Speaker 1: M I'm Katie Curic, and this is Abortion the Body Politic,
Speaker 1: Part five. What has just occurred in the United States
Speaker 1: is unprecedented. Globally, we have never seen retrogression on this
Speaker 1: scale in terms of the taking away of a constitutional
Speaker 1: right to abortion that has existed for fifty years. Today,
Speaker 1: we're looking outside of the US to find out what
Speaker 1: the right for reproductive rights looks like in other countries
Speaker 1: and how the United States now compares. The United States
Speaker 1: is now in a situation but really is an outlier
Speaker 1: in sense of the global picture. I'm Lea Hocter and
Speaker 1: I work at the Center for Reproductive Rights. I'm the
Speaker 1: senior Regional Director for Europe at the Center, and I
Speaker 1: lead the Center's work to make legaland policy change on
Speaker 1: reproductive rights across Europe. Only three countries and now very
Speaker 1: unfortunately the United States, so that makes it for have
Speaker 1: actually moved backwards. El Salvador, Nicaragua, and Poland have rowed
Speaker 1: back entitlements to abortion, but never on this scale. They
Speaker 1: have done so from restrictive contexts, so they have had
Speaker 1: laws in place that we're already generally globally regarded as
Speaker 1: restrictive and have then scaled back those entitlements. But the
Speaker 1: United States, what has happened in terms of the Supreme
Speaker 1: Court's decision um, what that decision has done is taken
Speaker 1: away a very robust constitutional protection for abortion rights and
Speaker 1: completely decimated that. Globally, the trend is very clear. There
Speaker 1: is an overwhelming movement and has been for many, many
Speaker 1: decades across the world in all regions, towards the removal
Speaker 1: of bands and highly restrictive laws on abortion, and towards
Speaker 1: the legalization of abortion, the treatment of it as essential healthcare,
Speaker 1: the decriminalization and the removal of barriers in law and policy.
Speaker 1: And this is the overwhelming trend. It has been the
Speaker 1: trend in Europe for eighty years. It has been squarely
Speaker 1: the global trend um for at least the last thirty years.
Speaker 1: I mean in the last thirty years alone, fifty five
Speaker 1: or you know, over fifty five I think actually fifty
Speaker 1: nine countries globally have moved towards removing bands on abortion,
Speaker 1: legalizing abortion, and expanding access, expanding entitlements to abortion. We've
Speaker 1: seen major systemic change in Latin America as a result
Speaker 1: of the green wave. In Argentina, Columbia and Mexico, in
Speaker 1: the European region. We've seen systemic change in Ireland, in Cyprus,
Speaker 1: in Belgium, in Iceland. Even just in the last few weeks,
Speaker 1: major jurisdictions Germany, France, the Netherlands all removing barriers from
Speaker 1: to abortion from their laws Spain. Legislation is now pending
Speaker 1: in Spain that will really introduce a range of very
Speaker 1: important reforms that will increase protection for abortion rights. And
Speaker 1: these are just a handful of examples. We've also seen
Speaker 1: major change in African countries in Kenya, um in South Africa,
Speaker 1: and in in Asia and Nepal, in India and South Korea,
Speaker 1: and a range of other countries. It's not actually impossible
Speaker 1: for me to list every single country in the world
Speaker 1: that has made progressive change, because there are so many.
Speaker 1: Some countries are now taking protective measures in direct response
Speaker 1: to the Supreme courts reversal of Row. In the days
Speaker 1: since the decision from the United States Supreme Court, we
Speaker 1: are now hearing lawmakers in France, in Belgium, in Sweden
Speaker 1: and Denmark discussing in a very conquerent way the reforms
Speaker 1: they will undertake to introduce constitutional rights protection for abortion
Speaker 1: rights in their national constitutions. We've seen sinn Land announced
Speaker 1: that it will undertake reforms of its laws to improve
Speaker 1: them to bring them into line with World Health Organization
Speaker 1: UM guidance. So while for people in the United States
Speaker 1: the situation is very troubling and very grave, what we
Speaker 1: are actually seeing on foot of this decision in this
Speaker 1: region in Europe is a galvanization by decision makers across
Speaker 1: the region who care about reproductive rights to actually begin
Speaker 1: to stand up for those rights and do something in
Speaker 1: terms of their own national laws and policies to shore
Speaker 1: up that production. With the US now facing a long
Speaker 1: road ahead, it's about time we turn our attention to
Speaker 1: what activists around the world have been building. What can
Speaker 1: the US and abortion advocates learn from the systemic change
Speaker 1: rippling across other continents. We reached out to someone on
Speaker 1: the front lines of reproductive rights in Latin America, one
Speaker 1: of the organizers of the so called Green wave. The
Speaker 1: green wave is resistant, is power, is hope. That's what
Speaker 1: the green wave is. So I am Powerla Like jan
Speaker 1: I am a human rights attorney reproductive rights activists all
Speaker 1: over Latin America, and I am the executive director at
Speaker 1: the Women's Equality center. It started in Argentina when UM,
Speaker 1: the la Campaign Nacional, the National Campaign for Legal and
Speaker 1: Free Abortion, was created in two thousand three. It all
Speaker 1: started with a symbol. There was this handkerchief. The handkerchief
Speaker 1: was a green handkerchief. The handkerchief came inspired by the Ulam.
Speaker 1: There were the women in Argentina that were marching UM
Speaker 1: to find the kids that their children that were disappeared
Speaker 1: during the Dector Chip. And they will march every Thursday,
Speaker 1: and they will wear these white handkerchiefs around their their
Speaker 1: heads as a symbol of who they were. And every
Speaker 1: Thursday at three o'clock you will see the Martian even
Speaker 1: as today they are still Martian. At this point, it's
Speaker 1: not to try to seek their children, but their grandchildren.
