hanging on by a thread
April 18, 2019 6:46 AM Subscribe
"O.K. Well, my name’s Vivian Zwick, and I’m 101 years old. And I came to this issue quite a long time ago." Did you know about abortion? "No, I’d heard about it, but I really didn’t know much about it. I didn’t start really working for it until about the early ‘60s, just the time that Governor Rockefeller in New York signed the bill to have abortion available to everybody — not in Missouri, but in New York State. So we were just delighted that there was actually a place where you could get an abortion here in America." As a growing number of states are introducing, moving, or enacting 6-week abortion bans, the NY Times Daily Podcast visits the Last Clinic in Missouri (transcript) and explores the Illinois option.
More from The Daily on Roe V. Wade - Who Was Jane Roe and The Culture Wars.
More from The Daily on Roe V. Wade - Who Was Jane Roe and The Culture Wars.
I used to try to argue with die-hard anti-abortion zealots along the lines of "nobody is pro-abortion," and they never seemed to find it that convincing.
So now instead I think a fairer response is to just fucking walk away and never speak to them again, while being proud that I'm able to restrain myself enough not to say something like "nevermind, your very existence has converted me to a fully "pro" position and fuck you."
Every time I'm down by the White House in the middle of the day there's at least a couple middle-aged dudes with big graphic posters of aborted fetuses, and I know they just send these dudes to start shit, but . . . let's just say that old vow of non-violence gets sorely tested.
posted by aspersioncast at 8:10 AM on April 18, 2019 [4 favorites]
So now instead I think a fairer response is to just fucking walk away and never speak to them again, while being proud that I'm able to restrain myself enough not to say something like "nevermind, your very existence has converted me to a fully "pro" position and fuck you."
Every time I'm down by the White House in the middle of the day there's at least a couple middle-aged dudes with big graphic posters of aborted fetuses, and I know they just send these dudes to start shit, but . . . let's just say that old vow of non-violence gets sorely tested.
posted by aspersioncast at 8:10 AM on April 18, 2019 [4 favorites]
Good on you for being able to restrain yourself. I am actively pro-abortion and not particularly restrained when unsettled in some way - if you're standing by a giant dead fetus poster trying to make people feel bad, fuck you, I have no qualms telling that I specifically wish they had been aborted. They had those giant fetus posters at my university sometimes and I would get really angry with them, I don't take high roads, and while I won't do violence -- I will run my mouth.
posted by GoblinHoney at 8:19 AM on April 18, 2019 [5 favorites]
posted by GoblinHoney at 8:19 AM on April 18, 2019 [5 favorites]
It just blows my mind that so many people don't understand that making abortions more difficult to get doesn't result in less abortions, it results in unsafe abortions. History shows us this. Whole wards full of women who were desperate to have autonomy over their bodies, butchered because women's healthcare apparently meant nothing and who were forced to seek the services of the underground, full of shonky operators.
Why is this entirely researchable and established history so rarely brought up when the other side is ranting and roaring? It makes my fucking blood boil.
posted by h00py at 8:41 AM on April 18, 2019 [13 favorites]
Why is this entirely researchable and established history so rarely brought up when the other side is ranting and roaring? It makes my fucking blood boil.
posted by h00py at 8:41 AM on April 18, 2019 [13 favorites]
I tried to do an abortion counter-protester thing years ago, when I literally lived across the street from a clinic where there were protesters every weekend, but I ended up going off on this church lady when she was like, “How can you support murdering children?” And I was like “Because less babies means less people will grow up to be tacky, sanctimonious misogynist #%^ts like you” but probably more offensive and less articulate than that. And the people I was with were like “You’ve been here for five minutes and you’re literally frothing at the mouth. Maybe you should go home and send a donation before you bite that preacher with the bullhorn.”
Or to put another way, nothing sends me to rage-blackout level faster than this stuff. Which makes right now a very difficult time for me to read the news.
posted by thivaia at 8:41 AM on April 18, 2019 [13 favorites]
Or to put another way, nothing sends me to rage-blackout level faster than this stuff. Which makes right now a very difficult time for me to read the news.
posted by thivaia at 8:41 AM on April 18, 2019 [13 favorites]
It just blows my mind that so many people don't understand that making abortions more difficult to get doesn't result in less abortions, it results in unsafe abortions. History shows us this. Whole wards full of women who were desperate to have autonomy over their bodies, butchered because women's healthcare apparently meant nothing and who were forced to seek the services of the underground, full of shonky operators.
