Without Apology: The Abortion Struggle Now - Jenny Brown

Published in 2019 by Verso, Brooklyn, NY and London, UK

208 pages

ISBN: 978-1-78873-584-1

LCCN: 2019016599

LCC: HQ767.5.U5 B785 2019

On Friday, June 24th, 2022, The Supreme Court of the United States voted in a 6-3 decision to overturn Roe vs. Wade. Fulfilling the prolonged and relentless efforts of conservative organizations such as the Federalist Society, the overturning of Roe v. Wade rips away federal protection of abortion rights, immediately stripping the rights of childbearing individuals to make their own reproductive health decisions in thirteen states, with more states likely to follow. Conservatives celebrated this as a victory for the rights of the unborn while simultaneously blocking the expansion of healthcare rights, access to mandated maternity/paternity leave, and other measures that would also be considered “pro-life.” Liberals, on the other hand, were inexplicably shocked that, after decades of failing to codify Roe, their milquetoast political positions were swiftly steamrolled by the relentless mobilization of conservative forces to overtake the Supreme Court. 

Abortion is a topic that, at least on the surface, seems to be deeply divisive along partisan lines. Abortion was the first hot-button political issue that I remember hearing about as a child. When I was in the first grade, the 2000 election between George W. Bush and Al Gore was in full swing. At the time, my parents had placed my sister and me at a Christian elementary school, and inevitably, in the ever-intertwining relationship between politics and religion, the topic of the election came up among teachers and students. One of my peers mentioned that their mother refused to vote for the Democrats, since “Al Gore wants to kill babies.” 

Since I was not that far removed from being a baby myself, this left an indelible impression on my young mind, an impression that continued until my late teenage years. In the rural Southern community where I was raised, Democrats were labeled “baby killers,” which was a difficult thought to overcome as I matured in my political awareness. It was only when I began to dig deeper and listen to the stories of the women around me that I began to slowly change my perspective. But as someone who grew up within the conservative anti-abortion movement, I found that the Supreme Court’s recent decision, while undoubtedly setting a dangerous precedent (as the opinion of Clarence Thomas reveals), was not particularly surprising, especially given the Federalist Society’s infiltration of the Supreme Court. 

Those of us in the United States must now contend with the fact that we officially live in a post-Roe America. Many Americans are left wondering how we got here, and what steps can be taken to fight for the reproductive rights of childbearing individuals. In her 2019 book, Without Apology: The Abortion Struggle Now, feminist activist and organizer Jenny Brown examines the history of abortion in America, analyzes the current issues within the “pro-choice” movement, and what we can do to rebuild a fierce feminist movement that can win reproductive freedom for all. 

Overview:

In this fast-paced and ambitious volume, Brown provides a succinct overview of the history of abortion rights in America, ultimately making the argument that abortions should be free and on-demand without any restrictions. She points out that abortions were legal and common in America in the late 19th century, as it was believed that personhood did not begin until the “quickening” or when the woman first feels the fetus move in her belly (typically around 15-20 weeks). It was only in 1873 that it became outlawed in the US, as white male elites began to worry about population decline and the economic independence of women. These laws disproportionately affected Black and Hispanic women, whose bodies have been subject to policing and regulation since before the nation’s founding. 

Brown then recounts the stories of women who were forced to procure abortions while it was illegal. With no other form of recourse, women with the economic means to do so were forced to go to underground abortion providers (a famous example being Frank Sinatra’s mother, Dolly), each with varying levels of expertise. This precarity led many women to undergo procedures with untrained “physicians” who could often do more harm than good, sometimes even leading to the woman’s death due to infection. Yet, Brown draws inspiration from groups such as the Jane Collective, which worked to provide low-and-middle-income women with private, safe, and affordable abortions. 

She also recounts the radical work of the Redstockings, a radical feminist organization that utilized consciousness-raising to fight for women’s liberation in the late 1960s. Drawing from these women’s stories and actions, she shows how they tirelessly and uncompromisingly fought for equal access to abortion care, and how these demands were gradually worn down in the ensuing decades after Roe v Wade. She lambasts the failure of Democrats to make meaningful progress on protecting abortion rights, as they have repeatedly ceded ground to Republican demands, such as exemptions and limits on who is eligible to receive an abortion. Democrats have also given into the conservative emphasis of abortion as a wholly tragic and traumatizing event, while also shifting abortion from a collective political struggle that affects us all to an individual’s personal choice. 