Speaker 1: So it was a movement of resistance, right, this idea
Speaker 1: that women can come together and resists together and the
Speaker 1: like companion as you all decided, instead of using white,
Speaker 1: they were using green because abortion is healthcare and green
Speaker 1: is associated with the color of health. And it started
Speaker 1: very simple, just with this idea of you will put
Speaker 1: the handkerchief in your race, in your purse, and and
Speaker 1: it was a not when you were on the street
Speaker 1: of letting know somebody what you were standing for, and
Speaker 1: I mean that you were standing for women's rights. It
Speaker 1: means that you were standing for health. I mean that
Speaker 1: you were standing for abortion as a health care. That
Speaker 1: you were standing for equality, you were standing for democracy
Speaker 1: and all the sudden UH. Through the work of many years,
Speaker 1: this small symbol took cover the entire Latin American region
Speaker 1: and it has take over the entire work. It also
Speaker 1: has created changes. In the last two years, Latin America
Speaker 1: has jumped from being one of the regions with the
Speaker 1: most restricted abortion laws to be in a region there
Speaker 1: has changed its abortion laws in three countries. Argentina is
Speaker 1: also the land of the current pope, just changed its
Speaker 1: law in December twenty twenty, recogniztion autonomy as a as
Speaker 1: a right and UH and also making sure that help
Speaker 1: the abortion was included in health services and were provided
Speaker 1: free in hospitals for anybody who needed. Then we had
Speaker 1: Mexico through the decision of the Supreme Court, he decided
Speaker 1: that in order to make it equal for everybody, no
Speaker 1: women could be criminalized because of abortion access and the
Speaker 1: states had the duty to change their laws. And since
Speaker 1: that decision, nine states had changed their laws, and then
Speaker 1: very resently we had my home country, Columbia, the true
Speaker 1: decision of the UH Constitutional Court recognized the women should
Speaker 1: have autonomy to decide when and where UH interrupt apprentices
Speaker 1: if they wish so between the first twenty four weeks
Speaker 1: of of pregnancy, and and that just is something that
Speaker 1: we never thought that would happen in Mexico. Is it's
Speaker 1: still a very religious country. Goluby is still a very
Speaker 1: religious country and conservative in many ways. But what we
Speaker 1: are seeing is the resistance of this movement and the
Speaker 1: hope that this movement brings is changing laws in the
Speaker 1: meantime here in the US. For women who need abortion
Speaker 1: care right now and live in states that ban or
Speaker 1: heavily restricted traveling even outside the country, maybe their beast.
Speaker 1: But I think that there are two things that are
Speaker 1: important to remember when we talk about abortion in the
Speaker 1: context of traveling outside the United States. The first one
Speaker 1: is abortionist health care, and Americans have been traveling to
Speaker 1: Latin America for healthcare for a very long time. Then
Speaker 1: tal procedures, some of the best dentists are done in
Speaker 1: Mexico and Colombia. They are training the United States, they
Speaker 1: go back there is much cheaper. They have all these facilities.
Speaker 1: The tourism of health is something in exist because the
Speaker 1: United States doesn't have a strong health care system. They
Speaker 1: they are already are examples and you're seeking healthcare in
Speaker 1: other countries. So now we are just starting abortion just
Speaker 1: one of those services that you're going to be seeking
Speaker 1: that is of the same quality and of the same
Speaker 1: level that you will receive and is sometimes better than
Speaker 1: many of the states here, like the systems that you
Speaker 1: will have. But the other thing that is happening is
Speaker 1: that the women who are in the border in Mexico
Speaker 1: UM trying to provide these services. There is an amazing
Speaker 1: leader in Mexico, Peronica Cruise from Lallibres, who have created
Speaker 1: this whole network of people who are willing to just
Speaker 1: provide abortion to anybody who crosses the border or even
Speaker 1: sometimes they across the border UM to to provide help.
Speaker 1: They didn't do it because it was a request for
Speaker 1: anybody from the United States. They came together so the
Speaker 1: Texas law and say, what are we going to do
Speaker 1: about it? It's our border, they are our sisters. There
Speaker 1: are our Latino systems on the other side. What are
Speaker 1: we going to do? About it, because, as Beronica says,
Speaker 1: the law sometimes is wrong, and when the law is wrong,
Speaker 1: you need to find a way to fix it. The
Speaker 1: United States, in this case, it's just completely going backwards.
Speaker 1: It is regressing and humanity cannot allow that. We spoke
Speaker 1: to Veronica Cruise with the help of a translator from
Speaker 1: her office in Guana Wato, Mexico. Veronica started her organization
Speaker 1: Las Libres two decades ago. Las Libre. Las Libres is
Speaker 1: a feminist organization that was born twenty two years ago,
Speaker 1: and we were born in the right time to fight
Speaker 1: for safe abortion in a state which was the most
Speaker 1: restrictive for abortion rights at the time in the country
Speaker 1: of Mexico. So, twenty two years ago, local legislators wanted
Speaker 1: to put women victims of rape in jail after having abortions,
Speaker 1: and and we decided to make a huge fight to
Speaker 1: guarantee that not only would those women be released, but
Speaker 1: also to have the law change so so I can
Speaker 1: we We did a great job of ensuring safe, free
Speaker 1: and legal abortions for girls and women who were victims
Speaker 1: of rape. From there, we we started to guarantee that
Speaker 1: all women would have that right to a safe and
Speaker 1: legal abortion if they decided to do so. And and
Speaker 1: so we built this model of safe abortions at home
Speaker 1: without medical supervision under the protocol of the World Health Organization,
Speaker 1: and today we've built networks across the country to ensure that. Coincidentally,
Speaker 1: a week after s b A became law in Texas,
Speaker 1: the Mexican Supreme Court decriminalized abortion. We thought it was
Speaker 1: a good idea to help that memen in Texas right
Speaker 1: because in Mexican territory, the Texas lob does not apply
Speaker 1: to them. And although our locations border each other, if
Speaker 1: you just crossed the street, we are in Texas. So
Speaker 1: in certain border cities, we decided to form a cross
Speaker 1: border network to support and accompany women from Texas who
Speaker 1: are seeking free, safe and legal abortions. So then more
Speaker 1: women began to arrive from other states from the United States,
Speaker 1: and well after the summer, women from all around the
Speaker 1: country started coming to Mexico for help. We've already developed
Speaker 1: several logistical ways over the past few months to ensure
Speaker 1: the safety of abortion and to ensure that women and
Speaker 1: people in the United States who are seeking them can
Speaker 1: do so safely. The first are the women who can
Speaker 1: cross to Mexico. Those who have the ability to cross,
Speaker 1: they can come and they can buy their mr Po
Speaker 1: style pills at any pharmacy in Mexico, and they can
Speaker 1: return home with their prescription and they can have a
Speaker 1: virtual accompaniment to accompany them through the procedure. And then
Speaker 1: there are other women who are crossing into Mexico, and
Speaker 1: we have safe spaces that we arrange for them for
Speaker 1: those women who want to do everything in Mexico. And
Speaker 1: then there are others, and and these are actually the majority.
