FEMST 150 Lecture Notes - Lecture 18: Medroxyprogesterone Acetate, Levonorgestrel-Releasing Implant, Intrauterine Device
Fem 150
5/15/18
Expanding the Reproductive Justice Movement
• WOC reproductive justice activists claim that mainstream
women’s movements notion of choice has focused too narrowly
on defending legal abortion
• “Pro-choice” terminology obscured social context in which
individuals make choices & discounts ways in which state
regulates populations, disciplines individual bodies, and
exercises control over sexuality, gender, and reproduction
Fighting for “Choice” and More
• Choice implies a marketplace of options in which women’s right
to determine what happens to their bodies is legally protected,
ignoring WOC’s economics & institutional constraints
• WOC Reproductive Justice activists expand paradigm beyond
“choice” to include the right to not/have a kid & a range of health
& social concerns
• They want reproductive justice to address needs of communities
including structural issues restricting WOC’s choices like poverty,
lack of access to healthcare, health insurance, childcare options,
coercive pop. control policies, criminalization of pregnant
women, abstinence sex ed, social stigma, and cultural
discrimination
• Sistersong (WOC Reproductive Justice): ability to control bodies
constantly challenged by poverty, racism, environmental
degradation, sexism, homophobia & injustice in U.S.
An Abusive Context
• State & medical community push pop control via contraceptive
techs like Depo Provera, IUD, and Norplant and welfare policies
like the Family Cap
• WOC skeptical of how pharmaceutical companies test new drugs
on WOC and third world, poor women & reluctance to remove
contraceptive device or support ongoing care
• Sterilization abuse has been used coercively, w/o women’s
knowledge, and as a condition for receiving welfare
find more resources at oneclass.com
find more resources at oneclass.com
