the floor and, you know, put our head between our knees if we needed to.
Like it
was, we had a whole, we were trained how to do this and they
weren't.
And it really reflects how weather is different in different parts of the country.
It sure is.
And we're in the hotspot for tornadoes.
Tornado Alley is only extending further north, encompassing more and more of Wisconsin.
It's becoming more often.
I mean, we get an average of 23 tornadoes per year and last year we broke records with 45 of them.
And now this year we had seven twisters on April 28th, and then we had nine confirmed on Thursday.
So that puts our total for this year so far at 16 tornadoes.
And June is the peak month, and we're not even there yet.
Wow.
Yeah.
That's really scary.
And can you say that this is related to climate change?
I'm gonna say 100%.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Because to see this warmth, that kind of heat and humidity get here so early in the spring, have so much force packed with it to provide an outbreak of tornadoes in the middle of May.
I mean, it's not like it hasn't happened before, but it just keeps happening more and more often, earlier and earlier, and also later and later, and what we had a February tornado last year too.
Right.
So, I mean... It's
craziness.
that one blew my mind.
That one absolutely blew my mind.
But now nothing's out
of the realm.
This is not to be funny.
I'm asking, is there any difference?
I know this sounds so dumb.
Is there any difference between a tornado and a twister?
Or is it just different words?
Different words.
Because someone once tried to tell me, well, a twister is a little bit different.
It's not as dangerous as a tornado.
I'm like, I don't think that's true, but I'm also not a meteorologist.
So I'm not going to be like, you're wrong.
Okay, thank you.
I mean I would say I'd probably use the word twister for a smaller one just because but it It's the same thing I would just feel weird though if it was a major F5 calling it a twister because that thing's a beast wedged tornado
Tony Zimmerman says one is a movie actually two of them are a movie as well
It's folksy twister seems folksy.
Yeah, exactly.
Yeah, it's old-timey language
Yeah, so what does it look like?
for the upcoming week.
Brittany, tell us, can we anticipate twisters?
Oh, thankfully, no, no, no.
But we are looking at a lot of rain headed our way after a cold morning.
I mean, we have freeze warnings up in the northern part of the state this morning.
Dropping to that freezing market is still 34 degrees into Antigo, Medford, places all up north, 46 degrees right now until the cross, mostly cloudy for a good chunk of the state and still breezy.
Those winds are going to get.
crazy as we go through tomorrow.
They're going to be off the lake too, out of the east.
So areas like the Fox Valley, Milwaukee, you're going to be blasted with about 40 mile per hour winds tomorrow.
They'll be at about 25 mile per hour today, really ramp up tomorrow, still stay feisty on Wednesday.
And then by the end of the week, things start to dry out, calm down, and we start to get a little bit warmer.
So hikes today by Lake Michigan, you're going to be in the low 50s, further west in the state, low 60s.
but we're looking at spotty sprinkles possible further south this afternoon and then the rain really rolling in to the western parts of the state tonight, possibly around nine, 10 o'clock moving through the rest of the state overnight and through tomorrow.
I think in the morning, I think the southern half is definitely going to be soaking in the morning and then it's going to move up to the north tomorrow afternoon, kind of more widespread and lingering through Wednesday.
I mean, we are looking at at least three quarters of an inch of rainfall to potentially an inch.
for a lot of us, which isn't the worst.
We are still kind of abnormally dry.
We can take it.
I think, you know, as it goes through the entire timeframe, it's not going to be an inch all at once in a thunderstorm.
So as it slowly accumulates, that'll be good stuff for the farmers.
So hopefully no flooding, but beautiful green grass.
That's
what I hear you say.
Yeah, yeah.
That's exactly what I'm saying.
We have Rob from Tiger, Tigerton saying good morning.
Bach in the dock and Abe in Tigerton is cloudy 36 degrees.
Windchill is 29 yesterday.
I mowed my neighbor's yard.
She has cancer and having surgery, so I mowed it for the first time.
