Discussion: Dem Rep. Jayapal Speaks Openly Of Her Abortion In NYT Op-Ed

2 Likes

She’s a very courageous woman.

24 Likes

My Rep, and I couldn’t be prouder!

ETA: Just called her office to express my thanks.

22 Likes

“It was a heartbreaking decision, but it was the only one I was capable of making.”

And the twisted, horrible GOP will, no doubt, come at this brave woman with “slut-shaming” guns blazing.

18 Likes

“Nevertheless, she persisted.”

20 Likes

I’m sure all of the Republican registered women who have had abortions will soon follow suit.

7 Likes

Clearly the republican answer is for her to have died and to have left her existing child motherless and her husband a widower.

6 Likes

About 25% of all women have had an abortion, which means there are lots of stories out there just like this one. The conservatives try to claim that abortion is used by loose women as birth control, and try to shame them the same way that they try to shame rape victims for not wearing “proper clothing”. It’s galling, and doesn’t match the reality of cases like this.

10 Likes

That shaming is the only way they can control the narrative. The hundreds of thousands (probably millions) of women who have had one are shamed into silence. If they all started speaking out, this issue would disappear from the political landscape.

In a sane society, such a thing shouldn’t even be needed. In our utterly insane one, it still shouldn’t be a woman’s responsibility to educate the assholes that hate them. I deeply respect the courage of those who do.

6 Likes

I’m torn about this … women should not have to report the details of their pregnancies in the pages of the NYT. Women should not have to justify terminating pregnancies to anyone, and certainly not to anyone who is not even related to them.

We have a right to privacy. We have a right to bodily autonomy. If I get an abortion, I’m exercising those rights just as surely as I’m exercising the franchise when I fill out a ballot.

Does this statement from Jayapal (my MOC, by the way) convince anyone who isn’t already convinced? Or does it strengthen the idea that getting an abortion is always traumatic and difficult and only justifiable under extreme circumstances?

A great many of us have terminated pregnancies as soon as the test was positive and we could get to a clinic. We’ve done so without hesitation and without regret.

I think we made a terrible mistake in allowing the sanctification of motherhood become an unstated rationale for letting the State impose its will on us.

There are 3 possible outcomes to a new pregnancy: a miscarriage, a baby, or an abortion. The first is seen as disappointing, the second as a glorious miracle, and the last as a heinous tragedy.

It’s all bullshit. And I say that as someone who’s had 3 miscarriages and 2 babies.

16 Likes

I guess I qualify as a loose woman. I got pregnant in spite of using birth control; the relationship was deteriorating so even though he ‘offered’ to get married, I decided to have an abortion because I wanted neither him nor a child.

21 Likes

Yes, the suits will follow… the lawsuits, that is.

1 Like

Slut Baby Killer Shaming.

3 Likes

My representative who should be in line to be Speaker some day.

3 Likes

I love how many of us on TPM are in her district!

2 Likes

“…women should not have to report the details of their pregnancies in the pages of the NYT. Women should not have to justify terminating pregnancies to anyone, and certainly not to anyone who is not even related to them. …”

I’m a guy, pro choice. Something made me uncomfortable about her action with the NYT, but could not quite articulate why. You did it for me. Additionally, I think these stories help the anti -choice people justify their beliefs in some perverse way. In their minds she’s just some “shameless baby killer”.

3 Likes

Women shouldn’t have to, but if they choose to, I think we should listen. (Our own story is disquietingly similar: first sustained pregnancy almost resulted in two deaths, second one was monitored and medicated on a daily basis, and luckily came out OK.)

3 Likes

I love the way you put it. You were able to say what I wish I could put in words. I often feel in my gut that this is what has been missing about how many people frame abortion in general. Thank you for that.

I’m still waiting for an unapologetic movie or TV depiction about someone having an abortion where there’s no equivocating, that it was done for whatever reason the woman thought necessary, with no tortured debate needing to be depicted because it was clear it was the right decision to make. Not some schlock that has to present both sides as if that’s the only way to present a woman’s decision to have an abortion because the rightwing will be offended otherwise without some form of regret or trauma built into the story.

Again, bravo.

2 Likes

I’m uneasy with these sorts of narratives because to me, pro choice means I’m not asking for the right to make any woman’s decision for her. I’m not asking the right to judge whether her decision was the right one. I’m certainly not asking the state to punish her for it. The strong corollary is I don’t believe I should be obligated to defend a woman’s personal choices either. I certainly don’t want to be sucked into the rhetorical trap of imagining what extreme, ridiculous, trumped up outrage it would it take for me to agree with the judgement of a forced-birth, pro punishment individual.

1 Like