Abortion Support Network- abortion not just a women's issue?

[Doobigetta]

Apologies- I know lots of people are sick of hearing about the trans issue. But I received the following email from the ASN today-

Calling all creative minds
Six and a half years ago we were very fortunate to have someone design a logo for us. Our logo has served us well but ASN has grown and we feel it’s time for our brand to have a bit of a touch up. We are particularly interested in a logo that is more in line with the fact that we sometimes hear from trans people and others who do not consider themselves to be women. At ASN we’ve crowd sourced everything from our first logo to our director’s 2015 salary and we thought we’d do the same with our new logo. Interested? Email us and we'll send you the brief. You don’t even need to be an "official" - if our favourite image is a doodle we can get one of our amazing volunteer designers whip it into a graphic. We can’t wait to see what you come up with!

I've responded to say I'd be very unhappy about them badging abortion rights as anything other than a women's issue, and that I feel conflating it with questions of gender identity weakens and undermines the importance of it as a women's issue. Please, if you feel the same way, could you let ASN know?

Surely it should be possible to make a logo which does not suggest the service is only for women without it being one which puts women off?
If the laws may be abolished due to sexism surely that could happen anyway as there is sexism directed against anatomically female bodies rather than female gender? Or does it make a difference?

The current logo does not suggest the service is only for women.

It does suggest it to me, if its the one that was put up earlier. I thought that was the whole point of the thread?

Verysad, does your child live in the RoI or in Northern Ireland? No? Then the service is not for them anyway.

If you are pregnant in the RoI or NI and don't want to be, then your problems are a bit bigger than what a logo looks like. The website makes it clear that anyway that they will assist transmen too.

I've just emailed.
Verysad- your child is female and that's inescapable fact. If they need an abortion then (unless you and their school has failed to teach them any basic facts) they will understand that they need an abortion clinic. Any pregnant person who needs an abortion but sees that the logo for an abortion clinic is the symbol for female, then decides that abortion clinic is 'not for them' is...well I don't really know how to express how extraordinarily stupid that person would be.
Being in the position of needing an abortion is pretty shit for anyone. Let's not pretend it's worse for trans people than women eh?

It's difficult being a young girl anyway. My daughter's friends have already started fretting about being fat (aged eight) and are surrounded by depressing hairless plastic sexualised images of women everywhere, and their boy contemporaries will be raised on porn. When I was a teenager I took great solace in feminist literature and activism which helped bridge the gap between the oversimplified images of femaleness I saw depicted and the complicated reality I experienced myself. I am so glad I didn't have a lot of Alice in Wonderland shite about how men can get pregnant and women are allowed take their beards and penises into the ladies changing rooms and Olympics events. If you are a trans person you have to accept that the sexes are not equal to begin with and respect that. It's extraordinary how men lose nothing while women lose everything -I wonder if it'll make even more young women decide it's shit being a woman and transition?

If someone has such disconnect that they cannot see that the biological 'female' sign includes them as ftt, how are they going to cope with a d&c?

The female sex sign comes from the ankh, which is an Egyptian fertility symbol. Nothing is more apt for an abortion charity than something which addresses fertility.

Very - I am sorry for your son's predicament, and I hope that with support he goes on to lead a happy life which he is comfortable with. But let me try to explain why abortion is a women's issue.

My mum used to use a great quote (can't remember the source): "If men got pregnant, abortion would be a sacrament." I'm starting with this to place debates about abortion in their historical context within a society shaped by its Judeo-Christian religious roots, and long history of patriarchy. Now of course that quote is (and is intended to be) a very provocative statement, both in the sense of provoking strong emotions (comparing an act which according to Catholic doctrine is murder with a sacrament) and in the sense of provoking thought. Because if you go back through the history of Christianity you can see the knots the church tied itself in concocting and defending the concept of a just war (Jesus being fairly unequivocal that killing was wrong and pacificism was a good idea!). This got to the point where going on the Crusades to kill people gained you remission from your sins, in theological terms. We still see this confused set of values among right wing Christian Republicans in the USA - typically they will picket abortion clinics while upholding the right to bear arms and defending the death penalty.

So, if the people who attack abortion rights are selective in their application of the right to life, it's informative to ask "who's getting the fuzzy end of the lollipop here?" If you asked them, they would say that the foetus is the sine qua non of an innocent life, hence its rights cannot be trumped by someone else's right to bodily autonomy (unlike, say, an enemy combatant whose right to life might be in conflict with your nation's right to self-determination, or a murderer whose right to life might be in conflict with the victim's famimly's right to restitution). They would then claim that the fact that the only people whose autonomy is impinged upon are women (and a very tiny minority of transmen) is simply a biological accident.

They would of course be talking hogwash, because a cursory glance at their other beliefs rapidly reveals that on the whole they also oppose contraception, straightforward divorce, and push for very conservative social attitudes towards women's place in society. This is why abortion is a women's rights issue - because it is part of a systematic attempt to control women and reduce their right to self-determination. Obfusticating that by insisting on Orwellian New Speak in talking about abortion removes the ability to name the problem and explain why it happens. Instead of being a systematic attack on women's rights because they are women, it becomes a case of "random shit happens, move along now, nothing to see."

This is why we are so resistant to taking the word "woman" out of abortion literature.

Yy. Especially as this charity is not just a general abortion charity in the UK, but one that specifically helps women in IoM/NI/Eire who are confronted with the (devolved) law that it is illegal for a woman to have an abortion.

The UN has ruled these laws unlawful (link upthread) because they are sexist. How do you propose that is addressed if it is no longer a biological sex issue, but a gender-free one instead?