He also goes on to say today mowing jobs in Wittenberg area and an old school house where my dad went to school.
And he said that my thoughts and prayers are with President Biden, his family for prostate cancer is very serious, especially getting to the bones.
I had two uncles pass away from prostate cancer.
That is very true.
Our sincere thoughts, prayers and good wishes go to the Biden family going through what can only be a very difficult situation.
Yeah, I think we need to talk a little bit more about.
prostate cancer screening, but we won't subject Brittany to that.
No, no, no.
And then finally, Rob, Rob says, good morning, award-winning meteorologist and news anchor, Brittany Merlot.
I have cellcom, I can text, but still can't get phone calls.
That's been
an ongoing
problem for Rob since like last week.
And that did not help with all the storms because people with cellcom could not get emergency messages either.
That's right.
I think that started on Wednesday.
Yeah.
So this is a long time and ongoing and a bad time too.
Like you said, wow.
Yeah.
You think a company would then do something for their customers like, hey everybody, we're sorry this got messed up.
Here's like a month of free service or something.
I don't know, you know, customer service.
Two months.
Yeah, exactly.
Let's make it
three.
Do I hear three months?
Do I hear three months?
Do I hear three months?
Do I hear three months?
Do I hear three months?
Do I hear three months?
Do I hear three months?
Do I hear three months?
Do I hear three months?
Do I hear three months?
Do I hear three months?
Do I hear three months?
Do I hear three months?
Do I hear three months?
Do I hear three months?
Do I hear three months?
Do I hear three months?
Do I hear three months?
Do I hear three months?
Do I hear three months?
Do I hear three months?
Do I hear three
Absolutely.
I'll be right back here.
Can we talk about sunshine?
Yes.
Let's do it.
Yes.
All right.
We'll look forward to it.
Thank you so much and have a wonderful morning.
We'll see you soon.
Sounds good.
You too.
All right.
Greg.
Doc.
Prostate cancer.
Yes.
I mean, no.
I mean, bad.
No, it's bad.
It's
terrible.
It's one of the top two cancers for men.
And a lot of men.
I think are reluctant to ask questions about it and to seek out screening.
I mean, men are kind of known to avoid getting help
care in general.
Absolutely.
No, I am absolutely.
We are.
We are.
I mean, there's a it's a whole host of things.
There's pride involved.
There's you think you're too busy.
I mean, also just let's.
put in the general dislike for all Americans to go to their doctor or the hospital because they know it's gonna be a very huge cost.
Oh yeah, the cost.
But a lot of men, and I'm not gonna, I don't wanna speak for any women or others, but I think that a lot of men also have a mentality.
I'm like, well, if it doesn't hurt, it's fine.
If I'm not in pain,
it's
fine.
Oh, my knee hurts a little bit, but I can still walk and do this stuff.
It's fine.
If it gets worse, I'll go.
Instead of being more preventative,
instead of reactive.
So yes, absolutely.
Well in the preventive visit that everybody should have every year I mean a baseline every single one of us should have a preventive visit every year That's where you talk with your health care provider about your risks and the things you need to do to mitigate those risks and that may include Vaccines or blood tests or certain physical exams and it takes into account your family history and the things you're concerned about There's so much that goes into it when it comes to prostate screening.
This is important.
There's a blood test
There's an exam, the famous digital rectal exam, but you get to have that conversation with your doctor about what the best screening is for you.
And especially if you have a family history, and Robin and I talked about this a little bit yesterday, if you've got a family history, it's really, really important to get your screening done and to know what your risks are.
President Biden fortunately has had this caught at this point.
It's
an aggressive form.
It's still it's a hormone sensitive form So it may be treatable and I am not going to tell you that I'm an expert in prostate cancer.
I don't see men but
If you are a man, especially if you are a man with a family history of prostate cancer, please do go see your provider.
And regardless of who you are, schedule a preventive visit if you have the means to do that is so very important.
