As Many as 16% of People Having Abortions Do Not Identify as Heterosexual Women

LGBTQ+ Patients Face Overlapping Barriers to Care

Doris W. Chiu, Emma Stoskopf-Ehrlich, Rachel K. Jones, Guttmacher Institute
June 14, 2023

At a time when conservative state policymakers are launching coordinated attacks on reproductive and LGBTQ+ rights, data on the intersecting identities targeted by these types of legislation are especially important. Prior research has found that there is diversity in sexual orientation and gender identity among people who have abortions in the United States.

Continued: https://www.guttmacher.org/2023/06/many-16-people-having-abortions-do-not-identify-heterosexual-women

14.06.2023

Research

Abortion Patient Survey

gender-affirming care

Guttmacher Institute

transgender healthcare

How GOP efforts to restrict trans rights take a page from the antiabortion playbook

BY ARIT JOHN
JUNE 7, 2023

WASHINGTON — Bans on treatment. New laws threatening doctors with malpractice suits and criminal charges. Praise from lawmakers who say their legislation is meant to protect minors, even as the new policies infringe on the rights of adults.

As state legislatures wind down and the 2024 election cycle kicks off, the similarities between the fights for abortion access and transgender rights have come into stark focus. Republican lawmakers have introduced a record number of bills at the state level and in Congress that would restrict the rights of transgender people and the healthcare they receive.

Continued: https://www.latimes.com/politics/story/2023-06-07/wave-of-anti-trans-laws-reminds-advocates-of-another-struggle-abortion-rights

USA – The Shared Anti-Trans and Anti-Abortion Playbook

Some of the very groups that pushed for abortion bans are now coming for trans health care.

By Irin Carmon
Apr 4, 2023

A self-described whistleblower touting her progressive bona fides, claiming patients are being harmed by rapacious medical providers with no regard for informed consent or side effects. A cadre of former patients stating their regret, claiming the existing research on side effects and outcomes is doctored or misrepresented. Conservative legislators swooping in to purportedly protect these patients from themselves or from greedy doctors, lingering on whatever graphic details they can get their hands on. Centrists, and some liberals, wondering aloud if the strident defense of this health care may be political poison for Democrats, and anyway, surely there’s a middle ground to which only the truly reasonable and unemotional folks can lead us. In the meantime, people who can’t afford to get on a plane to a less hostile state are trapped unless grassroots funds come through, and even helping someone get care can put you in the crosshairs. All of this describes Abby Johnson…

Continued: https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2023/04/anti-trans-anti-abortion-activism-playbook.html

The language we use to talk about pregnancy and abortion is changing. But not everyone welcomes the shift

By Harmeet Kaur, CNN
Sun September 4, 2022

Across the US, mainstream institutions such as the American Civil Liberties Union, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and CNN are increasingly opting for gender-neutral terms such as "pregnant people," "people who get abortions" and "birthing parent" in favor of "women" when referencing pregnancy, fertility and abortion.

These shifts in terminology signal an effort to be inclusive of transgender and nonbinary people who can also get pregnant. But the changes have also prompted pushback -- not just from Republican politicians who are openly hostile to LGBTQ people but also from some cisgender women (women whose gender identity conforms with the sex they were assigned at birth) who consider themselves LGBTQ allies and who support abortion rights.

Continued: https://www.cnn.com/2022/09/04/us/abortion-pregnant-people-women-language-wellness-cec/index.html

USA – ‘We’re a part of this movement, too.’ Transgender and nonbinary people say they feel excluded from the abortion fight

By Jacquelyne Germain, CNN
Sat August 27, 2022

Mikiko Galpin still feels the impact of being sexually assaulted by someone he thought he could trust -- and the tough decisions he was forced to make after multiple pregnancy scares.

When Roe v. Wade was overturned in June, it was a sad and heavy moment for the 29-year-old transgender man. He was taken back to the first time he took a pregnancy test prior to transitioning. He recalls crying in the passenger seat of a friend's car at 2 a.m. trying to search for a pharmacy that was still open so he could buy a pregnancy test.

Continued: https://www.cnn.com/2022/08/27/us/transgender-nonbinary-abortion-reproductive-care-reaj/index.html

USA – Trans Men Talk About Why They Got Abortions

“If I got pregnant, I would not live through that experience.”