Speaker 1: These are women who write to us and we send
Speaker 1: the pills to be hand delivered to them from here,
Speaker 1: and then we accompany them through the process. Virtually, there
Speaker 1: are women who are looking for our services, and there
Speaker 1: are also people who want to help. And so we're
Speaker 1: developing the model that we developed in Mexico twenty years ago,
Speaker 1: building social solidarity, a society that accompanies the decision of
Speaker 1: women and a guarantee of abortions, with the insurance of
Speaker 1: the safety of women so that they do not have
Speaker 1: to have abortions and restrictive and unsafe settings. We are
Speaker 1: prepared because we know that we can be an option
Speaker 1: that more and more women are are learning about this
Speaker 1: possibility and they can get care through our services and
Speaker 1: that they have us as an alternative. So so we
Speaker 1: are prepared with more medicine and more hands and heads
Speaker 1: to go along with it. But but honestly, we don't
Speaker 1: want to solve America's problem. American society has to solve
Speaker 1: this problem because it's not a woman's problem. It's it's
Speaker 1: a problem of a society that allows women's rights to
Speaker 1: a legal and safe abortion to be restricted. So if
Speaker 1: we really hope that American society is prepared to deal
Speaker 1: with this problem. When we come back the story of
Speaker 1: one woman's border crossing abortion, this isn't the first time
Speaker 1: that American women have turned to Mexico for help. In
Speaker 1: the nineteen sixties, in particular, many women traveled to Mexico
Speaker 1: for abortion care they were unable to get in the
Speaker 1: United States. Women like Marcia Carlin. My name is Marcia Carlin.
Speaker 1: I'm seventy seven and I had my abortion when I
Speaker 1: was twenty one, before robi Raide was passed in nineteen
Speaker 1: sixty six. When Marcia found her pregnant and did not
Speaker 1: want to be she first went to an O. B. G.
Speaker 1: Y N in San Francisco to a Dr Loewenstein, but
Speaker 1: he refused to do the procedure. Dr Loewenstein didn't know
Speaker 1: of anybody, any doctor in the United States at that
Speaker 1: time who would give me an abortion, so he gave
Speaker 1: us the phone number in Tijuana for this doctor. And
Speaker 1: it turned out the police had had a had made
Speaker 1: him leave Tijuana. He'd run out of Tijuana because the
Speaker 1: police were after him, so he was now in Warez,
Speaker 1: so we knew we had to somehow get to Mexico.
Speaker 1: He told us to check in at the el, pass
Speaker 1: at the hotel and then take a taxi to a
Speaker 1: street border in Warez and then um, a guy would
Speaker 1: pick us up in her I think it was a
Speaker 1: red Chevrolet, and we were supposed to act like we
Speaker 1: knew him. And we waited and waited on that street corner,
Speaker 1: and finally he came by and he opened the door
Speaker 1: real fast and said get in. So we got in,
Speaker 1: and he drove around and around and around for at
Speaker 1: least twenty minutes, drove around the back streets of Warez
Speaker 1: and probably trying so we wouldn't know where he was going.
Speaker 1: Ended up in a residential neighborhood in a small house
Speaker 1: and said coming here, the doctor's in there, and he
Speaker 1: brought me in and a woman said sit here and
Speaker 1: wait for the doctors. So after a while she brought
Speaker 1: me back to a bedroom where there was a metal
Speaker 1: table and she said, lie on the table. It was
Speaker 1: stirts and the doctor came in and he was going
Speaker 1: to give me gas and he said I want you
Speaker 1: and I put the gas on. Not to move, don't
Speaker 1: move at all. But he gave me gas then, so
Speaker 1: I started having wild dreams, and all of a sudden,
Speaker 1: all I remember is he pulled the yanked the gas
Speaker 1: mask off and said you moved, and I was. It's
Speaker 1: hard to explain how scary that was because I didn't
Speaker 1: know what he was doing to my body and my uterus.
Speaker 1: And so he said, I'm then I have to finish
Speaker 1: the operation without the gas, and I said that's fine
Speaker 1: with me because I was scared to death. I wasn't
Speaker 1: gonna move then, and so he did very quickly finished
Speaker 1: what he was doing. I guess he was scraping my
Speaker 1: uterus and and he said you're going to get cramps,
Speaker 1: and I did that serious fans. Anyway, we left and
Speaker 1: got in the car, the red Chevrolet, and he drove
Speaker 1: us back again, and we got a taxi back to
Speaker 1: El Paso, and then we got up playing back to
Speaker 1: San Francisco, and then I saw Dr Loewenstein that evening,
Speaker 1: I think for the next morning, and he said everything
Speaker 1: looked fine. But a couple of days later, I think
Speaker 1: it was two days later, I started to hemorrhage. I'd
Speaker 1: never hemorrhage before. It's it's that in itself. It's a
Speaker 1: very scary feeling. There's just blood gushing out of your
Speaker 1: your vagina. My friends were very worried about me, and
Speaker 1: so they said, call Dr Lowancy. We're gonna take you
Speaker 1: back to the hospital in San Francisco. So they drove
Speaker 1: me back. I was curled up in the backseat of
Speaker 1: the car. I remember this distinctly, and just so anxious.
Speaker 1: First I didn't know what was happening in my body,
Speaker 1: and then I thought I was messing up his car
Speaker 1: with all this blood. No, even though I tried not
Speaker 1: to mess it up. So we got back and Dr
Speaker 1: Loewenstein had talked to me and he said come right in.
Speaker 1: And what he did that he put me out that
Speaker 1: night and just so i'd sleep, and then first thing
Speaker 1: in the morning he operated. I think he did a
Speaker 1: DNC to finish the operation. He told me how scared,
Speaker 1: how not he wasn't scared, but how worried he was
Speaker 1: that I could have died from the hemorrhaging. And he
Speaker 1: y'all also came around, gave me a hug, actually said,
Speaker 1: stand if I want to give you a hug. And
Speaker 1: he said, I'm so glad you will be able to
Speaker 1: have children. And I hadn't even realized that that could be.
Speaker 1: I was worried about I don't know. I was just
Speaker 1: frightened more than anything. And he said he will be
Speaker 1: able to have the children. I'm quite sure I was
Speaker 1: able to have two kids. So a few years later,
Speaker 1: when it was the right time, Dr Loewensteinen in San
Speaker 1: Francisco had asked me to write up to type up
Speaker 1: the experience, so I typed it up before I hemorrhaged.
Speaker 1: I typed it up when I got back and gave
Speaker 1: it to him because he wanted to know more to
Speaker 1: help other women. I sent you a copy of the
Speaker 1: They're write up, which I finally found. I hadn't seen
Speaker 1: it since I gave it to him. That was great.
Speaker 1: Two kind of verify everything I had remembered in my mind.
Speaker 1: I was most surprised that it ended before I hemorrhaged.
Speaker 1: I didn't remember that that it ended like everything was fine,
Speaker 1: but it wasn't. It was not fine. I just thank
Speaker 1: the Lord at the end that everything worked out. Okay,
Speaker 1: it's very lucky, as very very lucky. It's really hard.
Speaker 1: It's even harder to know, like who were the people
Speaker 1: across the border for morsons. It's very hard to know
Speaker 1: how many. UM, my guess is in the thousands of
Speaker 1: My name is Lena Maria Murillo and I'm a historian. UM.