Why is this entirely researchable and established history so rarely brought up when the other side is ranting and roaring? It makes my fucking blood boil.
But that is what they want. They want this as a punishment for women who dare to have abortions.
posted by Hypatia at 10:21 AM on April 18, 2019 [13 favorites]
Why is this entirely researchable and established history so rarely brought up when the other side is ranting and roaring? It makes my fucking blood boil.
But that is what they want. They want this as a punishment for women who dare to have abortions.
posted by Hypatia at 10:21 AM on April 18, 2019 [13 favorites]
After several decades of wrangling with the topic, I have come to the conclusion that there is no point in trying to argue with the anti-abortion side; their position is not based on logic and therefore can't be refuted that way. They can be shouted down, and they can be beaten down (legally or otherwise), and very little else. Productive discussion with them as a group is not possible; compromise with them is not possible. Their position is mutually exclusive with individual bodily autonomy—there's no more compromise possible than there would be between an abolitionist and a slaveowner in the 1850s.
It's as close as you get in politics to total warfare, and bringing logical arguments to pro-lifers is deep into knife-to-a-gunfight territory, or maybe wrestling-a-pig-in-shit territory. They looooooove a good argument. It legitimizes them.
Occasionally you do find individual people open to having a change of heart, although I have found this is rarely the result of some sort of logical reasoning/argument and generally because they run squarely into the issue in a very personal way. (But not always! There are lots of putatively anti-abortion people who have had abortions or have people in the families who've had abortions, and get around it with some variant of the "Good Jew" argument, i.e. that abortion is generally bad except for the people who they know, who are somehow all special snowflakes who are exempt.) And I have huge respect for the people who are willing to open up personally about their lives, because I do suspect it makes it somewhat more difficult for anti-abortion folks personally when they know how many people around them have had abortions and don't regret it. (Like, I've personally witnessed an interaction where someone I knew was getting up on their theological high horse about life-begins-at-conception and how-could-you and someone else was basically "yeah, well, I had an abortion and if I hadn't, I'd be dead, no regrets at all, so shut the fuck up, kthx" and they actually did shut the fuck up. It was amazing and no amount of fact-based argument can ever equal that sort of personal bravery.)
FWIW, one of the struggles I've had personally, is to stop doing and enabling the "nice person except for..." thing. Like "oh yeah, Ted's a nice enough guy except for he goes to those weird clinic protests on the weekends." No, Ted is not a nice guy. Ted is an asshole. Nice people do not stand in front of clinics protesting. If Ted spent his weekends wearing a white sheet burning crosses up on top of Stone Mountain with his quirky KKK friends, I think a lot of people would agree he's probably not a nice dude—the rest of his life is likely a facade for his unrepentant racism. That's increasingly how I feel about militant pro-lifers; scratch the surface of the rest of their lives and you'll almost always find some nasty sexism or anti-secularism (why not both?!) underneath.
Doesn't mean you can't talk with or work with them on other things, because in some parts of the country you literally couldn't function otherwise, and sometimes getting things done does require some amount of triangulation with disagreeable actors, but they are not "nice" or "good people", they're Lizard People with good camouflage.
Anyway... does anyone have any thoughts on donating to Planned Parenthood vs. NARAL vs. National Institute for Reproductive Health or some other organization? One of my 2019 resolutions was to make a donation every time I got angry about Dumb Fucks Ruining The Country (which, as it turns out, is a more expensive proposition than I counted on) and I've been going through various reproductive-rights charities round robin. I'm not sure that's really the most effective thing to do.
posted by Kadin2048 at 11:34 AM on April 18, 2019 [6 favorites]
It's as close as you get in politics to total warfare, and bringing logical arguments to pro-lifers is deep into knife-to-a-gunfight territory, or maybe wrestling-a-pig-in-shit territory. They looooooove a good argument. It legitimizes them.
