Short-time fan, first time commenter. Love the site, Feministers!

Now, on the "I had an abortion" t-shirt. I suppose I don't have anything particularly insightful to say, as it seems the obvious is true -- this is a mixed bag. It is, I think, a very good thing in the sense that abortions are legal, are a right, and are in a big way symbolic of the sustained struggle to really establish women as equal citizens with what must be, by the nature of gender, different but hopefully "equal" laws in certain cases. One should not have to be ashamed to exercise one's rights, especially in a vital area like reproductive control, with its certain effects on the life and health of the woman.

On the other hand, I think by and large everyone agrees that an abortion isn't something to be proud of in the normal sense. NOT, I hasten to add, because it necessarily reflects on some lack of responsibility or "ill repute" of a woman (or at least it damn well shouldn't), but simply because it is a difficult and almost always complex choice where neither option in many cases is better than being able to avoid the situation entirely (again, not to say that it is solely a woman's responsibility or ability to avoid it in many, many cases). But an unwanted pregnancy... well, it would be easier if it didn't happen, right? I mean, I suppose there is potential for disagreement here, but as someone who suffered intense guilt as a kid after intentionally killing some lightning bugs on one occasion when I was 8, the termination of even a potential human life strikes me as an immensely difficult decision even without the baggage our society gives anything sex-related.

I think on the balance, the t-shirts mark a positive idea, the idea that you should not be ashamed of your rights. Like gay marriage in Massachusetts, I think when people see that it's neither the end of the world nor the sole province of weirdos or "people like that", it can overall be a force for acceptance even as it brings divisiveness to the surface. And insofar as it can spark conversation and not just divisiveness, hooray... but on the other hand it has the distinct potential of simply alienating those who disagree and preventing civilized discourse...

I think it takes a uniquely strong and well-informed woman to sport such a shirt, someone eager and able to engage in conversation with those of diametrically opposing views. Any woman can be such, but it is not an easy cup to take up when passed.

I thought about making my own version of the "I had an abortion." t shirt. I think if I ever do see a woman wearing one, I'd be quite likely to go up and give her a hug or something.

I've signed the petition, at least. And I'm still trying to figure out ways to talk about abortion (as well as ways to feel the courage to do so) and reproductive rights in everyday conversation.

Good points, Lorien... The thing is, I never saw the t-shirt as a defiant in-your-face statement. I saw it as an awareness-raising tool, like the gawd-awful ribbons-in-every-color thing or the Lance Armstrong bracelets, only bolder. I never saw it as proclaiming, "I had an abortion, and it was awesome!" but as a way to combat the shame that is so deeply rooted in isolation, in feeling alone, like you're the only one.
How much would the world change if we did not live out of our fears of being alone & apart. Imagine a world where everyone had t-shirts that read, "I had an abortion", or "I have $35,000 in credit card debt" or "I have depression" or "I think I'm ugly" or "I am afraid of dying alone". Imagine if everyone around you owned their reality and you began to see the world for all its complexity, your neighbors with all their vulnerabilities, your colleagues with their insecurities and foibles and fears. Wouldn't it be more fearless and more compassionate?
How would it change politics if we could see for real what the sanctified "mainstream" really did look like?
These politicians who prey on our fears and insecurities by referring to the "mainstream" and progressive ideals as being "out of step" would be out of their jobs faster than they would know what happened. *sigh* to dream big....

Since I'm male, I obviously couldn't wear that particular t-shirt, but there have been days when I've been teaching (first year composition at a midwestern university) when I've had to say, "I've had friends, partners and family who had abortions. They didn't do it lightly, they don't regret it, and they made the best decision they could for themselves and the people they loved. So, you know what, I trust women to make the decision. Why don't you?"

Think we could get that on a t-shirt? I'd wear it.

It's very important to change the dialogue from "virginal Catholic 14 year old raped by her father" vs. "evil slutty welfare mom on her 20th abortion and her 10th kid" to "single businesswomen, and rich stay-at-home moms, and middle-class stay-at-home moms, and poor welfare mothers working or not, and working mothers of any class, and college women, and virginal Catholic 14 year old incestual rape victims and women with life-threatening health conditions and women for whom pregnancy would be more uncomfortable than average" vs. "the same." I hate to say "both the right and the left," but both the right and the left (in the mainstream dialogue, not on most feminist sites) tend to focus on these almost mythological figures to the exclusion of the fact that 95-97% of women who get abortions aren't rape victims and aren't on their 10th abortion. So I wholly applaud this campaign for attempting to tell the truth about women who have abortions - that you can't, in fact, tell who's had an abortion just by looking.