Speaker 1: I'm an assistant professor at the University of Iowa and
Speaker 1: the Department of Gender, Women in Sexuality Studies, History and
Speaker 1: Latin and Latino Latin Next six. Through her work, Lena
Speaker 1: has uncovered evidence of just how long American women have
Speaker 1: been traveling to Mexico for abortion care. This is a
Speaker 1: problem with trying to find the history of things that
Speaker 1: are underground and illegal, right, It's always hard to find
Speaker 1: this sort of like moment when it started. But through
Speaker 1: oral histories, um I was able to document UM one
Speaker 1: abortion clinic in into other bodies UH in the nineteen
Speaker 1: late nineteen forties and UM the person I spoke to
Speaker 1: like worked at his clinic. She was a young woman
Speaker 1: worked at at the Davalos clinic. She hired is another
Speaker 1: young woman, uh, and he teaches her how to do
Speaker 1: the procedure. Now she's not a doctor, she's she's just
Speaker 1: an assistant, but she teaches her, and then he teaches
Speaker 1: his son mad and then it's like kind of radio
Speaker 1: silence from that, like that oral history intribue that I
Speaker 1: did in nineteen forties until the nineteen sixties when a
Speaker 1: person by the name of Patricia McGinnis, along with um
Speaker 1: Rowena Gerner, and Lanta Fallon out of the Bay Area,
Speaker 1: begin to really advocate very loudly for a repeal of
Speaker 1: the abortion laws in California. Patricia McGinnis in San Francisco.
Speaker 1: She's working class women from Oklahoma, and she's a medical technician,
Speaker 1: historian Leslie Reagan, and she she that's like the first
Speaker 1: person to start talking to just ordinary people and collects
Speaker 1: petitions to reform the abortion law and make it easier, uh,
Speaker 1: to get therapeutic abortions. And then she starts talking because
Speaker 1: she had had abortions herself, she had performed her own abortion,
Speaker 1: she had had illegal abortions. She had illegal abortion in Mexico.
Speaker 1: And so they created this big um not we want
Speaker 1: big pathetic quotes organization UM called the Society Humane Abortions
Speaker 1: and then the Association to Repeal Abortion Laws. And through
Speaker 1: those two organizations UM, they begin to create a list
Speaker 1: of abortion providers in the US Mexico border region, what's
Speaker 1: called the list of Providers in Mexico and some in
Speaker 1: Japan and England. They go and they to Mexico and
Speaker 1: they meet the specialists, and they they inspect the clinics,
Speaker 1: and they set up this whole thing where UM there
Speaker 1: they heart like the public health inspectors. And really was
Speaker 1: Rowena Gerner who was like that. She was the one
Speaker 1: who was on top of making sure that everybody was
Speaker 1: doing things properly. And they ask anyone who gets this
Speaker 1: information they provide, you know a big packet of information
Speaker 1: of where to go, how to prepare, what to expect,
Speaker 1: how much it will cost. And they asked them to
Speaker 1: fill out, um uh something about the procedure and to
Speaker 1: bring back information, you know about the quality of the procedure.
Speaker 1: Was it safe, did it appear to be um, you know, sanitary?
Speaker 1: How do they behave how much did they charge you?
Speaker 1: So so they also created you know, like a consumer
Speaker 1: pressure group because they kept information and they would take
Speaker 1: people off the list as they got bad information. So
Speaker 1: that's one really important group that was sending people out
Speaker 1: of the country UM for Safe Abortions, and that they
Speaker 1: are trying to regulate the practitioners. What's fascinating is that
Speaker 1: she ends up and listening those two people that I
Speaker 1: just mentioned UM who is the son of Antonio la
Speaker 1: who had the clinic of nineteen Fouries, and this other
Speaker 1: other person who's the father taught her and they're like
Speaker 1: number one on her list. She's like, I love these people.
Speaker 1: They know what they're doing, they're amazing, they do great work.
Speaker 1: And and sure enough, like as I've looked through the
Speaker 1: UM through their files, some people were like it was fine, right,
Speaker 1: like they didn't want to say too much. This was fine,
Speaker 1: not a big deal. And other people went to great
Speaker 1: links to kind of tell every detail of what the
Speaker 1: experience had been like. And UM of the woman provider,
Speaker 1: people had the most incredible experiences with her. She operated
Speaker 1: completely underground UM out of a small house, you know,
Speaker 1: as an all women, all women crew. UM. She was
Speaker 1: assisted by her sister, and then they had like two
Speaker 1: other women assistants, and um, they would feed the people
Speaker 1: that would come um and get abortions. And you know,
Speaker 1: one woman wrote like they did my makeup when I left.
Speaker 1: I lived prettier after my abortion and I did when
Speaker 1: I got here. UM. I mean just you know, I'm
Speaker 1: interpreting it as like really thoughtful sort of feminist, feminist
Speaker 1: grounded care right. And so the demand for abortion goes up,
Speaker 1: especially in the nineteen sixties when you've got like women's
Speaker 1: liberation right is at the forefront of all this um
Speaker 1: and and so people are demanding greater access to abortion care.
Speaker 1: And so they go to Northern meche Goal to to
Speaker 1: get that abortion care. I want to guess Tomate thousands
Speaker 1: of people um went and and got successfully access abortion
Speaker 1: care from reputable providers in Northern Micheo Goal. We wouldn't
Speaker 1: have organizations like the Society for Humane Abortions or the
Speaker 1: Clergy Consultation Service referring people to make a goal if
Speaker 1: these were not good providers. A young woman dies, be
Speaker 1: it as an agrest a budged abortion, and that creates
Speaker 1: this massive like, well, what the heck is going on
Speaker 1: in Mexico. We thought we had done what we could
Speaker 1: in Bifuana, but now like this has spread all across
Speaker 1: northern Mexico's border. The narrative that these awful abortion mills
Speaker 1: and quad is and making we're killing American them right
Speaker 1: was the sort of big story, and it was bringing
Speaker 1: disrepute to places like like I'll Passo right, where people
Speaker 1: in a Passo Americans and I'll Passoor ashamed embarrassed by
Speaker 1: their Mexican compatriots who were engaging in this unlawful activity.
