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All posts in Reproductive Justice
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Erin Konsmo writes at Reproductive Justice Blog:
The Native Youth Sexual Health Network celebrates all Indigenous mamas and the many forms in which they come, as well as the critical everyday, on-the-ground work they do for our families, communities, and nations.
To read the blog: http://bit.ly/11VtnTh
What started as a mean-spirited attempt by an anti-choice group to sabotage a youth-leadership campaign has come turned into a positive story of fair-play and collaboration.
This year, the Atlantic Council for International Cooperation’s (ACIC) Active 8 Campaign became the battle ground for Prince Edward Island’s fight for access to abortion. PEI is the only province in Canada that does not provide this service, and Kandace Hagen, an Active 8 Ambassador from PEI intends to change that. The trouble started when an email by the spokesperson for the PEI Right to Life Association went public, urging her networks to “vote against” Kandace Hagen by voting for her closest competitor, Tara Brinston. Unfortunately Brinston’s campaign was promoted in opposition to Hagen’s, with little regard for her important work as an advocate for the rights of people with intellectual disabilities.
This turn of events garnered some local media coverage, but online it was a different story. The story went viral, inspiring countless blog posts - including two notable American sites - Jezebel on the one hand and Lifesitenews on the other. Each triggered hundreds of votes for each candidate.
“The ambassador with the most pledges by 11:59 pm on February 29th, 2012 was named this year’s champion,” said Jennifer Sloot, ACIC Executive Director, at a press conference. “This year, both Tara Brinston and Kandace Hagen were declared Active 8 co-champions. Their totals were nearly identical and we unanimously agreed that both of them had won.”
ACIC strongly moderated the pledges, rejecting those that were not in the spirit of the campaign. Neither Brinston nor Hagen welcomed the controversy, and Brinston was not happy to have attracted the anti-choice vote. “I was personally bothered by being pulled into a debate that I do not have a history of being a part of,” said Brinston. “I would have preferred that pledges would have come through highlighting the work that I do with the disability movement and have been made with that intent.”
Ann Marie Tomlins, the PEI Right to Life Association spokesperson who originally encouraged the “vote against” tactic to prevent Hagen’s win claimed that ACIC’s effort to moderate pledges represented “the denial of pro-life Canadian youth of their fundamental right to vote and to express themselves as they so choose” (Lifesite.net).
Although it is not yet decided whether each candidate will be awarded the full prize money or whether it will be split, both candidates and ACIC are happy with the results.
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Josie Baker is a feminist community organizer in Charlottetown, PEI. She works on issues of food sovereignty, labour justice, anti-racism, reproductive rights, and queer visibility in the smallest province in Canada. Her educational background is in community development, and religious studies/women’s studies. In her spare time she is an avid vegetable gardener.
Tumblr is one of the many online networks I, and thousands of others, use in the course of a regular web browsing day. For those of you not familiar with the website, all you need to know is this: it’s basically a microblogging and social networking site which allows you to post many different kinds of content (links, quotes, images) to one “.tumblr.com” space. You can “follow” any number of individual tumblr blogs. When you browse on tumblr, you’re using your dashboard to look at all of those tumblr blogs you follow in one convenient spot. If you like a post, you can “heart” it, much like the Facebook “like” function. You can also “reblog” it to your own tumblr page, and add your thoughts and feedback. The more people that like and reblog your post, the more “notes” your post gets.
Every once in a while, there are those tumblr posts that spread like wildfire. More often than not, they’re usually photos of cute animals, film stills, or fancy fashion things. Those links are all examples of tumblr posts with over five thousand notes.
Screencap of tumblr post
Recently, a political post was one that got such attention. It’s one of those posts I generally try to ignore, for a whole host of reasons. But it kept coming into my line of sight, time and time again, on my dashboard. Half the people who I’ve seen reblog it have been critical of it, while the other half have been loving it. Instead of simply ignoring it though, it gives us a great opportunity to map out how this kind of post this is pretty representative of what is wrong with a lot of third-wave feminism.
The Active 8 is a campaign that highlights eight youth from across the Atlantic provinces who are active and engaged in work for positive social change in their communities. This is the 3rd year that the Atlantic Council for International Cooperation has launched this contest. The spirit of the Active 8 campaign is that individual actions can inspire others to take action to make positive change. As such, everyone is encouraged to “vote” for each candidate. The winner receives $1,000.
This year’s female candidate from PEI is Kandace Hagen.
(Active 8 2012 Website)
Kandace burst into the local and national media in November by breaking the long-standing silence on abortion. She shared her story of getting misleading information from her doctor. PEI is currently the only province in Canada that does not provide abortion – and Hagen plans to change that. Kandace’s campaign was going extremely well, putting her in second place.
Hagen’s efforts caught the attention of Ann Marie Tomlins, the spokesperson for the PEI Right to Life Association. In response to the work of Hagen and PRRO, the PEI Right to Life Association declared that they would be running a “Truth Campaign” in 2012.
This campaign took a hit this week when an email Tomlins sent to a national mailing list was leaked to the media. In this email, Tomlins urged anti-choice groups across Canada to “vote against” Hagen, by voting for the youth ambassador in the lead – Tara Brinston. Brinston’s campaign is focused on the rights of people with intellectual disabilities, also a worthy cause.
