MENSTRUAL EXTRACTION, ABORTION, AND THE POLITICAL CONTEXT OF FEMINIST SELF-HELP

Abstract

In 1920 Margaret Sanger called voluntary motherhood “the key to the temple of liberty” and noted that women were “rising in fundamental revolt” to claim their right to determine their own reproductive fate (Rothman, 2000, p. 73). Decades later Barbara Katz Rothman reflected on the social, political and legal changes produced by reproductive-rights feminists since that time. She wrote: So the reproductive-rights feminists of the 1970s won, and abortion is available – just as the reproductive-rights feminists of the 1920s won, and contraception is available. But in another sense, we did not win. We did not win, could not win, because Sanger was right. What we really wanted was the fundamental revolt, the “key to the temple of liberty.” A doctor’s fitting for a diaphragm, or a clinic appointment for an abortion, is not the revolution. It is not even a woman-centered approach to reproduction (2000, p. 79).

Citation

Copelton, D.A. (2004), "MENSTRUAL EXTRACTION, ABORTION, AND THE POLITICAL CONTEXT OF FEMINIST SELF-HELP", Texler Segal, M., Demos, V. and Jacobs Kronenfeld, J. (Ed.) Gendered Perspectives on Reproduction and Sexuality (Advances in Gender Research, Vol. 8), Emerald Group Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. 129-164. https://doi.org/10.1016/S1529-2126(04)08005-1