Speaker 1: And they interviewed this one doctor, you know pass So
Speaker 1: and he says, uh, you know, we can't do anything
Speaker 1: about our Mexican neighbors. They're just lawless like this at
Speaker 1: the same time that people are racializing. May he go
Speaker 1: out this? You know, Um Sarah Weddington who goes on
Speaker 1: to r U Rovi Wade, you know, she had a
Speaker 1: Ward Mackey golf. She was in Austin at the time,
Speaker 1: getting her degree in in law, becoming an attorney. Um,
Speaker 1: but u t Austin and she's like, you know, here
Speaker 1: I am on this dusty, dirty backwards Mexican Mexican town
Speaker 1: going to get an abortion right. Like the trope of
Speaker 1: the like back alley butcher for people in in the
Speaker 1: Borderlands was mee Go like Mickey Go was where these
Speaker 1: butchers lived and this is where they did their butchery,
Speaker 1: even though there's so much information about non butchers right
Speaker 1: like actual providers who were doing incredible work, but it
Speaker 1: was they were an easy fall guy for demanding rights
Speaker 1: in the US. And that's part of the work that
Speaker 1: I that I'm writing about and talking about is the
Speaker 1: way that this, like the racialist tropes worked in the
Speaker 1: favor of like US feminist activists to be able to say, yeah,
Speaker 1: we're leaning on some of these folks to do the
Speaker 1: like dirty work of providing access to abortion, and I
Speaker 1: put dirty working quotes so that we can protect doctors
Speaker 1: in the US. But we'll also use them escapegoat to say, like,
Speaker 1: we don't want women traveling to backwards on sanitary Mehico
Speaker 1: to get abortions. We want safe, legal abortions in the US.
Speaker 1: There are doctors who could have performed abortions in the US,
Speaker 1: and some of them did, but for fear of losing
Speaker 1: their license or fear of being accosted being known as
Speaker 1: the abortion provider in their community. They're like now but
Speaker 1: I know somebody who can help you in Mexico, because
Speaker 1: we don't care about our colleagues and mahkoes about the
Speaker 1: way that they're seeing or understood in their communities. As
Speaker 1: the United States embarks on this new era of abortion criminalization,
Speaker 1: Lena says, if we're willing to pay attention, there is
Speaker 1: a lot we can learn just by taking a global perspective.
Speaker 1: One of the lessons that run the past for me
Speaker 1: is really thinking about the rb rariness of borders and
Speaker 1: how they have to not make people care, and how
Speaker 1: people constantly thwart them anyway. They're all means to control people.
Speaker 1: The thought that, like all all social justice and survival understanding,
Speaker 1: is going to emanate from the United States is absolutely incorrect.
Speaker 1: We should be thinking about how weird going to join
Speaker 1: international global coalitions for social justice in racial justice, not
Speaker 1: as the not as the ones that are bringing the knowledge,
Speaker 1: but the ones that are here to learn right. And
Speaker 1: so that to me is like a critical fundamental part
Speaker 1: of what we can learn from history. Don't We have
Speaker 1: benefited from care from other countries and other providers in
Speaker 1: the past, and we will likely lead them again. And
Speaker 1: that racialist tropes and ideologies have no there's no room
Speaker 1: for for that at this particular juncture. Once again there's
Speaker 1: pala a villa. The United States has been living in
Speaker 1: a war. They was beautiful and it was privileged in
Speaker 1: terms of autonomy for many. Still it wasn't the reality
Speaker 1: for many or stays for a while, but at least
Speaker 1: in general and the role protection had a lot of
Speaker 1: power and um. In Latin America we have been in
Speaker 1: the opposite for many years and we have been able
Speaker 1: to survive. Somehow we know from a legal point of
Speaker 1: view how to make some legal laws better when they're
Speaker 1: still very restricted. Some of them have been through international standards,
Speaker 1: the World Health Organizations, the UN standards. So so I
Speaker 1: think the activists need to look to those standards that
Speaker 1: we have been trying to create for twenty or thirty
Speaker 1: years as symbols of how you make laws. There are
Speaker 1: still very restrictive, a lot more flexible until you change everything.
Speaker 1: But then also from examples of the SASS, we have
Speaker 1: had success for the last um two years, and even
Speaker 1: in very restricted environments like All Salvador, where there is
Speaker 1: a total abortion and women in All Salvador have been
Speaker 1: criminalized for upset for emergencies for miscarriages and stilberts, which
Speaker 1: is something that we are going to see in the
Speaker 1: United States as well, and unfortunately dies a reality that
Speaker 1: we have also just celebrated the freedom of sixty five
Speaker 1: women that we were able to get out of prison.
Speaker 1: And I think this is an opportunity for the United
Speaker 1: States to say and for the activists, Okay, we haven't
Speaker 1: seen this new reality yet, but there are others who have.
Speaker 1: Let's bring it on board and common and I am
Speaker 1: started seeing a lot of that already happening, but I
Speaker 1: think it needs to be more consistence, more effectively, and
Speaker 1: more um and more openness. Right for that when we
Speaker 1: come back, what the progress these Catholic countries have made
Speaker 1: says about our own complicated relationship religion. Votes in favor
Speaker 1: of the proposals who vote will lead to the dismantling
Speaker 1: of one of the strictest anti abortion regimes in the world.
Speaker 1: Just south of the border, in one of the most
Speaker 1: Catholic countries in the world, women's rights activists have scored
Speaker 1: a major victory. This is a huge step for a
Speaker 1: widely Catholic country. Much has been made of the fact
Speaker 1: that several of the countries that have liberalized abortion laws
Speaker 1: in the past couple of years are largely Catholic. The
Speaker 1: Catholics can be anything but anti abortion seems to be
Speaker 1: a shock, but Catholics and people from all faith have
Speaker 1: been in the fight for reproductive rights all along. I
Speaker 1: am Jamie Manson and I'm president of Catholics for Choice.
Speaker 1: The dominant narrative UM that most people buy into is
Speaker 1: that all Catholics are opposed to abortion, and all Catholics think, um,
Speaker 1: life begins at conception. Uh. And so that is like
Speaker 1: the number one myth that we have to bust in
Speaker 1: our work, because in fact, abortion is very popular among
Speaker 1: Catholics in the United States, more popular actually than the
Speaker 1: general US population. Sixty percent of Catholics did not want
Speaker 1: to see Roe versus Wade struck down on Friday. Um.
Speaker 1: I've seen different number. More recent numbers say sixty of
Speaker 1: Catholics believe abortion should be legal in all our most cases. Uh.
Speaker 1: And I think one of the most surprising numbers is
Speaker 1: that h one in four abortion patients in this country
Speaker 1: is Catholic, meaning that not only did Catholic support abortion,
Speaker 1: they're having abortions at the same rate as everyone else.
Speaker 1: In this country, so abortion is part of the life
Speaker 1: of the church. Catholics for Choice has a decades long
Speaker 1: legacy of working in Latin America helping liberalize abortion laws there.
