Sujatha Jesudason, "The Latest Case of Reproductive Carrots and Sticks: Race, Abortion and Sex Selection"
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Organizations like Generations Ahead, National Asian Pacific American Women's Forum, and Asian Communities for Reproductive Justice argue that we need to discourage sex selection while protecting women's access to abortion.[6] These organizations recognize sex selection as not only a practice rooted in gender discrimination and stereotyping, but also based on the idea of a gender binary. They hold that it should be discouraged, but discouraged based on changing the context within which women are making their decisions. This means that we need to address the gender bias that leads to particular preferences, tackle the gender stereotypes that create assumptions about desirable and un-desirable characteristics, and un-do the notion of two fixed and discrete genders from which one can choose. This work of true social change cannot be accomplished by banning some women's access to abortion. The carrots to change individual behaviors are based in cultural change and require a long-term commitment, and once again, the question is, have we focused enough on this area of work?

FDLs and sex/race selective abortion bans become easy and convenient tools for anti-choice forces to expand "fetal rights" at the expense of women. And at the confluence of racism and classism, women of color are the most vulnerable targets for these legislative campaigns. While beating back attempts that further demonize and punish women of color, our job as reproductive justice advocates is to invest just as heavily in campaigning for those reproductive carrots—universal health care, access to abortion, comprehensive sex education, pay equity, and Title IX funding. As reproductive justice advocates we need to expand the fight to include the enabling conditions that allow women to make the best reproductive decisions for themselves, their families, and their communities. Simply fighting to defeat bad legislation or even fighting for good legislation is not enough, especially as these reproductive sticks begin to use racism and sexism against us and drive a wedge between us. The best anti-wedge strategy will be a comprehensive reproductive justice campaign.

Hopefully to their dismay, this anti-choice campaign on race, abortion, and sex selection is proving to be an excellent opportunity for the pro-choice movement. It has brought advocates and organizations from reproductive health, rights, and justice groups together to take a stance against racism and sexism, develop a more comprehensive agenda, and ensure the right to abortion for all women. It has created new and stronger alliances between health, rights, and justice groups and has created the opportunity to work with women's groups, domestic violence groups, and racial justice groups. The movement is beginning to develop new messages, that capture the complex intersections of race, class, gender, and immigration and argue for a more comprehensive agenda for stronger women and stronger families. New leadership has emerged within the movement on this issue, particularly women of color leaders, as they have the strongest, most authentic, and most outraged voices on this issue. The latest racist and sexist tactic of the anti-abortion movement could divide the pro-choice movement, but right now it is looking like it might just make it stronger.

Endnotes

1. Dorothy Roberts, Killing the Black Body: Race, Reproduction, and The Meaning of Liberty (New York: Pantheon, 1997); and "Race, Gender, and Genetic Technologies: A New Reproductive Dystopia?" Signs 34: 783-804. [Return to text]

2. H.R.1822: Susan B. Anthony and Frederick Douglass Prenatal Nondiscrimination Act of 2009. [Return to text]

3. Testimony before the Georgia State Senate, March 22, 2010. [Return to text]

4. S.A. Cohen, "Abortion and Women of Color: The Bigger Picture," Guttmacher Policy Review (2008). [Return to text]

5. Jason Abrevaya, "Are There Missing Girls in the United States? Evidence from Birth Data," American Economic Journal: Applied Economics 1.2 (2008): 1-34; and Douglas Almond and Lena Edlund, "Son-Biased Sex Ratios in the 2000 United States Census," Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) 105.15 (2008). [Return to text]

6. Generations Ahead, National Asian Pacific Women's Forum, and Asian Communities for Reproductive Jusice, "Taking a Stand: Tools for Action on Sex Selection" (PDF) (2010). [Return to text]

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