La Chola blogs on a controversy involving a few bloggers on the racist history of Planned Parenthood and it’s work today:
It’s dangerous to not know the history of an organization–even more dangerous to not know its present. Yes, PP has done some absolutely amazing and brilliant things. PP has also done some detestable and horrific things–and it is WRONG to let the detestable and horrific things pass because of the good things. It’s even worse to call a woman of color who has had a bad experience with her reproductive life “stupid” because there is no critical analysis of how a historically “population control” centered institute is currently conducting its business. As I said in my comment, the only reason PP is where it is today is because women of color stood up to all the people who attempted to silence them with calls of “stupid” and “worthless” and demanded to be heard.
Planned Parenthood claims that the eugenicist claims circulating about itself and Margret Sanger are largely in error. They note that one of their major early backers was W.E.B. DuBois. MLK endorsed her work.
http://www.plannedparenthood.org/about-us/who-we-are/margaret-sanger-14115.htm
It would unrealistic to expect her to be a 21st century progressive. I think many of the claims against her are unfair and many of those who advance charges against her are being very cynical about it. In their day to day lives, they could care less about racism. Current, ongoing, systematic racism isn’t something they want to hear about, unless they can cherry-pick a part of it to argue in favor of sexism.
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http://www.ppct.org/facts/research/sanger.shtml
Les, did you even read the link? Are you saying that La Chola and Black Amazon are people who “in their day to day lives… could care less about racism”? Seriously?
If that’s not what you’re saying, if you’re referring to other people, then why are you bringing those other people up in this post? This post isn’t about those other people’s criticisms. It’s about La Chola’s post (which, in turn, reference Black Amazon’s writings).
It’s true that many critics of Sanger’s racism aren’t sincere anti-racists; they are pro-lifers seeking to smear Sanger and Planned Parenthood (despite the fact that at the time Sanger was associated with eugenicists Planned Parenthood was strongly anti-abortion). However, it’s unfair to use that as an excuse to ignore the criticisms and comments of women of color like La Chola, Black Amazon, and (to name another example) Julianne Malveaux.
It is natural to automatically suspect bad motives on the part of people criticizing allies. And in fairness, it has long been my ilk that has brought up the Sanger issues, and the troubling racial history of abortion in general and Planned Parenthood in particular. Time for us to hush up, probably, so that people of good faith on your side can make the points that need to be made and have a better chance of getting heard.
I wonder if this particular internecine conflict is becoming more pronounced because of the “Blacks Vs. Women” theme currently being fought out on the liberal side of the aisle.
I guess I disagree with what seems to be the premise about ihstory.
I think that the history of a group can be useful for understanding what CAN go wrong, and for giving us things to look at.
But i don’t think that the history of a group really has much to do with the actual analysis of the present day actions, as they seem to be asserting. Whether PP was pro-eugenics in 1950, whether they were enthusiastically endorsed by MLK, or both, seems almost entirely irrelevant to whether they are acting appropriately NOW. The main reason that people seem to be bringing up the past acts (on either side) is to provide some sort of illusional ability to predict future actions, or perhaps tyo demand “compensatory” actions in the present day.
But while it’s true that PEOPLE don’t tend to change all that much, GROUPS do. Fire president a and replace her with president b and you can get a while new group. the racist/wonderful actions of PP back when don’t tell you shit about what they are doing now.
Er yes, which is why the claims over there about the present concern me more. The post doesn’t explain what these claims mean, however; do the comments?
Or, at least, to stop pretending it’s more than a club to beat PP with. Being genuinely concerned about whether a history of racism is leading to abortion is one thing; “Sanger was a racist so ha ha ha you liberals!” is another. I think “STFU” is more applicable than “hush up” in the latter case.
La Chola brings up the issue of forced sterilization, and I think that’s less a case of overt racism than a different understanding of how that works. Middle-class white women aren’t generally being pressured to “get fixed” and “stop popping out babies” in the way that women of color may be. So a white woman might see a 30-day waiting period for tubal ligation as a roadblock thrown up by anti-choicers, where a woman of color might see that waiting period as a check on the medical establishment’s ability to trick or force women into sterilization.
