Abortion Gang

A guest post from Ayesha Chatterjee and Judy Norsigian. Cross-posted from On the Issues Magazine.

As current staff members at Our Bodies Ourselves (OBOS), an organization that has advanced the health and human rights of women and girls over four decades, and longtime reproductive justice activists, we continue to hope that safe and affordable abortion care will, someday, become a reality for everyone. With increasing attacks and restrictions on abortion access worldwide, we have our work cut out.

Here, in the U.S., the debate around abortion has become especially polarized. Right-wing and anti-choice groups bombard young people with messages that stereotype and stigmatize those seeking abortion services — both individuals and entire communities. Think: billboards have popped up around the country equating abortion to the genocide of African-American children, who are further described as an “endangered species.” These — and other — oversimplified messages mock a personal and often complex decision, not to mention the right to a constitutionally protected and medically safe procedure. They influence how people, especially young people, articulate and align themselves on abortion. They drive our activism — our tireless commitment to alliances across aisles and opinions, and to conversations that move beyond “pro-life” and “pro-choice” rhetoric to focus on the individual, her needs, rights and circumstances.

Engaging, mobilizing and building alliances on an issue like abortion can be an uphill climb. But as 2012 rolls in, we want to take a few minutes to remind you about why it is important and suggest a few ways you can go about this challenge.

Building Up Our Friends

Our allies are our greatest strength. We especially need to appeal to the hearts and minds of people “on the fence,” by connecting abortion rights to principles that they hold valuable — equality, privacy, dignity, security and more. We must show how these principles will be affected if we do not have the fundamental right to reproductive freedom. We believe that we can even engage anti-choice people in conversations about how restrictions on access to abortion affect women and girls — especially those who are uninsured, under-insured, socially or ethnically marginalized and isolated.

We need to take a few minutes to contact the judges in our communities and ask them to defend the rights of women and girls. Monica Roa, the lawyer who argued a case before Colombia’s Supreme Court that liberalized that nation’s restrictive abortion law in May 2006, identifies judges as a key audience: “Judicial bias is a major conflict throughout the world.” She proposes a highly effective “court targeting” approach that includes getting better acquainted with specific judges and their position on issues.

And we must not forget our friends, our existing allies — an activist neighbor, a local abortion fund or a provider — on the forefront of the abortion rights movement and under threat because of it. Supporting them is critical and we can do so in a number of ways. We can donate money to local abortion funds which provide financial and logistical assistance to women that need abortions, or simply volunteer our time to their activities — a list of abortion funds is online. We can also volunteer at clinics, in roles that range from administrative to serving as clinic escorts that guide staff, providers and clients in and out of clinics and shield them from harassment and pro-life demonstrators. If these options seem daunting, we can help tremendously by just talking — with family and friends at home, with our community via blogs and local newspapers, and with our political representatives on the phone.

Listening and Engaging Listeners

In our bid to build alliances across the table, those of us involved in the struggle to preserve abortion rights must develop new tools of moral suasion. How? For a start, we need to be good listeners, good storytellers and patient communicators, and to create safe spaces for respectful dialogue, either one-on-one or in groups.

Judy Norsigian:

I remember an eye-opening conversation many years ago with a priest – a family friend – who had regularly sermonized about the evils of abortion. He described how one year a woman came to him afterwards and described WHY she had had her own abortion and why what he had said in church was so wrong and hurtful to her and many other women. A thoughtful and compassionate person, he decided to cease such sermons, but his comment about this encounter was instructive: “Don’t get me wrong, I still think of abortion as killing life in some form…I have not changed my mind about that. But what I realize now is that an abortion can be the RIGHT and moral thing to do.”

In the years that followed, I found a number of people who resonated with this kind of thinking and who could find a way to support a woman’s right to choose, while, at the same time, holding on to the concept of abortion as an act that destroyed life in some form. They noted that society does, at times, sanction even the killing of human beings (during war, in self defense) and, thus, could envision abortion as a moral choice and one to be preserved for women needing to make that choice.

Ayesha Chatterjee:

Active in the grassroots abortion access movement in the Boston area, I am also expecting my first baby in the spring of 2012. While I see absolutely no dichotomy in my activist and parenting roles, I have been asked a few times whether becoming a mother has softened my position on abortion rights, made me more empathetic to pro-life reasoning. My response: Far from it! My decision to have children is situated within my unique context and personal needs and capacity. If anything, the hands-on experience with the ongoing physical, emotional and financial commitment needed to nurture another human being has only deepened my understanding of an incredibly complex and personal issue, as well as my appreciation of why some decide to terminate their pregnancy and others, despite the many and different challenges, carry theirs to term.

