I don't much care for the implication that people of color are a different species. I think this campaign was very poorly thought out, but revealing in a Freudian sense of the anti-choicers true feelings towards POC.

WHAT THE HELL, BILLBOARD.

Oh. My. God.

It they wanted to discuss racial implications of abortion they cold have done it without the 19th Century discourse of "Them N*** will die out anyways, the ain't as bright as us whites"

They are comparing blacks to ANIMALS!

This is appalling!

More of the right's most successful strategy: tricking people into working against their own good.

There is nothing okay with this whatsoever. I can't even think in the terms you're asking me to, because I'm too stuck on the fact that they're comparing babies to, oh, I don't know, tigers...animals. What the hell?

It makes be angry because nobody actually gives a fuck about black women, or what black women want. If they did they would be looking at providing access to healthcare and contraception and education, and they would tackle the root causes of inequality, the disproportionate number of poor black people, inadequate maternal health care and so on instead of making retarded ads.

I just checked out their website and would suggest that it's worthwhile checking it out before this thread becomes too full of assumptions about who is behind this campaign and what their real motivations are.

Alright, eugenics in American history. Very real.

But . . . one google search, first result. Hm.http://www.guttmacher.org/pubs/fb_induced_abortion.html

"The abortion rate among women living below the federal poverty level ($9,570 for a single woman with no children) is more than four times that of women above 300% of the poverty level (44 vs. 10 abortions per 1,000 women). This is partly because the rate of unintended pregnancies among poor women (below 100% of poverty) is nearly four times that of women above 200% of poverty* (112 vs. 29 per 1,000 women[3,1]"

Huh. Poverty. Institutional racism, black women are poorer on average. More abortions on average.

That site also lists the demographics differently than the billboard people do. "Thirty-seven percent of abortions occur to black women, 34% to non-Hispanic white women, 22% to Hispanic women and 8% to women of other races.**"

Regardless, oh yes great idea. Blame pregnant poor women for a history of eugenics and make women of color shoulder a bigger burden. Nice guilt-tripping the victim.

I escort clients at an abortion clinic in Kentucky. The escorts have a blog at everysaturdaymorning.com, if anyone is interested. Here is a link to an interesting video with Loretta Ross, a social justice activist. In it, she says that if the right could just get white women to stop aborting, they'd be offering minorities rides to the clinic in limousines. I don't know about all that, but anti-choicers certainly do use this "endangering" tactic on black women as they enter the clinic. "You're helping kill off your race," etc. Anyway, here's the video.

http://everysaturdaymorning.wordpress.com/2010/01/28/interview-with-social-justice-advocate-loretta-ross-about-hardships-of-people-accessing-reproductive-healthcare/

I respect what you're trying to say, but using that billboard to spark off a discussion unrelated to how very racist it is was a really bad idea.

I can't help it, whenever I see that billboard I just feel sick.

In answer to Lisa's question: in Argentina, where abortion is illegal, it's often presented as a class issue (as well as a feminist one) because only rich people can afford doctors who are willing to perform an illegal abortion. Poor people, who often rely on public (free) hospitals, only have the option of performing their own abortion or paying someone without proper qualifications. Abortion is one of the leading causes of death among Argentinian women.

I just checked out the other older video: Apart from everything else that has been said- why is he so outraged with the notion that having less children might help either a two-income family or a single mother financially?

I guess what I don't understand here is this concept that abortions are responsible for the "endangered" status of black children. I would say that, as previously mentioned, the real issue here is not the abortions that are occurring, but the pregnancies themselves. I don't know the statistics for the reproduction rates of African-Americans, but I imagine that what we as a society should really be addressing is the fact that there are so many unintended and undesired pregnancies. If any sort of eugenics is occurring (or given the opportunity to occur) here, it's in the form of socioeconomic oppression, unaddressed racism, and a lack of proper sexual education which creates the opportunity for accidental conception. Regardless of the race of the people behind this message, I would say that the message doesn't even make sense - the problem is not that too many children are being aborted, but rather the problem is that too many unwanted children are conceived in the first place.

abortion ... is used disproportionately against the children of Black mothers.