I do think the shirts are very easy to misinterpret, though, and I'd worry about the safety of the women brave enough to wear them.

"Since I'm male, I obviously couldn't wear that particular t-shirt"

maybe we could make some that say "i drove my girlfriend to the clinic"?

I think any kind of male-focused shirt that didn't have a bunch of disclaimers (I drove my girlfriend to the clinic because she wanted an abortion and I did as well but never would have put pressure on her to have it, and anyway I'm fully pro-choice) would be even way more open to misinterpretation than an "I had an abortion" shirt because of the existence of "shock" t-shirt retailers like TShirtHell. I'm sure you'll see a few guys wearing "I had an abortion" shirts, anyway.

I appreciate your post, Lorien, which in my opinion was thoughtful and well-written. I agree that a woman needs guts to wear the shirt.

But your post made me think about this part: "it is a difficult and almost always complex choice where neither option in many cases is better than being able to avoid the situation entirely..."

Obviously, it's always better to avoid getting into any kind of trouble than to have to deal with the problem once it's there, but I wonder--is there no room for the consideration of women for whom it is not a difficult or complex choice? So often it seems like pro-choice rhetoric must focus on the many women for whom it is a complex and difficult decision to have an abortion--and that is at least in part to combat the right-wing's idea that women are frivolous girls who get abortions in order to fit into pretty dresses. But what about the women for whom it isn't a difficult decision?

Almost a year ago, I had a small (and thankfully brief) pregnancy scare--and there was no complexity or difficulty in my mind about having an abortion if indeed it was more than a scare. It would be a terrible idea for me to have a baby now--even though I want one, the circumstances of my life are not such that it's at all feasible. In considering it, I felt a slight pang, because if the circumstances of my life were different I would have had kids a few years ago, but it was no greater than the pang one has in general about roads not taken.

It's not that having an abortion is not a difficult decision for many women; it's that I'm very leery of saying it's always a difficult decision, that it's always conflicted. I fortunately wasn't pregnant, so I suppose one could argue that I might have felt differently if push actually came to shove, but I know myself reasonably well, I think, and there was no doubt in my mind at all. I also know many women who are dead-set against having children ever, and for them it would not be a difficult decision either. I think it's important that we keep that in mind as well as considering the many women for whom it is difficult.

I think part of my concern comes from the fact that I only ever see the discussion of difficulty and complexity brought up when the ultimate decision is to have the abortion--I never hear anybody talking about how having a baby is a difficult and complex decision! Even though, to my mind, (and I love children and plan to have more than one) that is a far more complex decision with far-reaching effects.

FWIW, I think it's a huge awareness-raising tool. I was only latently pro-choice until I actually got to know women who opened up to me about the fact that they had themselves had abortions, and why they had them, and what the experience was like for them.

I'm Not Sorry is similarly helpful.

Down here, there are "CHOOSE LIFE" license plates but wearing a "THIS IS WHAT A FEMINIST LOOKS LIKE" T-shirt will get you stopped and harassed in supermarkets. So I do worry about women getting hurt or worse for wearing these shirts--at the very least, they'd be the center of attention--but if activists took care of themselves as much as I sometimes wish they would, only the radical right would have the public sphere and the rest of us would all be driven underground. And that way lies theocracy.

Cheers,

TH

EG, very well said.

I think that for women for whom abortion is a difficult choice, Plan B may make life much easier. I imagine it's pretty hard to feel bad about losing a friggin' ovum.

Cheers,

TH

kgsavoie, incredibly awesome post!

EG, your post fit my experiences so closely that halfway through I laughed and thought, "Ten dollars says this is an EG post." ;)

I've never had an abortion, but I agree that when I had my pregnancy scare, I wasn't conflicted at all. Which isn't to say I wasn't sad, but I knew there was only one possible choice.

I really want one of these shirts, though, just to raise awareness. Facts be damned. Most of the girls I know who HAVE had an abortion did so secretly and would never admit to it outside their very close circle of friends. It's so secret and shameful. People need to realize that "normal" girls do have abortions - and their lives aren't over because of it.

kgsavie, I also appreciated your remarks - I even had to point out how great they were on my own blog. Bravo.

kgsavoie and EG: Really good points.

