NAF Member: Anti-Choice Woman-Hating Goes Mainstream

NAF board member Carole Joffe, author of Doctors of Conscience and the recently released Dispatches from the Abortion Wars, has just published an article about recent anti-choice actions, from the ongoing controversy over Sister Mary Margaret McBride to Oklahoma’s just-passed ultrasound law. Published on RH Reality Check, the article reads in part:

Do these examples of misogyny represent anything new? To be sure, in some extremist anti-choice circles, full throated woman-hating never went away. (See, for example, this video from several years ago of Flip Benham screeching at women entering a N. Carolina clinic that “Satan will drink the blood of your child!”) But in other, more mainstream quarters of the movement, the heated, and hateful rhetoric of the period immediately after Roe—where women seeking abortion were routinely called “sluts” and “baby killers” —gradually became replaced by a new frame: abortion hurts women. Given that by the early 1980s, about 40 percent of American women were estimated to have an abortion during their reproductive years (the number now is about 33 percent), arguably such hate speech was counterproductive for the opponents of abortion: too many Americans either themselves had had an abortion or knew someone who did. Thus, antiabortion rhetoric shifted to professed sympathy for women, and abortion providers—those doing the hurting—became the main objects of demonization.


>Read the entire article here.

Wednesday's Words from Women

Over one-third of women of reproductive age have an abortion by the age of 45. However, women who have chosen abortion are often absent from the public debate. In order to break the silence surrounding abortion, we will be featuring real stories from real women each Wednesday on our blog. If you would like to share your story with us or have it published on our blog, go to http://www.prochoice.org/pregnant/hotline/share.html.



I’m pro-choice because I think having a right to have this option is very helpful! I am also grateful for the help of the Hotline because I wanted to make this decision for myself. I would like to thank you very much, from the bottom of my heart. I couldn’t have obtained an abortion without the Hotline’s help.

--Submitted by Carrie* through a member clinic


I found out I was pregnant at the worst time possible. My boyfriend and I are both currently out of work and having a lot of money issues. I had to take off a semester of college because I couldn’t even get the funding for school; there was no way that we were financially or mentally ready to support and raise a baby. The people at the clinic have been so helpful and nice and making this process a lot more comfortable for me.

--Submitted by Britney* through a member clinic

--*Names have been changed to protect patient privacy

Wednesday's Words from Women

Over one-third of women of reproductive age have an abortion by the age of 45. However, women who have chosen abortion are often absent from the public debate. In order to break the silence surrounding abortion, we will be featuring real stories from real women each Wednesday on our blog. If you would like to share your story with us or have it published on our blog, go to http://www.prochoice.org/pregnant/hotline/share.html.


When I was 28 years old, I had completely depleted my savings account. I decided to drop out of my graduate program in order to find a better-paying job than the one I had. My husband was in school, and had a lot of student loans. Then the economy fell apart. The job search was a long and difficult process.

My husband and I had lost our health insurance when I left school, but for about $400 I took out a temporary plan with one of the big companies, that would last three months. It didn't cover any costs relating to pregnancy or abortion, but I wasn't particularly worried about that. I had no plans of getting pregnant. I was taking my birth control pills as prescribed.

The next month I missed a period, and bought a pregnancy test just in case. It was positive.

Since my temporary insurance plan did not cover any costs associated with pregnancy, childbirth, or abortion, I followed the suggestion of the health center staff and applied for medical assistance through the local county office. My state does cover the cost of abortion for women who qualify for medical assistance. But first I had to qualify. I submitted tax records and bank account statements for me and my husband. I submitted my husband's student loan records and records of my wages. I wrote a statement explaining how I had a temporary insurance plan that offered no coverage for abortion. I spent of lot of time waiting in line.

My abortion was a deep decision, one I was certain about, but one that challenged me to think deeply about my life path. I don't want my health care options ruled by people who would impose their views on me. I'm able-bodied, well-educated, and married. But I'm poor. I can't even imagine how difficult the process of getting an abortion would be for a woman who isn't as privileged as I. The lack of insurance coverage is one piece we need to fix. I will fight for it.

--Submitted by Katie* through our website

*Name has been changed to protect patient privacy.

Wednesday's Words from Women

Over one-third of women of reproductive age have an abortion by the age of 45. However, women who have chosen abortion are often absent from the public debate. In order to break the silence surrounding abortion, we will be featuring real stories from real women each Wednesday on our blog. If you would like to share your story with us or have it published on our blog, go to http://www.prochoice.org/pregnant/hotline/share.html.


