Some have expressed the concern that by extending Justice Alito’s reasoning, other hard-won rights - such as the rights to contraception and marriage equality - could be struck down too. Wade is overturned.Īnd there are other disturbing considerations in the draft decision, written by Justice Samuel Alito. As many as 25 states are poised to ban abortion the moment Roe v. Still, it is a harbinger of terrible things to come. The Supreme Court has issued a statement emphasizing that the draft, while authentic, may still change. Abortion is still legal, though it is largely inaccessible in parts of the country. The same mostly male politicians who oppose abortion so often do everything in their power to oppose rights to paid parental leave, subsidized child care, single-payer health care or any kind of social safety net that could improve family life. Despite promises from the anti-abortion movement to support pregnant women and children, the “pro-life” lobby appears to be invested only in the unborn. These burdens disproportionately fall upon poor and working-class women without the means to travel across state lines to receive the care they need. Without the right to abortion, women are forced to make terrible choices. Any civil right contingent upon political whims is not actually a civil right. We should not live in a country where bodily autonomy can be granted or taken away by nine political appointees, most of whom are men and cannot become pregnant.
#ROXANE GAY HUNGER MOBILISM HOW TO#
People should not have to demonstrate their virtue to justify a personal decision about how to handle a life-altering circumstance. All those who want an abortion should be able to avail themselves of that medical procedure. Given that unfortunate reality, we should not live in a world where someone who is raped is forced to carry a pregnancy to term because a minority of Americans believe the unborn are more important than the people who give birth to them.Īnd we should defend abortion access not only in cases of sexual violence. We should not live in a world where sexual violence exists, but we do. Whoever leaked it wanted people to understand the fate awaiting us.Īt least, that is what I am telling myself. Wade was leaked before the justices planned to announce their decision, likely next month. It is stunning that a draft of a Supreme Court ruling that would overturn Roe v. Opinion Debate Will the Democrats face a midterm wipeout? I worried I would not know who the father was. And still, in the weeks and months after, of course I worried I was pregnant. I have told the story, and am tired of telling it, and the story is not the point. I was sexually assaulted by several young men when I was 12. It is unfathomable to consider how a forced pregnancy would have further altered the trajectory of her life.
She is still dealing with the repercussions of that trauma. It was the early 1970s.Ī pregnancy would have, in Debbie’s words, ruined her life. Her mother took Debbie to a doctor, who said that because of her scar tissue, she was sexually active and must have a boyfriend.
She had no one to talk to and nowhere to turn.ĭebbie’s stepfather often threatened to kill her younger brother and her mother if she told anyone, so when the fear of pregnancy became too consuming, she told her mother she was assaulted at school. The abuse went on for years, and as Debbie got older, she was constantly terrified that she was pregnant. As a woman who describes her own body as ?wildly undisciplined,? Roxane understands the tension between desire and denial, between self-comfort and self-care.My wife’s stepfather began raping her when she was 11 years old.
I was trapped in my body, one that I barely recognized or understood, but at least I was safe.?In her phenomenally popular essays and long-running Tumblr blog, Roxane Gay has written with intimacy and sensitivity about food and body, using her own emotional and psychological struggles as a means of exploring our shared anxieties over pleasure, consumption, appearance, and health. I tried to erase every memory of her, but she is still there, somewhere. I buried the girl I was because she ran into all kinds of trouble. From the New York Times bestselling author of Bad Feminist: a searingly honest memoir of food, weight, self-image, and learning how to feed your hunger while taking care of yourself.?I ate and ate and ate in the hopes that if I made myself big, my body would be safe.