Abortion is personal for physicians and healthcare workers, not just professional—we need to help protect abortion access.
Tag: Amy Coney Barrett
Tracing the History of a Job That Shouldn’t Exist: The Role of Clinic Escorts in America’s Fight for Abortion Rights
Their actions started relatively quietly. But then came the megaphones, the screaming, the death threats and the outright violence.
Bodies on the Line by Lauren Rankin examines the role of clinic escorts in America’s fight for abortion rights, and chronicles the history of anti-abortion extremism.
Pregnancy and Childbirth Endanger Women’s Lives and Health: “Pregnancy Is Not a Benign Condition”
During oral arguments in Dobbs v. Jackson, Justice Amy Coney Barrett suggested now that all 50 states have “safe haven” laws that allow mothers to relinquish parental rights after birth, the burdens of parenthood discussed in Roe and Casey are irrelevant, and the decisions are obsolete. Putting aside the callous assumption that giving up a baby is not burdensome, the argument ignores the physical and psychological effects of pregnancy, labor and childbirth.
“Legal abortion has reduced deaths of women from unsafe abortion to almost zero and has had important positive effects on other aspects of maternal and child health,” said Dr. Warren M. Hern, director of the Boulder Abortion Clinic. “It has been one of the greatest public health successes in the history of medicine.”
States Have Always Held the Power Over Our Reproductive Rights
Despite Roe v. Wade legalizing abortion at the federal level, the restrictions enacted in the states—from requiring (and denying) admitting privileges for doctors; constraints in insurance coverage; mandatory waiting periods; erroneous restrictions on clinics forcing them to close their doors and more—is where the power over reproductive rights has long resided.
Generation Roe: Have We Always Known Roe Was an Aberrance Only Two Generations Would Experience?
I was born in 1974, nearly 18 months to the day after Roe. The women of my generation, along with the following generation, have been shaped by access to legal abortion and the subsequent guarantee of full personhood. The birth control pill, first approved by the FDA in 1960, promised reproductive autonomy, but abortion rights helped make it true.
As we approach the overturning of Roe, the women of Generation Roe must continue to speak out and join forces with other generations of activists to ensure we will not be the only ones to have experienced full personhood, unencumbered by laws seeking to define all women as mothers whose interests are subsumed by their children, born and unborn.
The Most-Read Ms. Stories of 2021
Ms. readers are fed up. You know how I know? Your reading patterns.
Explore the most popular articles published this year on MsMagazine.com—measured by page views, average time spent on each page, times shared and a few other technical measures.
Apparently We Don’t Need Abortion Because of Adoption … “or Whatever”
In Dobbs v. Jackson, Amy Coney Barrett said the right to an abortion is unnecessary because of safe haven laws. This argument ignores the fact that pregnancy itself has profound impacts on a woman’s life and comes with many risks, especially in a state like Mississippi with an exceptionally high maternal mortality rate.
To suggest that adoption is a simple or equivalent alternative to abortion is shocking. To have that suggestion come from a mother of seven children, who has both been pregnant and been through the process of adoption, is dangerous.
For many children, even if eventually adopted, some time will be spent in foster care. And foster care is not always a safe haven.
The Supreme Court’s Vision of Equality Likely Means the End of Abortion Rights—But It Could Mean Much More
During last week’s oral arguments in Dobbs v. Jackson, many Supreme Court justices said nothing about equality at all—but Justice Amy Coney Barrett stood out. She suggested that people relied on abortion “as a backup form of birth control in case contraception fails” because they wanted to avoid the burdens of both pregnancy and parenting.
If the Court is ready to put an end to Roe, the conservative majority might also try to redefine what the Constitution means when it comes to equality of the sexes.
Supreme Court Allows Texas’s “Radical” Six Week Ban to Stand, Leaving Abortion Advocates Stunned
Reproductive rights advocates, health care providers and lawmakers blasted the Court’s decision to allow Texas’ extreme six week abortion ban to go into effect, and not intervene.
“This should send chills down the spine of everyone in this country who cares about the constitution,” said Nancy Northup, president and CEO of the Center for Reproductive Rights.
Women Must Be Focus Of New Court Appointments
As conservatives have worked for decades to take over the courts with judges who eschew civil rights in favor of protecting the wealthy and powerful, the courts cannot be counted upon to always protect women’s rights, from their reproductive freedom to their personal safety.