When we are at a loss for words, drawing on other eloquent voices in the reproductive justice movement can help get the discussion started.

For starters, here are a couple such individuals:

Dr. Garson Romalis, a Canadian abortion doctor, whose speech on January 25, 2008 at the University of Toronto Law School Symposium is well worth reading. Dr. Romalis had been physically attacked — shot and stabbed, on two different occasions six years apart — and remained deeply committed to providing abortion services throughout his long career. At the close of his speech, he wanted to describe “one last story that I think epitomizes the satisfaction I get from my privileged work.” He continued, “Some years ago I spoke to a class of University of British Columbia medical students. As I left the classroom, a student followed me out. She said: ‘Dr. Romalis, you won’t remember me, but you did an abortion on me in 1992. I am a second year medical student now, and if it weren’t for you I wouldn’t be here now.’”

Lynn Paltrow, executive director of National Advocates for Pregnant Women, offers many compelling insights in, for example, Missed Opportunities in McCorvey v. Hill: The Limits of Pro-Choice Lawyering, in the New York University Review of Law & Social Change in 2011, or Long Term Policies, Long Term Gains in Conscience in Winter 2006-2007. In the latter, Paltrow writes: “those who defend the right to choose abortion often frame their defense in terms of protecting Roe v.Wade and access to abortion services. But far more than Roe and abortion is at stake. The health, dignity and human rights of all pregnant women are threatened by anti-abortion and fetal rights laws. Such laws create the basis not only for outlawing abortion but also for forcing women to have unnecessary Caesarean sections, for banning vaginal births after Caesarean sections and for treating pregnant women with drug, alcohol and other health problems as child abusers before they have even given birth.”

It also helps to be prepared for contentious conversations with compelling arguments and facts.

Anti-abortion advocates often use dangerous and misleading approaches to restrict access to abortion and birth control, and having a counter argument ready goes a long way. This misinformation runs the gamut — from claiming that the emergency contraception or morning-after pill (Plan B) is the same as the “abortion pill” to asserting that feticide laws, now existing in about 38 states and on the federal level, protect pregnant women, when in reality they are frequently used against pregnant women, especially those who may have used drugs during a pregnancy. So, staying abreast of facts to counter their fiction is critical and there are innumerable on-line and off-line resources. Here are two: The Guttmacher Institute and Ipas.

Converting Our Energy

When we gain ground by changing hearts, minds or policies, we have to ensure it translates into action — securing real and affordable access to birth control and abortion for women and girls.

While we have a long way to go before reproductive justice is a reality for everyone, the looming possibility of an anti-choice administration (and all that this would entail) has serious implications for women and girls in the U.S. and, through policies that restrict the use of U.S. development aid overseas, women and girls around the world. Your voice is important.

Our goals are substantial and clear. We need to become involved — to educate one another and ourselves on the nuances of abortion rights and access; defend the fast dwindling numbers of abortion clinics and abortion providers nationwide; express our outrage when they are attacked and vilified; demand greater and equal access to all reproductive health services including affordable and safe birth control and abortion care; counter misleading and dishonest anti-abortion propaganda and hold the people behind these tactics accountable for their actions.

Doing this effectively will require creativity, tenacity and abiding respect of all women’s realities and circumstances. We’re up for the challenge — are you?

Guest post by Abortion on Demand.

Is there an advocacy organization more ham-handed about talking about young supporters than NARAL Pro-Choice America? I opened the Washington Post Outlook section on Sunday and found yet another bunch of completely stupid quotes coming from both NARAL’s President Nancy Keenan and Communications Director Ted Miller. To wit:

• “These are people that we haven’t quite crossed their radar screen,” NARAL President Nancy Keenan explained in a recent interview. “They share our values, they’re pro-choice, but the question is: How do we talk to them?”
• For many women who have grown up in an era of legal abortion, that mentality has persisted. NARAL’s Keenan often refers to the graying heads of the major women’s groups as the “menopausal militia.”
• NARAL has begun dividing its e-mail list between its younger and older supporters, testing different messages on about 10 percent of its subscribers. The group saw response rates double when younger people received a message from a NARAL staff member their own age, rather than one from the group’s president.
• “Much of our list consists of people who are baby boomers,” says NARAL communication director Ted Miller. “With Millennials, we’re trying to be more strategic and communicate in a different way.”

