Posts Tagged: georgia
Finding Reproductive Justice: “No Más Bebés” & The Limitations Of “Pro-Choice”
I’m proud to be a Latina, but I wasn’t always. Growing up in a predominantly white community in Georgia, my family and I were often targets of incredibly ignorant and hurtful microaggressions. I’ve lost count of how many times someone has made assumptions about how my parents arrived to the United States, or where I’m really from. Even as a kid, I was hyper-aware of how different I looked from my white peers and begged my parents to speak to me in English in front of my friends. The microaggressions I experienced as a child, questioning my belonging and citizenship, were not just incidents of routine childhood teasing, but were a part of a larger system of xenophobia. These seemingly innocuous and juvenile expressions of contempt can better be understood… Read more »
Anti-choice lies will continue to fly at “crisis pregnancy centers”
On July fourth, as my family draws to the dining room table, our conversation turns to politics. My mother mentions blocking hate speech on Twitter, resulting in users getting kicked off, my uncle feels attacked and argues, “if we say freedom of speech, that means all speech.” Why should we censor some speech and not others? Why is it permissible that “oppositional” speech be omitted? On June 26th, the Supreme Court of the United States handed down a 5-4 ruling involving this matter in National Institute of Family and Life Advocates (NIFLA) v. Becerra, Attorney General of California. The NIFLA v. Becerra case grappled with the regulation of speech at so-called “Crisis Pregnancy Centers” (CPCs) in California. The State, via the California Reproductive Freedom, Accountability, Comprehensive Care, and Transparency Act… Read more »
The South And Marriage Equality, Part I: Between A Rock And A Hard Place
Days after the landmark U.S. Supreme Court hearings for Proposition 8 and the Defense of Marriage Act, Sue Everhart, a chief figure in Georgia’s Republican Party, voiced disdain over the proceedings. “Lord, I’m going to get in trouble over this, but it is not natural for two women or two men to be married,” Everhart told The Marietta Daily Journal. “If it was natural, they would have the equipment to have a sexual relationship.” Juxtaposed with the masses of celebratory, often high-profile, marriage equality ralliers on the marble steps of America’s highest court, Everhart’s sentiments are a sobering reminder that the posterchildren of the anti-gay opposition are changing. The National Organization for Marriage–the leading anti-marriage equality organization in the States–has suffered critical drops in funding in the past year. The… Read more »
Georgia Senators Try to Take Away Their Own Right to Abortion
At Choice USA, we make habit of talking about older politicians’ assaults on youth’s reproductive agency. We’re so accustomed to these attacks against comprehensive sex education and birth control accessibility that it would be surprising to see politicians infringe upon their own right to choose. But that’s exactly what’s happening in Georgia. The newly-minted Senate Bill 98 seeks to restrict birth control accessibility among state employees who receive insurance benefits. The bill blatantly states that, “No abortion coverage shall be provided” and that it “would provided certain exceptions” to that abortion restriction. While SB 98 seems like an attempt to manage the debt caused by Georgia’s recession by decreasing government spending, it’s a classic example of sex discrimination via legislation. You would never see a bill restricting access to funding… Read more »
Reproductive Justice Violation: Shackling
I cannot imagine a place where one might stand and have a clearer view of concentrated disadvantage based on racial, gender and class inequality in the country then from inside the walls of a women’s prison. – Beth E. Richie (“Feminist Ethnographies of Women in Prison” Beth E. Richie) Prisons and jails were constructed by and for men. They then became a way of perpetuating the oppression of disadvantaged groups – like people of color, who happen to be disproportionately incarcerated. While the conception of our prison system may not seem pertinent, acknowledging this fact helps to illuminate the disadvantage that exists in these institutions today. Over the past thirty years, the number of women in jails and prisons has grown rapidly. Despite the rise in the incarcerated women population,… Read more »
Plenty of Georgians like eating peaches, why can’t we talk about it?
I’ll start with a little ice-breaking self-disclosure. When I was little, even though I’d heard the word vagina, my parents called it “gin-gin,” so that’s what I called it. For those of you who also grew up skirting around the proper names for genitalia, see any names you recognize? (If not, you should leave a comment with what you called yours.) Private parts No-no Nether region Down there Business Ding-dong Pee-pee Thing Wee-wee Hoo-ha Ya-ya So what does calling your vagina a “wee-wee” or penis a “pee-pee” when you were a kid have to do with reproductive justice? Answer: Lots!
Where’re We’re At, Where’re We’re Going: Reproductive Rights in Georgia
With anti-abortion laws forcing clinics to shut down in Tennessee and Mississippi this summer, I felt compelled to examine the forces at work in other Southern states, including my home state of Georgia. Were there even any good things to be said about the state of reproductive rights south of the Mason-Dixon? I peeked at the National Abortion Rights Action League (NARAL) 2011’s survey through gaped fingers. Entitled Who Decides? The Status of Reproductive Rights in the United States, the report is a great tool to examine the accessibility of reproductive health services in your own state. Each one receives a letter grade based upon its reproductive healthcare accessibility. Despite my worst fears, the Peach State received a ‘D’ from NARAL. I felt relieved; almost as if it were Finals… Read more »