One of Brown’s most clear targets is this liberal adoption of “choice” as a leading signifier for abortion rights. For Brown, the problem with labeling abortion as merely a personal choice is multifaceted: 1) it becomes a way to not say the word “abortion,” softening the blow and obscuring what is demanded from abortion-rights activists, and 2) it presents abortion as solely a personal decision, rather than a political struggle. From Brown’s perspective, if we are trying to overcome the shame of abortion, then unabashedly saying the word with boldness is a good place to start. By having women boldly tell the stories of their abortions, Brown hopes to destigmatize and remove the shame that so often surrounds the topic. 

In the last section of the book, Brown lays out several lessons that abortion rights activists can use to help them win again. Using her own experience as an organizer that successfully fought to make the morning-after pill an over-the-counter drug, she shows how dues-paying feminist organizations can make a difference in securing access to affordable and safe abortion care. She also draws on the collective experience of black feminists and their fights for reproductive justice over the centuries as a key example of how abortion care is an intersectional and multifaceted issue, touching on all aspects of society. Finally, Brown uses the recent mass movement referendum in Ireland to repeal the Eighth Amendment (which forbade abortion across the county) as a prime example of how mass organizations can successfully enact social and political change. Brown believes that this struggle can be revived in the United States as well, as free access to abortion and birth control are central to the struggle for women’s freedom. 

Commendations: 

Given the Supreme Court’s recent ruling to overturn Roe v. Wade, it has arguably never been more important to learn about the struggle for abortion rights in the United States. Without Apology is a quick, concise, and passionate plea for the reader to join in the fight for reproductive rights. Brown writes in easy-to-understand, straightforward, and conversational language, which makes this an easily accessible primer into the history of abortion and the fight for reproductive rights in the United States. Her bold and unapologetic language will be striking to most readers, but it also helps to break the taboo of talking about abortion and gives the text a deep sense of urgency. She also rightly emphasizes the lived experiences of women who tell their stories of their abortions, which makes her account much more visceral and relevant to the average reader. 

Along with Brown, I fully agree that Republicans have been setting the rules of engagement for the abortion debate, with Democrats continually acquiescing to their demands. While Brown doesn’t mention this historical development, Evangelical Christians were relatively unbothered by Roe v Wade in the immediate aftermath of its ruling. To be anti-abortion was seen as a distinctly Catholic voter issue at the time, as Evangelicals had been much more concerned with desegregation and their perceptions of governmental overreach in the prior decade. The Republican establishment needed another wedge issue to mobilize voters who were growing concerned with their loss of power in the wake of tumultuous social changes, such as the increasing roles of women and racial/sexual minorities in society. Thus, with a newly mobilized evangelical Moral Majority gaining ever more political power (culminating in the Reagan administration), restrictions began to become imposed on the legal right to abortion and the role of the federal government in funding them, as exemplified in the Hyde Amendment. 

These restrictions (ie. allowing abortion only up to six weeks) and exemptions (such as allowing it only in the case of rape or incest) are next to useless, as many women do not know they are even pregnant at six weeks and cases of rape and incest can spend months in litigation, effectively wasting precious time in which a woman can access abortion services. Making abortions illegal does not make the number of abortions performed decrease; it only increases the number of women who will suffer and die as a result of being forced to seek out dangerous abortions or from complications resulting from being forced to carry out their pregnancy (such as ectopic pregnancy, continued sexual and domestic abuse from an abusive husband/partner, etc). Brown correctly points out that abortion is not always an emotionally overwrought, traumatic event, but that many women can feel relief afterward. This trope of abortion as an exclusively heartrending event is a right-wing obfuscation of the diversity of women’s experiences, with Democrats also buying into this common, reductionist narrative.  

Brown does well to highlight the various ways in which the mainstream liberal political discourse has continually capitulated to right-wing demands, often couching abortion in terms such as “choice” and “privacy.” In my perspective, the debate around abortion cannot be centered around the issue of rights, which is confined to the question of legality. Rather, we should talk about it in terms of dignity, and what it means to live with dignity in a collective society. When liberals boil the issue down to one of personal choice, they are ultimately making an individualist, neoliberal argument. We should instead ask ourselves what a dignified public space should look like, and how we can achieve dignity for all people. This moves us away from the particularist demands of the stagnant politics that define our current era and moves us toward the universal. This is the site of political struggle today. 