Dear Keenan and Miller, guess what great communications strategy is for either selling widgets or organizing people: NOT TALKING ABOUT YOUR TARGETS IN THE THIRD PERSON. Also maybe not talking about HOW you are going to SELL TO THEM. Cause everyone loves to know how they are marketed to, like they are a piece of meat.

You want to talk amongst organizations about successful campaigns that seemed to resonate amongst college-age kids? Great. Do it privately. You gain NO BENEFIT TALKING TO A WASHINGTON POST REPORTER ABOUT THIS.

And please stop, stop, STOP publicly talking about the “intensity gap.” (That 2010 study you commissioned should have NEVER been a document you shared with the press).

The “intensity gap” absolutely exists amongst non-activists. Let’s get something straight, voter does not equal activist. Voter just means you go out and vote. Activist means you do something (anything) other than voting on Election Day. But what you’re voting on Election Day is often determined by what activists were doing leading up to Election Day.

Of course there are lots of under 30 activists in the pro-choice movement. Some of them write for this blog even. But here’s my message to NARAL. Shut up about the intensity gap. First of all you don’t know about the “intensity diminishment” as all those young supporters you see bused to Washington, DC by their parents on Roe Day grow up. Guess what? A lot of them will end up drifting away from their church and their anti-choice positions. Not all of them, of course, but usually what you feel at 12 you don’t feel quite as intently about in your 20s or 30s or I would still get up early on Saturday mornings to watch the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.

(And here’s the chance to quote my favorite FUCKING STUPID QUOTE NANCY KEENAN EVER SAID TO REPORTER SARAH KLIFF.)

“I just thought, my gosh, they are so young,” Keenan recalled. “There are so many of them, and they are so young.” March for Life estimates it drew 400,000 activists to the Capitol this year. An anti-Stupak rally two months earlier had about 1,300 attendees.

You want to garner more teenagers and 20-somethings Keenan, then why not just do it and stop telling the press HOW you’re going to do it. Stop talking about the fact you don’t have as many “youth supporters” as you’d like (all it’s going to do is piss off everyone who is a young supporter of Choice).

Maybe another piece of advice is Keenan (and Planned Parenthood’s Cecile Richards who’s a tad better at talking about what they do) need to just stop spilling their guts to reporter Sarah Kliff. Not because Kliff is misquoting them. Because the first rule of communications strategy is that if you don’t have a good message when talking to the press THEN DON’T DO IT.

A guest post by Gwen Emmons.

One of the most common questions reproductive justice activists get is why we focus on choice in a time where so many other pressing issues – jobs, poverty, healthcare reform – have yet to be solved.

My answer is simple: they’re all connected. And on the 39th anniversary of Roe v. Wade, I think it’s more crucial than ever to reflect on how reproductive autonomy fits in to the bigger question of realizing the American dream.

The ability to determine the timing and spacing of one’s pregnancies (or whether to be pregnant at all) contributes to your ability to enjoy economic security. Unplanned pregnancies can, unfortunately, be costly (particularly if you are un- or under-insured) and can impact your ability to work in some cases. Having the ability to control your reproduction is crucial to controlling your economic destiny.

Access to safe abortion care, contraception, Plan B, medically accurate sex ed, and affordable gynecological screenings and childcare services are at the base of the pyramid that makes up that American dream. Lose Roe – or any of these other pieces – and we risk toppling that pyramid. Unfortunately, for too many women and men, that’s already happening. And it’s shameful.

The flip side of this is that instead of fixing things like poverty, the economy, or our healthcare system, legislators in Pennsylvania and across the country have focused their efforts on chipping away at choice. Spoiler alert: restricting access to Plan B doesn’t create jobs. Draconian restrictions on abortion services won’t fix our economy.

So as we celebrate 39 years of access to safe, legal abortion, let’s reaffirm our commitment to ensuring that reproductive rights – and the American dream – remain attainable to everyone.

A guest post from Abigail Collazo. Cross-posted from Fem2pt0. 

Dana Milbank of the Washington Post thinks the debate surrounding abortion, or what he refers to as “Roe Week,” is absurd.

