#Abortion Stigma

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Alanna Vagianos at HuffPost:

Many Republicans want you to believe that women are getting abortions in the eighth and ninth months of pregnancy simply because they can. The right-wing rhetoric has been used to criticize abortion rights supporters and Democrats for years. Even Donald Trump — who up until recently consistently dodged the topic of abortion — has started repeating the myth.

Democrats “support abortion up to and even beyond the ninth month,” the GOP presidential nominee said last month. Democrats can “have [an abortion] in the seventh, eighth, ninth month, and they can kill the baby,” he said in another interview, adding that in some states “they can kill the baby after the baby is born.” Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) said this week that “there are late-term abortions and every single Democrat supported it.” (“Late-term abortion” is a popular right-wing talking point, but HuffPost is not using it because it’s medically inaccurate.) The belief that pregnant people use abortion like birth control is a well-worn boogeyman that the anti-choice movement has peddled for decades. Though rife with misinformation, the political strategy has been extremely successful, creating cultural stigma so deep around abortions later in pregnancy that many Democrats, including President Joe Biden, and even some pro-choice advocates, are uncomfortable discussing it.

But people do get abortions later in pregnancy — a phrase that generally reflects abortions at or after 21 weeks. Some are women with wanted pregnancies who get a fatal fetal diagnosis. Others are young people who don’t realize they’re pregnant or don’t have a safe way to get an abortion right away. Still, others experience something catastrophic and life-changing later in pregnancy — a partner becoming violent, their home burning down, a job loss — that will make it nearly impossible to safely raise a child. There’s also an increasing number of people pushed further into pregnancy because they experience barriers to care early on: their home state banned abortion forcing them to travel, or their immigration status makes it dangerous for them to seek health care, or they need to save up for the procedure because it’s not covered by insurance.

No one is getting an abortion in the second or third trimester because they woke up one day, months into being pregnant, and decided they didn’t want to be pregnant anymore. But the politically manufactured shame around later abortion care runs so deep that many Democrats believe it too, in part because of the power of these lies. Biden has centered his reelection campaign around restoring Roe v. Wade, and advocates are building policy around it too, protecting abortion care until viability or around 24 weeks — effectively ignoring those who will need care later in pregnancy.

“One of the mistakes we’ve made as a movement is to not talk about later care,” said Dr. Diane Horvath, an OB-GYN and abortion provider at Partners In Abortion Care, an abortion clinic in Maryland where 90% of her patients receive care in the second and third trimesters. “I think we thought we were protecting ourselves by being quiet about it,” she said. “But when you leave gaps in the narrative … anti-abortion folks have always been very happy to fill them in with things that are scary and incorrect, and really debase people who have abortions and debase people who provide them.” Most abortions do happen in the first trimester: Almost 93% of abortions reported to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in 2020 were done before the 13th week. Nearly 99% took place by the end of the 20th week. Somewhere around 1% of abortions occur at 21 weeks or later, and the subset of abortions in the third trimester (around 26 weeks) is even smaller.

[...]

Even under the best of circumstances, with a lot of privilege and resources, getting an abortion in the third trimester when Roe was still intact was extremely difficult. “The whole time we’re asking ourselves, ‘What would we have done if any of these pieces were not in place? What if we couldn’t have accessed that money quickly? What if we didn’t have IDs that allowed us to get on a plane? What if we didn’t read and speak English?’” recalled Christensen, who along with her husband founded the abortion strategy and advocacy group Patient Forward.

In 2020, 9% of people who accessed abortions had to travel out of their home state to receive care, according to The Guttmacher Institute. Three years later, after the Dobbs decision that repealed Roe, that number has doubled with around 20% of patients seeking care across state lines. (That number does not account for the increase in medication abortion by mail, a common access point for pregnant people in the first trimester post-Roe.) Horvath and Morgan Nuzzo, a certified nurse midwife, opened Partners in Abortion Care shortly after the Supreme Court repealed Roe v. Wade in the summer of 2022. The two met working at a Planned Parenthood clinic, but didn’t become close until Nuzzo was pregnant with her first child, and Horvath offered some hand-me-down baby clothes from her kids. Partners in Abortion Care in College Park, Maryland, is one of a small handful in the country that offer all-trimester abortion care. During the first year the clinic was opened, they saw patients from 40 different states and three countries.

