All Our Lives has joined over 200 other organizations in endorsing this call for 3.5 million more health workers, especially in the Two Thirds World. This figure includes 350,000 more midwives and 1 million community health workers, who can help with providing certain reproductive health services, such as sex education and some family planning methods. No human being should ever have to die-or live less abundantly than he or she could-for lack of enough health workers.
Category: Past Actions
An action we have taken/asked people to take, which is now completed.
Victory! Catherine Ferguson Academy to remain open
The Catherine Ferguson Academy will remain open as a charter school, the Detroit Public School Board announced today:
The Detroit Public Schools today announced that the school for pregnant and parenting teens will not close , but be operated as a charter school. The announcement came an hour before a noon rally planned to try to save the school.
Ferguson was scheduled to be one of three alternative schools to close this summer due to the district’s $327 million deficit.
[…]
G. Asenath Andrews, the principal of Ferguson since it opened 27 years ago, said the planned rally will become a celebration. “I am relieved, excited and pleased,” she said.
So are we, Ms. Andrews. Congratulations to the students and staff of the Catherine Ferguson Academy, and thank you to everyone who sent messages of support.
Can you help us?
All Our Lives seeks dedicated volunteers to help us:
- Upgrade our global directory of abortion-reducing resources.
- Design visually appealing PowerPoint slides, fact sheets, flyers, and posters, especially for our new "Contraception Is Prolife" campaign.
- Form an outstanding board of directors.
- Launch as a US-based official nonprofit with a global focus.
Email your statement of interest and resume to volunteer@allourlives.org. We especially encourage applications from women, people of color, people with disabilities, and LGBT persons. All Our Lives fosters a pro every life, pro nonviolent choice agenda.
ALERT: one week left to save school for pregnant and parenting teens
For those of you who don't follow us on Facebook or Twitter, here's the latest on the Catherine Ferguson Academy in Detroit. Principal Asenath Andrews was informed this week that the school will be closed permanently on next Friday, June 17.
Here's what you can do to help.
- If possible, please attend the rally at noon on June 16 at the site of the Academy. If you can't attend but want to help with the rally, BAMN is taking donations to rent buses and vans to bring people from Metro Detroit who don't have cars.
- Contact school district officials and the media. The Save the Catherine Ferguson Academy Facebook page has contact information. If you use Facebook, you should follow them to keep up with the latest information.
- All Our Lives has set up a Tumblr page where you can upload notes, pictures, or videos of support for the students and faculty at the school. Let them know that people from all over are watching and wishing them well!
Happy 46th Birthcontrolday!
Today is the 46th anniversary of the U.S. Supreme Court decision Griswold v. Connecticut, which held that laws criminalizing the provision of contraception were unconstitutional. Unfortunately, even though it is no longer against the law to sell or use birth control, anti-contraception lawmakers are still trying to undermine access to it.
If you live in the United States, we urge you to contact your members of Congress to let them know that you're pro-life and pro-contraception. Ask them to resist further efforts to defund Title X family planning — most Title X recipients don't perform abortions, so don't let them claim otherwise. Remind them that evidence from around the world indicates that access to modern contraception reduces abortion, and that women are more likely to use contraception consistently (and avoid unintended pregnancy and abortion) if they are ensured an adequate, affordable supply. Let them know that existing evidence does not support claims that either hormonal methods or the IUD prevent implantation. Finally, remind them that opposition to contraception is simply one viewpoint, held by a small minority of Americans, and that the rest of us deserve representation too.
Blogging Against Disablism 2011: Adoption, Special Needs, & Choice–By Meghan
(Our second of two posts for this year's Blogging Against Disablism. Thanks to All Our Lives supporter Meghan for sharing her life story.)
In 1982, my biological mother found herself in a terrible position. Not only was she pregnant, but she was taking LSD, her mother was an alcoholic, and she was being abused by her mother's boyfriend. She had had an abortion three years before I was conceived. I'm not sure why she decided to carry me to term, but she did.
My Mom and Dad were also in a painful position. After giving birth to my brother, my Mom unknowingly used a defective IUD device that was later found to have injured thousands of women, including her. After undergoing several dangerous and unsuccessful corrective surgeries, she and my Dad decided to adopt.
I have no way to get my biological mother’s perspective on the adoption, information which would provide more insight into how the adoption process impacts the women who choose it. Because she has never tried to make contact with me, I’ve assumed that she would prefer to put the adoption in her past and haven’t attempted to contact her. I do know that the particular agency she chose was an ethical** one and hope she went on to have a joyful, fulfilling life.
I also had the pleasure of meeting my biological father and that side of our family after they made contact a few years ago. They are well and were very happy to meet me. In doing so I learned that I’m Cuban on their side. Although this revelation has had little impact on my life, it’s fun to have that information.
Both situations surrounding the choice of adoption were painful and sad. I certainly agree that it would have been wonderful if my Mom, my biological mother and our relatives hadn’t had to experience the heartbreak that they did. Nevertheless, I am grateful for the adoption that resulted from those experiences, for it was largely responsible for the success I enjoy today.