Hallie Lieberman, BuzzFeed News Contributor
August 15, 2022

In 2012, Oliver, then a 19-year-old living in Missouri, found out he was pregnant. “It was really surreal for me. And I think that being trans kind of complicated that surrealness,” Oliver said. (Last names have been withheld throughout this story to protect people’s privacy.) “I didn’t really know that trans people existed, so I didn’t know why I had dysphoria. ... I just knew that anytime my body did something that was considered female, it was confusing and uncomfortable for me.”

It didn’t take Oliver long to make a decision. “It kind of felt like a life-ending situation because ... I couldn’t afford to feed myself a lot of the time. When you’re in a situation like that abortion was the definite answer,” he said. His boyfriend at the time agreed; he already had a kid and couldn’t keep up with the child support payments. Oliver was also estranged from his parents, who he says were abusive. He was struggling financially and began looking online for abortion providers, but feared he wouldn’t be able to afford the abortion. “I was too scared to ask people for help, and I was really young and just kind of stupid, honestly,” he said. He borrowed about $400 — most of it from his 15-year-old sister. “She had saved it up for Christmas [presents], which is really crazy and sad but very lifesaving and awesome at the same time.”

Continued: https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/hallielieberman/trans-men-abortion-rights-roe

15.08.2022

Commentary

Featured

Aspen Ruhlin

Mabel Wadsworth Center

transgender healthcare

42 States Have Considered or Passed Anti-Abortion or Anti-Trans Laws This Year

Is your state anti-abortion? It’s probably anti-trans, too.

By Neda Toloui-Semnani
May 24, 2022

“I'm devastated and frustrated and losing sleep. I’m worried out of my mind about it,” said Myriam Reynolds, a Texas resident and mother of a 17-year-old transgender child.

Reynolds and her children live about 30 minutes north of Dallas. A few months ago, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, a Republican, issued an executive order that directed the state’s child welfare agency to investigate parents and guardians who’ve helped secure gender-affirming care for their trans children. Since then, Reynolds told VICE News, it’s been “absolutely horrible.” The state’s Supreme Court upheld the order in May, allowing the agency to open new investigations of child abuse into these families.

https://www.vice.com/en/article/y3vamy/states-with-anti-abortion-trans-laws

USA – Flurry of New Laws Move Blue and Red States Further Apart

A wave of legislation, particularly in the West, is making states “not only a little different but radically different,” says one expert on government.

By Shawn Hubler and Jill Cowan
April 3, 2022

SACRAMENTO — After the governor of Texas ordered state agencies to investigate parents for child abuse if they provide certain medical treatments to their transgender children, California lawmakers proposed a law making the state a refuge for transgender youths and their families.

When Idaho proposed a ban on abortions that empowers relatives to sue anyone who helps terminate a pregnancy after six weeks, nearby Oregon approved $15 million to help cover the abortion expenses of patients from out-of-state.

Continued: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/04/03/us/state-laws-republican-democrat-division.html

“Left out of the conversation”: Transgender Texans feel the impact of state’s restrictive abortion law

While Texas’ controversial abortion law strictly refers to women in its phrasing, it also limits access to the procedure for transgender and nonbinary people who are able to become pregnant.

BY NEELAM BOHRA
DEC. 21, 2021

Samson Winsor moved across the country from Utah to Austin in 2019, hoping he would feel less out of place. The Texas capital city had creative opportunities and cheaper living costs than places like Los Angeles and New York City while still having a substantial population of transgender people to support his identity as a transgender man.

But Winsor said he’s still afraid. Weeks after having sex with someone, he noticed his menstrual period was late. While his hormone therapy affected the consistency of his periods, he worried about the possibility of being pregnant. Winsor anxiously awaited test results, recognizing how limited his options would be if he were pregnant.

Continued: https://www.texastribune.org/2021/12/21/texas-abortion-law-transgender-pregnancy/

Opinion – Only women have abortions

Womanhood is a question of material reality, not identity.

Ann Furedi
30th September 2021

Following a barrage of criticism, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) has apologised for revising an iconic speech by the late Supreme Court justice, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, to fit with today’s woke-speak.

At RBG’s confirmation hearing in 1993, a time when anti-choice activism was rife in the US, she was asked about her position on abortion. She did not mince her words:

Continued: https://www.spiked-online.com/2021/09/30/only-women-have-abortions/

30.09.2021