Revolution #90, May 27, 2007
Battle Over Abortion Rights In U.S. and Mexico…
"Honor" Killings of Women in Iraqi Kurdistan…
Break the Chains!
From the United States to Iraqi Kurdistan to Mexico, last month was marked by events that starkly illuminated the conditions women face – conditions of forced childbirth and brutal enslavement to patriarchy.
On April 18, a ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court effectively banned an abortion procedure used after the first trimester of pregnancy. That ruling will force some women to bear children that they do not want and will force others to risk their lives and even die. And it dangerously undercuts remaining legal foundations for any right to abortion in the U.S.
One week later, on April 24, a law went into effect that legalized abortion in the first three months of pregnancy in Mexico City. As our article in this issue points out, this law—which for the first time provides any opportunity for a legal abortion anywhere in Mexico—was denounced by the Pope himself on his recent high-profile Latin America trip as a “grave moral disorder.” Powerful reactionary forces, including key U.S. puppets, have gone on the counter-attack throughout Mexico.
A day before the U.S. Supreme Court ruling, and a week before the Mexico City abortion law went into effect, a young woman named Doa Khalil Aswad was stoned to death in U.S.-occupied Iraqi Kurdistan for the “crime” of marrying a man outside her religion. Kurdistan is portrayed by the powers-that-be in this country as a model of the stability and “enlightened democracy” the U.S. can bring to the Middle East. Doa Khalil Aswad was stoned to death in public on April 17 by religious fundamentalists protected by public security forces. Her body was left in the street for days as a message to other women. And this was just one of a wave of so-called “honor killings” by forces of reactionary religious patriarchy that the U.S. has enlisted as part of its local enforcers in Iraq.
Wherever you go on this planet, you see historically outmoded forces dehumanizing, degrading, oppressing and killing women – whether in the McWorld/McCrusade of the United States or in the Jihadist Muslim fundamentalist world. What is needed, urgently, is a whole other way for humanity! A force coming forward around the world that has, as a bedrock element, complete liberation from every form of slavery and oppression, including the oppression of women.
- “Honor Killings” – Who’s to Blame? A Look at Iraqi Kurdistan
- Abortion Decriminalized in Mexico City
- The Deadly—and Patriarchal—Logic of the U.S. Supreme Court’s Decision
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