Stupak Amendment Reveals Fissures in Feminist Movement

In reading all the accounts from fellow pro-choice women—like Emily's from earlier this week—bemoaning the Stupak abortion restrictions, I noticed that many of the women who were outraged by the concessions of the health care bill used the terms feminist and pro-choice almost interchangably. Over at Salon, Kate Harding writes, "Feminists have been up in arms about the latest assault on access to abortion," but if you take one look at the website for the group Feminists for Life, one of the first things you see is the banner proclaiming "Women the Winners in U.S. House Amendment Vote."

Also on Salon, a year ago, Catherine Price wondered whether you can be pro-life and feminist. She muses:

I think the question is interesting because in some ways it's emblematic of a big problem not just in the battle over abortion but in American politics in general: a complete refusal to see any part of the opposition's argument. I like to think that there are often more shades of gray, more nuance, than just the black and white lines down which we are currently divided—and this is a great example.

But actually, when it comes to things like the Stupak Amendment, things are absolutely black and white: If this thing goes through, it will be impossible for a huge chunk of American women to get abortions. The fight over this amendment reveals what a mess the feminist movement is. Women who care about feminism want it to be more inclusive, because we believe that many women are merely turned off by the label, but there have been so many concessions about the term (almost like there have been so many concessions on the health care bill) that it's devolved. In an article from The New Republic last year about Sarah Palin and her membership in Feminists for Life, Michelle Cottle broke it down: "Feminism seems no longer to denote a particular set of values or ideological agenda; it is merely a label appropriated to proclaim that one is committed to the best interests of women—whatever one believes those to be."

Fissures in the feminist movement are also the subject of Ariel Levy's excellent piece in this week's New Yorker about Gail Collins' When Everything Changed and Leslie Sanchez's You’ve Come a Long Way, Maybe: Sarah, Michelle, Hillary and the Shaping of the New American Woman. Levy wonders, "[W]hy has feminism, which managed to win so many battles—the notion of a woman with a career has become perfectly unexceptionable—remained anathema to millions of women who are the beneficiaries of its success?" Maybe because there are still issues where feminists can't be gentle and nuanced and inclusive. To rally women against the Stupak Amendment, feminists need to be willing to offend.

Tags: ariel levy, feminism, kate harding, pro-choice, pro-life, Sarah Palin, stupak amendment

Jessica Grose is the managing editor of Double X and the co-author of Love, Mom: Poignant, Goofy, Brilliant Messages from Home. Click here to follow her on Twitter.

Comments

Move On

By: GMD | Fri, 11/13/2009 - 01:15

What is wrong, as a feminist, with the following idea: "My body, My choice, My cash"? If we want the government to stay out of our reproductive decisions then we should keep them out of paying for it. Feminists who do not have a moral problem with doing so should set up private funds for women who cannot afford to have abortions--which is a small percentage, indeed, when Guttmacher is citing the fact 74% of women pay for abortions on their own. I am among the younger women (26) who are willing to defend/fight for legal abortion while at the same time admitting to the moral problems involved therein. If you want to enter into a health care system where my tax dollars are at play then I should have a say in how you use them: I'll pay for you contraception, pap smears, STI counseling, prenatal, and postnatal (and even your childcare), but if you want an abortion, it's your choice and you're on your own. We have an embarrassing number of abortions for a developed country and we need to emphasize prevention--which has more to do with empowerment than it does with cash. The capital "P" Patriarchy isn't involved in pushing Stupak as much as it tells women that birth control is sole responsibility of women and that they should say "yes" to jackasses. Stop treating Stupak like it's the only attack on women out there. In fact, it's the least of our worries.

What???

By: Jack McCullough | Thu, 11/12/2009 - 15:59

@VAdena

You said: "How is it anti-feminist to wish that all of the women out there who currently have NO HEALTHCARE have the same option these women had?"

Actually, demanding that the law should single out one particular procedure, that is only used by women, and that strikes at the very heart of the reproductive freedoms that have been recognized as a constitutional right for women is pretty much the definition of anti-feminist.

what fissures?

By: jerseygirl | Wed, 11/11/2009 - 14:00

I'm a feminist and I'm pro-choice and it sickens me that conservatives will use the health insurance debate as another opportunity to rally the vocal minority of anti-choice voters.

