For want of a goddess

The news of Alito's terrible, awful, disgusting draft decision has enraged me, as well as every woman I know. Like many of you I remember a time before Roe, when both birth control and abortion were illegal and women were forced into terrifying decisions that left too many dead or sterile for life, or with a child to raise or, just as heart-wrenching, to give away. I knew such women and I saw how those agonizing decisions changed their lives forever. We cannot go back.

Alito and his crazy cohorts want to return women to those dark days. If not changed materially, this draft decision will repeal a half-century old law that finally gave women the constitutional right to make decisions for themselves about their own bodies and their own autonomy. Shockingly, Alito's draft decision does not bother to mention women and their rights and concerns, or the burden of carrying a baby to full term. There is no empathy for a raped child forced to bear another child and perhaps die as a result. Nor is there a reference to the rapist or any term in hell recommended for him. Instead he says "Roe was egregiously wrong from the start."

Unfortunately this ruling is based on the 14th amendment* of the Constitution that assumes our liberties include personal privacy. The right to abortion, to birth control, to marrying whomever you choose and other non delineated liberties, all rely on that same amendment. So it is not just women who should be outraged. This is the first time in history that a constitutional freedom has been taken away. If religious conservatives remain in control of Congress and the Supreme Court it will not be the last.

Maybe it's time to bring back the goddess. Cast your imagination back several thousand years to a culture that was matrilineal, with children inheriting through their mother and women having equal or dominant roles in and out of the home. Many women of this period were renowned philosophers, physicians, scientists, and leaders. They had bodily autonomy (and yes abortions were known and available), could move about as they chose, and were not required to veil or hide or demean themselves. That came later, a gift of patriarchy and male power.

What I find most disturbing about this whole conversation is the outright arrogance of men—who know nothing about what it feels like to live in a female body—thinking they have the right to order women to bear unwanted children. As Vice President Harris said, "How dare they?"

I am so pissed. It's time to reclaim our heritage.

* The relative Section 1 of the 14th Amendment states: All persons born or naturalized in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the Unites States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States, nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws. [ratified July 9, 1868]