In his latest column, Milbank criticizes abortion provider Merle Hoffman for raising a ‘false alarm’ about the threat to reproductive rights in this country.  He then goes on the cite the numerous marches and events that will take place on both sides of the debate over the next week as the country celebrates – or laments – the landmark Roe v. Wade decision that made abortion legal in this country.

All of this attention troubles Dana Milbank.  He writes, “if these groups cared as much about the issue as they claim, and didn’t have such strong financial incentives to avoid consensus and compromise, they’d cancel the carnivals and get to work on the one thing everybody agrees would be worthwhile — reducing unwanted pregnancies.”

He chastises the choice movement by telling us that “not every compromise means a slippery slope to the back alley.”  He tells us to stop with the “sky is falling” argument and to acknowledge that the majority of Americans have legitimate concerns.

As you can imagine, I’ve never had a man tell me – a feminist – to “simmer down” and “be reasonable” before.  Maybe Dana Milbank doesn’t think the sky is falling, or that reproductive rights are being steadily rolled back in this country, simply because he’s so busy critiquing the “theater” surrounding the debate that he hasn’t bothered to really take a look at what’s at stake.

Milbank is on the right track with his admonishment of the Conservative side to pay more attention to family planning if they really want to reduce abortions.  But if he thinks that’s what we should all be focused on, and it’s the pro-lifers who aren’t willing to compromise on that, then what on earth is he admonishing the pro-choicers for?  Oh yes, for crying wolf and not being reasonable.  I’d like to take this opportunity to remind Mr. Milbank that “being reasonable” is what got us the Hyde Amendment.  Milbank wants us to find common ground with the pro-life movement and work on that.  Except as I’ve written about in the past, there is no common ground with the pro-life movement.  They aren’t anti-abortion; they’re anti-women.

The unprecedented efforts we’ve seen in 2011 to repeal a woman’s right to choose how to live her life and how to exercise agency over her own body goes far beyond just Roe v. Wade.  And yet, Milbank seems to just want us to focus on getting along and finding middle ground in reducing unwanted pregnancies and – always – to learn to play a little nicer.

The sky isn’t falling? The Guttmacher Institute has a solid (yet depressing) overview of 2011 already, so let’s just do a quick review, shall we?

- In all 50 states combined, more than 1,100 reproductive health and rights-related bills, amendments, and pieces of legislation were introduced.  Of these, 135 were enacted in 36 states, and 68% of these new provisions—92 in 24 states—-restrict access to abortion services.

- North Dakota was added to the list of 36 other states that require abstinence-only education.

- Montana, Texas, and New Hampshire all drastically reduced funding to family planning services out of proportion to cuts to other health care services.

- Kansas, Nebraska, Oklahoma and Utah adopted provisions prohibiting all insurance policies in the state from covering abortion except in the most extreme cases (life endangerment).

- Five states adopted provisions mandating that a woman obtain an ultrasound prior to having an abortion.

- Now that Texas and North Carolina have been added to the list, we’re looking at 26 states that mandate that a woman seeking an abortion must wait a certain period of time between getting counseling and having her procedure done.  Even stricter regulations were proposed in South Dakota (don’t even get me started on the host of other choice-related problems in South Dakota -only click through this link if you really want to feel sick.).

I understand that Dana Milbank doesn’t appreciate seeing “gruesome photos of fetuses” or images of bloodied hangers, but there’s a reason everyone’s coming out in full force.  WE’RE NOT GETTING THROUGH.

I’m outraged that “legal” in this country doesn’t mean available, accessible, or affordable.  I’m outraged that in addition to literally trying to close abortion clinics, pro-lifers are trying to enact legislation that would make fetuses into persons (Ohio is the latest, for those who haven’t been keeping track).  I’m outraged that we’re still teaching kids in public schools that women having sex is a bad and dangerous thing – hell I’m outraged that abstinence-only education still even exists.  This debate isn’t just about abortion.  It’s about women’s health, women’s rights, and women’s choices.

Milbank uses as the “hook” in this piece a report commissioned by abortion-rights activist Merle Hoffman to examine the effect of economic need on abortion coverage.  Except one has to wonder if he even bothered to read the report.  The conclusions in the report were not based exclusively on “journalistic” reports, but also on newer research from credible institutions like Gallup and the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, and from peer-reviewed research that explored the increase in numbers of women choosing abortion for economic reasons. These are more than “journalistic” sources. Furthermore, all the data supported the trend presented, and none contradicted it.  The idea isn’t to wait three years for a full and comprehensive, state by state analysis to realize that there’s something going on.