As to the "consciousness raising tool", I agree with you in principle. But I think by the nature of its controversy in society, it is unambiguously confrontational and in-your-face in its effect. What I mean is, even if it were the consensus among pro-choice/pro-abortion camps that a fetus is quite simply NOT a human life, it is to many of those who oppose it. To them it is the equivalent of bragging about murder (though of course they are silent on the 33% of conceptions that end naturally in early miscarriage/termination). I'm not saying the shirt is necessarily confrontational in intent, but I think it is necessarily confrontational in reality. For example, I could wear a t-shirt saying "3 times as many Palestinian civlians have been killed by the IDF as Israeli civilians by Palestinian militants." That simple statement of fact (to the best estimates) would be seen by many as saying "Oh, well then so Israel has no right to defend itself?" That rhetorical question is itself confrontational as it begs the question of Palestinian rights/oppression/proportionality.

I'm just saying that most people should be aware the shirt will have an in-your-face effect, regardless of personal intent, and be prepared for such.

On the "difficult" decision, excellent point EG -- that's why I love conversing with other feminists, I always learn a new perspective, often insightful and always educational. (I still have trouble with stereotypical gender conformism, being that I find it odd to call myself a feminist, being male, even though I support feminist ideals and analyses). I agree with you, and I guess I was hedging my bets a bit against theoretical disparagers of my points. I have the perhaps bad habit of conceding minor points to people I disagree with for the sake of engaging larger ones -- on a cynical level, I find it easier to take them down if you grant them certain points and then hammer them on big ones. But just between us feminists (goddess that feels weird to write!), it's certainly valid and possibly common to not find it difficult at all.

The problem is, the "Abortion is Murder" people would consider a shirt that says "I used Plan B" to be just as bad.

You're right that we should be prepared for a response, but it shouldn't be that way. Tom Head is right in that theocracy isn't too far off as far as the conservatives are concerned.

Thanks, everybody!

I don't think it's a bad habit, Lorien. I think that as pro-choice activists we need to mobilize all the most effective arguments we can, so we can keep abortions legal.

In my opinion, people who think that abortion is murder are a lost cause, and while those of us who wear this shirt need to be prepared to deal with their anger (more or less so depending on where we live), we can't build our campaigns around them. I like this shirt because it reverses the idea of the scarlet letter A--imagine the impact on a young woman who feels kind of guilty and ashamed about her abortion if she sees a woman she admires wearing one. It could help even those women who do not feel comfortable being public about their decisions by letting them now they are not alone. It is, I think, like gay people coming out in that it forces everybody to be aware that normal women whom they know or like have had abortions--it becomes much harder to see women who have had abortions as some kind of evil "other."

But I also think that women who have had abortions already know firsthand about the kind of responses they should be prepared for. They're the ones who, if they're of a certain age, had to sneak off and do it illegally, or if they're younger, walk past screaming protesters calling them baby-killers. They already know. I don't think anybody's going to buy this t-shirt who doesn't have a sense of what's out there.

Just this weekend, while escorting women to a local health clinic I got called "scum of the earth," a baby-killer, and "someone who likes to murder black babies." Huh. And use the blood to make matzoh, no doubt.

That's not strictly relevant. I just felt like complaining about it.

..."only the radical right would have the public sphere and the rest of us would all be driven underground. And that way lies theocracy."

All good posts. I like the above quote, too. I think no matter what you think of the t-shirt, you can't ever say no to visibility. Other groups have realized this as well.

There was a woman several years ago, I forget who she was, but she promoted the PR campaign of abortion being a good thing, a thing so good it should be done with frequency. I thought she was crazy at the time, but her idea was that if we didn't absolutely claim the idea of it and completely destigmatize it, then we would lose it outright. And that has happened now, hasn't it? States are outlawing abortion. Who would have thought it would come to this.

I think a big push back is necessary now. And maybe talking about it again, about all of it, about the reasons for it, the women who do it, about the fetus, would get it decriminalized. If all people see are abortion protestors carrying signs of dead babies, that's all they'll remember. And now a new generation of kids are literally growing up with those images, and they don't have the context of the 60's and 70's to balance it out with. Their conclusion is going to be, "well I'm not going to be some selfish women who's going to kill my baby. I'm going to get married, have lots of kids, make lots of money and never get divorced." That's where they're at. We need to start over.

you would never see a women wearing this shirt. This shirt is not good. It would be interesting if women did wear this shirt.
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