And you know this about them, how? You know they don’t care or they don’t work to end racism or fight against it every single day? How do you know this? Through a crystal ball?
Is this instead something that you tell yourself so that you can feel more comfortable when women of color do call Singer on some of her beliefs that were racist including those involving eugenics? That some racial groups had brains that were smaller or were more sexually promiscuous than Whites?
I wonder what would happen if a guy said that, as men often did about the brains of women as a gender. They probably wouldn’t be considered a product of their time and they would probably be expected to be 21st Century progressives by some of the same people who hold Sanger to a separate standard.
She fought a battle that liberated many women. She fought a battle that was detrimental to women because this is a racist, sexist society and she fought one part of it but embraced elements as well. It might be natural for those to feel liberated by what she did to feel protective of her from challenges of her feelings on issues like race and eugenics, but if it’s to the point of refusing to listen to other voices who are critical, then that’s not really feminist in my opinion. In fact, these arguments make it seem like what’s going on is a mirroring of the patriarchy that feminists are supposed to be and should be fighting. Part of that is because we tend to iconize the women we choose to be our heroines, rather than address them as who they were.
I’m learning to be more careful of discussions I have with feminists, because more often it feels it’s more about establishing a hierarchy of who’s the most feminist, or the more “pure” feminist, or the “fun” kind of feminist than actually feminism itself which if it’s hardy and just, it should survive an influx of different views and ideas and yes, even disagreements and challenging not only those who oppress us, but our own privileges as well.
You could say the same about those who refuse to listen to criticism about Singer’s comments on race and eugenics. Though it’s nice for you to state that women who point these things out are in favor of sexism. LOL.
Do “liberals” really believe that everything is about them and laughing at them? Believe it or not, there’s a lot of discussions that they aren’t the center of.
Radfem, I honestly cannot parse your comment to me, particularly since you omitted the first sentence of my response.
It makes no more sense to expect Margaret Sanger to have conformed to our present day understandings of racism that it would be to expect that the signers of the Constitution would have. That Margaret Sanger had desired birth control to achieve certain racist objectives has no relevance to what PP is doing now anymore than the desire of some of the writers of the Constitution to protect slavery has any relevance to the operations of the government of the present day.
My wishy-washy thoughts on this issue:
1. If Planned Parenthood has a racist past, it is good to put that in the open and not deny it. No organization which has existed for any length of time has a perfect history and ignoring the history is a denial of the truth, which ultimately is harmful to the present. How can minority women trust PP if they consign all past misbehavior to the memory hole?
2. Past racism, if it does not continue in the present, is no reason to withhold support or to avoid using PP’s services.
3. It is possible for a historical figure to have done good overall without being perfect. If Sanger was a rabid racist, does that mean that her work improving access to birth control was not valuable? It is less valuable because it means that she didn’t extend it to minority women, but it is still valuable. She can still have contributed to the world without being perfectly enlightened.
I agree with those three broad principles, Dianne. However, the post linked to criticizes PP in the present, not just PP historically.
One of the more important things about this controversy, I think, is broadening the number of people who have heard about The Southall Black Sisters who are having their funding cut. Black Amazon’s original post went on at length about this valuable organization which deserves our support, written or financhial.
Sometimes I think that blogging just makes people “stupid.” Gah, I’m so sick of these ridiculous fights. Don’t get me wrong, many of the issues (including this one) are important issues — but, I’m sick of the bloggers on both sides who can’t discuss the issue in ways that acknowledge both (or all) sides of the issue, but can only do so in ways that undermine and degrade the person on the “other side,” despite all essentially being feminists (or liberals, or anti-racists, or anything else they may have in common). What’s more, ridiculous mischaracterizations of the other “sides” arguments and what they are actually saying.
Above, LaChola is quoted as saying:
But, if you click through to the link and read what was actually said, you’ll see that’s NOT what Aspostate says. Instead, she says:
Regardless of whether one agrees with Apostate or not, to reword her argument into what looks like inflammatory ad hominem name-calling is just trying to start (or engage in) a flame war. What good does that do for anyone, other than the misogynists?
