photo: @VPS_Reports
Thousands rallied and hit the streets on Tuesday, after a draft report was leaked by Politico from the US Supreme Court stating, “We hold that Roe and Casey must be overruled. The Constitution makes no reference to abortion, and no such right is implicitly protected by any constitutional provision . . . Roe was egregiously wrong from the start.” This ruling is likely to be part of a larger attack on a slew of civil rights protected under the “right to privacy,” which includes everything from access to contraceptives, gay marriage, an end to so-called anti-sodomy laws, and the separation of church and State.
You have to die of covid for their economy, you have to die of poverty for their economy, you have to die from pregnancy complications for their economy, you have to die from american arms for their economy, you have to die from unemployment and debt for their economy
— No Wars ๐ฅ๐๐ฅ No Borders ๐ฅ๐๐ฅ No States (@Vicky_ACAB) May 3, 2022
As one report wrote:
Beyond the right to an abortion, a Supreme Court decision overturning Roe will open the door for a frontal assault on a whole series of established democratic rights known as “unenumerated rights” because they were not explicitly mentioned in the text of the Constitution, which was ratified in 1788. Alito’s position, that there is no right to an abortion because it was not in the original Bill of Rights, can be applied just as well to every other right established over the course of the development of modern society, including the right to a public defender, the abolition of anti-miscegenation laws, bans on mandatory prayer in schools, and the right to gay marriage.
If Roe v Wade is overturned or drastically attacked, poor and working-class people, especially in communities of color – people already impacted the most under the pandemic and the subsequent economic fallout, will be hurt the hardest. Such a reality will force many to seek out unsafe and potentially deadly methods such as many have been forced to do in the past. States, such as Texas, which have pushed for the criminalization of both those getting an abortion and providers, will create an increased atmosphere of potential far-Right violence, state repression, and overall fear over yet another aspect of daily life.
We aren't voting our way out of this violence; local orgs and abortion funds and mutual aid groups have been worth your time and resources far more than these electoral vampires.
— Zoรฉ (@ztsamudzi) May 3, 2022
As Natasha Lennard wrote in The Intercept:
More women and pregnant people will suffer and die; poor people of color will be affected in disproportionate numbers…The blame lies squarely with the powerful Christian right, aided and abetted by cynical fascoid right-wingers, who have set their sights on pregnant peoples’ bodily autonomy for decades. They will not respond to our rage and protests. They will push on with their authoritarian agenda. Despite claims to states’ rights in the leaked opinion, written by Justice Samuel Alito, there is clear evidence that if Republicans retake Congress in November, they will seek to pass a federal abortion ban.
This leak comes hot on the heels of a flurry of anti-LGBTQ and anti-abortion bills across the US that have attacked and criminalized reproductive freedom, healthcare, and the LGBTQ community. Democrats have predictably responded with calls to donate and vote in the 2022 midterms while also refusing to amend the filibuster and enshrine abortion rights into law. Moreover, as some states may potentially move to protect abortion access and those coming into the state to receive services while others push to criminalize them, we continue to hurdle towards a situation much like what existed before the civil war.
Fascist + authoritarian patriarchal movements have long sought to criminalize reproductive health-care + autonomy.
The same forces obsessed with carrying out mass violence + murder by wielding the State as an instrument of repression against the population as a whole. https://t.co/F8TR58KVld pic.twitter.com/837lxlSg7W
— It's Going Down (@IGD_News) May 3, 2022
As Lennard wrote:
26 states are ready with laws to enact abortion bans when Roe is undone and are passing ever more elaborate ways to criminalize abortions. Over a dozen of these states recently passed bans in their legislatures; other laws predate Roe but remain on the books and could snap back into effect. At present, only 16 states and Washington, D.C., have laws that actively protect the right to abortion.
Major interstate court battles along these lines are set to erupt after Roe — from the policing of women and other pregnant peoples’ interstate travel, to the functioning of telehealth services that can prescribe abortion pills across state lines, to the criminalization of those who share resources and material support to aid abortions.
The push to criminalize reproductive health comes amidst a backdrop of a massive transfer of wealth and record breaking corporate profits following two years of the deadly COVID-19 pandemic. Amidst rising inflation, skyrocketing rents, the ratcheting up of repression at home and a push to war abroad along with a growing climate crisis, the elites have doubled down on a push towards the Right by embracing a culture war which further demonizes a host of manufactured threats in an effort to distract the population from its real enemies.
And if and when Roe vs Wade is repealed, according to the Washington Post:
by It's Going Down via It's Going Down
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