Speaker 1: But now it's the US that needs the help. We're
Speaker 1: going to bring in our sisters in Latin America who
Speaker 1: are from the Catholic for Choice UM organizations there to
Speaker 1: come and tell us what we need to know about
Speaker 1: how to live under a repressive anti abortion regime. How
Speaker 1: did you survive, how did you create networks? How did
Speaker 1: you avoid the law? Um? You know, and it is
Speaker 1: just a stunning moment for us that the people that
Speaker 1: we helped we are turning to to help us navigate us,
Speaker 1: to be our visionaries, to be our profits UM in
Speaker 1: the Road ahead. Catholics Are Choice actually really predates ROW,
Speaker 1: not formally, but UM. The women who ended up founding
Speaker 1: the organization were already organizing before ROW and then really
Speaker 1: in earnest formalized after the road decision. So the organization
Speaker 1: is UM just about fifty years old now and its
Speaker 1: purpose was really to to ask for several things. One
Speaker 1: is for conversation about abortion within the walls of the church,
Speaker 1: because there is no room even at the most liberal
Speaker 1: Catholic university, where there are other conversations about controversial things,
Speaker 1: you cannot talk about abortion. So wanting to you know,
Speaker 1: to be able to have dialogue about the issue was
Speaker 1: it was a very big, big campaign of theirs um
Speaker 1: and then to embolden the voices of Catholics who already
Speaker 1: are pro choice. And for those Catholics who don't know
Speaker 1: where they fall um in in in what camp? To
Speaker 1: educate them, you know, not to tell them what to think,
Speaker 1: but give them the resources there the church won't give them, uh,
Speaker 1: to discern what for them is a morally complex issue.
Speaker 1: In my opinion, for the bishops, this is not about babies,
Speaker 1: This is not about life. This is really about controlling
Speaker 1: women's freedom. Because there is a fundamental idea in Catholicism
Speaker 1: of gender binary uh they call it gender complimentarity. That
Speaker 1: God ordained men for a very specific role, having that
Speaker 1: they're supposed to be leaders and take authority, and women
Speaker 1: are meant to be servants and nurturers and care for
Speaker 1: the family, and our most essential vocation is motherhood. According
Speaker 1: to this theology, um Pope chump Pulled the second had
Speaker 1: a special phrase for women. He said, we had a
Speaker 1: feminine genius. And what that really means is our uterus
Speaker 1: is our ability to just state was our genius. And
Speaker 1: so this is this is so pervasive. Um. And I
Speaker 1: think this is the prime mover for these men. Again,
Speaker 1: these are ostensibly celibate, all male leadership. This is the
Speaker 1: most radical patriarchy in the world. There's a billion Catholics.
Speaker 1: They have presents in every country in the globe, in
Speaker 1: the globe, and they also have enormous power at the
Speaker 1: U N for that matter. And so they are terrified
Speaker 1: of women's power and women's freedom. And um, that is
Speaker 1: what you know, A portion is really all about. When
Speaker 1: you can control your own fertility, you have access to
Speaker 1: freedom and power. And this is the opposite of what
Speaker 1: this hierarchy wants it they it scares a life out
Speaker 1: of them. Remember, they do not ordain women. Why on
Speaker 1: earth would they want women to have access to freedom
Speaker 1: and power. And also, all of these ideas that we're
Speaker 1: hearing life begins a conception, personhood, these are all Catholic theology.
Speaker 1: These are all Catholic theological ideas that suddenly Evangelicals believe in.
Speaker 1: Suddenly Mormons believe in churches that never believed to this.
Speaker 1: Suddenly when it became politically expedient where they could have
Speaker 1: a you know, an unholy alliance. Uh. These three, these
Speaker 1: three churches Catholicism, Mormonism and Evangelicalism, they saw the political
Speaker 1: power and cloud they would get that they got this
Speaker 1: prime seat at the Republican table. Uh, it changed everything
Speaker 1: for them. And so but again, but these are these
Speaker 1: are you know, to me, very fringe Catholic ideas because
Speaker 1: most Catholics don't believe them. That are being codified into
Speaker 1: civil law. I mean it is the grossest infringement on
Speaker 1: religious freedom, I think in the history of this nation,
Speaker 1: because we have a lot of people of faith, like Jews,
Speaker 1: who not only support abortion rights, it's required in some circumstances,
Speaker 1: and so we are really infringing on religious freedom of others.
Speaker 1: In a survey done of Jews in the United States
Speaker 1: support abortion access. We go back to this value of
Speaker 1: piqua nefesh, this value that means the the importance, the
Speaker 1: value of saving a life. My name is Rabbi Kelly Levy.
Speaker 1: I am the associate Rabbi at Congregation Beth Israel in Austin, Texas,
Speaker 1: and I work with a vibrant, inclusive, social justice oriented
Speaker 1: congregation as their associate rabbi, but as a major part
Speaker 1: of the clergy team. This is where Judaism diverges from Christianity.
Speaker 1: In Judaism, we don't believe that life begins at conception.
Speaker 1: We believe that life begins at first viable breath. So
Speaker 1: as soon as a child is able to exit the
Speaker 1: womb and is able to take a first breath and
Speaker 1: is viable to take that first breath, that is when
Speaker 1: that life truly begins. So in Judaism, when it comes
Speaker 1: to abortion and it comes to the pregnant person, that
Speaker 1: individual is the life that is prioritized. And so when
Speaker 1: it comes to pekuah nafeesh, the the value of saving
Speaker 1: of life, of preserving a life, that is the life
Speaker 1: that we prioritize. So in a situation where you have
Speaker 1: a pregnant person who has either had a terrible traumatizing
Speaker 1: experience that caused them to become pregnant, or they find
Speaker 1: themselves pregnant and know that they cannot men toe or
Speaker 1: physically carry this child, or they know that they cannot
Speaker 1: care for this child after the child is born, or
Speaker 1: they know that they won't be able to endure forty
Speaker 1: plus weeks of this pregnancy. That is part of that
Speaker 1: preserving of the life of that soul. It's not about
Speaker 1: the fetus, who, according to Jewish tradition, does not have
Speaker 1: the status as a living person. The Christian theology has
Speaker 1: often taken over the conversation around faith and abortion because
Speaker 1: so many Jews are are accepting and basically requiring and
Speaker 1: demanding abortion access. It's not traditionally been something that we've
Speaker 1: organized around. That's changed in the in recent years. The
Speaker 1: National Council of Jewish Women has a scholar in residence
Speaker 1: named Rabbi Dania Ruttenberg who focuses entirely on abortion access
Speaker 1: and actually organizing Jews around this particular effort. One of
Speaker 1: the things that the Jewish world has started to change
Speaker 1: as far as the way we approach this subject is
Speaker 1: it's actually a violation of our religious freedom to not
Speaker 1: have access to abortion, because we fully support abortion access
Speaker 1: and the rights of reproductive justice, and it is actually
Speaker 1: it's actually deterring our ability to practice our faith because
Speaker 1: if you go back and look at our text, it
Speaker 1: says there are certain situations where you absolutely must provide
Speaker 1: an abortion and this goes back thousands of years, and
Speaker 1: by not allowing us that opportunity that right, we are
Speaker 1: not actually allowed to practice our religion to its fullness.
