Reproductive Justice Reimagined: Centering Equity, Consent, and Healing in Sexual Assault Awareness Month
By YWCA Clark County’s Prevention team
While April 1st is often thought of as the day of silly pranks and fun jokes, it also has another significant meaning as the start of Sexual Assault Awareness Month. Every April, the YWCA Clark County Prevention Program hosts and collaborates with community partners to put on programming and raise awareness around sexual assault. This year, our program is choosing to highlight Reproductive Justice as part of Sexual Assault Awareness Month.
Reproductive Justice can often be incorrectly pigeonholed into being solely about a woman’s right to decide if/when they’d like to have children. A big part of this assumption is due to the long and complex history of the fight for reproductive rights in the United States. At the outset of the reproductive rights movement, the focus had largely and solely been securing legal protections for women seeking abortions. This purpose, while initially well intentioned, became muddied as these efforts began to exclude the needs and concerns of Black and Latinx women. As such, in 1997, sixteen different BIPOC-women-led reproductive health organizations came together to build the reproductive justice framework. This framework was made with the specific intention of making reproductive healthcare equitable and accessible for all.
Currently, reproductive justice is about far more than just the right to choose and impacts more than just cisgender women.
“Reproductive Justice can best be defined as a holistic framework that acknowledges the role race, gender, sexual orientation, and socioeconomic status play in reproductive healthcare and policy and seeks to make reproductive healthcare equitable.”
In less academic terms, reproductive justice acknowledges that in order to make reproductive healthcare safe and accessible for all, we need to look at all the parts of life that impact our reproductive health. Today, reproductive justice also includes focusing on consent, boundaries, healthy relationship skills, and safety from intimate partner violence. Acknowledging how that trauma impacts reproductive health, and even further, impacts long term health and family planning should be an integral part of creating informed reproductive healthcare policy that serves all communities. Likewise, it is deeply important to recognize that the unique barriers that BIPOC and LGBTQ+ communities experience when fleeing domestic violence are also similarly reflected in their experiences when accessing reproductive healthcare.
Barriers to timely, trauma-informed, and respectful care have facilitated a deep culture of mistrust and fear among BIPOC and LGBTQ+ communities when it comes to healthcare, most especially reproductive healthcare. This culture of mistrust has not been unfounded as Black maternal mortality rates have routinely been significantly higher than that of white mothers and LGBTQ+ barriers to family planning are based in both receiving adequate care and legal barriers/challenges to LGBTQ+ rights. In fact, this culture of mistrust and fear has served to protect these communities from various harms (intentional and unintentional) that have been inflicted on their communities as it relates to healthcare. However, as a result of this culture of mistrust, BIPOC and LGBTQ+ communities are also missing out on valuable resources, tools, and supports in their reproductive health journey that they need and deserve. The reality is that changing this culture of harm and mistrust will take intentional work from all of the community to build a reproductive healthcare system that prioritizes the patient’s needs over profit or political neutrality. To repair the harm, we must first acknowledge the harm that’s been caused and then seek to correct ourselves.
As part of that effort, the YWCA Clark County Prevention Team will be hosting a Safe Sex Kit Assembly Party on Tuesday, April 29th from 6-8 PM where we’ll creating inclusive safe sex kits to distribute to community organizations and community members. If you’re interested in participating, please register.
To learn more about the Reproductive Justice Framework (copied below) or for resources to share with youth, please feel free to check out any of the resources below:
The Reproductive Justice Framework:
Access to abortion services
Access to contraception
Comprehensive sex education
Prevention and care for STIs
Adequate prenatal and pregnancy care
Adequate wages to support families
Domestic violence assistance
Safe homes
Book List:
Undivided Rights: Women of Color Organize for Reproductive Justice by Marlene Gerber Fried, Elena Gutiérrez, Loretta Ross, and Jael Silliman (Adult – Non-Fiction)
Decolonizing the Body: Healing, Body-Centered Practices for Women of Color to Reclaim Confidence, Dignity, and Self-Worth by Kelsey Blackwell (YA & Adult – Non-Fiction)
Hood Feminism: Notes from the Women that a Movement Forgot by Mikki Kendall (Adult – Non-Fiction) (Available at FVRL Libraries)
The Pride Guide: A Guide to Sexual and Social Health for LGBTQ Youth by Jo Langford (YA & Adult – Non-Fiction) (Available at FVRL Libraries)
Let’s Talk About Down There by Dr. Jennifer Lincoln (Youth – Non-Fiction) (Available at FVRL Libraries)
Life Isn’t Binary by Meg-John Barker (YA & Adult – Non-Fiction) (Available at FVRL Libraries)