But my bigger concern is that Dana Milbank thinks the pro-choice movement needs to acknowledge “legitimate concerns” and stop crying wolf.  This is because when it comes to reproductive choice and abortion rights, he doesn’t think the sky is falling.

But I suppose that’s easy to say when the sky isn’t falling on him.

For those who are interested in telling Dana Milbank (@Milbank) why abortion rights really are at risk in this country, you can email him at milbankd@washpost.com or post a comment to his piece.

A guest post by Lauren Herold.

White girls are getting a lot of attention lately.  From @whitegrlproblem to BetchesLoveThis.com to the video Sh*t Girls Say, blogs, tumblrs, YouTube videos, and twitter handles love satirizing privileged white women and the things they talk about.

Franchesca Ramsey, in her video “Shit White Girls Say…To Black Girls,” takes the satire one step further: she uses the internet meme to recognize racial microaggressions that women of color face on a daily basis.  In a blonde wig, she parodies the White Female Friend who starts sentences with the phrase, “Not to sound racist, but…” and asks inappropriate questions like, “Can I touch your hair?” It’s funny because it’s too real: most privileged white people feel uncomfortable talking about race, especially to people of color, and end up making awkward comments that tokenize and exoticize their black friends. While these comments are not purposefully offensive, they are problematic because they contribute to the receiver’s experience of social marginalization and often deny the significance of historical and institutional racism.

Ramsey’s video went viral yesterday.  This morning, I noticed that every progressive person on my Twitter and Facebook had posted about it.  In scrolling through my news feeds, I noticed a lot of these people were white.  Which, theoretically, is great. As more anti-racist media is available via online activists, one hopes that white people will read, watch, and think critically about this media. But do they actually recognize that they are the ones who need to be internalizing these messages?

Because it’s far too easy, in this current meme-of-the-moment culture, to watch a viral video and then forget about it a few hours later.  And it’s far too easy to get your liberal cred by re-posting the latest progressive video on your social media site of choice.  I worry that white people will get a quick, condescending laugh at the stupidity of the “white girl” without processing the video’s messages.

I worry because, as a privileged white girl myself, I can theoretically ignore or laugh off these messages. If I don’t want to think about interpersonal and structural racism, I don’t have to, because I don’t face these issues every day.  And it’s true: a lot of white people don’t educate themselves about institutional racism, as evidenced by the pervasive comments Ramsey parodies. In the third chapter of his book Racism Without Racists, Eduardo Bonilla-Silva discusses the awkward semantic moves that white people often make to evade talking about race. These moves include finding excuses for racism (“some of my best friends are black”), denying the existence of racism (“this is about class, not race”), and even being unable to express oneself coherently in discussion (“um, you know, I think black people, um, well, I don’t know, but…”). Bonilla-Silva says these semantic strategies are the result of “talking about race in a world that insists race does not matter.”  Indeed, media personalities and newspaper articles insist we are “post-race.” So why would we need to acknowledge the experiences of our friends of color or the way we contribute to their marginalization?

Hey, I’ve been there too. I’ll admit it, I’ve asked black female friends about their hair, I’ve compared oppressions, I’ve become hopelessly awkward and incoherent while talking about race. I’m still developing an anti-racist language and consciousness. Thanks to people like Ramsey, I’m just realizing how many mistakes I’ve made.  But if we, white liberal people, really want to become allies in anti-racist causes, we need to take anti-racist media seriously as the educational tool that it is. We need to apply its message to our thoughts, our actions, and our relationships. Sure, let’s re-post and spread the message, but let’s take the time to work on recognizing and challenging the racism we’ve internalized as well. That’s the first step to becoming supportive, productive allies.

Lauren Herold is an anti sexual violence activist and a senior majoring in Women and Gender Studies and Anthropology at Columbia University in New York, NY. She tweets from @takebacknightcu. 

A guest post by Gwen Emmons.

Turns out, some pharmacists don’t need an HHS decision to block young women’s access to Plan B.  A new study suggests that in some pharmacies, misinformation around emergency contraception (EC) accessibility abounds – particularly in lower-income communities.

