There are good and intelligent and thoughtful men, who care about women's lives, but so many, if they could get pregnant, ... there would be an abortion clinic on every corner. Men would say "how dare you try to have rights over my own body!" The woman/corpse in GA is particularly egregious -- she is being USED as an incubator -- she is brain-dead and the fetus will be "born" dead. Doctors who are trained to "do no harm" are afraid to practice medicine. Politicians are making religious laws in place of medicine. I seem to remember there is a 19th Amendment which makes women's rights the same as men's.
We now have outlaws of DEI, so when we point out that non-white women are more at risk, that they and their babies die at higher rates than pregnant white women, .... we are called too liberal. I live in Texas now, because of old parents -- I wouldn't CHOOSE to live here -- but I will not abandon my younger sisters, but stay and fight for their rights. I've fought all my life for justice, starting with integration, Black rights, women's rights ......, so you can see how angry we are, to be treated like children.
Thank you, Qasim! Your reflection is personal and deals with serious topics. Your analysis of the breakdown of trust in institutions, and how reproductive rights intersect with civil liberties, is the focus of your piece . I really appreciated your perspective of the fight for bodily choice as intertwined with broader democracy and justice efforts. Your piece isn’t just commentary, but a call to action to safeguard rights across the board. Thank you for your article!
I, briefly, knew William Faulkner, a proud son of Mississippi.
I wonder what he would have to say about his native state now, when it ranks as the poorest state in America and one having one of the highest infant and mother mortality rates.
Qasim, just by reading the numbers- 21% for White women and 33% for Black women of pregnancy related deaths.
I hold that this is exactly why the court ruled the way it did.
The "high" court is as racist as this country as a whole! We know that the Republicans and the racists in general are very concerned about the birthrates of brown people because they are higher than the Whites' which is what fuels the "you will not replace us" crowd. Hence, more Black babies, moms dying from pregnancy is welcome.
This, I hold BTW, is exactly what Israel's thinking is when it comes to killing children- better dead now than Hamas later.
All this suffering is based on the uncomfortableness of White Men, which bugs me because I'm one of them and I don't feel like that at all.
I only have to say, their god is on their side don’t you know. Women are naught but breeding apparatuses for the sake of spreading the seed of Adam. 🤣Impotent old men speaking for women!
Just before I read this, I received a call from Planned Parenthood asking me to call Senator John Curtis (the Utah senator you hear less about) to ask him to vote against banning Planned Parenthood. PP, as most people know, provides many services other than abortion to women. I did this, and I hope others will call their senators, even if abortion is legal in their state. I've long viewed access to abortion as a woman's rights issue. But in Utah, where girls are encouraged to skip college to start their families, abortion rights are life-saving. And just yesterday I heard on NPR that homes are being set up for pregnant teens where they are urged to give up their babies for adoption. In Utah, once you have signed that consent, it cannot be withdrawn. This assures that the LDS church adds to his numbers, so childbirth has big religious implications.
It IS about not trusting women, and I think THAT is rooted in the belief that women can’t be trusted not to steal boyfriends and husbands. They don’t want women to stop having sex; they just don’t want them to get away with it. Punishing women into childbirth.
One of my daughters suffered an ectopic pregnancy years ago. Ectopic pregnancies are compatible with neither the life of the mother nor the fetus if allowed to progress. Under today’s law, she would very likely have died because physicians are all too often afraid to intervene in these cases until death is imminent. There was never any hope for the fetus: contrary to the wishful thinking of the pro-lifers, they cannot be removed from wherever they’ve implanted and placed in the uterus, to re-implant there. They don’t live long enough for the transfer, once removed from the ectopic site, and completely lack the capacity to re-implant. So- for the sake of doomed fetuses, women die. Welcome to Trump’s America.
Thank you 🙏 for writing this piece. I had the opportunity to meet one on one with 1 of my state congressmen and I asked him point blank what are we doing for our Black and brown communities and the infant mortality rate? Am I Black? No. But this issue affects us all. I don’t care what you look like but you will eventually be affected whether it’s a wife, friend, sister, daughter, neighbor, etc. I’m witnessing firsthand the lifesaving grants that help reach the communities most at risk being stripped away by this regime all because it said diversity or covid or bias.
💙 I’m trying to do what I can and calling other white people out since we need a revolution to change the oppressive system we seem to be stuck in on repeat. The event was great because I was able to be in front of their face not just an empty email with an automated response. Thank you for all that you do! I always look forward to your posts.
😬 that Delaware is the one out of 16 that is a blue-trifecta, protects choice, protects the identify of women who travel to Delaware for reproductive care, yet is still one of the worst for infant mortality.
Are they getting the very highest risk women who travel there for care? Those that other states have already abandoned until it’s too late? That could certainly skew the numbers.
Delaware has both a shortage of medical care providers, especially downstate (Kent County and Sussex County), and a significant population of poor women of color. Those conditions combined means I’m disappointed but not surprised about this.
Qasim, living in this country scares me, honestly. especially the anti-choice rhetoric that is coming from so-called "pro-life" anti-abortion women/men and republicans (ugh!). It's frustrating. all women deserve reproductive freedom. this is all rooted in misogyny..women should be trusted to make decisions about their own bodies. let's continue to fight the good fight!
There are good and intelligent and thoughtful men, who care about women's lives, but so many, if they could get pregnant, ... there would be an abortion clinic on every corner. Men would say "how dare you try to have rights over my own body!" The woman/corpse in GA is particularly egregious -- she is being USED as an incubator -- she is brain-dead and the fetus will be "born" dead. Doctors who are trained to "do no harm" are afraid to practice medicine. Politicians are making religious laws in place of medicine. I seem to remember there is a 19th Amendment which makes women's rights the same as men's.