Speaker 1: I grew up in a very conservative, white Evangelical church,
Speaker 1: so I'm very familiar with a theological framework that's very
Speaker 1: cut and dry, that things are this, they're not that.
Speaker 1: God is this or God isn't. I'm Reverend Katie's, I'm
Speaker 1: an ordained Baptist minister, and I'm the CEO of the
Speaker 1: Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice or our c r C,
Speaker 1: as we fondly call it. There is a certain comfort
Speaker 1: and having a sense of security that if I simply
Speaker 1: follow these rules, then my life will be wonderful. And
Speaker 1: I subscribe to that for a long time until I
Speaker 1: had experiences that disrupted that framework and showed me that
Speaker 1: I actually didn't have the kind of certainty that I
Speaker 1: thought that I did, and that required me to do
Speaker 1: a lot of soul searching around what does it mean
Speaker 1: to be a faithful person with a different kind of
Speaker 1: theological framework that allows for nuance and complexity. So I
Speaker 1: think it's just as much about how we approach those
Speaker 1: conversations as it is the content and I really try
Speaker 1: in my work not to fall into debate. What ends
Speaker 1: up happening is if we don't talk about the real
Speaker 1: people who are being impacted, it becomes an abstract, ideological conversation.
Speaker 1: It's so wrong when we lose the focus on on
Speaker 1: the real human beings in front of us. The way
Speaker 1: that we talk about abortion, even on the pro choice side,
Speaker 1: can often be really stigmatizing. We often talk about only
Speaker 1: the most extreme cases where a person's bodily autonomy has
Speaker 1: been violated, or we talk about it as if it's
Speaker 1: always a difficult decision for people, and that those things
Speaker 1: are true, but they don't encompass the full spectrum of
Speaker 1: people's experiences. And I think talking about how abortion can
Speaker 1: be such a positive thing for people. It can be
Speaker 1: life saving for one and lots of different ways, but
Speaker 1: also it can be a catalyst for really important changes
Speaker 1: in a person's life. Abortion is a blessing. Access to
Speaker 1: abortion is a blessing. The ability to make a reproductive
Speaker 1: decision is a right and a blessing. So as I'm
Speaker 1: talking to folks who maybe are struggling, I think storytelling
Speaker 1: is really essential, and not just storytelling of other people,
Speaker 1: but really asking folks, what is your reproductive story? What
Speaker 1: is your family's reproductive story? It does not take much
Speaker 1: digging below the surface to hear painful stories of reproductive
Speaker 1: loss regarding infertility or pregnancy loss, or just someone who
Speaker 1: was never able to create the family that they wanted.
Speaker 1: There are stories of adoption that are traumatic. Everybody has
Speaker 1: a story around this, and I think that that can
Speaker 1: be a way to create that heart connection is allowing
Speaker 1: people to tell whatever their story is. There just isn't
Speaker 1: space for people to share these things, and I think
Speaker 1: the first step in feeling ourselves and our communities as
Speaker 1: just holding space for people to share. Another faith based
Speaker 1: organization focused on reproductive rights is called Sacred. I am
Speaker 1: Reverend connetitition Way. I am the faith Advocacy coordinator for
Speaker 1: Sister Song, the Woman of Color Reproductive Justice Collective. I
Speaker 1: am also the national co chair for Sacred. We are
Speaker 1: encouraging brave conversations um not just among faith leaders, but
Speaker 1: faithful people to give voice to those who actually already
Speaker 1: believe in reproductive rights, health and justice, but feel afraid
Speaker 1: of what voicing that may cause. UM. So, I feel
Speaker 1: like what Sacred really is trying to do is give
Speaker 1: people the language UM to stand firm in their faith
Speaker 1: around this subject. My lived experience UM is what brought
Speaker 1: me to this work, and that's why I do it. UM.
Speaker 1: I understand what it's like to be told that your
Speaker 1: very existence is a sin. If I don't understand anything else,
Speaker 1: theological interpretation is that is just that it is UH
Speaker 1: open to interpretation by the lens of those who read it.
Speaker 1: But the one thing that we are pretty much all
Speaker 1: clear about in terms of our traditions of love is
Speaker 1: that we are supposed to love one another, and we
Speaker 1: are supposed to be compassionate to one another, and we're
Speaker 1: not supposed to judge one another. If I don't know
Speaker 1: anything else, that much, I do know and so UM,
Speaker 1: I will always approach uh any subject from that lens
Speaker 1: of how can I be compassionate in this moment while
Speaker 1: someone is navigating UM what is best for their lives?
Speaker 1: UM and so? And I know that is a direct
Speaker 1: result of having to navigate UM being queer and black
Speaker 1: and Caribbean and a woman in a world that said
Speaker 1: that most of those things were unacceptable. Being introduced to
Speaker 1: and embracing the framework of reproductive justice really does expand
Speaker 1: the possibility of understanding the moral good of abortion. We
Speaker 1: it reproductive justice. Do believe in the human right for
Speaker 1: everyone to have a child, to not have a child,
Speaker 1: the parent the children that they have, in safe, sustainable communities,
Speaker 1: free from interpersonal and stink state sanctioned violence, and to
Speaker 1: have bodily autonomy. And if you believe in that, if
Speaker 1: you believe in those tenants, then you understand that bodily autonomy,
Speaker 1: which is what we're talking about when we're talking about
Speaker 1: making reproductive choices, for our eyes, is just as morally
Speaker 1: sound as having a child, not having a child, and
Speaker 1: raising the children that you have. It can't be separated out,
Speaker 1: it can't be made other um and the only people
Speaker 1: who benefit from it being made other are those who
Speaker 1: seek to divide for political expediency. And as Jamie Manson shared,
Speaker 1: the reproductive justice framework has also been helpful for the
Speaker 1: work Catholics for Choice does in their communities. For a
Speaker 1: lot of Catholics who have a very rich understanding of
Speaker 1: social justice because it's in our tradition and they were
Speaker 1: raised in it, that is very eye opening as well
Speaker 1: when we really put it in that context that abortion
Speaker 1: is a decision that affects the entire trajectory of a
Speaker 1: woman's life. Is not just about bodily autonomy. It's about
Speaker 1: you know, every everything, you know, the every It's so
Speaker 1: consequential for every aspect, and it intersects with almost every
Speaker 1: issue of social justice that a lot of Catholics care about.
Speaker 1: So when you put it in that context, my goodness, UM,
Speaker 1: you see the lights go on, um and you see
Speaker 1: people realizing, okay, like this, you know, like I am,
Speaker 1: I do support abortion access um and I found my
Speaker 1: place in this movement again, Reverend Katie's a I think
Speaker 1: that part of being a person of faith is the
Speaker 1: practice of hope. And I say a practice because it's
Speaker 1: not a feeling all of the time, it's a discipline.