Lurcio I think you've put that very well!

I'm a Northern Ireland woman, with deeply held Christian beliefs and practicing faith, but I am also a firm advocate for the woman's right to choose abortion.

In NI abortion is just not mentioned, at all, anywhere when a woman is pregnant. It is a non-issue in medical circles because it is like it hasn't been invented here (yet).

Some of the strongest advocates for pro-choice are women - as one would expect. And there is a large Marie Stopes clinic on a central popular street in Belfast city centre.

The biggest advocates for babies-are-precious-and-must-be-born-at-all-costs are men, usually to be found ringing into talk shows on radio to complain that abortion is afforded to anyone anywhere.... I often wonder if these men can actually hear themselves, and if they are aware of the stigmas attached to being a vulnerable mother, with poor benefit systems, with little respect given to the relentless grind of motherhood.

I'm not saying that men can't have a say, or an opinion. But that this IS a women's issue, so let the women make the decisions - policy wise, in practice when campaigning, and for their own bodies.

Sorry if that was a bit of an Northern Ireland centric rant, but I had to let it out!

I think a NI-centric rant is appropriate on a thread that is re a charity that does a large chunk of its work in NI

if its the one that was put up earlier. I thought that was the whole point of the thread?

The one I put up? Thats the symbol for female. Which anyone requiring an abortion is.

Biological female. As in the thing that is produces eggs and is physically capable of becoming pregnant when some biologically male produced sperm is added into the equation.
Nothing to do with gender ID.

Transphobic image courtesy of Nature

Response #2 is greatly improved :)

I've had a reply...!

It is actually a very well considered one which directly addresses a lot of points I raised, but has one bizarre bit
"Just like women from the Isle of Man told us that they’d gone to our website and not realised we could help them, our trans clients (and we've had several) said the same about our exclusive use of the word woman to describe our clients"

I cannot believe for 1 femtosecond that a pregnant transman, panicking and hoping to access an abortion has stumbled across the ASN website and thought "Oh crap, it says here that they only offer abortion services to woman. I need to keep looking for a service that offers services to men, as my working vagina, cervix, ovaries and uterus clearly exclude me from the services offered by ASN"

I suspect what has actually happened is that an out-there transactivist has stumbled across the website while looking to be professionally offended, and has written a whinging email about how they would have felt disenfranchised and excluded, and ASN has moved in fear of further action from the trans community.

The full reply is long, so I won't post it, but happy to PM it to anyone who wants it. They do also address my questions about whether this has been through the correct governance and oversight channels from a trustee point of view...

The fact that they're not moving entirely to gender-neutral language is reassuring.

I have sympathy for the poster who is parenting a transboy and I think that trans people have enough to cope with, without being subjected to vitriol or being trapped in the middle of an argument.

But I think that services for women should be loudly, proudly for women. Someone suffering enough dysphoria that they can't bring themselves to use women's services must logically require a trans-specific service. It is not reasonable to expect all women's services to change to accommodate a minority, because women still live in a society where they are the disadvantaged sex, and it is important that services like abortion are provided in the name of women's rights.

To reduce women to "people who get pregnant" is to strip us of our identity. It is important for other minority groups to use phrases like "black lives matter" and "gay pride", therefore it is just as important that we promote rights and services for women, using the correct language, or we run the risk of becoming voiceless and lost in a sea of other agendas and concerns.

Trans people can fight for appropriate services and support, but not in the name of "women". Their struggles, whilst obviously severe, do not mimic the struggles of born women, and should not be lumped into the same category or conflated. They are simply parallel to us, and therefore need different kinds of support.

I've also got a further response, clarifying that they will not be changing any of their language to be gender-neutral- just to logo. Happy to fwd it to anyone who PMs me.

Although I'm supposed to be working, so it might be tonight....

I've had the same response. I think they must be sending the same one to all

Totally agree with you penne

Is seeking an abortion from a female-centred organisation worse psychologically for a ftt than engaging in piv sexual activity? Or having a monthly reminder of their female anayomy in the form of ovulation and periods? I don't see tampons and sanitary towels being rebranded so that they're not just products for women. But who knows, maybe that will come?

Abortion is, and always will be, a female issue.

I don't see tampons and sanitary towels being rebranded so that they're not just products for women. But who knows, maybe that will come?

Hopefully businesses with profits to make will resist the lunacy. Pissing off the real women when you sell tampons would not be clever.

I'm also struggling a bit with the idea that someone might end up needing to use an abortion service partly because it was 'upsetting' for them to take a contraceptive pill intended for women. More upsetting than a gynaecological procedure!?

There's always a lack of rationality in the trans-arguments.

I got a similar second reply to you beyond, only instead of saying "It's just a logo" it says, "It's a logo." Which sounds rude and dismissive to me, not better than the first reply.

And instead of the sentence saying. "We talk about women all the time" mine reply says:

"our trans clients (and we've had several) said the same [as clients from the Isle of Man in reference to Ireland] about our exclusive use of the word woman to describe our clients. This is why several years ago we changed the copy on our home page to reflect the fact that we also help trans people."

On their home page they have this:

"We help people from Ireland and Northern Ireland travel to England to access a safe and legal abortion"

And where they use the word "women" they clarify in a foot note with this:

"ASN does not ask clients their gender, nor does gender identity influence grant eligibility."

Why on earth would they ask clients their gender anyway? If they have a client who is pregnant, surely there's no disputing what their biological sex is, so no need whatsoever to discuss their gender identity?

I notice they haven't actually changed their copy with regard to Ireland-only references so the Isle of Man comparison is BS.