Feminist Classroom Blog

Reproductive Justice (RJ) isn’t just abortions. And it’s not just just about cis white women.

• RJ is folx of color not having children bc they are afraid of them being killed due to racist injustice.

• RJ is transmasculine (transmen, non-binary afab people, bois/boys, etc) folx being denied medical care because of our trans status, that is if we can even afford it.

• RJ is predominantly folx of color not being to keep their children or give them up for adoption, even if they wanted to, bc they can’t afford the medical bills that come with having a baby.

• RJ is folx who don’t speak fluent English having limited access to medical care, no matter what their decision is.

• RJ is dark-skinned folx receiving less pain meds during pregnancy or the doctor will ignore them all together bc of racist stereotypes which puts their bodies under unnecessary stress which in turn effects the fetus.

• RJ is transmasculine folx being misgendered by hospital staff.

• RJ is transmasculine folx having to teach our health care providers about our bodies, HRT, detransitioning (bc you can’t be on T if you’re pregnant), basic do’s and dont’s, etc. all while being sensationalized as a “pregnant man”.

• RJ is medical staff assuming you want an abortion since you’re transmasc.

Jael Silliman, Marlene Gerber Fried, Loretta Ross and Elena Gutiérrez

How Women of Color Have Broadened and Redefined Reproductive Rights

In 2009 I was sterilized against my will. 

And it didn’t happen the way I expected. I wasn’t strapped to a bed or dragged screaming into an operating room. If that had been the case, at least I would have had an easier time understanding what happened to me. 

Instead it was the slow mounting of circumstances. I was told that without proof of sterilization, I couldn’t change the gender marker on my passport. I learned that without that change I couldn’t find a job. I couldn’t go to a bank, hospital or dentist without being publically humiliated as I was forced to explain the discrepancy on my passport. I couldn’t get through passport control to leave my country. I couldn’t safely go to a bar at night. And since I didn’t get sterilized, doctors doubted my ‘commitment’ to being transgender and refused access to further transition related care. 

Eventually I gave in. I needed to get on with my life. I was done screaming, crying, fighting. I made my appointment, packed up my own bag for a 3 day stay at the hospital and checked myself in for my own sterilization. The one I really did not want. 

When I made my appointment, when I checked myself in, when I went through preparation for surgery, I must have signed over half a dozen consent forms. It seemed that at every turn there was a new form for me to sign saying that I did in fact want this. That I was giving my full informed consent to the procedure. I’ve had other surgeries that did not involve this pile of paper work and looking back, I’m sure all that extra attention to consent was there precisely because I was being forced into this position. I was being sterilized against my will, but I had to put on a performance of consent so the agents within the system could never be held accountable. I do not know if the nurse who handed me my 5th consent form and prepped my for my surgery knew that I really wanted to run out of that hospital. I don’t know if she knew that I felt broken, defeated, hopeless. Sometimes I feel guilty about allowing her to be an unknowing participant in my violation. 

I hated the consent forms more than anything. 

I had the surgery and I went on, as I did before, to campaign against sterilization as a requirement for legal gender recognition. And in 2014 sterilization ceased to be a requirement for legal gender recognition in the Netherlands, where I live. I celebrated that day. I am really happy that the next generation of transgender people will not have to go through the same thing. 

But I never forgot what had happened to me or considered it a finished chapter. I never forgot that consent can be a performance, enforced to cover up a great coercion. I never forgot that the participants in a consent violation, doctors and nurses in my case, may not even be aware of their role because they did not witness the coercion taking place. They did not see how my options were limited until I got to this point. Consent can be a choice made because all the other roads you would choose are blocked. Consent can be the mask violation wears. And I am very skeptical when I see consent hailed as the highest standard for ethical conduct. So there is a ‘yes’, maybe even an eager, informed ‘yes’. But what’s the rest of the story? Where there are those with power and those without it, consent is not a good measure for whether abuse occurs.