Speaker 1: And I've been talking about hope as being something that
Speaker 1: we hold in community and not just individually. And I
Speaker 1: think what's so important about holding hope in community is
Speaker 1: that the vision needs to be informed by the people
Speaker 1: who are being most impacted by the injustice. And I
Speaker 1: also think that what the reproductive Justice framework has done
Speaker 1: for me is really identify the larger what we call
Speaker 1: white Christian nationalist political agenda that has never been used
Speaker 1: about abortion, has really been about the control of bodies
Speaker 1: and maintaining power over our bodies, and so I'm really
Speaker 1: grateful to the ways that that framework expanded my own understanding.
Speaker 1: That is not enough to only focusing on any one
Speaker 1: particular issue, but to really see it within this broader
Speaker 1: framework of just what it means to be a human
Speaker 1: being and who wants to flourish. We'll be right back.
Speaker 1: My name is Sue and I am a forty nine
Speaker 1: year old woman from Wisconsin, and I've spent my career
Speaker 1: in ministry in various different capacities. I am now a
Speaker 1: single mother of four children. I'm divorced, and yeah, it's
Speaker 1: probably about it. So I was twenty one. I was
Speaker 1: in graduate school at a seminary, and I was young
Speaker 1: from my class because I had didn't high school three years.
Speaker 1: I became involved with a fellow classmate who was there
Speaker 1: as a second career. He had been an attorney. He
Speaker 1: was thirty six years old, UM and going through a divorce,
Speaker 1: and I we I thought I was madly in love.
Speaker 1: He claimed he was madly in love. And we talked
Speaker 1: about marriage from the very beginning of our relationship and kids.
Speaker 1: UM big part because he told me that he was
Speaker 1: getting divorced because his wife didn't want children and he
Speaker 1: really wanted kids. So that was a huge part of
Speaker 1: that um. Probably about eight months inter relationship, it got
Speaker 1: a little rocky and found out, probably I was right
Speaker 1: around Thanksgiving that I was pregnant, and his immediate response was, well,
Speaker 1: you don't, you have to do And I was floored
Speaker 1: by that. I thought, well, we've been talking about getting married,
Speaker 1: we'll get married, and what is you know, where did
Speaker 1: that come from. I was just blindsided by that. Immediately
Speaker 1: started saying, you know, if your parents find out, they
Speaker 1: will just disown you. They will never let you live
Speaker 1: that down. So there was just this immediate separating me
Speaker 1: from my family, from my friends, from my loved ones.
Speaker 1: And we went to a planned parenthood and had that's
Speaker 1: where I had my initial pregnancy tests where they confirmed that,
Speaker 1: and so I had the abortion. It was a Saturday morning,
Speaker 1: was January six, and he got me back to his apartment,
Speaker 1: took care of me for a day, and then dropped
Speaker 1: me back off at my dorm and I think just thought,
Speaker 1: boom boom and wash his hands with me. I never
Speaker 1: told my parents. They knew something was wrong, but I
Speaker 1: just I still lived in that they'll be bad, they'll
Speaker 1: down me kind of thing. A couple of months later,
Speaker 1: he sent me a letter on this stationary letterhead from
Speaker 1: his law firm, demanding that I pay him back for
Speaker 1: the abortion. And at that point I just I didn't
Speaker 1: know where to turn. I just felt lost. And I
Speaker 1: went to our campus pastor, who it was fantastic and said,
Speaker 1: you know what would help you the most right now?
Speaker 1: And I said, I think telling my parents. And I
Speaker 1: drove to my parents that night and they were fantastic,
Speaker 1: and they they, yeah, it's loved me. And you know,
Speaker 1: I asked him at that point, what would you have
Speaker 1: wanted me to do? And my mom, who I had
Speaker 1: never thought in a million years would say this, said
Speaker 1: exactly what you did. You have a life ahead of you.
Speaker 1: So that was sort of the beginning of my I
Speaker 1: think owning it, acknowledging and owning it. The school the
Speaker 1: attorney made a deal with him basically I said, I'll
Speaker 1: give him the money, but and he could never contact me,
Speaker 1: sort of an agreement, so I had no contact with
Speaker 1: him after that. Um, yeah, I think. You know, there's
Speaker 1: long periods of time where you are you don't think
Speaker 1: about it at all. I have an eighteen year old
Speaker 1: daughter now, so then now I think about it because
Speaker 1: she's completely riled up about the last few days and
Speaker 1: couldn't be prouder for starters. But I think young women
Speaker 1: that I've known along the way, I would never I
Speaker 1: would never encourage it. But at the same time, I
Speaker 1: would never discourage I think it's such an individual thing,
Speaker 1: so for any of us to make a blanket statement
Speaker 1: of right or wrong, none of us have that right
Speaker 1: to do that, or to say one way or another
Speaker 1: for each person. I think, at the end of the day,
Speaker 1: the shame I think I probably did have shame, which
Speaker 1: I think was completely unfounded. What I did was completely legal.
Speaker 1: There was nothing illegal about what I did. But then
Speaker 1: why why don't I talk about it more freely? And
Speaker 1: I hate that there's that stigma for anybody to not
Speaker 1: be able to say I did this, because at the
Speaker 1: end of the day, I've ever thought of it as
Speaker 1: I killed a human. I've never thought of it that way.
Speaker 1: Is I don't believe that whole life beginning at conception,
Speaker 1: but at the end of the day, it was a
Speaker 1: very life giving part of my life. And I think
Speaker 1: for so many women like, how can you not say
Speaker 1: it was to have that second chance and to be
Speaker 1: able to go live your best life. I think it's
Speaker 1: that was probably my first experience of never assume what's
Speaker 1: going on in someone else's life. I think, um it
Speaker 1: has made me a much more compassionate person, especially in
Speaker 1: my ministry roles of who are we to judge? And
Speaker 1: I think that's a huge part of it. Right, we're
Speaker 1: almost at the end of this series and wanted to
Speaker 1: hear what you think. You can call this number one
Speaker 1: eight four four for seven nine seven eight eight three
Speaker 1: and leave us a message about how you're feeling, or
Speaker 1: perhaps actions you're taking, or even things you've learned or
Speaker 1: want to share about abortion. Your message might be included
Speaker 1: in a future episode. Again, that number is one eight
Speaker 1: four four for seven nine seven eight eight three. Abortion
Speaker 1: The Body Politic is executive produced by me Katie Couric
Speaker 1: and was created by small team led by our intrepid
Speaker 1: supervising producer Lauren Hansen. Editing and sound designed by Derrick Clements,
Speaker 1: research by knee A Perlman. Production and editing help for
Speaker 1: this episode from Mary do Translation help from Carlo Martinez
Speaker 1: and Marcy Deepina, and a special thanks to case Um
Speaker 1: producers Courtney Litz and Adriana Fasio.