After I was born, I developed respiratory distress and had to be airlifted to another hospital, where I was placed on a respirator. Because of this I incurred a hefty medical bill. If the state of Kentucky had been unwilling to absorb those costs, it would have been too expensive for most people to adopt me and I would have ended up in foster care. Luckily, the adoption agency convinced the state that doing so was less expensive than taking care of me for eighteen years.
Over the coming years, my adoption afforded me with dedicated parents and stability, something that was particularly important to me as a person with nonverbal learning disorder. Nonverbal Learning Disorder is similar to Asberger Syndrome. NVLD makes it difficult to interpret social cues, which can lead to unintentional breaches of etiquette. It also increases one’s tendency to loose things and become lost, which enhances the difficulty of changing one’s routine. Because of the adoption, I did not have to struggle with the pain and disruption of being moved from place to place.
I also had parents who wanted me very much and who fought valiantly for my rights. As we navigated the educational system, my mother came to every meeting, every doctor’s appointment, and every vocal recital. My Dad and I took long nature walks and gardened together. Because of this love and advocacy, I was able to make the most of my intellectual, spiritual, and emotional gifts. I tend to believe that my parents sunk all the energy they would have used on having multiple children into me and my brother.
This care and attention helped me cope with the persistent bullying I experienced growing up. Whenever I came home from a long day of being told that I was hated, retarded, cursed, or what-have-you, my parents were there to tell me that I was gifted, beautiful, and unconditionally loved. I wouldn’t be the same person if it weren’t for their ability to counteract the vitriol I experienced.
If my biological mother or father had chosen to care for me, I believe that they would have found a way to do it well. If I had been placed in foster care, I’m sure that caring people would have helped me. Adoption, however, was an excellent choice because it enabled me to have everything I needed to grow up and achieve my goals.
Now that I am in graduate school, I volunteer as an educational surrogate parent, which involves making educational decisions on behalf of disabled students in foster care. There are many people in the system who dedicate their time to helping these students achieve their goals and rise above the difficulties they experienced. This makes me believe that they will be all right. Nevertheless, consistent advocacy and familial connection is a much more dependable option.
Every time I go to a meeting, I am grateful to my biological mother for choosing adoption and giving me the gift of parents who were able to be consistent educational advocates. If you are unable to have children and have a heart to help others, consider adopting a child with special needs who needs consistency and the unconditional love of a parent. Children with special needs can be adopted via foster care, international agencies and domestic adoption agencies.
Moreover, if you’re a prospective parent considering adoption for your child, don’t think that a child with special needs cannot be successfully placed. In fact, there are currently waiting lists of people wanting to adopt children with various special needs and disability rights advocacy have lead to more rights and opportunities than ever before.
Canada's Waiting Kids
Be My Parent [Britain]
Adopting a Special-Needs Child [how-to article for Americans]
AdoptUSKids [USA]
National Indian Child Welfare Association [for members of USA's First Nations]
National One Church One Child [helping to place African American kids]
**In an infant adoption, an ethical adoption agency will not pressure women or their partners into an adoption decision and will treat them as complete individuals with legal, financial and emotional needs. They will help navigate adoption options, including open, semi-open, and closed adoption and will be honest about all aspects of the process.
Blogging Against Disablism 2011: Reproductive Violence and Injustice Against Disabled Adults–By Marysia
(Our first of two posts for Blogging Against Disablism 2011.)
More often than not, issues of reproduction and disability are approached solely in terms of ablebodied parents and disabled children. Of course issues like prenatal diagnosis and abortion of disabled unborn children are critical parts of the story.
But not all people with disabilities are children, whether unborn or already-born. Some of us are in fact adults, even if we are overlooked or infantilized. Like other humans, we are sexual and reproductive beings. And we face many forms of reproductive violence and injustice ourselves.
Namely:
- Poverty, un or underemployment, poor housing conditions, poor nutrition, poor access to medical care, transportation barriers, and other problems that often severely undercut our ability to exercise our own sexual and reproductive preferences, whatever those may be.
- Stereotypes that we are either asexual, or grotesque sexual predators.
- Stereotypes that reproduction is a nonsequitur for us, or that we are by definition “unfit” parents whose “monstrous” breeding must be forcibly stopped.
- Heightened vulnerability to sexual assault and other abuse.
- Sex education that omits or glosses over us.
- Interference with our freedom to seek out and marry the partners of our own choosing.
- A long history of outright forced sterilizations and other pressures to use family planning methods we do not want, at the same time we are denied access to contraceptives we do want and that best fit our particular needs.
- Interference with our freedom to seek out fully supported parenthood, whether biological, adoptive, or foster.
- Intense pressure to abort when we become pregnant or partner to a pregnancy.