Researchers called pharmacies in five major cities to inquire about the availability of Plan B (a helpful flowchart of their script is here).  The good news?  80% of them said it was available, up from previous studies (that 20% of pharmacies surveyed said they didn’t carry it – or claimed they didn’t – is still baffling).

The bad news?  When the caller claimed to be 17, 19% of pharmacists claimed she couldn’t receive emergency contraception (even with a prescription) – which is false.

But what’s most troubling is that this misinformation was more frequently given by pharmacists in low-income neighborhoods.  23.7% of pharmacies in poorer communities gave the caller the wrong information, compared to 14.6% of pharmacies in higher income communities.  Plus, in almost all the calls to these pharmacies, the minimum age for over-the-counter access (17) was incorrectly stated.

Misinformation like this threatens to unnecessarily imperil young women seeking the medical care they deserve.   When it comes to EC, the clock is ticking.  If a young woman isn’t entirely dissuaded from her interaction with an ill-informed pharmacist, by the time she does receive the correct information, it could be too late for her to take EC.

Couple this with a laundry list of barriers to accessing reproductive health care in poorer communities, and we’ve got a big problem on our hands.  We already know that there are gaping disparities in health care access for young women in poor communities – disparities that only widen when it comes to things like receiving accurate and comprehensive sex ed, obtaining contraception, and getting annual exams.  Being denied Plan B serves to further marginalize this group of young women.  It’s little wonder we’ve seen the rate of unplanned pregnancies among low-income women skyrocket – the very limited window of options available to them is becoming narrower each day.

Contrary to what researchers conclude, their findings aren’t just proof that pharmacists need to be better educated on the rules and restrictions around Plan B.  While the restrictions around EC have changed in recent years, it’s a pharmacist’s job – and responsibility – to follow these changes and adjust their practice accordingly. Indeed, many, many pharmacists do just that – but clearly, not enough are.

What it does suggest is that even with looser restrictions on who can access Plan B, barriers still exist, whether they’re due to a lack of awareness or a willful desire to restrict access.  Providing Plan B over the counter would eliminate the (potentially unreliable) middleperson, ensuring a product that is safe and sometimes necessary is available to anyone, regardless of her situation, and regardless of what someone thinks they need.  While this just adds to the litany of reasons why the Obama Administration’s decision to keep Plan B off the list of medications already available OTC is misguided, I doubt it will do much to reverse their decision.  Let’s hope I’m wrong.

Guest post from Rachel

My thanks for the information and advocacy of the National Asian Pacific American Women’s Forum, Trust Black Women, the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, and the grassroots activism of  SisterSong NYC who’s listserv provided the information to present this action, and those unidentified warriors whose words and wisdom I am drawing on for this post.

I’m writing today to ask my fellow women of colour reproductive justice activists and our allies to take a united stand against the “Prenatal Nondiscrimination Act,” a race and sex selection bill that goes before the House Judiciary Subcommittee on the Constitution on Tuesday, December 6, 2011. I cannot repeat enough times the urgency of moving quickly to act in solidarity.

This is a federal version of that legislation that a coalition of Asian, Black, and women of colour organizations fought at the local level in Georgia, which attempts to portray the restriction of women of colour’s access to abortion and prenatal care as serving a ‘nobler’ human rights cause. This bill, like others before it, seeks to protect the “civil rights” of unborn fetuses by banning race- and sex-selection abortions. However, the underlying motivations are racist characterizations of entire communities:

• First, that Black women are selfish, irresponsible, and incapable of making reproductive decisions on their own behalf;
• Second, that Asian women mindlessly reproduce “son preference” and bring ‘dangerous values’ into the country.

This is patently untrue, and Black and Asian/Pacific Islander (API) women have consistently fought for the right to make decisions on if and when they will have children, based on the support networks and resources that are available in their communities. This bill attempts to drive another wedge between women and abortion and reproductive health practitioners. It will exacerbate many of the already-existing structural barriers to access that we must overcome to receive reproductive healthcare. It will put pressure our abortion care providers to conduct racial profiling on us, requiring them to second-guess our motivations in seeking abortions. It will do nothing to address the entrenched disparities that low-income women of color must navigate every day in seeking reproductive care. It does not contribute to or encourage cultural, grassroots-level change in Asian communities where we are already working to address the sexist roots of son preference.