Yeah.
Yeah.
That's something that is... Yeah.
For me personally, we just had a...
not even a health, it's not a health scare.
It was a scare.
It was a full blown thing.
And my mother-in-law was in the hospital for about a week and a half.
And it made me realize that I have to go to the doctor.
I mean, we're not blood related, but there is stuff in my family that affected her as well.
So it's like, all right, I'm at the age now.
I need to get that colonoscopy.
I need to have an exam of my heart.
I need to make sure my heart's in good shape and just start taking those preventive measures now.
So, you know, we hear about, especially young, especially men who are like, my dad,
you know, died at 51 from a heart attack.
It's like, probably because he didn't have a child because he didn't think about it.
And a lot of times it can just hit you because just because you have heart disease doesn't mean that you're in pain or anything.
It's just sitting there waiting to happen.
And then it does.
And so.
And there are so many silent things that contribute to heart disease.
Heart disease is the number one killer of Americans, men and women.
And things sneak up on you like diabetes.
It sneaks up on you.
Blood pressure problems sneak up on you.
You don't know if your blood sugars are high.
And sometimes it's related to other conditions that you do know about obesity.
Other times it's not.
So that's why these preventive screenings are so important to figure out what they are and to treat them early to mitigate the risks down the road.
I think the other thing too is that we're so we're so in the world of
movies and TV shows where heart attacks are, ah, my arm is hurting.
I'm smelling the toast and then having a big dramatic heart attack.
That's not how heart attacks happen too.
Heart attacks can be very stealthy.
And your doctor will be like, hey, you had a heart attack.
You're like, I just feel gross.
I feel sick because you're having a heart attack.
So
that preventative nature, that going to your doctor, as you said, doc, especially if you have a history in your family of certain conditions, it's, you know,
It's part it can be part of your physical talk to your doctor have that conversation don't be afraid especially men and and and Men especially I think to make time don't allow work or other things be like I gotta get this thing done And I'll go to the doctor later.
No,
that's right.
Make this a priority
You've got to take care of yourself.
That's what I've had this conversation with so many people we've
We're living in difficult times and it can feel really overwhelming and sad But number one is you got to take care of you take care of your health Take care of your people and then you can start working on the other stuff But if you're not okay, it's like when you're flying and they say in the case of a sudden drop in it and cabin pressure The oxygen masks may drop from the ceiling.
Please place the mask over yourself first You have to take care of yourself first before you help other people.
That's exactly what my friend will say.
She'll say she'll like remember
Put your, put your oxygen mask on first and that's her saying like, yeah, that makes total and complete sense.
So
it does.
I'm really looking forward to continuing this conversation about guys.
Cause you know, I've got a bunch of them that I'm raising, but we've got in our next hour, Alan Tipple is joining us, but not in our next hour.
Later this, that seven 30, Alan Tipple is joining us with men for choice to talk about how they approach.
reproductive freedom issues, because it affects men too.
So I'm really looking forward to that conversation.
Plus, we've got new friends from Ashland who are talking with us about childcare in the eight o'clock hour.
There's so much good stuff on the horizon.
I am so excited to be with you this morning.
I know Greg is too.
We are back in the dock.
Peck Rital is coming back tomorrow, but for the time being, you've got us for another hour and a half or so.
This is Civic Media Mornings with Dr. Kristen Leirle on the Civic Media Radio Network.
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Right most morning show that we used to call Civic Media Mornings, but now it's Pat's show, but it's our show actually.
It's Bach in the Dock.
It's Greg Bach and me, Dr. Kristin Lyerle, entertaining you all morning, talking about all the stuff that you care about.
If you want to be part of the conversation, please join us.
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That's always fun.
Agreed.
Agreed.
It's always great when you and I are here, you know, a.k.a.
Bach and the Doc.
You just can't help yourself.
Nope.
Not at all.
The need for this stuff is deep in my bones.
It's called a problem,
so.