Occasionally you do find individual people open to having a change of heart, although I have found this is rarely the result of some sort of logical reasoning/argument and generally because they run squarely into the issue in a very personal way. (But not always! There are lots of putatively anti-abortion people who have had abortions or have people in the families who've had abortions, and get around it with some variant of the "Good Jew" argument, i.e. that abortion is generally bad except for the people who they know, who are somehow all special snowflakes who are exempt.) And I have huge respect for the people who are willing to open up personally about their lives, because I do suspect it makes it somewhat more difficult for anti-abortion folks personally when they know how many people around them have had abortions and don't regret it. (Like, I've personally witnessed an interaction where someone I knew was getting up on their theological high horse about life-begins-at-conception and how-could-you and someone else was basically "yeah, well, I had an abortion and if I hadn't, I'd be dead, no regrets at all, so shut the fuck up, kthx" and they actually did shut the fuck up. It was amazing and no amount of fact-based argument can ever equal that sort of personal bravery.)
FWIW, one of the struggles I've had personally, is to stop doing and enabling the "nice person except for..." thing. Like "oh yeah, Ted's a nice enough guy except for he goes to those weird clinic protests on the weekends." No, Ted is not a nice guy. Ted is an asshole. Nice people do not stand in front of clinics protesting. If Ted spent his weekends wearing a white sheet burning crosses up on top of Stone Mountain with his quirky KKK friends, I think a lot of people would agree he's probably not a nice dude—the rest of his life is likely a facade for his unrepentant racism. That's increasingly how I feel about militant pro-lifers; scratch the surface of the rest of their lives and you'll almost always find some nasty sexism or anti-secularism (why not both?!) underneath.
Doesn't mean you can't talk with or work with them on other things, because in some parts of the country you literally couldn't function otherwise, and sometimes getting things done does require some amount of triangulation with disagreeable actors, but they are not "nice" or "good people", they're Lizard People with good camouflage.
Anyway... does anyone have any thoughts on donating to Planned Parenthood vs. NARAL vs. National Institute for Reproductive Health or some other organization? One of my 2019 resolutions was to make a donation every time I got angry about Dumb Fucks Ruining The Country (which, as it turns out, is a more expensive proposition than I counted on) and I've been going through various reproductive-rights charities round robin. I'm not sure that's really the most effective thing to do.
posted by Kadin2048 at 11:34 AM on April 18, 2019 [6 favorites]
does anyone have any thoughts on donating to Planned Parenthood vs. NARAL vs. National Institute for Reproductive Health or some other organization?
I mean, they're all good.
Planned Parenthood provides all sorts of sexual health care to those who do and don't have vaginas - including birth control, STD screenings, regular pap smears, prenatal exams, and abortions. They've been hit hard by the loss of Title X funding but also are probably the one that people are most likely to donate to.
There are other abortion clinics that aren't affiliated with Planned Parenthood out there, and may be one near you (Whole Woman's Health is another set of clinics with a mutli-state presence). They'll oftentimes get less direct funding than Planned Parenthood - though PP tends to share their funding with other clinics in the area. If you're giving directly to another abortion clinic, just be careful and make sure that they're actually an abortion clinic and not a crisis pregnancy center.
NARAL are the lobbying arm for this fight, working against anti-abortion measures on the legislative side of things. As you can imagine, they need help.
Abortion Funds are places that provide grants for people who want an abortion but don't have the resources for one (as a note, most abortion funds will also pay for all prenatal medical care if that's the mother's choice). They'll do things like also cover the cost of the abortion along with travel and hotel rooms - as abortion gets restricted in more and more areas, people will have to travel further and further afield and it becomes more and more cost prohibitive. Check out the national network of abortion funds for a list (or google 'PLACENAME abortion fund and vet whatever turns up)
posted by dinty_moore at 12:00 PM on April 18, 2019 [2 favorites]
I mean, they're all good.
Planned Parenthood provides all sorts of sexual health care to those who do and don't have vaginas - including birth control, STD screenings, regular pap smears, prenatal exams, and abortions. They've been hit hard by the loss of Title X funding but also are probably the one that people are most likely to donate to.
There are other abortion clinics that aren't affiliated with Planned Parenthood out there, and may be one near you (Whole Woman's Health is another set of clinics with a mutli-state presence). They'll oftentimes get less direct funding than Planned Parenthood - though PP tends to share their funding with other clinics in the area. If you're giving directly to another abortion clinic, just be careful and make sure that they're actually an abortion clinic and not a crisis pregnancy center.