Eliza, blogdom is full of people who either say “When you say ‘a’ you really mean ‘b’ and ‘b’ is bad and horrible so therefore you are bad and horrible” or in some other fashion completely misinterpret what you said so that it fits into their narrative. Sometimes I debate these people if I think that they’ve made an honest mistake or if they’ve accused me of something particularly egregious, but more often I simply ignore them.
Er…Eliza, when someone says to you that the words coming out of your mouth are stupid, do you get the idea that they think you are a genius? She called BlackAmazon a stupid liar there and more directly called her ignorant in her post.
Amp: Guilty. I hadn’t read the link when I posted initially. Now I have and am still a bit confused about what exactly PP has been doing. There is mention of failure to oppose coercive birth control, but I’m not sure on what level the coercion is taking place and how much PP is involved. The proper response to it, IMHO, depends on what exactly they are doing.
Birth control can certainly be misused to control women and maybe PP is guilty of pushing BC (0r long term/permanent BC) on women who don’t really want it or who want only short term birth control. But there’s a difference between forced sterilization (which I’m pretty sure doesn’t occur legally in the US anymore), deceptive advice (definitely occurs), and pushing more strongly for tubal ligation when a patient is black. All are wrong, but the first is reason to drop all association with the organization, the second requires major reorganization, the third can probably be solved with training.
I do wonder if some of the counselors at PP aren’t expressing the same sort of racism as the people in the car vandal scenario from a few days ago. They may not consciously intend to push black women toward sterilization or noraplant and may deny that they do any such thing (as in the “but I’d do the same thing for a white person, probably faster” defense). I’m not sure what to do about that problem. Systematic review demonstrating the bias so that people have to confront it? Stricter guidelines of what should be offered initially and when to suggest more permanent or dangerous forms of birth control? Anyone else have any thoughts?
But, if you click through to the link and read what was actually said, you’ll see that’s NOT what Aspostate says.
Apostate deleted two posts full of what she originally said, actually, where she called the claim that Margret Sanger advocated eugenics was a canard.
She did so, ironically for someone who claims to be supporting a reproductive health organization (apparently they are not all created equal, especially when one is created by a white woman and the other is created by women of color), while ignoring what BA was actually talking about, which was the Southhall Sisters, who are losing their funding.
And then when people pointed out there’s a fair amount of evidence Sanger at least advocated eugenics, which was and is horrifically racist and scientifically bankrupt, they were called “divisive” and “silencing”.
So, it is NOT divisive to ignore a Woman of Color reproductive rights organization (Southhall Sisters) that is losing it’s funding, but it IS divisive to comment on the history of Sanger.
Funny how that lines up with White Women being above critique and Women of Color being invisible. At the hands of, again ironically, a Woman of Color.
But I’m sure it’s just a COINCIDENCE that everyone is coming out to defend Apostate and Planned Parenthood against the divisive, stupidly argumented people who want to support a Woman of Color reproductive health center (Southhall Sisters, who are losing their funding) who don’t ignore Planned Parenthoods racist history and racially questionable current actions.
All of those people would have been HAPPY to link to and make known the situation of the Southhall Sisters, but the TONE. All those complainy-women need to watch their TONE. You wouldn’t want offend anyone, now, would you? What do you mean you’re offended? Sweep their little racisms under the rug; that’s the past, and it’s not like we need to own up to and appologize for the past. That happened five minutes ago – it’s PAST. You don’t want to be taken for a TERROR, do you?
RonF — Nooooo, really? Well, thanks for enlightening me, I never would have figured that out on my own. (IOW, that’s why I said that blogging makes people stupid.)
I don’t get the idea that she’s calling her anything (genius or stupid). Lots of very intelligent people can have very stupid ideas. And if I call their ideas stupid, I’m not negating or denying their intelligence. Apostate called BA’s “rhetoric” baseless, not BA. There’s a difference. The former is a legitimate form of argument (whether or not you agree with it may be another matter). The latter would be an ad hominem attack. In fact, I’ll go further and state that, personally, I think Apostate’s arguments are ridiculously stupid. Note, though, that I’m not calling Apostate stupid — only her arguments.