We're slowly unpacking those problems, Greg.
We've got this
CPAP.
We're working on one thing at a time.
Indeed.
Indeed.
Making myself better one day at a time.
I know.
Hey, can we talk about something that's just so silly?
We talked about it a little bit during the secret show.
Was it last week?
Two weeks ago when President Trump brought up Alcatraz.
Oh.
How he wants to reopen Alcatraz.
And then five days ago, Representative Glenn Grossman from the Sheboygan area actually introduced a bill to reopen Alcatraz.
There's a lot happening in this country right now, and there are a lot of people who have needs.
You know, can't afford food, healthcare is a disaster, but we need to reopen Alcatraz, which we know is unsustainable.
That's the reason they shut it down in the first place.
It's a national park.
What are we doing?
Well, I just want to, let's start at the beginning here.
First of all,
Glenn growthman or as we call him on Jane show Wisconsin's most rumbled politician
Yes,
so this whole thing since they got an office has been slash burn cut collapse Jettison get rid of all wasteful
and extraneous and, and fraud.
I haven't seen a single person brought up on fraud cases, uh, fraud charges yet, but that's, that's a conversation for another day.
But this notion of, of be more fiscally sound, which I think a lot of people would agree with.
Now I don't like the term fiscally respond, or fiscal conservative or anything.
I think that invokes some topics that is a little dicer than this one, but.
If your main notion is to cut spending and cut costs, then don't say out loud, we want to reopen a national park as a prison again, that would cost how much in the ballpark, Dr. Light, and I don't have a number.
What do you think the number would be to begin to renovate that island, to become a functioning modern prison?
I don't know about renovating it, but the reason they closed it was because operationalizing it, it costs three times more than a similar facility on the mainland, because everything had to be trucked out there.
So it doesn't make any sense at all.
But what we're seeing is, and this is, we said this earlier in the show, they say this, but then,
quietly they do
that.
It's squirrel.
Alcatraz, it's squirrel.
Alcatraz, it projects power, but it's too expensive.
So we're not actually going to do it, but we want you to think about the power piece.
And you know, it's brilliant messaging, but it's terrible leadership and it doesn't serve the people.
It makes me crazy.
Every week when I get Tony weed, my congressman's letter and you know, full disclosure, he beat me in the race for Congress.
So yeah, I'm a little salty about it.
But every week when I get his letter and I read it, the gaslighting is profound.
Because what he's saying is not what he's doing.
And it's not what the people of Northeast Wisconsin want or need, regardless of whether they tend to vote for Republicans or Democrats.
This has nothing to do with political parties.
It has everything to do with actually taking care of the people you are elected to represent.
I mean, absolutely.
The snarky first thought I had was well, you could have had your Alcatraz had you not accepted a $400 million plane is like or you want to do that because it cost another Close to a billion dollars to like it's just this thing of like you it's there's no consistency in the messaging but they're but their supporters don't care because everything they say is gospel and We could say we want to shut down Medicare and they'd be like we don't want you to do that But like this is why we want to do it and this is what we're going to and then they'll say oh
Yeah, that's why we have to do it.
It's, and it's all, the ultimate goal is always just a tax break for the rich, which, you know, I don't know, they seem to have a lot of money.
So
they
don't need more.
Do you need more?
Do you have to have more?
Everybody always wants more but then you look at some of these people who are like Bill Gates and Warren Buffett who I mean these guys are capitalist.
Yeah,
they they're like everybody flawed individuals But they have made so much money in their philanthropic work and they're using it to save lives They're using it to do great things.
We've seen big announcements from Bill Gates recently But then you look at Elon Musk who's even wealthier
And his foundation doesn't even actually meet the criteria to be a foundation because they don't do enough significant giving.
tax break, a tax shelter for him.
Well, I mean, that also sounds like the Trump Foundation and all that stuff.
I mean, really, the best example is Mackenzie Scott, Jeff Bezos, his former wife, who's just literally sitting in her house right now, probably writing checks to people just and she's still rich.