Their clinic sees about 10 to 15 patients a week ― nearly all of whom are getting abortions after 20 weeks. The clinic caps the number of patients they see weekly because later care takes more time. Unlike early care, which can often be done using abortion pills, abortions in the second and third trimester are more complex. An abortion between 20 and 26 weeks is typically a two-day procedure, and past 26 weeks is a three-day procedure.

HuffPost explores the stigma of those who get an abortion post-fetal viability and how anti-abortion propaganda (such as falsely calling post-fetal viability abortions "late term abortions") plays a role in creating such stigmas.

Those who choose abortion in the later half of the 2nd or the 3rd trimester do so because of extenuating circumstances.

Post-fetal viability = anywhere after 21-25 weeks in gestational age.

[ex-foster]

[femjhonenvasquez]

I'll never understand why it's seen as obsessive or radical to center female issues in your politics. How is it insane, overly specific, unnecessary ect to focus on issues that affect 50% of the human population?

[70slesbian]

i visited an exhibition about abortion today and it really made me SICK, i think a lot of people overestimate the access to safe abortion in europe and we’ve become too comfortable in thinking we don’t have to fight to keep it

[questioningdragons]

I've been rewatching/catching up on Call the Midwife and it's amazing how many important topics this show covers. Including an episode that completely dismantles the myth that what a woman wears matters in any way when it comes to being attacked. This predator attacked a sex worker, a young mother out walking her colicky baby, and a nun.

[anadrenalineslut]

I don't know who lied to you dumbasses but abortion is not inherently traumatic. That's your sexism and your Christian values showing its ugly head, babes.

[wayward-sherlock]

i am now putting dirty dancing on my watch list exclusively because of the fic

@kaiminluu and i consider this the biggest win ever. thank you.

[ivygorgon]

Abortion is healthcare! Pass the Women’s health Protection Act NOW!

AN OPEN LETTER to THE U.S. CONGRESS

1,391 so far! Help us get to 2,000 signers!

Today the Supreme Court heard arguments in Idaho v. the United States, a case about the Emergency Medical Treatment and Active Labor Act. There is a real possibility that right-wing justices on the court will rule that pregnant people aren’t entitled to emergency care that may involve an abortion unless they’re at death’s door.

We have already seen that even with EMTALA in place emergency rooms in abortion ban states are turning pregnant people away with alarming frequency, and with catastrophic results. This is utterly sickening, and if SCOTUS rules for the state of Idaho it’ll get much worse. Congress needs to pass S. 701 / HR 12 the Women’s health Protection Act now.

Abortion care is a top issue for me. I am desperately concerned about the rollback of rights we’re seeing. Women and other pregnant people are going to suffer and even die if our rights aren’t restored. Do something. Thanks.

▶ Created on April 24 by Jess Craven · 1,393 signers in the past 7 days

📱 Text SIGN PQGYBW to 50409

🤯 Liked it? Text FOLLOW JESSCRAVEN101 to 50409

[sweetstarcollector]

So phrases like "people with uteruses" or "people who have periods" never really bothered me as much as more overtly dehumanizing phrases like "bleeders" or "birthing bodies", but I saw a post today talking about the abnormal symptoms women experienced after getting tear gassed protesting, that ended with something like "we don't know the full effects of tear gas on people with uteruses". And what struck me about that is that's not really correct, because female people without uteruses (either bc they were born without one or bc they had a hysterectomy) will still experience different symptoms after being tear gassed than male people. Women metabolize substances differently than men, our immune systems are different, our hormonal cycles are different, our skin has different thicknesses, etc. All of those things have potential effects on tear gas reactions, and are not dependent on whether or not we have a uterus. They're dependent on whether or not we're female. So saying "people with uteruses" when what is meant is "female people" is not really accurate. And I realized that a lot of times when people use those kinds of phrases, they aren't being accurate.