Deoridhe – I can’t make any judgements about deleted posts. I’m going by the one that was quoted. And, since LaChola is making the claim that Apostate is calling BA stupid, then if there was a post that Apostate made that said that, then she should have quoted that one.
I’m not defending Apostate’s arguments, I’m saying that this sort of restating of a person’s argument into a much more incendiary statement does no good. Why not focus on the actual arguments against Apostate’s position? I suppose that’s not what makes the blogosphere so volatile…I mean “fun.”
I’m not defending Apostate’s arguments, I’m saying that this sort of restating of a person’s argument into a much more incendiary statement does no good.
Ur, yes, which was why people objected to Apostate stating in her response to BA that BA was against women’s rights.
Amusingly, people seem to be MUCH more interested in defending Apostate than BA. It couldn’t possibly be because Apostate is lining up with white feminist policies, though; that would imply RACISM.
I do have to amid to a great deal of migled irritation at Apostate deleting her posts. Thankfully, Plainsfeminist was able to reproduce her posts in the comments of that linked post, so with some effort you can actually read them.
I’ll quote the bits I think are relavent, but you can find all of them there.
Note that at NO POINT did Apostate, the supporter of Planned Parenthood who aregued that even if Planned Parenthood had racist policies we should support it because reproductive rights are SO important, even MENTION The Southall Sisters.
And note the title of her post was: “inexcusable-attack-on-planned-parenthood-is-the-feminist-blogosphere-without-conscience”. She placed BA in the feminist blogsphere, but oddly couldn’t ask at BA’s site why BA was angry about eugenics being espoused by the founder of PP, and she assumed that a feminist (multiple in fact) was both without conscience and was anti-reproductive rights.
Apostate:
“While some of us bust our asses getting funding for the invaluable — irreplaceable — work that this terrific organization does, someone uses her status as the Voice of Women of Color to spread a canard. She isn’t my voice.”
“Which some college-educated people who ought to know better malign out of… what? ignorance? anger? If anger, anger at what, exactly? The great and necessary work this organization does?”
“My understanding has always been that the only people who attack Planned Parenthood are those who oppose women’s rights, especially their right to control their bodies.
Seems I was wrong.”
“I was angry that Black Amazon would irresponsibly (as I think) attack an organization that is part of the solution for women, especially for women like the teenager I was. The thing is, we have enough real enemies out there, and the battles we have to fight with those real enemies take away from the care and services we could be providing to needy women. These women’s lives are jeopardized by the negative publicity that anti-choice groups disseminate and the funding they take away from the clinics.
BUT
If there is a consensus in a certain community that Planned Parenthood deserves criticism, I want to hear from you:
1) What is Planned Parenthood doing that you find objectionable? Be specific — point to practices and policy. If possible, give me your sources.
2) What can Planned Parenthood do to give you confidence in the organization and its intentions?
3) What should Planned Parenthood do differently from what it’s doing now, in any area?
I’ll repeat an important point: I am not the enemy. Nor do I want to silence anyone. In fact, I would respectfully request that you not act in a silencing manner. The fact that nothing Black Amazon says can be criticized without accusations that I am objecting to her right to speak, is very problematic, and the comments on the post below this one make me feel like I should’ve kept my mouth shut.
Which is the very thing you accuse other bloggers of doing to you. “
Note that Apostate states she is not the enemy, after saying BA is lying and implying she is ignorant while not understanding why BA is angry about the founder of PP supporting eugenics and indicating she had no idea anyone had ever objected to PP who was feminist (womanist, for women’s rights, etc…).
And then she deleted her posts, silencing herself after stating that she shouldn’t be silenced.
And she characterized people who objected to what she posted were objecting because BA can’t be critiqued (which is obviously not true, since she was) not because they disagreed with Apostate.
And now, several steps out, people are focusing on those awful white women silencing Apostate and the The Southall Sisters have entirely disappeared and BA remains as some sort of Guyenese Terror who sent poor Apostate clambering off the internet in fear of her life. Poor Apostate, who had people assuming she was calling BA STUPID when she called BA someone who “ought to know better”.