It's at that level of wealth.
It's it's unless you're giving money away 24 hours a day in large amounts, you not only going to never be poor, you're never going to be broke or never without money, but you're also that money's going to
pile on itself where you're going to be richer and richer and richer and richer even though you're giving money away and she's the only example of someone who's like just unfettered just here you go take the money just go take it all take it all take it all
and in the meantime my patients are having a hard time putting gas in their car yep
yep absolutely but let's open Alcatraz dr. Lyleigh
It exists.
Yes, it
does.
This is not how you fix the problem.
Hey, we're going to talk about fixing other problems when we come back from this short break.
We'll have Alan Dippel.
He is the Wisconsin Youth Organizing Manager with Men for Choice.
We're going to talk about how men are affected by reproductive rights issues and abortion.
In the meantime, I'm Dr. Kristen Lierly, and this is Mornings with Pat Crite Low on the Civic Media Radio Network.
Welcome back to Mornings with Pat Critello, but we're not Pat Critello.
I'm Dr. Kristen Lierly, and I've got Greg Bach over here on the board.
We are Bach and the Doc.
I'm getting used to it.
I set you up that time.
Very much.
I appreciate
it.
And for this segment, we are joined
by Sheboygan's own Alan Tipple.
Alan is the Wisconsin Youth Organizing Manager with Men for Choice.
Thanks for joining us this morning, Alan.
Thank you so much for having me.
It's great to be here.
Yeah, so tell us about Men for Choice.
We hear a lot about women advocating for choice, but where do men fit in here?
Yeah, so Men for Choice is
an org that I work for right now and we're kind of just around getting mainly young men but any men of any age involved in the fight for reproductive freedom because this is not a fight just for women this is also a fight for all of our health care and all of our rights.
Why?
I mean, I see it, obviously,
you know,
I'm an OVGYN doctor.
These are my patients, but I have four sons.
And we have a lot of oddly dinner table talk that also includes reproductive rights and abortion.
That's just normal for us.
But that is not, I think, common for most families and definitely for a lot of men of all ages.
Like you said, why do men need to care?
Why are they part of this conversation?
Yeah, well, I think the problem that we're seeing right now is that men aren't a part of the conversation.
I mean, you know, obviously women and the people who are directly affected should be leading the conversation, but men are just sitting back and not being involved at all.
And the reason why they should be involved is because reproductive health and abortion access is more than just a woman's issue.
It's a family issue.
You know, I mean...
You know, I don't know how many people have seen those kind of stories out there, but there are people who, because they can't get this healthcare, are not able to have children in the future because of the complications they have.
Or, you know, women will die because of what's going on because they can't get this access.
And I think the men out there need to realize that if you want to have a family and you want a family plan effectively and responsibly, you need to have that option available to you.
And so it's not just...
a woman's issue, it's also a family planning issue and I think a lot of men don't really think that far ahead.
I've definitely had these conversations with men because I'm so out there and I think people know that I encourage these conversations and men of in their 60s have told me about the abortion that they and their girlfriend at the time in college went through and how they still recognize how it has affected their lives.
But I think that there are a lot of men out there who do have stories, but they don't either feel like they know how to tell these stories or that they should be telling these stories because it doesn't belong to them.
How would you talk with those folks who have these stories but just don't have the pathway to make that happen?
Yeah, I think this.
We we've identified that there are some main barriers to men getting involved in the fight for reproductive freedom and one of those is not knowing what avenue to get involved with you know For you know a lot of these spaces tend to be very women dominated for I think a very obvious reasons But that can make men think that it's not you know their place to speak up or talk about the ways that it's also affected them in a negative way
And I think the way that I would encourage men to talk about these personal stories they've had is to take a look at who the main proponents for anti-choice legislation are.
They're mainly men.
The people who are advocating against women's right to choose are men.