In a statement to the CBC, Brinston said she did not welcome the support of those voting against Hagen’s campaign: “If persons would like to pledge because they are inspired by the work I do within the disability movement then of course I would welcome their pledges, I would not welcome pledges that are not in the spirit of that campaign.”
Tomlin’s efforts to sabotage Hagen’s campaign have backfired. After breaking in the local PEI media it has gone viral in social media, even earning the attention of the American feminist media site, Jezebel. This attention has resulted in a groundswell of support for Hagen’s campaign, and she currently has a strong lead. The voting ends on February 29th.
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Josie Baker is a feminist community organizer in Charlottetown, PEI. She works on issues of food sovereignty, labour justice, anti-racism, reproductive rights, and queer visibility in the smallest province in Canada. Her educational background is in community development, and religious studies/women’s studies. In her spare time she is an avid vegetable gardener.
Saturday November 19th, 2011 was the date set by the PEI Reproductive Rights Organization (PRRO) for the first rally for reproductive justice to happen in almost 25 years. The Campaign Life Coalition announced that they too would hold a rally – same time, same place - a counter rally to the renewed demands for access to abortion services on PEI.
Saturday was a chilly but sunny November day. On Friday evening I had volunteered to distribute flyers to promote the rally at the Charlottetown farmers market - a weekly event, where folks shop for local produce, chat with friends and enjoy brunch. My Saturday morning routine involves the leisurely enjoyment of this weekend ritual; bean burritos and lattes, socializing, and stocking up on eggs and veggies.
But this week anxiety churned in my gut - I was on a mission. In a place like PEI, the countless familiar faces and can be overwhelming at the best of times. Despite my convictions and my eagerness to promote the rally, taking a public stand on reproductive rights in PEI is speaking the unspeakable, and I felt unsure of the responses to expect. I didn’t feel prepared for this on an empty stomach.
My partner took on the mission of acquiring the requisite food and coffee, and I got nervously got to work distributing flyers. I made my way through the busy market, handing the flyers to anyone with a free hand. “Oh, good for you!” and elderly lady told me. A man approached me trying to sell tickets for an AIDS PEI fundraiser – what a relief. AIDS PEI is an underfunded, overworked organization. In addition to their core mandate and member services, they also serve as the go-to organization for every aspect of sexual and reproductive health that the powers-that-be wish would just go away. I visited their booth and bought a raffle ticket. We exchanged flyers, and I was hearted by the moral support and solidarity.
It became easier after I was fed and caffeinated– the support was verbal, the indifference or opposition silent, for once. Vendors and farmers bound to work the market until close expressed their support and their anger about PEI’s lack of access.
Reproductive rights – specifically access to abortion – are finally being demanded by the women of Prince Edward Island. Following 25 years of silence, and two weeks of media circus, the first rally for reproductive rights is scheduled for this Saturday, November 19th, 2011.
Kandace Hagen co-founded the PEI Reproductive Rights Organization (PRRO) after being given incomplete and misleading information by her doctor. PRRO was the catalyst that broke the silence surrounding PEI’s lack of access: PEI is the only province in Canada in which women cannot access abortion.
The government and Health PEI does not provide information about the options that do exist for women in need of abortion, and this lack of access to basic facts is incredibly detrimental to PEI women. Women in PEI seeking access to this service must travel to other provinces. They must either pay $650-800 for the service in a private clinic in Fredericton, New Brunswick, or find a doctor willing to provide a referral for the service at a hospital in Halifax, Nova Scotia. In both cases, women must cover their own travel and accommodation expenses, and have someone accompany them. For young women and women without access to funds, that is simply not possible, and stories of isolated and desperation abound.
Brad Trost, Conservative party candidate (and incumbent MP) for the Saskatchewan riding of Saskatoon-Humboldt, announced on Saturday that the Conservative federal government, if re-elected, would stop funding the International Planned Parenthood Association.
“Let me just tell you, and I cannot tell you specifically how we used it, but those petitions were very, very useful and they were part of what we used to defund Planned Parenthood because it has been absolute disgrace that that organization and several others like it have been receiving one penny of Canadian taxpayers dollars,” Trost said.
As I’m sure most Shameless blog readers are aware, the United States House of Representatives voted last month to defund Planned Parenthood across the US, hailed as a major victory for the anti-choice movement. This is despite the fact that Planned Parenthood is forbidden by law, thanks to the Hyde amendment of 1976, from using government funds to provide abortion services except under extreme and rare circumstances. Among the US right-wing, “Planned Parenthood” stands as shorthand for “abortion clinic.” De-funding Planned Parenthood in the US does not prevent abortions, because that funding has not been used for abortion care since 1976.
However, as you also undoubtedly know, Planned Parenthood in the United States provides a heck of a lot more than just abortion services. (If you missed Emma’s post on the election on Shameless earlier today, check out the linked statistics.) And in Canada, the Canadian branch of Planned Parenthood, the Canadian Federation for Sexual Health (CFSH) doesn’t provide abortions at all (although it offers counselling and referrals), but does lots of other things.
So what does this “defunding” that Trost talks about mean? (more inside…)
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