We can’t let people mischaracterize Apostate like this! It is without conscience, when she is defending PP so ably and well!! Obviously, despite the well documented history of Margret Sanger’s ties to eugenics (whether she believed them or not, that anyone could consider things which dehumanized WOMEN to be FEMINIST astonishes me), Apostate stating that talking about that is spreading a canard is obviously a far more minor mischaracterization than people going from “ignorance” and “ought to know better” to “stupid.”
Look, if you want to argue with Apostate’s actual statements (and I think there’s a lot to argue with), great, I’ll support you. But, frankly, I think the only thing that jumping to the “she called her stupid” comment does is raise people’s ire, spark some rage, and hurt people’s feelings — on all sides. And if that’s your intent, fine, have at it. And if you want to assume that I’m jumping in on her side because of racism, I’m not going to bother arguing that. It’s a great way to shut down discussion.
It’s a great way to shut down discussion.
It’s kinda sad when people object more to the word “racism” being used than to situations where there are clearly racial biases in play.
I think it’s kind of sad that anyone who might even slightly disagree with you (not even about the main issue, but just one aspect of it) is automatically assumed to be racist. But, if that’s how you want to do things, there’s not much I can do about it. I’m not going to try and argue you about how I’m not a racist — what good what that do anyone, esp. me?
I’m not going to try and argue you about how I’m not a racist
I called you a racist even less than Apostate called BA stupid.
The argument that Apostate called BA stupid you reject as flimsy, but the argument that I called you racist you do not.
What an interesting double standard.
Fine, you’re right, you didn’t outright call me a racist. But you did lump me in with all the other “white feminists” (as if we’re all the same, and it’s some sort of insult — but I’ve been noticing that more and more lately, it’s become the meme du jour), and sarcastically refer to the racism of such white feminists. That is actually different, IMO, than claiming that someone who says an opinion is stupid is the same as calling the person stupid.
What’s ridiculous is I was commenting on a quote on THIS blog. I read the original blog post, in which she quoted Apostate. I didn’t go further than that. I spoke up about something I see all too frequently, which does nothing but separate people into more and more camps and sides. I’m not going to defend Apostate’s views of PP — because I don’t agree with them.
But, frankly, I’ve given up trying to find any common ground between myself as one of the evil white feminists and the feminists of color.
Fine, you’re right, you didn’t outright call me a racist. But you did lump me in with all the other “white feminists”
No, I said that this fit a pattern, of White Feminists (and White Feminist Concerns) being centralized while Women of Color feminists (and Women of Color in general) disappeared. And I said it the way I did because it was really, really, really blatant. The Southall sisters are GONE and in some cases, far enough out, BA and bfp are gone and this whole thing has become the evil white women attacking a poor woman of color and silencing her (Apostate, in this case).
Your response has been, as has been the response of the majority of people (including myself until one of BA’s later posts) to focus on the increasingly white, increasingly outlying points, which is just more of the same phenomena.
That you take from that that I am calling you racist and lumping you in with all white women is also part of this entire phenomena, because so long as you react defensively – so long as you react as though anyone pointing out a racist structure which you may or may not be taking part of as though you were personally being held responsible for the actions of the twenty or thirty people involved – you don’t have to change how you view situations where white women are centralized while women of color are maginalized because you identify yourself as the marginalized person and the women of color as the oppressors.
Which is exactly what Apostate did in this situation, despite her BEING a woman of color.
Which is exactly what a lot of people do in all sorts of situations. It’s the natural response. It’s part of why there is, for example, feminism 101 statements about how men shouldn’t take feminists talking about male/female dynamics and objecting to repetitious sexist phenomena as a personal affront to them.
I agree, all the more so because it’s not uncommon.
Can someone please explain to me why so many otherwise intelligent people fly off the handle and freak out when the word “racist” is used or when white people as a group are discussed? If what is being said does not apply to you, then it does not apply to you. So why the defensiveness?
About PP, as you will be able to see if you follow the trail of links the real issue isn’t that Sanger was racist years ago (which she was), it’s the fact that PP still acts in a racist ways in terms of which women are given which forms of contraceptives, whether they are warned about possible side effects, the fact that sterilization is encouraged for some groups and discouraged for others, etc right now. Pointing these issues out is not an attempt to shut down PP, it’s an attempt to reform it. Why is that so threatening to people? Most large organizations have some issues and most could do with some reform. Characterising all criticisms of PP as coming from an anti-abortion perspective…now that really is a stupid argument. Especially when the critisism is coming from women who are quite clearly feminist and not anti-choice in any way. To then imply that people like BA and BFP aren’t concerned about racism is the icing on the stupidity cake.