And so we need men on our side as well to explain why they support reproductive rights, their personal experiences with them.
And I think that will
you know, that kind of shows a more well-rounded perspective of the pro-choice side, you know.
Yeah, and I think that my gut tells me that this was a major factor in the last presidential cycle.
We saw amongst young people, most women voted for Democrats because Democrats are on the side of reproductive choice.
Most many, most young men voted for Republicans, maybe not understanding, acknowledging, we didn't think that it was going to be as split as it was, but it was a pretty well-defined split.
Yeah.
Yeah, it was, as a young man myself, it was very scary to see that that many of my peers were...
Because for the longest time I've been hearing that we are the most progressive generation right Gen
Z is
gonna change up the political landscape We're gonna be different.
We're gonna be more progressive and seeing this kind of shift Because of these like online right-wing influencers this kind of anti women attitude that's been kind of spreading online It was very scary to see and I think it's and it but I think that
Despite that, there are still the majority of young men support reproductive rights.
They just didn't see it as their issue in this last election, like I think you were referencing.
And the hope with men for choice is to help young men understand how impactful this is and to encourage them to engage on a level where it makes it obviously a monumental difference.
Absolutely.
As I said before, there are a few main barriers that we've identified that young men have.
One of those is identifying it as not just a woman's issue, as also a man's issue, a family planning issue.
Another one is just understanding the harm that a lot of these abortion bans have.
I've had a lot of conversations with young men and older men about this.
And the most prevailing thing I've found out is that
they just don't really know much about the abortion laws in their state, which, you know, if they don't have a partner who is needed to get an abortion and they don't need to get abortions themselves, why would you need to know those laws?
But then they don't really understand all of the harm that is being caused because they don't know what the laws are.
What are you hearing from people that you're engaging with?
as you're having these conversations.
Are you finding that most people have a sense of what's going on here or is this surprising to them when you help them understand that they are actually part of this conversation?
A
lot of people are surprised, I would say, which I guess is kind of scary, but it's good to have those conversations.
But a lot of people seem to be very surprised.
by the the laws in their state where they don't know what's going on they Tend to know like oh, yeah, I know that our state has so-and-so weak ban or so-and-so weeks restriction But they don't know about all the small bits like that there are these specific restrictions on where you can get abortions.
They don't know about all the
Crazy loopholes that they make abortion clinics jump through they don't know about the ways that you have to you know in Wisconsin you have to do two visits to a doctor you can't get The incredibly safe abortion pill mailed to you you have to go in person to get it all these little small things that just set up roadblocks in people's way to get the health care they need they're very usually very surprised about those and they don't understand how Difficult it is or how bad it is
think it's also they're also very surprised often about the impacts people usually think of abortion as this oh it's some you know young college girl who had an accident and is now going to get an abortion but a lot of the people who get abortions as I'm sure you know are already are already parents themselves
and
as I said before are making a family planning decision and
A lot of times also, it's because of a complication that happens in the pregnancy.
And a lot of men are very surprised about that.
A lot of men are never really thought about it in that way because they just don't think about it too much.
Well, so much of it doesn't make sense, don't you think?
I mean, especially things like waiting periods, having to get an ultrasound, all of this interference, it just defies common sense.
So it's no wonder that when men are confronted with these
these irrational laws.
They're like, really?
How could that possibly be?
Well,
It shouldn't be
it is.
Yeah, but it
is So how do you reach out to these folks?
How do you get in touch with them so that you can have these conversations?
I think that's one of the biggest barriers that I see these days is We're all in our social media rabbit holes.
So how and it's easy to message to our like-minded people But how do you get outside of that to have these conversations?
we try to we our main
Form is through relational organizing.
So we do a 10 week fellowship that men that young men can come into that That's 10 weeks of educating them on what the state of abortion is in the United States
how to take action, we put in some media training in there, some organizing training, and at the end of these 10 weeks that these guys have gone through and learned more and learned these communication methods and these organizing methods, they bring in their friends to have these conversations that I was just talking to you about, where we talk about, where we kind of synthesize the information we've gone over in the fellowship, we talk about what's going on, how they can take action, and kind of make them realize the impacts.
