Reflections on the Abortion Rights Freedom Ride
October 21, 2013 | Revolution Newspaper | revcom.us
We received this article from one of the Freedom Riders.
I participated in the Fargo, ND and Wichita, KS legs of the Abortion Rights Freedom Ride, the month-long caravan in July from both coasts down the middle of the country where clinics, providers and women are most sharply under attack. What hit me most strongly while on the ride, in an increasing way, is both how needed the Freedom Ride was and how much of a fight it is going to be to make the kind of society-wide impact that can turn the tide for abortion rights, the war on women, and the emancipation of humanity. These two things are related. If it was not a state of emergency, if the thinking of the people was not so backwards and confused on the question of abortion and what it represents for women, the ride would not have been needed so urgently. I know I may be stating the obvious, but it is FUCKED UP out there; female enslavement is already in effect in many ways. Things are going to have to get a lot more polarized—with people understanding that the terms of this struggle are either female enslavement or the full liberation of women, and FIGHTING for the right to abortion based on that understanding VERY SOON—or things are going to get much worse.
This was most evident in Wichita. A woman who had had an abortion and her mother told me that “Dr. Tiller was such a nice doctor. It was so terrible, they killed him in his own church.” When I asked them what people in Wichita thought about it when Dr. Tiller was killed, the mother answered, “It was about half and half. Some people thought it was good. Other people thought it was bad.” They seemed resigned and not particularly disturbed by how extremely bad the climate is. Most people who are pro-choice (at least in some circumstances) and really would not want to see forced motherhood and a whole Dark Ages enslavement of women, have no idea that that’s where things are headed. Even those who see some of the outlines of this and hate the antis do not want to see increasing polarization, do not want to fight. They want to find some “reasonable middle ground” and hope that the most vicious attacks on women and the right to abortion somehow just go away. Troy Newman and Operation Rescue (and the forces they represent) are very clear on the fact that they are winning, and the clinic in Wichita and the pro-choice non-movement are in denial that they are not only losing, but losing by a lot—losing ground even when they manage to hold back some aspects of the attacks, at least temporarily. You really get a sense that what is going on in these states down through the middle of the country are not only NOT simply local fights, but are setting terms politically for the whole country. It’s very correct that the ARFR is fighting for people to understand the need for a national counteroffensive and doing polemics that go up against the narrow localism.
I think one of the most important things we did on the part of the ride I was on was the talk by Sunsara Taylor held at a great coffeehouse in Fargo that is known for publicly supporting the right to abortion and not backing down in the face of a boycotting campaign by the antis. The talk was on the “State of Emergency: Winning Abortion on Demand & Defeating the War on Women.” The transformation of people in the room was so evident—like you could see and hear people “getting it,” having epiphanies, being able to see in themselves how their thinking was changing since encountering these ideas and the ride. One woman ran down a conversation she had with her daughter about whether to support the Freedom Ride when it came to Fargo. She was concerned that the call for Abortion on Demand & Without Apology was too extreme. She led us through her thought process, explaining that she asked herself, “Do women need to get abortions on demand, which really means when they want and need them?” Her answer was yes. Then she asked herself, “Should women feel bad about getting abortions and have to apologize?” Her answer was no. So she summed up that she decided, “Yes, Abortion on Demand and Without Apology. That’s the way it has to be.” We should not underestimate the importance of continuing to have these longer presentations and discussions, even if it’s only a handful of people besides the riders.
A couple of us Freedom Riders had the opportunity to watch part of the BA Speaks: Revolution—Nothing Less DVD with a couple people who came to the talk and then bought the DVD and the book BAsics and stayed after the talk to have more informal discussion. One of them, a college student, said that he had an epiphany during Sunsara’s talk. He said he’d always been for equality for women and considered himself pro-choice, but that he’d never thought of what denying women the right to abortion actually was—that it would mean forced motherhood for women as a whole—and that that was a form of slavery. The other person, a young woman, when asked what stood out to her about the talk said that it was when Sunsara described what it meant for generations of girls to grow up with the assumption that their main and most important role in the world was to be a mother, and the effect it has on them when they see all women being degraded and abused and treated less than human, that it is like trying to grow a plant under a rock. She said she really felt that, that it made her reflect on how she would be different if she hadn’t grown up with those ideas, which were especially enforced in her life by her conservative Christian Catholic upbringing. These are important people—both of them were very broadminded and wanted to know how oppression could be ended. They were not heavily steeped in identity politics or looking at things from improving their own positions. The woman described doing a project about genital mutilation in other countries and not being swayed into accepting that it was okay in the name of “cultural sensitivity” or relativism. A lot of their questions centered around how you could get people to act because they feel alone in terms of wanting to do anything even though they have lots of friends who share their ideas.