Eh, I already babbled about this on my own blog so I’ll shut up, but really – not all the criticisms of PP are coming from anti-abortion groups, and it’s deeply disengenuous to pretend that they are.
Um, because we’re part of the group, and we think it’s an insult? because we’re human nature? Because racism (which we’re talking about in that context) teaches us that group labeling is occasionally problematic, to say the least? Because it makes for an at-best-awkward conversation to have one group of people trying to avoid making generalized statements, and simultaneously trying to distinguish themselves personally from the general statements of their conversational partners?
To use an example from feminism and a significant dose of sarcasm: Why do otherwise intelligent women fly off the handle when people post “women are stupid” articles on the WaPo? They should know it doesn’t apply to them, right? So what’s the big deal? (/snark)
I’ve never really bought into the “just go exclude yourself” or “oh, I must not have been talking about you.” lines. It’s the burden of the speaker to define an accurate group. If she can’t do so, perhaps that’s a sign in and of itself.
Having read through all the blogposts and comments, I have to say I found La Chola’s post as usual wonderfully pertinent and articulate, Apostate’s a legitimate voice in the dialogue, which, yes, definitely needed to be complemented by La Chola’s responses; and blackamazon’s posts much, much less careful or coherent. I really don’t understand why she was bringing up Planned Parenthood at all, since the Southall Black Sisters are a British organisation and Planned Parenthood doesn’t even operate in the UK. Even if she’d discussed Marie Stopes (an English family planning activist with a similarly tarnished record) it would have been vaguely relevant, though of course even Marie Stopes clinics don’t offer services in Britain any more, and never offered domestic abuse support specifically. Why not just discuss the problems that Southall Black Sisters is facing specifically? Or anything at all about the experiences of ethnic minority women in the UK? (US readers please note that I am not using the ‘women of colour’ identity to refer to British women, as it isn’t one British women tend to use about themselves.)
I agree with this too. But if you criticize them, you get compared to antifeminists, antichoice people or your views or you yourself are “dangerous” (as stated on one of the deleted comment threads by the blogger) or contributing to the oppression of women. Or that you’re involved in some gangpile or silencing a person.
There’s certainly a double standard about White men who say sexist and racist comments about the size of a person’s brain or promiscuity or sterilizing being based on race and/or gender and/or able-ness and when a woman, who’s considered a liberating force to some feminists says it. The first we’re supposed to condemn as racist, sexist for example. But if it’s a White woman, we’re supposed to overlook it or we’re essentially being disloyal to the cause. Because by pushing for the ignorance of this history, it does feel like it’s a loyalty test. But then that’s what feminism often feels like. One big loyalty test or Animal Farm with some feminists being more equal than others. It’s pretty clear that there are feminists who loathe any criticism of the movement by others and those are usually those who benefit the most from it being the way it is, even if it shares characteristics of the inequalities from society that it claims to be fighting. Almost like how it’s with White men often being reluctant and hostile to challenging or changing a patriarchal racist system because it benefits them.
It’s interesting to have had a discussion with someone who said they were into making policy for a large organization and was concerned to hear about change and like you said, Cassandra and others have too, most large organizations could use change and even reform. Depending on what they are, they may be more or less resistant to change. But I didn’t get the sense that this was the case especially after the deletion of the postings.
Yeah. And I’m glad that BA, Brownfemipower and others have blogged on what’s going on with this women’s center. It’s kind of reminiscent of how in one of the local cities here there’s a family health clinic that’s mostly used by Latinas, Asian-American and Black women which offers many services and does abortions. This clinic is the one that receives the attacks from the antiabortionists who picket it and harass women going in and out for any service. It’s why there are security guards there. It’s why it’s struggling to get by or survive like the Southall Sisters. Women who frequent this smaller clinic go because it’s accessible and because it’s for them in a way PP isn’t. PP isn’t located in communties where women of color live. It’s where White middle-class women live. And many women of color here have the same issues with PP that are mentioned here by female bloggers of color.