NARAL are the lobbying arm for this fight, working against anti-abortion measures on the legislative side of things. As you can imagine, they need help.
Abortion Funds are places that provide grants for people who want an abortion but don't have the resources for one (as a note, most abortion funds will also pay for all prenatal medical care if that's the mother's choice). They'll do things like also cover the cost of the abortion along with travel and hotel rooms - as abortion gets restricted in more and more areas, people will have to travel further and further afield and it becomes more and more cost prohibitive. Check out the national network of abortion funds for a list (or google 'PLACENAME abortion fund and vet whatever turns up)
posted by dinty_moore at 12:00 PM on April 18, 2019 [2 favorites]
I've already seen three social media posts from teenagers in Ohio about how this news actively pushed them towards getting the hell out for college/their future. Why are all the young people leaving heartland America?! A mystery.
posted by nakedmolerats at 12:09 PM on April 18, 2019 [7 favorites]
posted by nakedmolerats at 12:09 PM on April 18, 2019 [7 favorites]
Or to put another way, nothing sends me to rage-blackout level faster than this stuff. Which makes right now a very difficult time for me to read the news.
Yeah, the most difficult thing about escorting is that you're not supposed to respond to the protesters at all. They can shout whatever they like at you, as long as it's not a direct threat, and it's considered okay. But they also try to go after the escorts as much as possible and will use whatever anyone gives them. We're not supposed to call the other escorts by their names when we're in front of protesters because the protesters will use them to get our attention.
On one of my first shifts, one of the protesters was telling me this story about how her father had left Germany after World War 2 because he found out about the horrible mistreatment of Jews after the war and was so shocked and horrified at his country that he fled to the US. And I don't know, I must have made a face because I saw some pretty big holes in that story and had questions, so now she shouts at me about the Holocaust (not even the supposed baby Holocaust, the actual Holocaust) all the goddamn time now. And typically shouting about the Holocaust at a Jew might be considered threatening behavior, but in this context it is just normal (presumably she does not know about my Jewish heritage, I sure as shit didn't mention it).
I tune them out and focus on watching out for any possible patients. I don't know, I just do it. At some point it's not about me - these assholes are going to be out there going after somebody no matter what I do. And if the choice is me there and taking it silently and being able to be there for the patients and me spending a sweet sixty seconds giving them a piece of my mind and there not being anyone the next time, I'll figure out a way to tune them out. Hell, shouting at my face and getting no response has to demoralize them a little bit. I sometimes write about my experiences, but since I don't write about the patients and I try not to focus on the protesters too much for my own mental health, a lot of it ends up being about the weather (to be fair, 90% of escorting is just pacing standing outside a building in shitty weather).
And this is that part that's not new. This is the way it's been for well over a decade, maybe two.
Planned Parenthood did a VR experience a few years ago called Across the Line that takes you through the experience of walking up to an abortion clinic. It's a more visceral version - not the calm, patronizing and outright version that involves just straight up lying and is the new hot thing these days. But I remember being at an event - the Minnesota State Fair, actually - where we could get people who aren't necessarily into the whole reproductive justice thing to watch it and it really did seem to shock people. And part of it is like - what did you imagine it was like? That it was easy? Have you thought about it at all?
It can make our day when someone just randomly walks down the street and gives the protesters a pieces of their mind, though. Just because we're not able to say anything doesn't mean we're not thinking it.
posted by dinty_moore at 12:19 PM on April 18, 2019 [9 favorites]
Yeah, the most difficult thing about escorting is that you're not supposed to respond to the protesters at all. They can shout whatever they like at you, as long as it's not a direct threat, and it's considered okay. But they also try to go after the escorts as much as possible and will use whatever anyone gives them. We're not supposed to call the other escorts by their names when we're in front of protesters because the protesters will use them to get our attention.
On one of my first shifts, one of the protesters was telling me this story about how her father had left Germany after World War 2 because he found out about the horrible mistreatment of Jews after the war and was so shocked and horrified at his country that he fled to the US. And I don't know, I must have made a face because I saw some pretty big holes in that story and had questions, so now she shouts at me about the Holocaust (not even the supposed baby Holocaust, the actual Holocaust) all the goddamn time now. And typically shouting about the Holocaust at a Jew might be considered threatening behavior, but in this context it is just normal (presumably she does not know about my Jewish heritage, I sure as shit didn't mention it).
