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

Abortion Without Borders helps almost 80,000 people access abortions in place of the Polish state

Thursday, October 20, 2022
Abortion Without Borders / Women Help Women

Two years on from Poland’s decision to effectively ban abortion, members of Abortion Without Borders have supported 78,000 people from Poland to access abortions safely.

In the last year, AWB has helped 44,000 people, with more than 1,200 able to terminate their pregnancies in the second trimester in clinics in other European countries.

Continued: https://womenhelp.org/en/page/1498/abortion-without-borders-helps-almost-80-000-people-access-abortions

20.10.2022

Featured

News

Abortion Dream Team

Abortion Network Amsterdam

Abortion Without Borders

‘No matter the law, no matter the stigma, no matter the cost.’ This European network helps people access abortions

Story, photographs by Kara Fox
CNN Video by Ladan Anoushfar and Louis Leeson, CNN
Wed September 28, 2022

It’s early evening in an affluent neighborhood in the Dutch city of Haarlem and bed and breakfast owners Arnoud and Marika are waiting for their next guest to arrive. They’ve prepared their single room for her, a brightly colored space with massive windows overlooking a leafy drive.

The traveller is a woman from France. She’s only staying one night, but her hosts want her to feel at home because she’s not here on vacation. She’s come to have a second-trimester abortion.

Continued: https://www.cnn.com/2022/09/28/europe/europe-abortion-travel-as-equals-intl-cmd

What the U.S. Could Learn from Abortion Without Borders

A coalition across Europe is resisting Poland’s abortion ban. Its strategy could foreshadow activism in a post-Roe America.

Anna Louie Sussman, The New Yorker
May 17, 2022

Last month, an abortion-rights activist named Justyna Wydrzyńska stood in a courtroom in Warsaw, Poland, and described her abortion. Her lips were painted a defiant red; her voice cracked at times, but she was unapologetic. When she was thirty-three, she said, she was in an abusive marriage and learned that she was pregnant. She struggled to find accurate information online and had to order three packs of abortion pills—the first two, from the black market, were duds. She was terrified that she would bleed out or fall unconscious in front of her three children, who were too young to call an ambulance. Wydrzyńska, who is forty-seven, is now part of a coalition of activists called Abortion Without Borders. She was on trial for helping another Polish woman get an abortion.

Abortion was legal when Poland was under Communist control, but, in 1993, the predominantly Catholic country outlawed most abortions, except in cases of rape, incest, severe fetal conditions, and risk to the life of the patient. As the U.S. Supreme Court considers Roe v. Wade and giving states the ability to ban abortion, the diverse, international coalition of Abortion Without Borders may model an effective approach to abortion-rights activism in a post-Roe America—and also its risks.

Continued: https://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/what-the-us-could-learn-from-abortion-without-borders

Europe – The abortion travel agents: ‘Some women know what they need, others just say: help’

With reproductive rights being increasingly restricted in Europe, people are relying on a network of volunteers to help them

Introduction Margaret Atwood
Interviews Candice Pires
Sat 19 Feb 2022

When The Handmaid’s Tale first came out in 1985, the initial response was broadly that people thought such threats to women’s bodies and reproductive rights “couldn’t happen here”. By the time it aired as a TV series in 2017, just after Donald Trump was inaugurated in the US, people were no longer so sure. With every headline about gains in reproductive rights – Ireland repealing the eighth amendment in 2018, which had effectively banned abortions – there are others that underscore how fragile these rights are, wherever you live.

Continued: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/feb/19/the-abortion-travel-agents-some-women-know-what-they-need-others-just-say-help-europe-margaret-atwood

Abortion Without Borders has helped almost 32,000 people from Poland

Abortion Without Borders (Aborcja Bez Granic)
has helped almost 32,000 people from Poland to access abortions in its second
year of existence.

Published on December 11, 2021

Abortion Without Borders is a grassroots feminist network that was launched on
11 December 2019 to help anyone in Poland access a safe abortion in Poland or
abroad. In the face of fresh attempts by Poland to criminalise women for having
abortions, Abortion Without Borders continues to help people who need support,
including 1,186 who were forced to travel to a clinic or hospital in another
country.

At least two women died this year after being denied an abortion for a
pregnancy that was threatening their lives. Poland criminalised almost all
abortions in a constitutional tribunal ruling in October 2020, and the last few
weeks have seen attempts by the Polish government to criminalise what little
abortion access remains in the country.

