THREAD: What does it matter if a committed group of sexists lies about abortion and keeps shaming and tricking people who need reproductive health care?
First and foremost, it's a travesty for patients seeking abortions that a group of people buying medicine coats at the costume shop is lying to them and trying to run out the clock so they can't get the care they seek.
Anti-abortion fake clinics are the core operating infrastructure of the anti-abortion movement. They operate throughout the country, mainly unchecked, and too often receiving taxpayer funds that should be going to REAL, fact-based, shame-free social services.
I'm all about free diapers but free diapers ain't free if they come with requirements to complete religious classes, or sign contracts or pledges about future sexual behavior or sexual health needs.
Also, if they're donated, why do they need tax dollars?!
Next up, unacknowledged medical experiments without consent of the patient. Anti-abortion fake clinics are peddling idea they made up of so-called "abortion pill reversal." But no one knows if it's safe. They just, you know, make it up and hope for the best.
Lying at the core of the anti-abortion fake clinic movement is a fundamental belief that women are simultaneously evil and helpless and above all, rightfully subordinate. Not deserving of autonomy and dignity, much less the truth about how bodies work.
Anti-abortion attitudes are not race-neutral. They are an expression of white supremacy, rooted in white panic about decreasing white birth rates and simultaneous, absolutely zero care that women and babies of color are most hurt by abortion restrictions.
Yes! We should support pregnant people who don't have money and need support. But we should tie those needs to expanding a fact-based, compassionate safety net.
NOT a racist, right-wing movement on taxpayer dime.
Abortion rights folks had been trying to warn you for so long. Because society failed to take the anti-abortion movement (a totalitarian movement) seriously, now it's everyone's problem. Let's settle in for a chat about anti-abortion fake clinics, also now everyone's problem. 🧵
Anti-abortion fake clinics exist to mislead and shame people seeking abortion care. They also form the backbone of the anti-abortion movement's power. Don't be fooled into thinking these are grassrootsy efforts. They are not. (More on that later.)
Anti-abortion fake clinics are often called crisis pregnancy centers, or pregnancy resource centers. Some also call them fake women's health centers or anti-abortion centers. They often choose deceptive names like "A Woman's Choice" to make themselves seem like abortion providers
The struggle for abortion rights and for racial justice are deeply interconnected. I would like more white people who are interested in abortion rights to deepen their racial justice analysis for the abortion issue specifically.
Controlling gender and sexuality + reproductive oppression operate in service of white supremacy by working to increase the supply of white babies. It is also intentional that the people most hurt by this "pro-life" approach are people of color, especially Black women.
In fact, the modern anti-abortion movement as we know it exists because right-wing operatives were looking to pivot from segregationism as their wedge issue as it fell out of favor in the early '70s.
There are two things happening at once with regards to the role and prominence of overt anti-abortion hatred in right-wing politics, and it's important to pay attention. This will have broad-reaching implications for the longterm politics of abortion. (THREAD)
FIRST: It has long been the case that Republicans who want higher office bend over backward to be the biggest, loudest, most cruel anti-abortion leaders they can be. One example is South Dakota Governor Kristi Noem, who absolutely wants to be president. abcnews.go.com/Health/wireSto…
SECOND: Right-wing groups who are trying to win elections for a variety of candidates more broadly know the expected actions of the Supreme Court on abortion are unpopular and a losing strategy. This, I believe, is why CPAC is not hosting a single panel on abortion this fall.
This is the perennial story about women in power — Senators, CEOs, non-profit leaders, editors, and now, vice presidents. Women are presented as too weak, too strong, too indecisive, too bullying. It serves to push out the good women leaders we have, and intimidate rising women.
In particular, this odious statement from someone too cowardly to use their own name is so sexist and racist I’m going to spell it out in detail:
1) “refuse” relies on racist and sexist tropes against Black women who are presented as non-compliant
There is no such thing as a pro-life feminist. And thank you, I majored in Women's Studies and was literally a national officer for the National Organization for Women.
When a would-be justice asserts "life begins" at fertilization they are arguing for Constitutional personhood, a term that makes abortion and birth control illegal. It means even the potential of pregnancy has more constitutional rights that the actual people who can be pregnant.
Tbh, however, #BigProLife is not actually obsessed with the law but rather what they can use the law to get away with. Provisions to send abortion providers to jail are routinely written into anti-abortion laws.