These injustices intersect mightily with the injustices resulting, for example, in the abortion or infanticide of children with disabilities. When I was pregnant with my daughter, for instance, a physician pressured me to have an abortion because he feared she might be “defective.” “You mean, just like me?!” I responded angrily. Hell if I was going to let him have his way with us!
Despite all the difficulties of that decidedly unplanned pregnancy- poverty, my ill health, disrupted life plans for me and my boyfriend, among other problems-I did have some resources for resistance, including the confidence that I could be a good mother. But what about other women who have disabilities and/or carry potentially disabled children-what if they lack the necessary resources? I already know the answer to that question. It is saddening beyond measure.
Even when and where it starts in the womb, the prevention and healing of reproductive violence and injustice against people with disabilities must continue ever after birth. And, as the disability rights slogan says, "Nothing About Us, Without Us." All of us.
Action (U.S.): tell the Environmental Protection Agency to reject a pesticide that causes cancer and miscarriages
I received the following action alert from the Consistent Life email newsletter today:
Subscriber Mary Grace sends in this note from the United Farm Workers union: “Cesar Chavez said farm workers are society’s canaries because they show the effects of pesticide poisoning before anyone else. The State of California has recently certified a highly dangerous pesticide, methyl iodide, for use on fruits and vegetables, including the state’s $1.6 billion strawberry industry. Strawberries may very well become the new poster child for plaguing farm workers with cancer and late-term miscarriages.” We have here another case where poverty is lethal because the very lives of unborn children in immediate danger aren’t taken seriously by those running large corporations. UFW has an online petition against this.
The UFW has a petition you can sign to tell the EPA not to approve methyl iodide. The comment period ends today, so please act quickly!
Help pregnant and parenting students in Detroit keep their school
Have you heard about the Catherine Ferguson Academy? CFA is an innovative and successful school for pregnant and parenting teenage girls in Detroit.
Catherine Ferguson Academy (CFA) is a Detroit public high school for pregnant and parenting teen girls- the only one of its kind in the nation. Providing an excellent education and services for both the teen mothers and their children, CFA has received international attention, numerous awards and is the subject of several documentaries.
"When people at my regular high school realized that I was pregnant, I was told my chances of being a success in life were over. At Catherine Ferguson, they told me they wouldn't allow me to be anything BUT a success. I love CFA, and I am prepared to fight to keep it open, not only for myself, but for all the girls who will come behind me," said Ashley Matthews, a junior at CFA.
With approximately 200 students who come not only from Detroit, but also from the surrounding suburbs, every year Catherine Ferguson achieves a 90% graduation rate and 100% of those who graduate are accepted to two- or four-year colleges, most with financial aid. (source)
How perfectly, beautifully pro-life is that? Isn't that what we (well, some of us) have been saying all along? Pregnant women shouldn't have to choose between their children and their future, and CFA is helping to ensure that they can have both.
So pro-lifers should help fight to keep this school open. Due to budget cuts, the Detroit school district has slated the Catherine Ferguson Academy for closure unless a private buyer can be found to convert it to a charter school. The students and educators at CFA believe that privatization would lead to cuts to the very programs that make the school so valuable for the population it serves — young mothers. Students even staged a sit-in over spring break to bring attention to their cause.
If you'd like to help keep Catherine Ferguson Academy open and serving young women and their children, here are some links that you can use to get more informed and take action:
- The Rachel Maddow Show did a segment on CFA and the sit-in, and posted informational links on their blog.
- Defend Public Education and Change.org have petitions to sign.
- You can also donate to the students' legal defense fund (when filling out the form, make sure to specify that you are donating toward the Catherine Ferguson Academy effort).
Remember to post to Facebook, Twitter, Reddit, Digg, etc., and get the word out!
International Women’s Day; help pass the International Violence Against Women Act
In honor of International Women's Day, we'd like to say "thank you" to our friends and supporters on every continent (except Antarctica — anyone know a very cold supporter of women's rights?)!
We'd also like to draw the attention of our U.S. members to this call to action in support of the International Violence Against Women Act.
An overview of the global figures on violence against women compiled by Amnesty International reveals a horrifying scenario:
- Only 3 countries in the world have legislation that specifically addresses violence against women as a category of criminal activity (Bangladesh, Sweden and USA).
- At least 1 in every 3 women globally, has been beaten, raped, coerced into sex, or otherwise subject to physical violence in her lifetime.
- Up to 70% of female murder victims are killed by their male partners
- More than 135 million women have been subjected to (FGM) female genital mutilation and an additional 2 million girls are at risk each year (6,000 new cases every day).
- 79 countries have no (or unknown) legislation against domestic violence.
- Only 16 nations have legislation specifically referring to sexual assault.
If you live in the United States, please click on this link, to locate and contact your Senator/Representative, and send them an email, telling them to pass the IVAWA. You can also include in your message a link to http://genderbyteslinks.wordpress.com/2011/02/25/a-call-to-all-u-s-citizens-make-history-please-help-pass-the-ivawa/ for more information.