We now have outlaws of DEI, so when we point out that non-white women are more at risk, that they and their babies die at higher rates than pregnant white women, .... we are called too liberal. I live in Texas now, because of old parents -- I wouldn't CHOOSE to live here -- but I will not abandon my younger sisters, but stay and fight for their rights. I've fought all my life for justice, starting with integration, Black rights, women's rights ......, so you can see how angry we are, to be treated like children.
Thank you, Qasim! Your reflection is personal and deals with serious topics. Your analysis of the breakdown of trust in institutions, and how reproductive rights intersect with civil liberties, is the focus of your piece . I really appreciated your perspective of the fight for bodily choice as intertwined with broader democracy and justice efforts. Your piece isn’t just commentary, but a call to action to safeguard rights across the board. Thank you for your article!
I, briefly, knew William Faulkner, a proud son of Mississippi.
I wonder what he would have to say about his native state now, when it ranks as the poorest state in America and one having one of the highest infant and mother mortality rates.
"Cry The Beloved Country/State"?
Qasim, just by reading the numbers- 21% for White women and 33% for Black women of pregnancy related deaths.
I hold that this is exactly why the court ruled the way it did.
The "high" court is as racist as this country as a whole! We know that the Republicans and the racists in general are very concerned about the birthrates of brown people because they are higher than the Whites' which is what fuels the "you will not replace us" crowd. Hence, more Black babies, moms dying from pregnancy is welcome.
This, I hold BTW, is exactly what Israel's thinking is when it comes to killing children- better dead now than Hamas later.
All this suffering is based on the uncomfortableness of White Men, which bugs me because I'm one of them and I don't feel like that at all.
I only have to say, their god is on their side don’t you know. Women are naught but breeding apparatuses for the sake of spreading the seed of Adam. 🤣Impotent old men speaking for women!
Just before I read this, I received a call from Planned Parenthood asking me to call Senator John Curtis (the Utah senator you hear less about) to ask him to vote against banning Planned Parenthood. PP, as most people know, provides many services other than abortion to women. I did this, and I hope others will call their senators, even if abortion is legal in their state. I've long viewed access to abortion as a woman's rights issue. But in Utah, where girls are encouraged to skip college to start their families, abortion rights are life-saving. And just yesterday I heard on NPR that homes are being set up for pregnant teens where they are urged to give up their babies for adoption. In Utah, once you have signed that consent, it cannot be withdrawn. This assures that the LDS church adds to his numbers, so childbirth has big religious implications.
Thank you for continuing to raise your voice. Know that it matters. ❤️✊🏽
It IS about not trusting women, and I think THAT is rooted in the belief that women can’t be trusted not to steal boyfriends and husbands. They don’t want women to stop having sex; they just don’t want them to get away with it. Punishing women into childbirth.
Yep, exactly right.
One of my daughters suffered an ectopic pregnancy years ago. Ectopic pregnancies are compatible with neither the life of the mother nor the fetus if allowed to progress. Under today’s law, she would very likely have died because physicians are all too often afraid to intervene in these cases until death is imminent. There was never any hope for the fetus: contrary to the wishful thinking of the pro-lifers, they cannot be removed from wherever they’ve implanted and placed in the uterus, to re-implant there. They don’t live long enough for the transfer, once removed from the ectopic site, and completely lack the capacity to re-implant. So- for the sake of doomed fetuses, women die. Welcome to Trump’s America.
They don't care about women and never have. It's atrocious.
Thank you 🙏 for writing this piece. I had the opportunity to meet one on one with 1 of my state congressmen and I asked him point blank what are we doing for our Black and brown communities and the infant mortality rate? Am I Black? No. But this issue affects us all. I don’t care what you look like but you will eventually be affected whether it’s a wife, friend, sister, daughter, neighbor, etc. I’m witnessing firsthand the lifesaving grants that help reach the communities most at risk being stripped away by this regime all because it said diversity or covid or bias.
That's being an ally. Thank you for speaking up.
💙 I’m trying to do what I can and calling other white people out since we need a revolution to change the oppressive system we seem to be stuck in on repeat. The event was great because I was able to be in front of their face not just an empty email with an automated response. Thank you for all that you do! I always look forward to your posts.
Texas and Florida are not listed because they don’t collect accurate statistics of women, girls and infants dying. They are atrocious.
Texas for a while was the worst place in the developed world to have a child.
It still is the worst place in the US to live as a woman. There is a factual study. Thank you for your advocacy! I am very impressed!
😬 that Delaware is the one out of 16 that is a blue-trifecta, protects choice, protects the identify of women who travel to Delaware for reproductive care, yet is still one of the worst for infant mortality.
Are they getting the very highest risk women who travel there for care? Those that other states have already abandoned until it’s too late? That could certainly skew the numbers.
Delaware has both a shortage of medical care providers, especially downstate (Kent County and Sussex County), and a significant population of poor women of color. Those conditions combined means I’m disappointed but not surprised about this.
Qasim, living in this country scares me, honestly. especially the anti-choice rhetoric that is coming from so-called "pro-life" anti-abortion women/men and republicans (ugh!). It's frustrating. all women deserve reproductive freedom. this is all rooted in misogyny..women should be trusted to make decisions about their own bodies. let's continue to fight the good fight!
Amen and well said, Poonam. We won't stop fighting.
Amen to that! Thank you Qasim!!
Thanks for reading, Anne.