This is a bill being put forward by members of Congress who consistently vote to decimate funding for reproductive health services and family support programs (see footnote below). This bill is funded by anti-abortion groups that have ties to racist billboard campaigns targeting Black and API communities.

The result of this bill is increased scrutiny of the reproductive decision-making of Black, Latina, and API women. This is being rushed through Congress on the back of a twisted appeal to “fetal civil rights,” even though the motivations for this legislation rest on racist and sexist characterizations of our communities. Again, this is a bill that seeks to mobilize arguments about the incapacity and dangerousness of women of colour making reproductive choices on their own behalf. It is an affront our rights to privacy, to bodily autonomy, and to mobilize in concert to create change and solidarity in our communities—based on our priorities and experiences, our visions for the future, and our agency.

If your organization is willing to stand in solidarity with us, please write to [sjorawar] @ [napawf.org] to have your name added to the written testimony against this disastrous bill. We need your signature by the end of today, December 5, so that it can be assembled and submitted for the Congressional Record. We have seen state versions of this bill and are still being targeted by the insulting media campaign attached to it. We have fought these efforts in the past and will continue to do so at the federal level. We represent the women and people of color this bill purports to protect, and we are announcing our unequivocal condemnation of it.

A guest post by ninersgal.

A recent article over at Daily Kos slammed mainstream feminist organizations, such as NOW and NARAL, for constantly asking their supporters for money. The author, Kaili Joy Gray, also criticized these groups for swooping in at the last minute and claiming victory for the defeat of Initiative 26 in Mississippi, when grassroots groups had been doing the mobilizing all along.

I agree with Gray’s critique, but I think she may have been a bit too kind with her criticism. There are several other big name feminist organizations that should have been called out in her post – and I think you know exactly who has the finger pointed at them when I say that.

I have been volunteering for Planned Parenthood for the past three years. At first I was a clinic escort, but that role has shifted over to their advocacy department since the clinic escort program has been eliminated in our state. I volunteer because I want to give back for the health care that I have received over the last ten years. I cannot afford to attend $85 luncheons, let alone write a $250 check. The core volunteer group that I work with has similar motivations – we love Planned Parenthood, but sometimes it feels like our contributions are completely overlooked, especially when we constantly get emails from PPFA asking for more and more money.

My problem doesn’t just reside with Planned Parenthood. Every nonprofit that I have ever worked for, either as a volunteer or a staff member, seems to discount the donor who can only afford to give $5 or $10. Volunteer hours are never calculated in terms of their economic value to the organization. And staff who already contribute to the organization by working long hours for very little pay are also disrespected when they are hit up for money by the development officers. When you’re only making $27,000 a year, how in the hell are you supposed to afford spending $250 a month in financial contributions to your employer?

Here’s the scoop: if PPFA didn’t spend so much money on fancy pink posters and snazzy T-shirts, they might not need to shake the money tree so often. How about asking for money to fund abortions, rather than political lobbying? Oh wait . . . that’s the job of your local abortion fund.

My tenure as a Planned Parenthood volunteer is rapidly coming to a close. I will be shifting my efforts over to my state’s abortion fund for many reasons. The main reason is that I want to know that my efforts are actually contributing to the ability of patients to access care. When the abortion fund asks for money, it’s very happy to accept those $5 and $10 donations – and I know that every penny of it is going directly towards patients’ health care costs. Every hour that I donate of my time goes towards the same goal.

So click on over to Gray’s article and see if you agree or disagree with her criticism of mainstream feminism. I’d love to get your take on the situation.

A guest post from  Jane Cawthorne.

Cristina Yang had an abortion. In Prime Time. Yes, it’s true.

The Grey’s Anatomy character, super whiz-kid, tough-as-nails with a hidden heart-of-gold cardiac surgeon-in-training, got pregnant, and told her husband, Owen, she wanted an abortion. They had a big fight. Owen wanted to have a baby (or more correctly, wanted Cristina to have a baby), got all “lifey” on her (Cristina’s word) and threw her out. Then Cristina stayed over at Meredith’s house and helped Meredith with her new baby, the one she was adopting from Malawi with McDreamy, demonstrating that she, indeed, could (if she wanted to) look after a baby and even smile at it and kiss it on the cheek, all the while affirming her desire to have an abortion. Cristina convinces Meredith that she really really really doesn’t want to have a baby and that she wants to concentrate on being a surgeon. She says she needs Meredith to be supportive because Meredith is her “person” which is “Grey’s-speak” for bigger than best friends or kind of soul-mates without sex. Meredith in turn convinces Owen that indeed, Cristina does not want a baby and says he should not pressure her. She boosts Cristina’s case by adding that she, Meredith, knows what it’s like to be the child of a woman who didn’t want you. And anyway, Owen knew who Cristina was when they married, and shouldn’t expect her to change her stripes or something like that.