For example, I'm sure we've all seen people say things about how the repeal of Roe v Wade will harm people with uteruses/people who can get pregnant/etc. And while yes, it definitely harms those people, the full truth is that abortion bans harm *female* people, *regardless of if they can get pregnant or have a uterus.* Because female people who don't have uteruses can still get pregnant, and in those rare cases will 100% of the time need an abortion. Female people who deal with infertility and can't carry a fetus to term can still be jailed for miscarrying. Female people who are completely sterile (for whatever reason) can still be denied medications/medical treatment on the grounds that the treatment could theoretically harm a fetus. Female people who may currently have no uterus/no longer be able to get pregnant but who have had an abortion in the past will face increased stigma.

Here's another example:

It seems pretty straightforward- menstruation stigma is experienced by people who menstruate. But again, that's only half true. Period stigma is experienced by all female people, regardless of if they menstruate. Think about the fact that we are told female people should not hold political leadership because "what if a female president has PMS and starts a war", despite the fact that almost all female presidential candidates are old enough that they would have experienced menopause. Female people have their feelings dismissed because "it must be that time of the month", regardless of if they're too young to menstruate or too old or if they have a condition causing amenorrhea. Female children grow up seeing periods- a natural function of their bodies- portrayed as disgusting, dirty and gross, as making them unclean, as something to dread and fear. This affects them before they experience menarche, this affects them even if they never experience menarche. It affects all female people.

I could come up with more examples, but you get the idea. Reducing female people to singular body parts and organs inherently denies the reality of femaleness. All parts of us (both biological and social) interact with all other parts of us to form an experience that can't be understood by chopping us up and putting our individual functions under the microscope. In order to get an accurate picture you need to look at the whole (female) human.

[wiisagi-maiingan]

Like I genuinely think that we can't afford to just be pro-choice anymore, we have to be PRO-ABORTION. We have to talk about abortion, we have to normalize people getting abortions, we have to let people CELEBRATE getting abortions, we have to start throwing fucking parties to celebrate someone getting an abortion, and we have to LOVE ABORTION.

Yes, abortion can be terrible and traumatizing and stressful but so much of that is because of social stigma! We celebrate when people undergo other medical procedures, when people survive surgeries and get transplants and even get organs removed entirely, so let's bring that energy to abortion too! Let's normalize this shit! For everyone's sake!

🏳️‍⚧️ THIS POST IS TRANS INCLUSIVE 🏳️‍⚧️

[ex-foster]

Liberal feminists: please stop using foster kids in the abortion debate. ✋🚫

Please stop using us as counter arguments to pro-lifers and suggesting that foster kids are "waiting to be adopted". 🚫

🚫 Not all children in foster care are waiting to be adopted for several reasons:

1. Reunification with Biological Family: The primary goal of foster care is to provide a safe and temporary placement for children while their biological families work to resolve the issues that led to their removal. Many children in foster care are in the system temporarily, with the hope of reunifying with their biological parents or relatives.

2. Guardianship or Kinship Care: In some cases, children in foster care may be placed with relatives or guardians who are not their biological parents. In these situations, adoption may not be necessary, as the child remains within their extended family.

3. Age and Personal Preferences: As children grow older, their preference and input in the decision regarding adoption becomes more significant. Some older children may have a strong desire to remain in foster care rather than being adopted.

4. Complex Legal and Family Situations: The legal and family circumstances of children in foster care can be complicated. There may be ongoing court proceedings, legal challenges, or unresolved issues that make adoption a complex or delayed process.

5. Limited Number of Adoptive Families: There is often a shortage of adoptive families willing to take in older children, sibling groups, or children with specific medical, emotional, or behavioral needs. This shortage can result in some children remaining in foster care longer.

6. Cultural and Ethnic Considerations: Some children have cultural or ethnic preferences for their adoptive family, and it can be challenging to find suitable matches, leading to longer stays in foster care.

Overall, the goal of the foster care system is to provide children with the best possible care and permanency, which may or may not involve adoption, depending on the individual circumstances of each child and family.

💙💚💛❤️💜

Using foster children in the abortion debate is highly insensitive as it oversimplifies and stigmatizes their experiences. Foster care is a complex system with various circumstances, and using it to argue in favor of abortion can inaccurately suggest that foster children are unwanted or unloved, which is far from the truth. Such an approach can further polarize the abortion debate and detract from the core issue of women's bodily autonomy. Advocates for abortion rights should focus on the central argument of reproductive choice without inadvertently stigmatizing foster children, respecting their unique stories and circumstances.