And that's where I've seen a lot of these like surprising results where men who are pro-choice come into these conversations and realize how much worse it is than they had previously thought or how they realize how they actually do need to like speak up and be involved as well.
And so sorry.
No, you continue, please.
Yeah.
And so we get these guys to bring in their friends because the most
The people who are gonna listen to you the most are the people that are your friends and that trust you with that information.
And so by having friends reach out to friends, it's makes it a lot more comfortable conversation to have because you trust the people that are talking to you about it.
Exactly.
And that's what I was going to say.
So you're not just cold calling people and saying, hey, fellas, you need to worry.
You need to be concerned about abortion.
You're actually reaching out to people who are interested.
You're bringing them into this fellowship program.
And then you're having them have these conversations with their friends in a trusted environment.
Right?
Yes, exactly.
What does this fellowship look like?
Is it something where people have to travel and you've got extensive cost associated with that?
Or is it how accessible is it for someone who might be listening and interested in participating?
It's very very accessible.
It's entirely online entirely virtual We meet twice a week on Mondays and Thursdays and it's a total of two and a half hours over the week So one and a half hour on Monday one hour on Thursday I did the fellowship program when I was in my senior year of college working a job on the weekend doing full-time school during the week and still going out and having fun with my friends and I was able to fit the fellowship in there and
As you can see now that I've graduated I can continue a career and what I am passionate about with men for choice still so even though I was Extremely busy at the time.
I was still able to make a pretty good impression during the fellowship But yeah extremely accessible as long as you got a laptop you can plug in from anywhere
You could choose to do a lot of different things and in the last minute of our time together why men for choice?
Well, the fight for reproductive freedom in the United States is going to be a tough one going into the future.
We've seen a lot of challenges and It's important that people have the health care that they need and to live happy healthy lives and being able to support the women in your life by being a man for choice is important in pursuing that goal and being able to give yours your
Spouse and your future family, the options that you need and want.
And so, yeah, I think that's about it.
That's amazing, Alan.
Alan Tipple, Wisconsin Youth Organizing Manager with Men for Choice.
If people want more information, they can go to men, the number four, choice.org.
Thanks for joining us this morning.
Thank you so much.
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Welcome back to Mornings with Pat Critello on the Civic Media Radio Network.
We're not Pat Critello.
I'm Dr. Kristen Lyrely, and Greg Bach.
He's on the board.
We are Bach in the Dock.
We're going to be really good at this by the time our morning is over.
Well, I don't think anyone told you, Dr. Lyrely.
This is my last segment with you for the morning.
I know.
Oh, you do?
OK.
But I'm going to see you at 9.30.
Because you're gonna be on mat and air and air.
I know.
I love hanging out with you and Jane.
We love it.
It's a great time.
It's energetic.
It's informative.
It's positive in a world of wackiness, craziness and utter meltdownery.
You are a bright light in our life.
Aw, thanks.
You're welcome.
In a world gone mad.
In a world gone
mad.
We can talk about gynecology.
Yeah.
Yes, so we'll do that at 9.30.
But until then, next hour, we've got more Brittany.
We're talking about childcare, all the craziness that's happening with the budget.
We've got some new friends from Ashland, Attorney Carla Smith and Teresa Fredericks, who is the owner and manager of Treetop Development Center in preschool.
They're going to join us to talk about what's going on with
child care in Wisconsin, how the legislature has removed Governor Evers' proposal to continue funding child care, which already is struggling, and the impact on both the providers as well as the folks who need child care.
This is a topic that is near and dear to my heart as the mom of four boys, but to so many of us and so many of us with young children who have struggled to get child care, accessible, affordable child care in our communities.
It's not easy.
No, no.
And I don't feel like they're asking for a lot.