We watched two parts of the Revolution—Nothing Less DVD—the parts on bourgeois democratic intellectuals thinking like serfs and the first section on strategy that starts with describing what a revolution actually is. One thing that seemed to hit at their questions in a different way was the “Fight the Power, and Transform the People, for Revolution” approach and what that has to do with bringing forward a revolutionary people. They were looking at it more as a question of what would make everyone move all at once, not necessarily seeing the importance of people like them acting on what they know and how this can grow in relationship to entering into and transforming key concentrations of social contradictions that this system continues to generate, working on them in a way that’s favorable to revolution. We also talked about the importance of what is true and basing ourselves on that instead of what’s popular or what can get the most people around something. We talked about BA (Bob Avakian) and the importance of leadership and particularly BA’s leadership, getting into their questions of who he is through talking about some of his memoir (From Ike to Mao and Beyond: My Journey from Mainstream America to Revolutionary Communist).
They both expressed a lot of appreciation and gratitude that the Abortion Rights Freedom Ride and the movement for revolution that it’s a part of came through Fargo and connected with them. We talked with them about staying connected through Revolution newspaper, how they could be a part of this movement for revolution from Fargo, the idea of showing the DVD to friends or doing a showing at the coffeehouse, and of course continuing to follow and spread the ARFR in a way that would make them virtual freedom riders. When we left, the woman said she had the next day off and planned on watching a lot more of the more of the DVD. This experience underscored to me the importance of Revolution newspaper as a collective organizer and a portal to allow people in all parts of the country to get a big picture understanding of the current system and the need for revolution.
These two people were a part of that reservoir of people that can be reached and transformed and activated to be a part of this initiative and the movement for revolution if we tell people the truth, really fighting to change what people think about abortion and women, thereby re-setting the terms of this struggle. The article at revcom.us, “Two Different Approaches, Two Different Epistemologies—Two Different Worlds,” applies to this and everything we do. I must say that Sunsara Taylor and the leadership of this Party really did a great job leading the ARFR because they fought for all of us on the ride to think and understand what the truth is in the deepest way possible so that we could base ourselves on it. It was actually a pretty solid core of freedom riders and, while it is always a pull on everything because of the society we live in, my evaluation is that due to the work of leadership and the determination and struggle of the riders themselves, we can be confident that this is a project that is not going to descend into populist ideology and just tell people what they want to hear or reflect back to people what they are already thinking. We are on fire with the truth! I’m so glad I got to participate and contribute, but beyond that, this fight needs to be WON.
One night we had a discussion that got into how changing people’s thinking is the most dynamic factor of the three objectives of the freedom ride. I agree and I think what I’ve written here are examples of why and how this is true. But one problem that needs to be solved in order to change the thinking and subsequent actions of thousands and then millions of people is the limitation on the number of people we are reaching. Most people still don’t know that the Abortion Rights Freedom Ride happened or that Stop Patriarchy (the initiative to End Pornography and Patriarchy, the Enslavement and Degradation of Women) exists. Most people have still never heard anyone speak positively about abortion or tell the truth about how bad it is and what it’s going to take to defeat the war on women. I’ve been thinking on this a lot and am just vexed as to how we can bust into the superstructure on a whole other level. Consistently being on social media allowed us at first to make a leap in the number of followers and getting the word out, but then it kind of reached a plateau and got more gradual. We need to make sure we are projecting out everything we are doing and affecting to a larger audience. Sometimes it won’t seem like it’s making that much of a difference, sometimes we won’t succeed when we know an EXCELLENT video (like the one of the Fargo rally!) needs to go viral. However, everything we’re doing to push this out in a consistent way can, at certain times in interaction with the objective factors of what else is going on in the world and other advances we’re making, make an incredible difference and break through to new sections of people or even become a mass question. If you are reading this, you can be a part of helping to spread what was accomplished and learned by the Abortion Rights Freedom Ride. You can start by sharing this article and others about the ARFR found on revcom.us. You can also retweet @StopPatriarchy on Twitter, and share Stop Patriarchy’s posts on Facebook and Tumblr.
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