[olderthannetfic]

I'm a big mpreg and A/B/O fan who is wondering if anyone else has noticed the weird anti-abortion attitudes in a lot of mpreg and a/b/o? Like where you're "2000s Hollywood movies" levels of characters not even CONSIDERING abortion as an option for unwanted pregnancies (in a universe where this is possible and safe, and where it doesn't make sense with the character's characterization). I get why for plot reasons, abortion isn't as satisfying an end to a certain kind of pregnancy story as having the baby, same as it is in movies that do it. But you can write a character considering abortion and deciding not to get one in a way that doesn't make the option seem horrible and unthinkable or otherwise stigmatize it.

Or the number of people who seem to think abortion is such an inherently "traumatizing" topic that they need to content-warn for even a vague, offhand mention of it. It's one thing if it's graphic surgery or something - I'd probably want a head's up for that no matter what it was, at least in a story where I didn't see it coming - but just mentioning it at all? Abortion is a routine, safe medical procedure in places where it's legal. If you're doing warnings with abortion and no other medical procedures, you're reinforcing the anti-choice idea that abortion is inherently upsetting and sad. It's reinforcing abortion stigma. I've met many, many more people who've had abortions who felt happy about it and wish they could say that without having people treat them like a murderer, than I have people who had the "post-abortion regret" that anti-choice organizations talk about, and my experiences are supported by basically all the statistics about this that aren't from anti-choice political lobbying groups. It's especially egregious when people do this over an early, fully-elective (and legal and safe) abortion - a thing where patients having triggering kind of trauma is so low as to be statistically insignificant - but don't do it over related topics that genuinely contribute to a lot of PTSD, like miscarriage, infertility, adoption, and even fucking child death!!!!! I saw a fic that mentioned ALL of those things in someone's inner monologue considering what he should do about an unexpected pregnancy, but only the abortion part got warned for! Maybe some of that sounds nitpicky, but I personally know people who read fanfiction who like warnings for discussion of infertility/miscarriage because they have a lot of stress and trauma over unsuccessfully trying to have a child, and don't want to be reminded of that in their happy place.

It feels like a thing that's oddly underdiscussed when people talk about things in mpreg and a/b/o that would be kind of questionable to these same authors if they were to encounter it in stories about pregnancy where the character is a woman (like the stories where simply having a working uterus means you are inherently more nurturing or less ambitious or sweeter, or where getting pregnant suddenly makes you like that no matter how you were before). But if anything it's more common. I have to assume a lot of it's because a lot of people writing these were raised with more conservative ideas about abortion and then changed their minds, but didn't really question everything their upbringing taught them about abortions being always tragic or something that you should only do in extreme circumstances or whatever. Something you often see on Tumblr discourse about abortion, too, where people who claim to be "pro-choice" will come u with a list of reasons (disability, gender, just not feeling it, etc.) why it's "not okay" to get an abortion - not getting the point that forcing someone to carry a pregnancy they don't want is a violation of their body autonomy regardless of their "reasoning." The ableist woman who doesn't want a disabled baby still doesn't deserve have to a pregnancy forced upon her by the state!

I have to wonder if it's more noticeable to me because i wasn't raised that way at all, I had pro-choice leftist feminist parents.

Anyway long story short, I've never agreed with the anti take that mpreg or a/b/o are inherently sexist or anything like that. A lot of it is nothing like this! But it's common and I have to wonder if something working within a medium that's considered to be queerer and more progressive sometimes leads people to expose more of these attitudes than they might otherwise. Kind of like how you see a lot of weird sex-negativity in queer and fandom communities because people think merely being queer and in fandom means they can't be conservative, but they haven't actually questioned underlying sex-negative attitudes they have.... and so you get them being susceptible to anti and "kinks don't belong at pride" and such.

It's not inherently sexist, but I'm not sure it's inherently progressive, either? Not that it has to be. But I think my patience for anti-abortion stigma is, given recent big world events, at its absolute nadir lol

(sorry this is so long! guess i had more to say about this than i thought)

--

Too much American culture, maybe? IDK.

My mother considered abortions to be about like having the doctor remove a tick. I too find a lot of people's pearl clutching bemusing.

