Abortion without Borders: How Feminists and Anarchists Defy Polish Anti-Abortion Laws

2022-11-14

In Poland, abortion has been almost completely prohibited since 2020. Nevertheless, a network of anarchists and other feminists strives to ensure that those who need abortions can access them, legally or not. Now that abortion has been prohibited throughout many of the United States, as well, people in North America stand to gain from the experience of those who have already been confronting this situation for years. To learn how Polish activists use direct action and mutual aid to keep abortion accessible, we interviewed participants in this network.

Maintaining widespread access to abortion—legal or not—is crucial to saving lives and preserving the autonomy of those targeted by patriarchal power structures. It is also an essential part of the struggle to legalize abortion. As we argued in June, after the Supreme Court struck down Roe v. Wade,

Continued: https://crimethinc.com/2022/11/14/abortion-without-borders-how-feminists-and-anarchists-defy-polish-anti-abortion-laws-1

What Poland Tells America About Abortion Politics

Democrats and Republicans alike can learn from the only other country to roll back the legal right to abortion in the last 15 years.

by ELLA CREAMER
11/07/2022

It happened like this: A dogged religious right and a determined set of anti-abortion movers and shakers poured years of work into curbing abortion access. Their efforts swayed conservative politicians, who adopted opposition to abortion as a central ideological goal in a vicious culture war. They appointed conservative judges to the courts, and when the topic of abortion crossed those judges’ dockets, they made a shocking yet predictable ruling that vastly curtailed abortion access.

No, I’m not talking about the U.S. This is what happened in Poland.

Continued: https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2022/11/07/poland-america-abortion-politics-00065416

Lessons from Poland, the other developed country curtailing abortion rights

By Gordon F. Sander
June 12, 2022

Last month, when Americans were stunned to learn of a draft Supreme Court opinion to overturn Roe v. Wade, one group of people was less surprised: Polish abortion rights advocates.

“What happened with the Supreme Court is of course shocking but not a surprise to us,” said Kinga Jelinska, a member of the Polish abortion rights group Abortion Dream Team. She sees “a lot of parallels between what is happening in the U.S.” and in Poland.

Continued: https://www.washingtonpost.com/history/2022/06/12/poland-abortion-rights-history/

Poland – What it’s like to live in a country with a near total ban on abortion

As the US teeters on the brink of outlawing abortion, an expert from Poland explains the practical and emotional consequences of such a ban

Katarzyna Wężyk
7 December 2021

openDemocracy asked me, as a Pole and the author of a book about abortion, to describe what it's like to live in a country with restricted reproductive rights.

In short: it’s lonely, humiliating, dangerous to life and health, and it undermines the rule of law. And it’s expensive.

Continued: https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/5050/live-in-a-country-near-total-ban-abortion/

Poland abortion protests reflect a deep schism in country’s society

By Michael Daventry
25/11/2020

In October, Poland became the only European Union country to remove a right to legal abortion from its citizens.

The country’s top court ruled on October 22 that it was unconstitutional to abort a foetus if it had congenital defects.

Continued: https://www.euronews.com/2020/11/25/poland-abortion-protests-reflect-a-deep-schism-in-country-s-society

As Poland defies ‘European values,’ women resist on streets and online

As Poland defies 'European values,' women resist on streets and online

By Eliza Mackintosh, CNN
Wed April 22, 2020

(CNN)Marta Gorczynska got in her car and started driving.

She didn't have a destination as she passed through Warsaw's mostly deserted streets, but, just before noon last Tuesday, she got a text with directions: go to Rondo Dmowskiego.

Gorczynska, a human rights lawyer, was among a throng of protesters that used their vehicles to defy Poland's lockdown and block the main roundabout in the capital, honking their horns and shouting slogans against a citizen's bill to tighten what are already some of the most restrictive abortion laws anywhere in Europe.

Continued: https://www.cnn.com/2020/04/22/europe/poland-protest-abortion-lockdown-intl/index.html

Poland: Reject New Curbs on Abortion, Sex Ed

Poland: Reject New Curbs on Abortion, Sex Ed
Don’t Manipulate Pandemic to Endanger Women, Adolescents

April 14, 2020
Human Rights Watch

(London) – Poland’s Parliament will consider regressive legislation this week that would restrict sexual and reproductive health and rights and put the lives and well-being of women and adolescents at risk, Human Rights Watch said today. The legislation is scheduled for reading on April 15 or 16, 2020 as the country remains under a COVID-19-related state of emergency that bans group gatherings.

The bills under consideration were originally introduced in March 2018 and October 2019, and have since been stalled or not moved forward under the Parliament elected in November 2019. Both were met by street protests.

Continued: https://www.hrw.org/news/2020/04/14/poland-reject-new-curbs-abortion-sex-ed

Canada/USA – The female game designers fighting back on abortion rights

The female game designers fighting back on abortion rights
Through video games, live-action role-playing games and interactive documentaries, developers are challenging the conversation around reproductive rights

Laura Hudson
Fri 28 Jun 2019

The year is 1972. You’re part of an underground network of feminists in Chicago that provide illegal (at the time) abortion services to vulnerable, pregnant people with few options. Despite the risk of imprisonment, and the ways that your personal experiences may not always perfectly align with your activism, you persist.

It’s emotionally complicated. It’s politically fraught. It’s a live-action roleplaying game by Jon Cole and Kelley Vanda called The Abortionists, which requires three players, one facilitator, six hours and a willingness to dig deep into the painful history of reproductive rights in the United States. That history has terrifying relevance in 2019, as numerous states pass laws that put their residents in a reality where abortion is functionally illegal. Based on the real-life work of a 1970s activist group called Jane, it challenges its participants to think about the “internal landscapes” of its players, and how they deal with the larger political and personal landscape of their world.

Continued: https://www.theguardian.com/games/2019/jun/28/the-women-game-designers-fighting-back-on-abortion-rights

Poland’s abortion laws: activists blame grip of ‘hardline’ church

Campaigners believe Catholic priests are exerting political leverage to further restrict women’s reproductive rights

Carmen Fishwick

Thursday 27 October 2016 07.30 BST

“It’s a strange thing to say about a country in the middle of Europe, in the 21st century, but this is how it works – nearly all politicians here are afraid of the Catholic church,” said Anna Leszczyńska, a women’s rights activist.

Thousands of campaigners marched through Poland’s largest cities on Sunday and Monday to protest against the government’s proposals to further restrict abortion laws in the country.

[continued at link]
Source: The Guardian

27.10.2016

A discussion with the Polish Greens on abortion and women’s rights

Oct 25, 2016

Recently, Eliana Capretti from the European Green Party spoke to the leader of the Polish greens, Malgorzata Tracz, about the Black Protest and the continuing struggle for abortion rights in Poland.

The Greens are one of the main members of the “Ratujmy Kobiety” (rescue women) committee that gathered over 215,000 signatures for the liberalisation of the abortion law. When the Polish Parliament decided to proceed with the “Stop abortion” project and reject the liberalisation project “Ratujmy Kobiety”, ‘black protests’ started in Poland. This was the first time in modern Polish history that hundreds of thousands of Poles protested on the streets to protect women’s rights. The Greens took part in the main protests and demonstrations. Right now they continue fighting for the liberalisation of an abortion law and are co-organising the second “Polish women on strike” protest (second black Monday). This interview was originally published on the website of the European Greens.

[continued at post]
Source: Green European Journal

26.10.2016