I really take issue with the way this is phrased. It concedes to the anti-choicers that fetuses are children (they aren't) and that pregnant women are automatically mothers (if they don't have any kids and they don't keep the pregnancy they aren't mothers yet, are they?)

It turns a health (and financial) decision that a woman makes about her own body into some sort of "bad mother!" moment, which is really a terrible and inaccurate way to frame it. Abortion isn't "used against" black kids disproportionately, it's used by black women disproportionately. Those oppressed black kids are *imaginary* and never existed -- they're just a bludgeon to use against real live women of color who *do* exist.

I find that often the people I know who make arguments like this billboard are the same ones who argue against welfare. I recently read an article about how Americans racialize welfare recipients and deserving vs. undeserving poor (i.e. blacks = undeserving poor / "welfare mommas"). These people may not be part of that group (I didn't look at the website), but people who argue against abortion AND against welfare bother me a lot.

Isn't the easiest refutation of this campaign simply asking the question: Is the population of black children decreasing?

The accusations in this blog reveal the propensity to express without actual knowledge. It's much easier to lob a convenient and lazy charge of racism than actually contend with any substance. I am as black as Obama. I created this campaign to raise awareness in a community that I've worked in for over 15 years and deeply care for. The campaign is led by AFRICAN-AMERICANS--people who work to improve the condition of the urban community. For those who spout talking points about 'anti-choicers' as if there's any truth to them, I'd challenge you to actually look at the immense amount of efforts and involvement in caring for, educating, providing opportunity and economic investment by prolifers in these communities. It happens all of the time and, if you're unaware of this reality, we invite you to look at the myriad of churches (i.e. The Salvation Army), pregnancy resource centers, and parachurch organizations that dedicate much of their time and resources toward this end. But it's much easier to demonize. TooManyAborted.com is the response to the oft-spoken but rarely acted upon rhetoric that we need to 'reduce abortions'. So we put abortion into a factual and (well-documented) historical and statistical context to expose the abortion industry for what it was and continues to be. It seems so many in the blogosphere are busy mining for racism where there isn't any (on the billboard) instead of discussing the irrefutable deep roots of racism/eugenics that defined Planned Parenthood and the Birth Control movement. The campaign doesn't suggest black people are a separate species. We are all the human species, and the African-American community is part of this beautiful human species that is disproportionately impacted by abortion. We don't ever claim extinction is the issue but that black children are more endangered (def: threatened by danger) by abortion and more likely (than any other race) to never be because of abortion. We frame the issue as one of deception by an abortion industry that profits, immensely, from the destruction of life. It's not shaming women; in fact we call out men for being irresponsible and abdicating their duty as fathers. It is the very abandonment of fathers that is a major factor that causes poverty to increase. In fact, since the legalization of abortion, the illegitimacy rate skyrocketed from less than 30% prior to Roe v. Wade, to our present day and devastating fatherlessness rate of 70% in the black community. Abortion doesn't mitigate poverty for any race; poverty has increased drastically since its low in 1973 of 23 million, nationally, to 40 million in 2008. It doesn't encourage two-parent homes which are the bedrock of a healthy and stable society. Welfare, although needed for temporary assistance, is NEVER a substitute for a father. And abortion is never a substitute for exercising responsibility and restraint. Perhaps instead of engaging in these expressions of mass distraction, go to TooManyAborted.com and see what the message is about instead of responding with uninformed invective. As one who is adopted, and is in the process of adopting, I know the power of Possibility within each life. That's our focus in this campaign. Instead of reducing people to caricature, take some time and find out what our character reflects--a heart to see people (women and men) making better choices because they've been exposed to the truth.