But, I'll support a healthcare bill that excludes abortion if it covers a wide swath of the population.

The conservatives want this whole thing to go down in flames while we fight over abortion. Let's not let them win. Abortion isn't the only women's health concern, and as others have noted, a "huge chunk" of American women already lack insurance coverage for this.

This only becomes a "fissure" among feminists if feminist sites like this make it one.

Re-read

By: VAdena | Wed, 11/11/2009 - 12:30

I stated "only 13% of abortions are directly billed to insurance companies"...as found by Guttmacher in 2001. Some estimate that employer coverage of abortions is less than 50% some estimate as high as 87%. Here is a link that provides the details http://www.guttmacher.org/media/inthenews/2009/07/22/index.html. Plus Slate had an article outlining this in detail earlier this week - I assumed that one Slate writer had the same resources as another but apparently this is not true.

Anyway, my insurance plan for military personnel, Tri-Care, doesn't pay for abortions under any circumstances except as an emergency procedure when the mother's life is in danger. This includes rape, incest, and severe birth defects in the fetus. And yet, I have known of four women who, with the same health care, terminated un-wanted pregnancies and one who terminated a fetus with a birth defect - they paid for it themselves. They were perfectly able to exercise their reproductive choice while still having outstanding healthcare provided by a top-rated insurance company. In two cases, the women were young privates stationed overseas. While the military will return them back to the states for free, they were on their own for travel from the military base they were left at to the clinic and had to use a couple of weeks leave (vacation time. And yet they figured it out. Amazing what women are capable of without a bunch of elitist women telling them they are somehow perpetual victims.

How is it anti-feminist to wish that all of the women out there who currently have NO HEALTHCARE have the same option these women had? Isn't it better to cough up the $300 for an abortion then go without healthcare at all? Donate to planned parenthood if you want women to have free abortions - they provide a lot of subsidies to women who can't afford it. The other side donates extensively to organizations that provde free pre-natal care, counselling, housing assistance, and child delivery which is a heck of a lot more expensive than the $300 you want tax payers to pay. People need to stop assuming that women are helpless little creatures who need the government to save them from an unwanted pregnancy....a real discredit to women's intelligence and courage.

Mostly Agree, but...

By: geml | Wed, 11/11/2009 - 12:06

Mostly agree, but using words like "impossible" really is as condescending and elistist as anything pro-lifer's say about women. Women, even poor, oppressed, uneducated and rural, have been pretty resourceful throughout history in regards to their reproductive abilities and finding ways to get what they need. That isn't going to change, no matter what.

WRONG STATS VAdena

By: Olivetti | Wed, 11/11/2009 - 11:17

Hey VAdena,

Your numbers are reversed. According to Guttmacher, 87 percent of employer-based insurance plans DO COVER abortion services. See this link:

http://www.guttmacher.org/media/inthenews/2009/07/22/index.html

Also, as far as I can tell -- the pro-choice position is the position that accepts shades of gray and nuance. Pro-choicers accept that some women may oppose abortion and may not wish to terminate their own pregnancies. We know the world is a complicated place. Anti-choice folks are the ones who believe that there's no gray area: by their decree, all pregnancies must be carried to term.

Except....

By: VAdena | Wed, 11/11/2009 - 10:59

You say that if this passes "a huge chunk of American women will be unable to get an abortion". How do you figure? Currently the majority of employer sponsored helathcare plans DON'T cover abortion. In fact, according to the Guttmacher Institute, only 13% of abortion procedures currently are billed to insurance companies. So somehow, without tax dollars or insurance dollars, 87% of women who want an abortion figure out how to pay for it. And considering that the cost of an abortion at $300-500 dollars for a first trimseter abortion is probably LESS than a month's cost of insurance for a family who doesn't have employer sponsored coverage (or even less than the cost of coverage for people who do have employer sponsored coverage) I fail to see how this makes economic sense for women who need healthcare coverage.

I'm sending coat hangers

By: PinwheelCookie | Wed, 11/11/2009 - 10:53

I'm sending coat hangers to Congress this week... and I've made a donation to Planned Parenthood in Bart Stupak's honor. He'll even get a thank you letter from PP! We need to send a clear message that women's reproductive health is NOT a bargaining chip.