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Mona Eltahawy Profile picture
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May 7 • 5 tweets • 4 min read
I am childfree by choice. Happily so.

I published this on last year's #MothersDay. And here it is again for #MothersDay2022

feministgiant.com/p/unmothering?…
I have had two abortions. I did not want to have children. I was not raped. I was not sick. The pregnancies did not threaten my life. I just did not want to be pregnant.

It took me 25 years to write about my abortions.
#RoeVsWade #AbortionStories

feministgiant.com/p/abortion-is-…
The few abortion narratives that are considered “acceptable” are often prefaced with trauma and pain—as if they were the price to be exacted for bodily autonomy.

It is important to share abortion stories that say simply: #IDidNotWantToBePregnant
feministgiant.com/p/essay-the-se… #RoeVWade
I am glad I had my abortions. They gave me the freedom to live the life I have chosen.

For as long as patriarchy shrouds abortion in silence, it stamps it with shame.

New essay on breaking silence this weekend. feministgiant.com #abortionstories #RoeVWade
Abortion is a human right. Banning abortion is unjust.

Criminalizing abortion does not eradicate it nor does it make it rare. It makes it dangerous and often deadly for the poorest & most vulnerable people who can get pregnant.
feministgiant.com/p/essay-the-se…
#abortionstories #RoeVWade

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More from @monaeltahawy

Mona Eltahawy Profile picture
May 9
Unsurprisingly and stunningly at once, the word “abortion” is not mentioned once in Happening, a film about a 23yo woman who becomes increasingly desperate to have one in 1963 France. That country did not legalize abortion until 1975. feministgiant.com/p/essay-lies-s…
Back in 1963, when the character Anne wants to end her pregnancy so that she can finish her university studies and become a writer, it was dangerous to even talk about terminations let alone help a woman have an abortion.
In 1943–just 20yrs before Annie Ernaux had her illegal abortion which is the basis of this film–France executed abortionist Marie-Louise Giraud by guillotine. She was the last person executed for abortion in France.
Read 6 tweets
Mona Eltahawy Profile picture
May 8
It took me 25 years to write about my abortions. For as long as patriarchy can shroud abortion with silence, it will continue to stamp it in shame. So I broke my silence to break free of shame. 📷 @rerutled feministgiant.com/p/abortion-is-… Mona holding a sign saying ...
A reason I decided to finally speak was to say what I'd long yearned to read: I had an abortion because I didn't want to be pregnant. That’s it. In so many of the abortion narratives I read, it was as if women were pleading for mercy & forgiveness that belonged to no one to give
it was as if they had to prove they were “worthy” of the abortion–whether by virtue of the pain they had endured in becoming pregnant (through rape or incest) or the pain they would endure by carrying the pregnancy to term #abortionstories
Read 6 tweets
Mona Eltahawy Profile picture
May 8
It is important to distinguish whether privacy or secrecy undergirds the silence that surrounds abortion, Carol Sanger writes in About Abortion: Terminating Pregnancy in Twentieth Century America. I look at the difference 👇🏽
Abortion concealment in contemporary society aligns not with privacy but with secrecy. That secrecy is a much darker, more psychologically taxing, and socially corrosive phenomenon than privacy,” Sanger says. feministgiant.com/p/essay-lies-s… #abortionstories
In 1998, when a referendum to decriminalize abortion in Portugal failed, artist Paula Rego made a series of works to highlight the "fear and pain and danger of an illegal abortion, which is what desperate women have always resorted to." #abortionstories
Read 6 tweets
Mona Eltahawy Profile picture
May 8
Today in the US, it is #MothersDay. I am happily childfree by choice. I had two abortions because I did not want to be a mother. That choice must be available to everyone who can get pregnant. feministgiant.com/p/essay-lies-s…
I am happy with the life I have created. I have never wondered what it would have been like to have children. We often hear “you’ll regret it when it’s too late.” It is “too late” now and I am here to say: I do not regret it. feministgiant.com/p/unmothering?… #MothersDay
Most books/essays I've seen about being childfree by choice are written by white cis women. We need to hear from more women of colour & women from different cultural & faith backgrounds as well as trans men & non-binary people who choose to be childfree. I have my book planned.
Read 5 tweets
Mona Eltahawy Profile picture
May 8
For as long as patriarchy shrouds abortion in silence, it stamps it with shame. Knowing that, I broke my silence so that I could break free of shame. 📷 @rerutled Mona holding a sign saying ...
It is incumbent on those of us who can, to talk. Not everyone can talk and survive.

It took me 25 years to write this. feministgiant.com/p/abortion-is-… #AbortionIsAHumanRight #RoeVWade
It is important to share abortion stories that say simply: I did not want to be pregnant. In my case, I was not raped. I was not sick. The pregnancies did not threaten my life. I did not already have children. I just did not want to be pregnant. feministgiant.com/p/essay-the-se… #RoeVWade
Read 6 tweets
Mona Eltahawy Profile picture
May 7
Amy Coney Barrett is not a Footsoldier of the Patriarchy. She is a Five-Star General of the Footsoldiers of the Patriarchy. feministgiant.com/p/if-amy-coney… #RoeVWade #SCOTUS #AbortionIsHealthcare
Amy Coney Barrett is a mediocre judge who was elevated because she’s a white mother of school-aged children who will do white supremacist patriarchy’s bidding in a country that hates mothers and children who are not white. feministgiant.com/p/essay-the-ju… #RoeVsWade #MothersDay
The confirmation of Barrett to the Supreme Court was the crowning achievement of concerted and zealous political power play by conservatives since the early 1970s at least.
Read 6 tweets

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