Rich White Women did.

Asian Women (and men) got the vote in the 1950’s

Aboriginal Women (and men) got the vote in the 1960’s

NeuroDivergent Women (and men) got the vote in 1993

To say “Canadian Women got the vote 100 years ago!” Is to neglect all the marginalised communities who got the vote so much later.

The 100 year aniversary of Canadian women getting the vote is 2093.

Which, in a sense I guess that’s true, because a fairer world is better for us all – but honestly, yes, we are trying to take things away from you, and achieving our goals will mean your life is different. Because people in oppressor groups have not been pulling your/our own weight this entire time.

Men, abled people, cis people, white people, straight people, rich people, non-intersex people, etc., all benefit from oppression. As in, there are things we/you have that we/you literally only recieve as a direct result of oppression, and in a world without that oppression, we/you will not receive those benefits!

Privileged people will have to give up being centred more, trusted more and deemed more competent than anyone else; having emotional work performed for us/you quietly and without recipricocity; having our/your interests prioritized over everyone else’s; being treated as the default from which everyone else is a variation; and a million more unfair advantages.

Ending oppression will require people in oppressor groups to actively give up all kinds of benefits that stem directly from oppression. There will often be things that oppressors didn’t even notice was a benefit of oppression that will now have to be relinquished. It’s difficult work, and it absolutely will affect your life. But it’s necessary and important work.

*yells in church nerd*: understanding/reading Lena Waithe’s rainbow garment as a cope and not a cape is essential to the entire outfit and what’s being signified by it

— Sara Misgen (@saramisgen) May 8, 2018

I keep seeing people say that she didn’t tie it at all to the theme and that’s a COMPLETE misunderstanding. SHE’S WEARING A VESTMENT USED BY THE HIGHEST ORDERS OF CLERGY BUT IT’S MADE OUT OF A RAINBOW FLAG

— Sara Misgen (@saramisgen) May 8, 2018

Before someone jumps in and points out copes can be worn by pretty much anyone helping in certain liturgies (true), copes with long trains, like Lena’s are reserved for popes and cardinals

— Sara Misgen (@saramisgen) May 8, 2018

See for comparison the papal mantum- the cope reserved for the pope. (Image from Wikipedia) pic.twitter.com/s6DzrjuDs6

— Sara Misgen (@saramisgen) May 8, 2018

Or the cappa magna, which has an excessively long train and is usually worn by cardinals pic.twitter.com/flpNkvdN6V

— Sara Misgen (@saramisgen) May 8, 2018

Here’s Lena, for comparison: https://t.co/pK1r7YLQOP

— Sara Misgen (@saramisgen) May 8, 2018

And another shot, so you can see the train https://t.co/Iu53SQ7XEn

— Sara Misgen (@saramisgen) May 8, 2018

It would be significant if a queer black woman chose to wrap herself in a garment reserved for a church that is antithetical to those things (on racism in the US Catholic church, see https://t.co/qMRot1yU3W), but instead she chooses the rainbow flag

— Sara Misgen (@saramisgen) May 8, 2018

The color of some copes is determined by liturgical season, but others by status (bishops wear purple ones, cardinals red ones, etc.). I’m choosing to read her selection of the rainbow as her status - it’s her queerness and her blackness that gives her her authority

— Sara Misgen (@saramisgen) May 8, 2018

(Including her blackness because her rainbow had the black and brown stripes - see here: https://t.co/4lWmqmhPdP). Y'all, that’s some powerful symbolism she’s baked into her outfit. There’s a lot more to be said, but that’s my cursory interpretation!

— Sara Misgen (@saramisgen) May 8, 2018

Note the stripe pattern is *upside down*, in a position denoting distress. Also, it’s the variant with the black & brown stripes for racial equity & inclusivity. The layers of symbolism in this single garment are formidable.

Girl Mans Up by M-E Girard

8/10

Do the wlw end up together : Yes