Continued: https://womenhelp.org/pl/page/1383/abortion-without-borders-helps-almost-32-000-polish-people-in-second

Abortion Without Borders helps more than 34,000 people in Poland access abortions

Published on October 21, 2021

A year ago – on 22 October 2020 – a Polish Constitutional Court decided
that the provision of abortion in case of foetal malformation was
unconstitutional. While the decision didn’t come into force until 27 January
2021, the change happened immediately. The next day, despite the still-valid
provision of abortion under Poland’s abortion act, the first four people
refused abortion in Polish hospitals called Abortion Without Borders for help.

Over the past 12 months Abortion Without Borders groups have helped 34,000
people from Poland to access abortion. 1080 people were able to terminate their
pregnancy in a foreign clinic in the second trimester. Financial support given
was more than 700,000 zloty/ £129,000/ €153,000.

Continued: https://www.asn.org.uk/abortion-without-borders-helps-more-than-34000-people-in-poland-access-abortions/

The mental health cost of Poland’s abortion ban

Seven months after severe restrictions against abortion came into effect, women are struggling with the emotional toll of the near-total ban.

by Ylenia Gostoli
22 Aug 2021

When Dominika Biernat took to the streets last October, joining the huge public protests against Poland’s near-total ban on abortion, little did she know that in a few months she would become one of its victims.

A single woman and a successful actress with
one of Warsaw’s most renowned theatre companies, her pregnancy was not planned.
But the father was a good friend and when she found out, the 39-year-old
thought it could be one of her last chances to become a mother.

Continued: https://www.aljazeera.com/features/2021/8/22/the-mental-health-costs-of-polands-abortion-ban

22.08.2021

Commentary

Featured

Abortion Network Amsterdam

All-Poland Women's Strike

anti-choice misogyny

Catholic Church

conscientious objection

Dominika Biernat

Dr Maciej Socha

European Court of Human Rights

European Parliament

European Parliamentary Forum on Sexual and Reproductive Rights

FEDERA

Federation of Women and Family Planning

Law and Justice party

Milena Kwiatkowska

Neil Datta

omphalocele

Ordo Iuris Institute for Legal Culture

Ordo Iuris International Law Center

Poland Constitutional Tribunal

severe fetal abnormality

travelling for abortion

Abortion Without Borders thrilled that Denmark is considering helping Polish people access abortions abroad

Published on July 20, 2021
Abortion Without Borders

Danish press reported that political parties the Red-Green Alliance and the Social Liberal Party want the Danish state to allocate DKK20 million (over €2.7 million) over four years to help people from Poland to have abortions in Denmark. If all goes to plan, the DKK20 million will go to the organisation Sex & Society, which – in cooperation with the international network Abortion Without Borders – will make abortion accessible to about 165 people per year. The proposal was also supported by the liberal-conservative Venstre party, currently the largest in opposition.

Denmark allows abortion on request until the twelfth week, unless the life or health of the pregnant person is in danger. This proposal could be particularly helpful for people given diagnoses of foetal abnormality or genetic defects in the second or third trimester of pregnancy – those people who were hit hardest by Poland’s “constitutional tribunal” (pseudo-court) decisions on 22 October 2020.

Continued: https://www.asn.org.uk/abortion-without-borders-thrilled-that-denmark-is-considering-helping-polish-people-access-abortions-abroad/

Abortion Without Borders helps more than 17,000 with abortion in six months after Polish constitutional court ruling

Published on April 22, 2021
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Exactly six months ago – on the 22nd October 2020 – the Constitutional Tribunal in Poland ruled that the performing abortion due to foetal defects in Polish hospitals is unconstitutional. Even though the decision came into force only at the end of January 2021, in practice the change worked immediately. Already on the 23rd October 2020 the first four people who had been refused abortion in Polish hospitals called Abortion Without Borders.

In the last 6 months the groups that make up Abortion Without Borders have helped thousands of people from Poland to access abortion. 597 people were able to terminate their pregnancy abroad in the second trimester. The financial support exceeded 420,000 PLN (£79,500)

Continued: https://www.asn.org.uk/press-release-abortion-without-borders-helps-more-than-17000-with-abortion-in-six-months-after-polish-constitutional-court-ruling/