I believe in constructive conversation and appreciate your response. It's obvious I'm in ideologically contrary territory, but opposition serves as an opportunity to sharpen each of us. I don't have time to discredit much of what's been written here as the day only has so many waking hours, but:

You’re “eugenics argument” has already been addressed pretty well in the comments of this post: Reproductive politics, justice and Obama

I guess I'll just address Interrobang's accusation of "quote-mining" and eugenics material that's "nearly a century old". There is no quote mining. I've read most of what Margaret Sanger has written. The totality of her writing consistently advocates a (negative) eugenics approach. These quotes are not misrepresentative extractions but complete reflections of her life's work. If Interrobang actually read her work, he'd realize how absurd his claims were. But based upon his reasoning, we should dismiss history whenever attempting to explain present-day socioeconomic circumstances. We should dismiss history to attempt to understand gender dynamics. We should dismiss history that explains slavery's impact on current day racial geographic demographics, poverty and economic opportunity. To the contrary, though of course; revealing history to help define a movement dressed up in euphemism adds clarity. Eugenics didn't die out a century ago. Segregation, here in the south, continued into the 70s. What do you think served as the basis for these laws? Yes, eugenics. What influenced Nixon to enact the Population Commission (have you heard the audio of him talking about reducing the number of those "negro bastards" at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wuwEEDP_wYc&feature=related)? Eugenics. What do you think influences the majority of modern-day population control entities? Negative eugenics. Margaret Sanger, one of the most pivotal women in the 20th century somehow is conveniently reduced to insignificance because to dismiss her is to avoid what defined the Birth-Control-Movement-turned-Abortion-Establishment. Her interview with Mike Wallace (in 1957) revealed her unchanged eugenic views. That was a little over 50 years ago. But I guess if we can shove all of this into the trivial annals of American history, let's shove Martin Luther King's words to the same abyss as his worldview was clearly rooted in something much older than the American Eugenics movement--Christianity.

I find it difficult to understand why racism is used so flippantly where it doesn't exist (like the trite and baseless assertion that I can still be black and racist--which is useless implication) yet is adamantly denied where it does. I was never enslaved. I cannot imagine the inhumanity of it all. I am black, though, and have known racial discrimination all of my life (and I use it ever so sparingly to define situations I've experienced). For a people who have once been enslaved, who endured the economic hardships and triumphs of emancipation, the chaos of northern migration and assimilation, the targeting of black women's high fertility rate with Sanger's Negro Project, the degradation of eugenics-based segregation, and the continual struggle for civil rights in several facets of American life, what is so threatening about exposing America's Birth Control Movement and legalized (albeit unconstitutionally) abortion's history for what it is? Can someone point at a moment in American history when their was a cessation of eugenics-influenced policy? What year would that have occurred?

Planned Parenthood refers to Sanger's views as 'dated' and 'unfortunate'-- views that did not typify the whole of America in the mid 20th century and was found then, and even more-so now, as morally reprehensible. They have never repudiated her views (or those of many members of the American Eugenics Society who have served on their board or as presidents). So this denial inevitably begs the question, why not? Instead, they celebrate Margaret Sanger by proudly giving out the annual Maggie Awards.

I can tell you, although we've received mostly positive and supportive emails about our campaign, there is clear evidence that a eugenically inspired worldview is alive and well. The repugnant and open advocacy in some of the more venomous emails of the "need to kill as many black babies as possible", "reduce the weak among us", "we need to stop paying for these #$*%&$@ to have children" only reveals that what's underground or obscured by veils of euphemisms will rear its ugly head when a little light starts illuminating the truth.

TooManyAborted.com exposes the propaganda and the distortions of history in hopes that people (of any race) see a divisive issue in a fuller, and more accurate, context. This history has remained obscured for too long. And its undeniable impact on our present is worth the investigation and the scrutiny and solutions that truly empower women, not leaving them convinced that the most powerful force on earth (a mother's love for her child) is something she should feel threatened by and terminate.

@ Kat: Lovin' the back and forth (which honestly, I won't have time to maintain simply b/c of the demands on my time...but your thread has me intrigued).

Just have time to respond to your last remark and will attempt to get around to the 4-point retort this weekend sometime.

I've never taken fathers out of the equation, as I stated in my first response: "...in fact we call out men for being irresponsible and abdicating their duty as fathers."

I also ended my first response in this thread with this: "Instead of reducing people to caricature, take some time and find out what our character reflects–a heart to see people (women and men) making better choices because they’ve been exposed to the truth."