I tune them out and focus on watching out for any possible patients. I don't know, I just do it. At some point it's not about me - these assholes are going to be out there going after somebody no matter what I do. And if the choice is me there and taking it silently and being able to be there for the patients and me spending a sweet sixty seconds giving them a piece of my mind and there not being anyone the next time, I'll figure out a way to tune them out. Hell, shouting at my face and getting no response has to demoralize them a little bit. I sometimes write about my experiences, but since I don't write about the patients and I try not to focus on the protesters too much for my own mental health, a lot of it ends up being about the weather (to be fair, 90% of escorting is just pacing standing outside a building in shitty weather).
And this is that part that's not new. This is the way it's been for well over a decade, maybe two.
Planned Parenthood did a VR experience a few years ago called Across the Line that takes you through the experience of walking up to an abortion clinic. It's a more visceral version - not the calm, patronizing and outright version that involves just straight up lying and is the new hot thing these days. But I remember being at an event - the Minnesota State Fair, actually - where we could get people who aren't necessarily into the whole reproductive justice thing to watch it and it really did seem to shock people. And part of it is like - what did you imagine it was like? That it was easy? Have you thought about it at all?
It can make our day when someone just randomly walks down the street and gives the protesters a pieces of their mind, though. Just because we're not able to say anything doesn't mean we're not thinking it.
posted by dinty_moore at 12:19 PM on April 18, 2019 [9 favorites]
It can make our day when someone just randomly walks down the street and gives the protesters a pieces of their mind, though. Just because we're not able to say anything doesn't mean we're not thinking it.
I pass by one occasionally that gets protestors, and I've always wondered whether the escorts would appreciate me yelling something back at the protestors, or whether it would just be more noise. NOW I KNOW, AND ME AND MY BATTLE-HARDENED LUNGS WILL BE READY.
Thank you for your work, dinty_moore, in the face of the awful protestor targeting you specifically.
posted by joyceanmachine at 12:33 PM on April 18, 2019 [6 favorites]
I pass by one occasionally that gets protestors, and I've always wondered whether the escorts would appreciate me yelling something back at the protestors, or whether it would just be more noise. NOW I KNOW, AND ME AND MY BATTLE-HARDENED LUNGS WILL BE READY.
Thank you for your work, dinty_moore, in the face of the awful protestor targeting you specifically.
posted by joyceanmachine at 12:33 PM on April 18, 2019 [6 favorites]
As a former escort, it absolutely made my day on a personal level when someone else would engage with the protestors in ways I could not.
That said, it can make things more difficult for the patients and the clinic staff, so it’s ultimately maybe the kind of thing where if you see people actively working with a patient to get them in or out safely, don’t heighten things further by inserting yourself into the process. If everyone’s just standing around between patients glaring daggers, sure, step on up and speak your mind.
posted by Stacey at 1:38 PM on April 18, 2019 [6 favorites]
That said, it can make things more difficult for the patients and the clinic staff, so it’s ultimately maybe the kind of thing where if you see people actively working with a patient to get them in or out safely, don’t heighten things further by inserting yourself into the process. If everyone’s just standing around between patients glaring daggers, sure, step on up and speak your mind.
posted by Stacey at 1:38 PM on April 18, 2019 [6 favorites]
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Tomorrow is a also a big day for abortion protests, so if you can, you can see if there's a counter-protest you can join in your area.
I'm a clinic escort - in an urban area, in a blue state, so I'm imagining it is worse elsewhere. But the most disturbing protester that I regularly encounter is the one that does an impressive imitation of a toddler and starts shouting "mama mama why are you killing me?". And especially around 40 days of life, there's always emails about possible incidents and reminders about what the procedures are if/when a protester crosses the line and touches someone, or makes specific threats against a person - along with guidelines about what behavior is considered threatening and what is considered normal.
Most of the abortion protesters I see are women, and the ones that are faster to approach the patients are all women (I'm pretty sure this is on purpose, so it seems more sympathetic). There are specific rules as to what they can and cannot do, and outside of the 40 days of life, it's the same people week after week, so they know how to get right up on that line.
posted by dinty_moore at 7:44 AM on April 18, 2019 [6 favorites]