(courtesy of Indybay.org)
Last week, on a bright and very early Wednesday morning, I traveled to DC for the “Stop Stupak” rally and lobby day on a bus organized by the National Latina Institute for Reproductive Health. We were traveling with hundreds of people from around the country to advocate that Congress vote against the Stupak-Pitts Amendment (which became Nelson-Hatch in the Senate) which restricts women’s access to abortion by banning insurance plans available under pending health care reform from covering this common medical procedure. In short, any insurance plans available on the “exchange” (i.e. federally subsidized health insurance market) cannot cover abortions, not even in the case of rape, incest or to save the mother’s life. Most insurance plans will want to be on the exchange because that’s where companies will buy coverage for their employees, and most people in general, therefore a large population of women will be excluded from using their own money for to cover their own abortions. That is unless women pay extra money up front each year to buy a “rider” that will cover abortion for the year, because of course, you can anticipate an UNINTENDED pregnancy. Ridiculous.
Organizations throughout the “feminist” movement coordinated this national effort. Women of color and reproductive justice organizations joined mainstream women’s groups. I mentioned the Latina Institute, who joined Sistersong Women of Color for Reproductive Justice, National Asian Pacific American Women’s Forum, Raising Women’s Voices, National Organization of Women, Pro-Choice Public Education Project, CHOICE USA, SPARK Reproductive Justice NOW, Planned Parenthood and NARAL.
So after traveling 4+ hours armed with signs that shout “Salud, Dignidad, Justicia” (Health, Dignity, Justice) and talking points for our lobby visits, we arrive and are directed to an overflow room for the rally. Huh? The rally was indoors. Fail. The inappropriately-named “rally” was held in an auditorium and people had to participate in different rooms. Fail again. I watched the rally on a screen. Buzzkill.
It became apparent that the main organizers (NARAL and Planned Parenthood) wanted to tell their story and create their own picture of the movement serving their agenda. Essentially, they wanted a room full of white women with calculated specks of color holding signage from only their organizations. Our banners in Spanish were not welcome because immigrant health care rights is controversial. That provides ammo for the other side (Republicans) and the powers that be within the reproductive health movement want to control the message. The rally was supposed to be an opportunity for allies from across state, ethnic, linguistic, gender, generational lines to unite for a common goal. Barring us from being in the same physical space where conversations and interactions happen is a detriment to the movement as whole. Here lies another example to add to the history books of marginalized groups being…er, marginalized, to achieve specific communications goals.
Being at the table with a muzzle doesn’t appease or impress me. Don’t invite us to the table and then hide us under it. People traveled from all over the country to participate in a RALLY and lobby day in the name of women’s rights. All women. How do we make this movement exciting and palatable to a wide range women, especially younger generations, when the mainstream movement doesn’t show any respect to its own colleagues and comrades fighting just as hard?
From a communications perspective, we lost a powerful visual. The overflow room was more diverse than the rally itself, packed with young activists (many of whom were students attending during finals season), immigrant women, and older activist women, notably ones that looked like my mom. I felt encouraged. My mom is an African-American woman raised in the South during the Civil Rights era and has always taught me about being pro-choice. She told me about women being butchered by wire hangers, or toxic concoctions, and how women suffered from back alley abortions. The idea of having to endure that desecration of my yoni because politicians want to play body politics in the name of their distorted Jesus is why I fight for legal abortion and access. They are legislating over something they can never truly understand as (mostly) white men, and the last time I checked we were supposed to be a secular nation.
While watching the rally from a television screen, it occurred to me that a casual observer watching the event would think that most of the attendees were white women ranging from mid-20’s to mid-50’s. There were some sprinklings of women of color but it hardly represented the full spectrum of the people who were there. It was an alienating experience, and certainly a wake up call. I know historically how women of color have been pushed aside, tokenized, and disregarded in most social justice movements (see civil rights, feminism) but I wasn’t prepared to experience it blatantly and shamelessly, especially with so much at stake.
Sure, when you have Representative Judy Chu (CA), Loretta Ross (Co-founder/Executive Director of Sistersong), and Silvia Henriquez (Executive Director of the National Latina Institute for Reproductive Health) speaking at the rally, you have achieved some level of diversity. But to not have the women who those leaders represent on the floor is absolutely unacceptable.
It’s okay because I see you. I am not one person. I am one of many who are doing this work throughout all facets and levels of the movement. Our eyes are wide open and our mouths are too. You, puppet masters of the “movement,” want us there for numbers sake but don’t want to make room for us at the table. We make a good photo op in the name of tokenism. But we’re not here to serve your purpose and never have been, we’d like to work with you but not at the expense of our mission. The same way you feel about politicians flipping the script on pro-choice women is the same way women of color, immigrants, LGBTQ people feel within our movement. We stand for Reproductive Justice, a fight for reproductive rights of all people, to have or not have children and to have utmost control over our bodies without government intervention. Isn’t that what we should all be fighting for if reproductive rights are human rights? Ain't I a woman?
(For more on this, check out the interview with myself and my friend and mentor, Aimee Thorne-Thompson, Executive Director of Pro-Choice Public Education Project, by our friend and comrade, Davey D on KPFA's Hard Knock Radio.)
(our badass group during the Stop Stupak Lobbying Day with Representative Eliot Engel, an amazing advocate for the rights of women, immigrants and people from all walks of life. and he reps Mt. Vernon-holla!)
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