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Adding to @RBraceySherman& #39;s thread:
-Abortions were legal in the U.S. until around the time of the Civil War;
-About half of the midwives up until that time were Black women;
-Drs sought to ban both midwifery & abortions, creating monopolies of wmns& #39; bodies for themselves 1/x https://twitter.com/RBraceySherman/status/1275094468731887617">https://twitter.com/RBraceySh...
-Abortions were legal in the U.S. until around the time of the Civil War;
-About half of the midwives up until that time were Black women;
-Drs sought to ban both midwifery & abortions, creating monopolies of wmns& #39; bodies for themselves 1/x https://twitter.com/RBraceySherman/status/1275094468731887617">https://twitter.com/RBraceySh...
In the U.S., racism was a significant feature of anti-abortion platforms; Dr. Horatio Storer, Joseph De Lee, and other prominent white gynecologists urged white women "spread their loins" after the Civil War. These doctors successfully lobbied for an end to abortion. 2/x
19th century gynecologists deployed racist & misogynistic stereotypes to push midwives out of their profession & to build a monopoly for themselves. They successfully used abortion as a tool to do so. They falsely claimed midwives were dangerous, unsanitary, & unskilled. 3/x
19th century (male) gynecologists wrote about their insecurities and being teased by male surgeons for doing "women& #39;s work." Here& #39;s what Joseph De Lee said: 4/x
Likely, it was all the more frustrating and infuriating for men of this new profession "gynecology" to be compared to Black women who comprised over 50% of the midwives in the U.S. prior to the Civil War. 5/x
Male gynecologists leveraged power & influence largely denied to women (including the right to vote) & appealed to the leading medical organizations and legislatures to ban both midwifery and abortions. This was not an altruistic campaign nor abt saving women& #39;s lives. 6/x
Instead, the rise of gynecology as a profession was about monopoly and rendering women& #39;s bodies in the service of men and their financial and political interests. Even Roe v. Wade, which was landmark, still preserved vestiges of this. 7/x
Today, as people debate whether anti-abortion platforms benefit Black women, the clear answer is NO. The U.S. has the highest maternal mortality rate in the developed world. 8/x
For Black women, the maternal death rate is almost 4x that of white women, nationally and 10x-17x higher in some states. Pregnancy has become a death sentence in the very states that make reproductive health care access the most fraught and hard to reach. 9/x
In the U.S., a woman is 14x more likely to die by carrying a pregnancy to term than to have an abortion. These disparities are further exacerbated when clinics that provide both pregnancy prevention care and prenatal care are forced to close. 10/x