The summer after my freshman year of college, I found out I was pregnant. Seeing as how I was only 18 and working just 20 hours a week at a tanning salon, I was not financially stable enough to support a child. My boyfriend worked a lot, but he did not have enough money for a baby. We went back and forth with our decisions: one day we'd want to continue the pregnancy, and one day we wouldn't. We were fighting a lot and it was putting a lot of pressure and stress into our relationship.

After a week we finally decided to go through with the abortion. The morning that I went to the clinic, there were protesters outside the door. I was surprised to see that only one of the protesters was a woman, and the remaining four were men. I thought to myself how selfish they were to try to make me question my decision. They were men; they would never have to be in my shoes, pregnant. I was feeling scared when I walked into the clinic and saw about ten other girls who were around the same age as me. It was comforting to know that I wasn't alone with my decision.

The procedure was quick, and everything was done before I knew it. When I walked out the door, an enormous amount of pressure was lifted off my shoulders. I felt like I could go on with my life the way I wanted to, and an unplanned pregnancy no longer had to define my future. To this day I do not regret my decision. My boyfriend and I are still going strong despite our rough time, and I'm now going into my junior year of college. I could never thank the women at the clinic enough. They really did a lot for me, and I know they've helped out many women.

I'm very passionate about being pro-choice. I believe all women should be able to make decisions about their body, no matter the circumstance. I'm very happy to live in a time where I don't need to struggle because of an unplanned pregnancy. I had no complications with my abortion, emotionally or physically.

--Submitted by Lila* through our website


I am 32 and have three children. After a lengthy separation and amiable divorce, I met a wonderful man. We moved in together, and proceeded to live a rather full and loving life. We'd been careful, and when the condom slipped I picked up Plan B, but I was one of the women for whom it didn’t work.

My partner had decided long ago not to have children. He has a form of muscular dystrophy, and did not want his children to have to suffer from this disease as he has to. I respected that completely, as I'd long before decided not to have any more children.

I made the choice, and my partner stood with me. And thank the gods of all, we had the ability to make the choice! I had a lovely clinic, full of women who were so full of support and love, and a partner who was right there with me.

When the time comes, if my daughter needs to make this choice, I want her to be able to do so. I've been pro-choice for years now, one of those letter writers, phone callers, and general rabble-rousers (even before she was born). If I could give a huge hug to a woman in my position, like those ladies did for us, I would, even if that hug is just her knowing she's supported by someone, somewhere.

--Submitted by Elizabeth* through our website

--Names changed to protect patient privacy

Wednesday's Words from Women

Over one-third of women of reproductive age have an abortion by the age of 45. However, women who have chosen abortion are often absent from the public debate. In order to break the silence surrounding abortion, we will be featuring real stories from real women each Wednesday on our blog. If you would like to share your story with us or have it published on our blog, go to http://www.prochoice.org/pregnant/hotline/share.html.

I was a college student in 1994 when I had my abortion. It was the right choice for me because I was single and it was an unplanned pregnancy.

I assumed getting my abortion would be a simple doctor's visit, but I was wrong. In the state of Ohio, before I could have my legal abortion, I had to listen to the pros and cons of abortion and childbirth via the phone; pick up a brochure sponsored by the state on fetal development; and wait an additional 24 hours before my procedure to give me time to “think.” The hoops I had to jump through were meant to dissuade me, but instead they just made me more determined to have it.

This was the first time I really started to take charge of my sexual health and became aware of how restrictive state abortion policies can affect ordinary women like me.

This experience started my interest in pro-choice politics and led me to become a clinic escort so other women wouldn't have to face what I did. In my escort work, I’ve been grabbed, and my openly gay friend was attacked and hospitalized with a concussion and six broken ribs. My attacker was convicted of criminal trespass, and my friend’s attacker was recently acquitted.

¬--Submitted by Nina* through our website

I was raped in December 2007. When I found out I was pregnant, I told my mom that I wanted an abortion. My mom blamed me for being raped, but even though she’s against abortion, she took me to the clinic. She thought it was better for me to have a safe, legal abortion than to attempt to do it myself in an illegal and dangerous way.

Every time I hear someone say she isn't able to get an abortion that she wants or needs, I can't help but think "what if my anti-choice mom hadn't taken me to get an abortion? What if my mom had cared more about her views on abortion than about my life?" I'm just glad that my mom valued my life more than her abortion views.

I'm pro-choice because I think all women and girls should be allowed to make their own decision about whether to carry a pregnancy to term or get an abortion. In a perfect world, everyone would place more value on the lives of women and girls than on their anti-abortion views.

--Submitted by Amanda* through our website

*Names have been changed to protect patient privacy