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• Reproductive rights

Last week, “Doin’ It Well” provided an update about available pregnancy termination services in our community. Writing that column got us thinking about reproductive rights, what they are and why they are important. So this week we decided to explore the concept further.

What Are Reproductive Rights?

Reproductive rights are a subset of human rights (as established in 1968 at the United Nations International Conference on Human Rights) relating to reproduction, including sexual and reproductive health. These include the rights of all people — individuals and couples, women, men and every gender in-between, the very young to the very old, gay, straight, lesbian or bi — to education and the highest standards of healthcare available through medical science addressing reproduction and sexual health. These rights allow women to determine the number, timing and spacing of children and to make these decisions fully informed and free from discrimination, coercion and violence. Reproductive rights means providing for citizens’ reproductive needs, allowing them the freedom to make decisions about their bodies and lives and to access available services based on their own values, circumstances and reproductive needs.

Reproductive Rhetoric?

Although these rights are discussed a lot, especially within political arenas, there are very good reasons why they are so important. First, it’s important for all of us to enjoy healthy, satisfying and pleasurable sex lives. They are also important for women — who bear the largest burden when these rights are absent — because reproductive issues (such as the ability to control and time pregnancies) affect opportunities for education, community engagement, employment and, therefore, economic and social mobility. In this way, we need reproductive rights if we want gender equity.

Research shows that increased education of girls and women leads to stronger and more stable families and better health for mothers and their children. These decrease the economic toll on communities and allow women economic freedom and full participation within society.

Despite this, the message that lingers is that — despite technology and the proven effectiveness of accurate sexuality education for avoiding unwanted pregnancy and disease — women should simply keep their legs closed and be afraid of their sexuality. Rather than accepting and celebrating (female) sexuality, women are expected to sacrifice sexual development, experimentation and enjoyment if they want to pursue education, employment advances and a chance at upward social and economic mobility.

Is That Justice?

Advocates for reproductive justice contend that these rights, even if available, are not truly the rights of all people if access to them is unequal. Reproductive justice, a concept originating within communities of color, highlights the necessary importance of paying attention to the very real gap among groups to gain accessibility of (i.e., the ability to seek, receive and afford) reproductive health services. For many communities, the education or technology may be denied them because of their age, location or income. For instance, parental notification laws — which have recently been passed in Illinois for the first time in 35 years — limit minors’ access to abortion in ways that no other medical treatment is denied them.

Reproductive justice, therefore, means that we make resources equally available to all and reduce the barriers (i.e. poverty, racism, heterosexism, ableism) to make reproductive rights a reality for everyone. Reproductive justice is more than just the availability of abortion; it’s also about access to accurate sex education, availability of condoms and other birth control and the whole range of information and technology to help us live sexual lives that we get to determine. For example, a wealthy woman with access to her own health insurance and money has better access to birth control than a woman in an abusive relationship who is without health insurance or $40 of monthly disposable income. So stating that birth control is available to women as a reproductive right is not entirely true.

Infringements of Rights

There are many examples of how reproductive rights get infringed upon, especially for women. Minor examples include pharmacies locking condoms in cabinets (as we’ve learned CVS does in certain ‘high crime’ communities) or the story we heard about a teenager in Belleville, Ill., who was told by a store clerk at checkout (condoms in hand) that he could not buy condoms because he should not be having sex! Or we can look at how the FDA stalled for years in providing emergency contraception over the counter, despite the recommendation from its own scientists that the medication was safe. It’s easy to say that this infringement doesn’t impact us if we don’t live in those areas or that we don’t need those services; however, when any of us are denied health information and services, it hurts our entire community.

If we are interested in reproductive justice, we must understand how the issue of reproductive rights affects all of our freedoms and sexual health — and fight to make reproductive rights everyone’s rights.

Stay tuned next week as we pitch a tent and see what sex looks like at a campsite.

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