Excerpt Refuse Fascism 161 June 25 2023
I’m a little bit hoarse from screaming yesterday. I was back in D.C. outside the Supreme Court on this one year anniversary of the overturn of Roe and we’ve got to talk about it. So before we get into Moms for Liberty and Philly plans, I want to talk about yesterday and the marking of one year without Roe. Saturday June 24 marked one year since the illegitimate, Trump-packed, fascist Supreme Court overturned Roe v Wade, ripping away nationwide protections for abortion rights. One year since the clear-eyed warning that RiseUp 4AbortionRights issued is being borne out in living color across the country.
In RiseUp4AbortionRights’ founding statement, they warned “denying the right to abortion forces women to bear children against their will. This does grotesque physical, emotional, societal and psychic violence to women by reducing them to baby-making machines, compelling women to carry unwanted and or dangerous pregnancies, hijacks their bodies, their safety, their lives, their sexual autonomy, their aspirations and accomplishments and their lifelong relations in the service of patriarchal domination. Forced motherhood is female enslavement. When women are not free, no one is free.”
One year later, tens of thousands have been forced to give birth against their will.
One year later, that hell of living in the world’s biggest superpower after its highest court has reduced women to nothing more than incubators is felt across the country. It is felt by 22 million women and girls of reproductive age who live in states where abortion access is heavily restricted and often totally inaccessible, and is felt by half of humanity in this country who have become second class citizens.There is simply no overstating the harrowing magnitude of a deepening generational tragedy.
One year later, we see women and girls brought to the brink of death from sepsis or bleeding out before they get care for miscarriages or high risk or non viable pregnancies. Doctors turned into arms of a fascist state or punished if they dare to speak out. Violent incidents and threats against providers and patients have risen dramatically. Maternal mortality and morbidity are increasing along with a climate of fear among healthcare providers, while access to all forms of care shrinks.
One year later, we see clinics shuttered and with them futures, lives, and dreams foreclosed.
One year later, women and girls beg for exemptions to save their lives or not have their rapists’ baby. The infringement of privacy rights spreads. “Abortion trafficking” laws are enacted with penalties of up to five years in prison for assisting a minor in accessing an abortion in Idaho, with others likely to follow suit.
One year later, the callous lie of “sending it back to the states” rings with profound cruelty as the Christian fascists in and out of power salivate over a nationwide abortion ban. Our free states shrink each month while they are moving to pull abortion pills from the market, aiming to go after birth control and moving to punish women who seek abortions. On top of all of this, as harrowing as this year has been, it is clear that this is only the beginning of the hell they hope to rain down on women, girls and LGBTQ people.
Let’s get real. This was foreseeable and foreseen in April 2022. RiseUp4AbortionRights wrote, “the reversal of abortion rights would do immeasurable harm to generations of women and girls and to everyone who can become pregnant. It would strengthen and accelerate the escalating attacks on contraception, LGBTQ rights, voting rights, the lives and true history of Black people and other people of color, immigrants and many more. Acquiescing to this loss rather than fighting now to defeat it would also contribute to the dangerous dynamic where people will be forced to adjust and work within greater and greater atrocities.”
One year later this is evident to everyone and anyone looking at reality. The Christian fascist victory and overturning abortion rights has accelerated their juggernaut, which right now is taking genocidal aim at transgender folks while escalating attacks on LGBTQ people. The theocrats who were popping champagne in front of the Supreme Court when Roe was overturned were out celebrating again yesterday and demanding the codification of fetal personhood and a nationwide ban on abortion.
At the Faith and Freedom Coalition Conference this past weekend, Pence underscored this saying “it’s important for us to remember the battle for life is far from over. We’ve not come to the end of our cause, we’ve simply come to the end of the beginning.” Trump, who wears his federal criminal indictment as a badge of honor, continues to be a fan favorite for the Christian fascists. At the Faith and Freedom Coalition Conference, he boasted of the role he played in overturning Roe- he made it happen- and told a crowd that the federal government has a “vital role” to restrict abortion access.
Since RiseUp4AbortionRights was founded, we have struggled against accommodation with this movement. And we warned right after Roe was overturned that, “too many pro-choice leaders and Democratic Party politicians preach a realism of working within this new reality. They tell us to dig in for the long haul of the electoral process or to focus on protecting abortion in a few states ,helping women induced their own abortions are helping women travel across state lines, whatever their intent This allows the Christian fascist juggernaut to continue to advance and capitulate to a growing nightmare.” One year later, the losing tactic of relying on increasingly rigged elections is beyond obvious.
In speech after speech I listened to on the anniversary, I heard calls that the main thing, the best thing we could do is elect “reproductive justice champions,” and celebrate our victories. As revolutionary Sunsara Taylor said, “..they tell you to celebrate a few rearguard ballot initiatives that protect abortion rights for some women in some states, while turning a blind eye as millions and millions lose this right and the Christian fascist juggernaut picks up speed. This is akin to a strategy of climbing to the higher depths of a sinking ship, ignoring those who are drowning below and ignoring the reality that you’ll soon drown too. This is not only unconscionable, it is downright delusional, and is wasting time we cannot afford to waste.”
Last year I worried the world would only see our tears as women slowly vanish from public life, defeated. I worried that we would swallow our rage as this gross assault on our humanity and lives barreled ahead and worried that we’d surrender and accommodate to this indignity following the counsel of those telling us to dig in for the generation-long electoral process.
In this past year, despite the widely felt outrage, the vast support for abortion rights, and the private heartache felt by the majority of us at the now-daily tragic stories caused by this overturn. The streets have been definitely silent, the decent people too passive as the women-hating theocrats continue to mobilize to strip away this fundamental right. But this does not have to be our future on the one year anniversary of this horrendous defeat.
Together, let’s affirm the urgent demand: Legal Abortion on Demand and Without Apology, Nationwide and Everywhere! Only the people in mass nonviolent struggle rising up in the streets relentlessly can make this real. Let’s take inspiration from the green wave for abortion rights in Latin America, and the women in Iran rising up against patriarchal degradation. In our millions we can and must unite and act together to win back the fundamental right to legal safe abortion.
You can check out a version of this available as a statement from RiseUp4AbortionRights.org, which I encourage listeners to read, comment on, and spread. If you want to listen to more on this topic that we’ve covered this past spring, I want you to check out the episode that aired April 16 on the fascist attack on medication abortion. Our April 2 episode on the Post-Dobbs human rights emergency and our March 19 Episode Your Questions Answered for more on this topic.