This is no avoidance, on my part, of holding men responsible. Perhaps you missed those important points made both here and on our website. In fact, I believe they should be equally involved in the child's life pre and post birth. But how do you explain your self-contradiction? You demand it is solely a women's 'choice' yet seem to decry fathers being removed from the equation. Since simple human biology requires both male and female to procreate, shouldn't a man have the both the responsibility to care for children he has brought into the world AND the constitutional right to the protection of his unborn child? Your position seems unclear here.

Love is the most potent force on earth (I should've posited it that way as I am a father and know this first-hand), unless one is a nihilist in which despair is your thing. It is love that triumphs over the most wretched evil. Actions that mar this pure and most potent human emotion doesn't alter the intrinsic nature of it. Violence is not love. Child abuse is not love. Neglect and abandonment is not love. No more than than eugenics was actual science.

When I have more time...I'll will try to get to that 4-point response. Oh, if you only knew my "working day hours".

So many posts....so many replies...

What these types of discussions about race and abortion (and abortion access) often miss is that mainstream Choice and mainstream feminism movements have never cared too much about Black women and children either. There is little discussion, for instance, about the high levels of infertility in Black women, or the disproportionate rates of parental rights termination of Black women. There is little contextualization in how Black women's wombs (and the symbolism of Black women's wombs) have to suit the political needs of everyone else--including progressive needs.

It is too bad that so much of this discussion has been focused on the word "species." Saying Black people (or Black youth, or Black males) are an endangered species is a long-standing rhetorical device in Black circles, used by everyone from Jesse Jackson to Public Enemy. The idea has often been to highlight a certain lack of humanity of (often, liberal) Whites, who would declare groups of non-human animals as "endangered" and worthy of protections, while their fellow humans (e.g., Blacks) were dying in large numbers.

And one final note: arguments that equate anti-abortion to slavery are incredibly offensive and reprehensible to me as a woman, a mother, and an African American descendant of enslaved people.

"And one final note: arguments that equate anti-abortion to slavery are incredibly offensive and reprehensible to me as a woman, a mother, and an African American descendant of enslaved people."

And I should also note: to me as a pro-reproductive choices advocate.

Black Abortion: Breaking the Silence

Article very worth reading.

Village Idiot, please give examples of other nations in which slavery was practiced for centuries and a group of people redefined as animals for breeding as chattel the way they were in American slavery. Please cite references of other nations that after centuries of institutionalized slavery pursued political means to dehumanize the "slave race" after slavery's legal abolition in an effort to justify its former practice and continued oppression of the group it transported to it shores not from spoils of war but by fancy. Please give examples that will define for us how American slavery is not unique, as your response indicates, and so therefore may be used as a non-hyperbolic political comparison.

And further, please give insight on why it is accepted that other groups, such as Jewish people, may ask their fellow humans to not compare their sufferings to other human atrocities because the comparisons are too painful and have that request honored while any claims African-Americans present as unique forms of suffering that they request not be used for political gain by other groups is challenged. It seems African-Americans are not even allowed to own what is theirs, not even their pain, that they are expected to submit to others defining their experiences for them according to others' comfort levels.

It's my understanding that slavery the way it was practiced in America, including ugly aspects of how to breed "bucks" and dismantle families for profit, as well as the length of time it was practiced, makes the American system of slavery a unique tale of human's inhumanity to humans, but should you have credible evidence to the contrary, I'd liked citations.

...

What I find interesting about the billboard is that pro-life groups are often political conservatives who breathe fire at any talk from black people of discrimination. They chomp at the bit to say, "You're playing the race card," and here they are playing the ultimate race card, and they play it in the creation versus evolution debate as well with comments such as "Don't you know Darwin was a racist?"

Furthermore, they rarely support programs that will help feed, clothe, and educate these black children the billboard claims are endangered. No, never, because government programs to help poor minorities smack of socialism, right?

What does this mean? In the womb black children are precious but outside the womb they deserve less than other children?

Hypocrisy, thou hast a putrid stench.

How odd - not safe for the workplace but apparently safe for the highway?