In the end, Owen goes with her to the appointment and Cristina actually has the abortion, but not before the doctor performing the procedure says very sternly, “I’m going to ask you one more time, are you absolutely sure this is what you want to do?” It is. She does. Surprisingly, the writers didn’t get out of the story line by making her have a miscarriage, a change of heart or an ectopic pregnancy like she did in an earlier season. Let the chips fall where they may. There has been a Prime Time abortion.

Wow.

What will happen to Cristina now? This is the most interesting question in TV, as far as I’m concerned. Will she just move on with her life guilt free, possibly expressing feelings of relief as most women do who have abortions? Or, will she be made to suffer? Well, it is Grey’s Anatomy, so we can assume there will be some suffering, but will the cause of it be the abortion?

This is what should happen. Cristina goes on to have the life she is planning and has worked so hard to get. She feels relief. She finishes all of her training and becomes a world renowned cardiac surgeon, unencumbered by offspring she did not want. She has a good marriage with Owen, with no more than the normal ups and downs that any relationship faces. She is a fun Aunt to Meredith’s new baby, assuming social services does not take that baby away, which is currently a possibility.

In a future episode, Cristina considers what birth control is best for her. Meredith and Cristina have a long discussion about the relative merits of everything from birth control pills to IUDs. Cristina, never one to do anything in half measures, decides to have a tubal ligation. Meredith is aghast and says, “Seriously?” She tries to talk her out of it, saying there are effective non-surgical options to control fertility. But Cristina says, “Mer, I’m some kind of pregnancy magnet. Please, respect my decision.” Then Owen dramatically intervenes just as the nurses are prepping her for surgery and announces that, out of love for his wife and his new understanding that she will never want children, he will have a vasectomy. America is informed about this safe and viable option. Owen gets snipped and goes back to work the next day.

A further series of episodes involves Cristina and Owen creating an abortion clinic when they realize a lot of women have trouble accessing services.

Episodes that we should not see include Cristina being plagued by guilt, Owen resenting her, Cristina second guessing her decision the next time she sees a chubby-cheeked newborn, Cristina getting hit by a car, Cristina losing her job or suffering in some way that might be construed as punishment, Cristina being left behind in the Rapture. She lives, as much as anyone can on Grey’s Anatomy, happily ever after.

A guest post by Speak for Choice.

The state of Kansas recently has undergone extreme social turmoil due to Brownback’s recent legislation designed to target abortion providers in Kansas. At the end of June, all three of Kansas’ abortion providers were nearly shut down and Kansas was days away from becoming the first state in the United States with no legal abortion access. Two of the clinics did not have their licenses renewed, and the Planned Parenthood of Kansas and Mid-Missouri received its license after a mad scramble to comply with the new regulations. A judge issued a temporary injunction and all clinics for now remain in practice. Anti-abortion proponents of the law claimed it was a great step toward protecting women’s health, but after learning details of the new regulations, it became apparent that it was less about women’s health and rights, and more about a religious system.

In response to these anti-choice laws, three students from the University of Kansas and local feminists in Lawrence, formed a group to counteract and inform the general public on the reality of these laws and the repercussions that would occur if the legislation passed and the clinics closed.

Speak for Choice is a grassroots organization that aims at educating and informing the public on Choice issues. On September 7, 2011, Speak for Choice will be holding a rally at the capitol in collaboration with other pro-choice, feminist, and equality groups from around the state. There speakers will voice their opinions, feelings, and life experiences in a positive demonstration of support for Choice. The rally will begin at eleven in the morning with music, chants, and speak-out-circles. By noon, speakers will commence.

In an effort to aid commuters, Speak for Choice is asking anyone who is driving to offer their empty seats to others interested in attending. Their blog is an informational hub where the public can access news articles, statistics, and updates on reproductive justice in Kansas.

If anyone is in the Kansas area and is interested in participating, feel free to check out the website or email the group at speakforchoice@gmail.com for more information.