People like Kareen Hendrickson and all the, you know, the day without childcare last week, they're not, they're not asking for, that's the thing is all these groups who want help with these programs to get people like educated to get care for children, care for elders.
We're not asking for billions to make, to get rich.
We want the funding that's necessary to provide a good level of care and a good level of just a decent level of living.
That's, that's.
And last time I checked, Dr. Lirely, most people agreed with that in Wisconsin, and a lot of our lawmakers agree too, but there are mitigating factors in Madison, and there's a $4 billion budget sitting in a bank account that we could definitely use to help fund these things, but there's no reason.
They're like, no.
Bootstraps for you all.
Yeah, I know.
And these are our kids we're talking about.
If we really want to encourage people to have kids and we need people to have more kids in this country to support our economy and to continue to support the infrastructure, but the way to do it is not to hand out a medal.
It's to make it affordable to grow your family.
Also, it's not about like, I didn't know there was a child, there was a birth rate crisis in this country until I asked you a couple of weeks ago.
And I don't think the way of handling that is a few.
rich people having 30 kids.
It's about making it easier for all of us to have kids if we want it and making them live in a world that's gonna be tenable for the future.
And ensuring that they have access to things like healthcare so they can have a healthy pregnancy and delivery and child care so that they can grow up in an environment where they've got education and support.
This is the foundation of the rest of your life.
But speaking of the foundation of the rest of your life, did you hear about the fertility clinic bombing in Palm Springs, California?
So when I saw that headline, I almost dropped my phone because one,
This is what, I mean, it's different in its location, but this is what was happening like 25, 30 years ago.
But it was, but that was even, those were clinics that provided abortion care and abortion healthcare and things of that nature.
But this was a fertility
clinic.
IVF.
Yeah.
With embryos.
Yes.
Yes, exactly.
So, I mean, it was like the thing we all agreed on.
Like a year and a half ago and then someone said Well, and that's how it always starts.
Well, do we and then some Junk explanation junk argument and people start saying well, we shouldn't have IVF.
Why not?
Why?
What's the problem?
Well, there are the embryos
And it's all, it depends on who you talk to.
There are a lot of ethical considerations when you're thinking about fertility.
You know, if you only believe in natural processes, then you're talking about no interventions, but fertility can really require a lot of drugs and science.
And then you've got these embryos.
And what if you don't use the embryos?
What if the embryos are flawed?
You have to implant them.
And there are all of these considerations that you don't.
think about when you're entering this and all you're thinking about is starting your family.
But in this situation, I don't think we know what the motive was.
Unfortunately, all of the embryos were saved because the fire department acted quickly.
This is different.
I had to double check and make sure that this wasn't an abortion clinic, which we've kind of gotten used to the idea of that, sadly.
I
wouldn't.
When I say I wouldn't be surprised, I don't mean to be flippant or
poke light into the situation, but that happening would make me go, yeah, that does make sense because that's where we're at in the world.
We're back to that.
That's not even, that's the other thing too is that's, this isn't even a new thing.
We are, we, we've had this happen to, we've had this happen to facilities that provide access to healthcare that some disagree with.
I mean, we know for a fact that IVS has helped IVF has helped Republican lawmakers have children.
Ron Johnson's grandchildren are IVF babies.
I believe Mike and
he's yeah Mike Pence's kids.
Yeah, I mean this is all
This is publicly available information you
can
check the back here if you want to but it is true IVF is a wonderful technology 1 to 2% of I think it's even more than that of babies in this country are born through the IVF
means.
This is important for people who want to start their families.
So an attack like this is, I mean, any sort of a violent attack is unnecessary, unethical, irresponsible.
Because the other problem too for me is, and then what's next?
And I hate saying that.
And I don't want to, and I don't want to be a doom say or anything like that.
But if someone does this, what's the next?
better idea for these individuals who are so against it.
Well, I think that you are being a doomsayer and so we're going to lighten things up.
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