I always find it embarrassing in that bad writing OOC way when people don't include abortion where it makes sense or treat it as a Big Deal where it wouldn't be to that character.

However, I do usually expect mpreg fic to be kinking on "Ohhh nooo, now we have to stay together for the baby!" nonsense fantasies. It's one reason I dislike most of it. Given that, I wouldn't read too much into the plague of conservative anti-abortion vibes.

The fandoms that do more with A/B/O world building (giving the betas an actual role, etc.) tend to have more fic where they consider or even get abortions though.

[a-really-big-cat]

also, the reason why abortion cannot be seen as an authentic expression of personal freedom to choose is because the overwhelming number of abortions occur because the woman felt pressured into the decision by any number of constraining factors, primarily financial hardship, but also including social pressure: e.g. her partner doesn't want children and has threatened to leave if she doesn't abort; or her family disapproves of the pregnancy (sometimes from a stigma of being pregnant out of wedlock). It's almost exactly the same social and financial pressures that force women into prostitution. Just like prostitution, its legalization does not solve the fundamental social problems that cause it to be positioned by an oppressive society as a solution, and just like prostitution it is marketed by the industry as a "freeing" choice in order to condition women into accepting the economic and social inequalities of society.

[thrashkink-coven]

Hi! I saw your post about the appropriation of religious imagery by extremest hate groups (a good post, I share your feelings of frustration) at the end you made a vague statement about the satanic temple and was wondering if you could elaborate on what happened there? They are a group I admittedly only have passing knowledge of, but what I have seen has usually been pro LGBTQ advocacy or similar things. Not that I don't believe you- I don't really interact with large institutions because they tend to become inevitably corrupt and have inherent gatekeeping, but I was wondering if you wouldn't mind explaining what exactly or which extremist propaganda they have been aligning with recently? Or is it just because they are generally anti-theistic?

(I have, in fact, been almost literally living under a rock the past few years so I apologize if the answer is something obvious, but I couldn't seem to find anything with cursory searches so thought asking someone in the community would be a better source)

I couldn’t even begin to outline all of the terrible shit the leaders and founders of The Satanic Temple have done over the years. They are a group of alt white scammers using progressive ideology and leftist sympathy to fill their pockets. They use their image to pray on young women at sex parties and employ real cult tactics to isolate and abuse them. They are a company comprised of sexual abusers, manipulators, and fascists parading the name of Satan to manipulate actual Satanists and Luciferians into giving them money, despite never showing any real respect to those philosophies or religions. We all already know they’re not theistic satanists and they don’t really worship Satan, but they also have absolutely no relationship with Satanism or Luciferian gnosis. You cannot be a Luciferian or a Satanist and be friends with Nazis. Idgaf call me a gatekeeper. They just like to use the image of Satan for publicity stunts to ruffle the feathers of a few Christians. They do not embody the Luciferian spirit or the values of Satanism.

I have a deep hatred in my soul for Douglas Mesner and how much damage he has done to the image of Luciferianism and Satanism, not to mention the real world damage they have done to abortion advocacy groups. The strategic moves of opposing institutions that oppose LGBT rights has actually given a bad name to good faith organizations who already have enough negative stigma around them. Abortion advocacy groups don’t need the narrative that they’re sacrificing babies to Satan by being supported by the Temple of Satan on top of all the backlash they already receive by Christo-fascists.

They DO NOT use the money donated for abortion advocacy to help young mothers or to fight real cases of human rights abuse, they have never actually helped a real woman obtain healthcare. The leader himself openly admitted to taking money donated to the Satanic Temple to pay his personal bills.

Asides from the plethora of real accusations of sexual assault and violence against female members of the church itself, the leader Douglas Mesner has actively supported abusers and suppressed victims from WITHIN THE CHURCH!! (kicking them out, harassing them, threatening them lawsuits etc) from obtaining justice. They have never made any actual strides in the fight towards liberation and have actively supported real fascists for years now. Douglas Mesner has advocated for eugenics and made horrible anti semitic and racist comments in the past and continues to support alt right nationalists who actively spread hateful rhetoric. The lie they promote of wanting to protect women’s and LGBT rights is a well crafted marketing scheme to give them a good image while they abuse and manipulate their own members behind the scenes.

