By Donald A. Collins | 1 March 2023
Church and State
Just reading my local newspaper the Washington Post on Sunday December 11th, I was struck again with how deeply the GOP has miscalculated the tenor of American feelings about issues that have burgeoned sharply since the Roe decision legalized abortion in 1973, a Supreme Court opinion which has governed my opinion about politics and life ever since.
My main point: Are we going to govern based on humane facts or religious fanaticism?
Let me highlight several newspaper stories which support my view of GOP politics.
I will begin by highlighting the remarkable article by the Washington Post’s Caroline Kitchener entitled “Pregnant and desperate in post-Roe America; Three women face unexpected pregnancies in states with abortion bans”.
Rather than expound on this remarkable piece, I beg you to read what the Supreme Court decision has already imposed on women and half of our state now are rushing to make it worse.
Read it all here.
Three pregnant women shared their abortion journeys since Roe v. Wade was overturned, each living in a state where she could not legally access the procedure. https://t.co/9AHsqq1H74
— The Washington Post (@washingtonpost) December 2, 2022
This whole essentially broader racial attack on all of us goes back farther than 1974 but a unique record album entitled ‘Free to Be … You and Me’ at 50: Still empowering. Still controversial. This album was by a white singer named Marlo Thomas whose “famous children’s album became a cultural touchstone that still resonates today”.
Thomas, daughter of Danny Thomas, put together a record of how-to bring women forward and achieve racial and human harmony which now after 50 years gets marked as remarkable. Her singing a duet with black Harry Bellefonte was then seen as not okay by many commentators.
One quote stands out: In 1974 for her 3 year old niece Marlo noted,
There were color-coded book sections: pink for girls, blue for boys. The title of one book, Whitney Darrow Jr.’s “I’m Glad I’m a Boy, I’m Glad I’m a Girl,” gave her pause. When she read it, it “almost gave me a heart attack,” she recalled with a laugh. Each page spread delineated gender roles and expectations: “Boys are doctors. Girls are nurses.” “Boys fix things. “Girls need things fixed.”
Read the entire heartening ground breaking article for feminism here.
“Free To Be… You and Me,” Marlo Thomas’s famous children’s album from the 1970s, became a cultural touchstone that still resonates today. https://t.co/6CtStot2TX
— The Washington Post (@washingtonpost) December 8, 2022
One other Post article had particular power for me since I have been working on the choice issue before and after Roe for decades. The bravery and vision of Loretta Ross, an African American child raped at 11 and several times thereafter, who still reached for her goals, but was stunned by Roe’s killing. Her forward philosophy on choice sets the standard for all of us interested in humane justice.
As the article tells us,
Loretta Ross saw her work in reproductive justice and Black feminism recognized recently with a MacArthur Fellowship. Loretta Ross was at home, alone, in late June when her phone started buzzing. The Supreme Court had just overturned the right to abortion, and her friends and allies — some shocked, some resigned — had to know how she was doing.
This is, after all, Ross’s fight — a fight shaped painfully by her own experience, raising a child born from rape and rendered sterile after being given a faulty contraceptive device. As a prolific organizer, Ross spent decades fighting for abortion rights and survivors of sexual violence, developing a race-conscious framework for women’s rights and founding a national organization to support reproductive freedom for women of color.
Seeing Roe v. Wade fall must have been devastating. Ross looks up from her breakfast and laughs.
“As a Black woman, I never put a lot of faith in the Supreme Court being the site of my liberation,” she says.
This year should be a celebration. In October, Ross’s work earned her honors from one of America’s most prestigious institutions. The MacArthur Foundation awarded her an $800,000 fellowship, one of several ‘genius grants’ awarded annually to the country’s top scholars, artists and activists. In November, she returned to the District to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the DC Rape Crisis Center — a groundbreaking organization for survivors of sexual violence that Ross directed as a young activist living in D.C.
Read her full story here.
As the rights Loretta Ross fought for are in peril, she’s teaching hope.
“As a Black woman, I never put a lot of faith in the Supreme Court being the site of my liberation,” she says.
https://t.co/Pu8h0LBggt— The Washington Post (@washingtonpost) December 8, 2022
The GOP with or without Trump didn’t listen to the cheers from the fervent audiences of the late George Carlin who died in 2008 as his classic routines on religion and abortion captivated with salient humor the minds and souls of most Americans, particularly women and minorities.
Hear Carlin here.
However, now it has become crystal clear the GOP while claiming to stand for personal freedoms is backing multiple tyrannies not only in reproductive rights, but sensible human rights, realistic gun control, and comprehensive negotiations on immigration reform among its no governance plans except to hassle Biden’s son Hunter, restrict our voting rights and continue to attack choice as the page one December 11th NY Times article tells us.
Read this unnerving picture of these massive GOP attacks on personal our liberty.
The decision whether and when to have a child is a fundamental right.
We’ll continue fighting with every tool at our disposal to ensure we all have access to the essential abortion care we need.https://t.co/2GiT00ednX
— ACLU (@ACLU) December 12, 2022
I can assure you there are millions of concerned Americans of both sexes and parties who will never again be voting Republican until Roe is restored; count me in!
We can expect that the GOP’s antediluvian views will soon be understood by more and more of us in near future!
Former US Navy officer, banker and venture capitalist, Donald A. Collins, a free lance writer living in Washington, DC, has spent over 50 years working for women’s reproductive health as a board member and/or officer of numerous family planning organizations including Planned Parenthood Federation of America, Guttmacher Institute, Family Health International and Ipas. Yale under graduate, NYU MBA. He is the author of “From the Dissident Left: A Collection of Essays 2004-2013”, “Trump Becoming Macbeth: Will our democracy survive?”, “We Humans Overwhelm Our Earth: 11 or 2 Billion by 2100?”, “What Can Be Done Now to Save Habitable Life on Planet Earth?”, “Vote”, “Can Homo Sapiens Survive?”, “Will Choice and Democracy Win?” and “Can Our U.S. Survive 8 Plus Billion of Us”.“What Can Be Done Now to Save Habitable Life on Planet Earth?”: https://t.co/fHuh0CG6JD
“We Humans Overwhelm Our Earth: 11 or 2 Billion by 2100?”: https://t.co/TA4j7cp1tE
“From the Dissident Left: A Collection of Essays 2004-2013”: https://t.co/lkC2t3E1A9 pic.twitter.com/bQsL2mLBcO— Church and State (@ChurchAndStateN) November 1, 2021
Hillary Clinton: Abortion Bans ‘Could Not Be More Serious And More Deadly’
KABC-TV7 (1974) “Free to Be You & Me!” Original Broadcast!!!!
Loretta Ross: Closing Keynote
George Carlin- On abortion and pro life supporters
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