Monday, February 15, 2010
"Black Babies are an Endangered Species" Say What!!!!
So I'm reading news updates and I see controversial abortion billboard in Georgia and I click on it and it has a pic of a baby and it says black children are an endangered species. Too many aborted. I cant tell you how angry this makes me that they would have the audacity to try and play on my race like that. That is outrageous and ignorant. White women get just as many abortions as black women and the way health care is going its going to continue to be that way.Only in the black neighborhoods do they pull stunts like that. Its just like fpa they only put up billboards with leading abortion provider at the bottom in black neighborhoods. Why must they target us, but its okay cause we wont be silenced at least I won't!!
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7 comments:
I know, right? So stupid. So, so stupid.
I hate that people can actually spout this rhetoric and that other people don't bother to break it down. For one thing, black babies are not a SPECIES for god's sake. For another, birth rates for black women are actually higher than birth rates for white women. (but if you use this argument you're probably damned too, because then people will come up with another load of racist theories about why this is true). For another, gah, whatever, theres a gazillion, and i'm preaching to the choir
Bottom line: Black women have way more abortions per capita than White women. There are probably lots of reasons for this, but one of them is that abortion clinics target them. That is the point of the article. It is a systematic attempt to exploit those who cannot defend themselves, and it is devistating the Black community.
thanks nicole for this post! i would love to talk about this on the show! but to address a comment on this post....in terms of csun goc stating that "it is a systematic attempt to exploit those who cannot defend themselves and it's devastating on the black community", is not accurate. the women that make the personal decision to not carry a pregnancy to term are not forced by a clinic. if a woman has made up in her mind that she is not ready to be a parent, then there is nothing in this world that is going to stop her. in fact, women have resorted to dangerous methods to induce abortion because they could not pay for it. so to say that the clinic being in the neighborhood is devastating is inaccurate.
that is like saying liquor stores are forcing us to become alcoholics. or that billboards promoting smoking are making us smoke. everyone has free will, and we make our decisions based on our experiences, circumstances and any other personal factors that we deem necessary to survive.
it's interesting to me that this argument focuses on abortion but not the real devastating issues of our community: violence, high incarceration rates, unemployment and unequal opportunities.
Further, you can't really say that black women have WAY more abortions. Black women may have more abortions than other races but all numbers are not counted. For women, that have private doctors, their procedures don't get tracked. And even if this was to be true, let's talk about why that is? Are black women being given the same opportunity to access information on reproductive health and birth control? What if their neighborhood clinic doesn't offer them a suitable birth control method and they can't pay for the one they really want? they are too many shades of gray for this to be a black and white issue.
I will climb off the soap box right now!
Gaylon,
I agree with what you wrote. As I said in my comment, there are a lot of reasons for the high number of abortions in the Black community. And the liquor store analogy is a good one: if a chain intentionally targeted a poor neighborhood with aggressive promotions and no regard for the wellbeing of the customers, that would be a BAD thing, and abortion is certainly worse than a liquor store.
In fact, you list other "devastating issues." Know that there are more abortions than incarcerations, and more abortions than unemployment. And abortion is and example of destructive violence, if not the most common example.
"abortion is certainly worse than a liquor store."
"more abortions than incarcerations, and more abortions than unemployment."
Statements like this reveal that you don't actually deplore what you consider disproportionate "targeting" but that you deplore abortion, straight up. How can there be a productive conversation here if you are clouding the issue?
Gaylon brings up a VERY good point about many private doctors' offices not being included in the national abortion statistics. In addition, here are some more facts:
*Black women may have a higher abortion rate than white women, but they also have a higher birth rate.
*Putting 2 and 2 together, this means Black women have a higher pregnancy rate altogether.
*In studies of women who gave birth (not just got pregnant but gave BIRTH), Black women were more likely to say their pregnancy was unwanted.
*Again putting 2 and 2 together, this means black women are more likely than white women to carry an unwanted pregnancy to term.
*Putting ALL of this together, clearly (A) black women do not have adequate access to effective and acceptable forms of birth control, and (B) black women either do not have ENOUGH access to abortion or are less likely to resolve an unwanted pregnancy via abortion.
To me, this means that the thesis of "targeting" is based in shaky or dishonest statistics, and it's very telling that you never see the same people working for racial justice in other aspects of life.
i love this thread! but more importantly i agree to disagree with csun goc. and my abortion was not devastating...it is a fact of life and women that go through it handle it differently based on their life circumstances. further, the prison population through out the country tops the abortion rates for black women every day.
I know I don't frequent this blog (I actually found it accidentally through a search for the stories on the Atlanta advertising campaign), and I am risking running out my welcome, but...
To tie Gaylon's comment back to the original post: the point the billboards are making and that Natasha called "stupid" is that abortion is destructive to the baby. So while Gaylon may say that hers was not destructive to her, that is not the point of the billboard. The point of the billboard is that abortions are destroying the Black community by decimating an entire generation disproportionately. This happens by killing Black babies, which is violence, and more harmful (to the baby) than the liquor stores.
So I am fine leaving it with agreeing to disagree. But I was just struck by the idea that a substantial point (even inadequately expressed on a billboard) could be so quickly dismissed by critiquing the definition of a "species" and the exclamation of "audacity."
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