This is a fantastic video essay that dives deep into the history of the members and their controversies:

Genuinely, from the bottom of my heart,

FUCK THE SATANIC TEMPLE

There are of course members who are great people who truly take the philosophy to heart, who have seriously fought for liberation and have sadly had their empathy hijacked. But I don’t like cops and I don’t like people who support Douglas Mesner and his band of freaks. They cannot be trusted and they have done far more harm than good. Actions speak louder than words.

[laurenfoxmakesthings]

ID: A thread of tweets by PinkRangerLB, a trans lawyer, that say the following.

"We in the LGBTQ+ community must understand that our dead were real people. Vital, awake, worlds unto themselves, like us. They didn’t live and die for the sake of our learning, but they have a lot to teach.

I want to tell you about Hart Island and hope in the darkness. /1

When I say they were real people I mean I do not believe they are necessary sacrifices, or that our dead paid a cost for us. They loved, they feared, they had favorite TV shows and candy bars. They were here and it will never ever ever be okay that they’re gone. /2

They’re not symbols or metaphors. They had books to write, vacations to take, meals to cook, and the world would be better with them still in it. We aren’t enriched by death, but we can stand in their shoes and see the future. /3

Hart Island, if you don’t know, is where New York City buries bodies that aren’t claimed by a licensed funeral director. At the height of the AIDS epidemic funeral homes were urged not to embalm AIDS fatalities. /4

In New York, as elsewhere, stigma toward the queer community was at a level that even now it can be difficult to remember. Many queer people who died of AIDS had been disowned by their birth family because of their identity, their HIV status, or both. /5

To make matters worse, their partners and found families had no rights to their medical care or their bodies after they passed. The hateful families that could claim them often didn’t, and the families that loved them were powerless to see to their wishes. /6

You can read more about all this at the memorial’s website, here:

hartisland.net/aids_initiative

/7

You can feel their weight, can’t you? The absence is heavy. And it’s important we understand that weight, because it’s a flat fact that current attacks on LGBTQ+ rights, trans rights especially, will kill people. There will be more absence, and it is not okay. /8

And when we say we have hope we are not saying it’s okay that they will be gone.

None of this ignores intersectionalism, higher rates of infection in targeted communities, death rates higher still. When I say things *can* get better I am not ignoring that improvement favors /9

the privileged.

Things got better. ACT UP and other activist groups organized and gained ground through community building, mutual aid, and grassroots action. Culturally, the tide began to turn. Federal action by Reagan and then Clinton contributed very little /10

(and in fact often caused harm). Direct action by activists galvanized AIDS research and the tide turned with very little government help.

In New York City, the death rate for HIV/AIDS patients fell by 62% from 2001 to 2012. So here’s what I’m saying. We’ve been seeing /11

an escalating backlash against LGBTQ people for years now. It gets very easy for us to come to expect the worst case scenario. Trump won, states are attacking trans kids, Roe was overturned. So now we say WHEN the Supreme Court overturns gay marriage, WHEN a national /12"

abortion ban passes, WHEN trans healthcare for adults gets criminalized.

And don’t get me wrong, those are all very real threats. We have to fight like hell. I am not pretending that times aren’t dark, that people won’t die, or that it will ever be okay that our people will /13

suffer and die. But things can, and do, get better when we fight, when we look after each other. The tide will not inevitably turn, but *we* can turn it. We can say that when the wall finally fell, our hands were there, pulling it down brick by brick. /14

And those we lost, if we remember them, honor them, we are their hands too. /15"

[profeminist]

"There is no reliable data on the number of deaths due to unsafe abortion in Brazil. However, the prohibition is believed to be a leading driver of the high pregnancy-related death rate. One recent study found that 5.2 percent of all hospitalizations in women of childbearing age between 2008 and 2018 were related to abortion.

The most recent National Abortion Survey, a project Diniz helms, found that in 2021, nearly 1 in 7 Brazilian women had an abortion by age 40, and that over half of them had to be hospitalized to safely complete the abortion."

Read the full piece here (TW for sexual assault): https://rewirenewsgroup.com/2024/05/09/under-brazils-abortion-ban-lack-of-information-kills/