PP clinics in this region don’t really address their problems well unless there’s a director who’s really committed to it but that’ s more of the initiative and drive of individuals not as a policy by the organization itself. These are some of the issues I tried to raise on Apostate’s thread before being asked to leave and then the threads getting deleted. So that’s why I didn’t think her efforts for dialoguing on changes were sincerely made which was pretty much obvious after her treatment of BA.
Ah, sorry Eliza; I was just venting, I guess.
Does it make me a bad person that I don’t really care what the people who started PP said a long time ago? I think PP is clearly a good thing. I’m sure they could do more and I’m sure they’re as subject to structural racism as every other organization on the planet. But unless it’s affecting today’s policy I really don’t care what somebody I’ve never heard of said way back when.
joe, if you read the linked post by La Chola, as well as many of the comments here, you’ll see that what’s at issue is PP’s current policy, not just its past.
I’m still confused as to why we’re talking about Southall Black Sisters as if it were a women’s health clinic. It isn’t. It’s a domestic violence centre which also offers counselling and advice on depression, suicide, immigration rights, homelessness, racism, forced marriage and a raft of other concerns, and also campaigns actively for women’s rights. This is important, because the issue is that no ‘mainstream’ organisation is going to be bringing together this constellation of concerns, concerns which specifically affect black and ethnic minority women in that part of London, and because several of them, such as forced marriage and dowry-related abuse, so clearly need to be dealt with by highly culturally literate and sensitive workers, not someone who went on a three-day council-sponsored course. Abortion isn’t on their site anywhere because abortion and birth control just aren’t the same kind of issue in Britain. I don’t think it’s Apostate’s fault that Southall Black Sisters disappeared from this conversation.
Because often it’s clinics that serve primarily women of color and/or poor women whether through health services or domestic violence services that often struggle to survive, may face harassment and often they don’t receive as much attention as clinics used by White women. The larger clinics have problems but often resources (i.e. hiring security) for example.
Here, if PP gets butyanic acid sprayed on it, it’s front page news but the harassment at the clinic I mentioned above doesn’t get any such attention even though it faces more harassment and regular picketing and harassment of women coming and going from the clinic.
When I was reading the blogging on Southall Black Sisters, it reminds me of what often happens here even if it’s in a country thousands of miles away.
To use an example from feminism and a significant dose of sarcasm: Why do otherwise intelligent women fly off the handle when people post “women are stupid” articles on the WaPo? They should know it doesn’t apply to them, right? So what’s the big deal? (/snark)
Except no one has said, “All white people are racist” in a lot of the cases where people act like they have. I almost always say, “This is a trend which indicates the presence of racism” and “These double standards, let me show you them!”
In certain contexts, the statement “all people are racist/sexist/agist/homophobic” may be a valid one, to make the point about the bigotry we have internalized, but in this instance that is CLEARLY not the case, which makes me wonder why you brought that up as a comparison point.
Acheman, my comment was poorly worded. I meant that I don’t care about what old dead people said not that I don’t care about current practices. Sorry for the confusion.
The whole “Planned Parenthood is racist” tactic is one of the dumbest I’ve seen yet, and is proof positive that the far-right extremist retards will sink to any depths to further their dumbass agenda. Okay, try looking at this logically if you can, morons, and ask yourself the following question. If the claims that Planned Parenthood is a racist organization that uses abortion as a form of genocide were true, how is abortion an effective way to cull the numbers of the African American population? Abortion doesn’t prevent women from having future children. In fact, in many cases, it gives them the time they need to establish themselves in whatever career they choose, giving them the financial stability to have more children than they would have had if they had kept a baby at a younger age!!! Imagine that! The logic behind this hoax is completely flawed, and fails on an epic level. But you’ve gotta hand it to the republitards; they knew their base would be too stupid to see through the bullcrap. Gooooo Ignorance!!!
Hi Bran,
I’d appreciate it if you didn’t use alterations of the word retard as an insult on this site, particularly when we’re in a thread that deals with eugenics.