As Brown points out, we should not only be fighting to secure the right to abortion but rather see reproductive justice as including the ability to have and raise kids (providing a living wage, affordable housing, etc). This is often viewed as being too expensive, but if conservatives truly want to reduce the number of abortions, then potential mothers must have the economic and social support necessary to raise them. We should be building a collective society of dignity, where women who do not want to be mothers have access to free birth control and abortions, while others who do wish to build a family are supported through social services. As such, free and on-demand abortions should be a part of a larger Universal Healthcare that functions to serve all people, regardless of background, means, or preexisting conditions. 

One of Brown’s strongest points within this slim volume is her consistency in connecting reproductive rights to other working-class issues. Despite the pro-choice’s emphasis on individual choice and privacy, we must realize that we are all interconnected. No one is an island, and, as a collective society, what happens to one of us will inevitably impact the rest. Brown deftly connects the abortion struggle to the more universal struggle of labor under capitalism, as she writes, “reproductive justice argues that abortion and birth control can’t be understood separately from housing, jobs, wages, health care, policing, racial and sexual hierarchies, immigration, and environmental health” (127). If abortion rights are to be restored in American society, they must be connected to the economic liberation of women and other marginalized individuals. 

Finally, Brown points us toward direct, concrete actions that we can take to once again win the abortion struggle. By refusing to give into incremental concessions and instead taking direct action, those of us who fight for reproductive justice can make real and lasting changes. Taking the recent Ireland referendum to repeal the Eighth Amendment as a prime example, Brown believes that, with the power of women sharing their experiences of abortion, we can once again take control of our reproductive labor. By grounding her strategy in real examples of victories in America and abroad, Brown makes a convincing case.

Critique:

On the other hand, the only ones who will be convinced by Brown’s polemic will be those who are already incensed and outraged at the current state of abortion rights in America. Brown’s uncompromising and blunt language, while bold and passionate, can often shock the average reader. For example, in her rhetoric, Brown advocates for abortion as a form of birth control, lightly deriding those who believe that it shouldn’t be cavalierly used in this manner. While I recognize her broader point in historically tying abortion restrictions to similar measures against birth control, this strategy runs the risk of alienating many readers who may be on the fence or have mixed feelings about abortion in the first place. Similarly, while Brown briefly acknowledges that trans men and nonbinary people need access to abortions as well, she exclusively utilizes gender-exclusive language throughout the rest of the text. While this was no doubt done to make the text more accessible in terms of reading, it also highlights Brown’s failure to connect the abortion struggle to queer liberation movements. 

To be completely transparent, despite my leftist orientation, I still often have mixed feelings about abortion, which a majority of Americans also share. As someone who was deeply instilled with the anti-abortion perspective for much of my life, I would be lying if I said that it is easy for me to rewire those circuits in my brain that immediately connect the beginning of personhood and life to conception. I still view abortion as not something to be taken lightly, but rather as an unfortunate but inevitable consequence of a deeply and systemically unequal society. Of course, as a cis man, I will never have to personally experience the effects of anti-abortion legislation. I fully recognize my limited perspective on this issue, and I know that my position could be seen as one of compromise and contradiction. In this way, Brown’s work challenged me to think in a radically different way than how I did growing up as a conservative. However, in large part due to its short length, Without Apology loses nuance, including the ideological framework of the pro-life movement. 

Brown assumes that most Republicans argue against abortion because they want to control women when most pro-life people I know genuinely believe that it is equivalent to murder. It matters little that there is a cognitive dissonance between the valuative status of the unborn and the inherent value of the mother. To paraphrase Methodist pastor Dave Barnhart, the unborn are easy to advocate for because they make no demands and do not force us to examine our prejudices or wealth. Yet they also allow the conservatives to claim the moral high ground, despite their refusal to support pregnant women and their children after they are born. No matter what argument one tries to make in favor of abortion, conservatives will always bring it into the discourse of morality. 

Accordingly, Brown does not take into account the role of projection and enjoyment in pro-life rhetoric, which often harbors resentment and judgment toward those whom they perceive as possessing a fully liberated and unconstrained enjoyment of free sex. By depriving the Other of their enjoyment, an excess of pleasure (or what Lacan called jouissance) is generated in the anti-abortionist. The conservative anti-abortionist is thus caught in a paradox: depending on the situation, pregnancy is both a beautiful gift from God to a married couple and a punishment that must be unequally borne by the “promiscuous” woman for the sin of sex outside of the boundaries of marriage. Often, conservatives conjure up the caricature of a woman who chooses to have an abortion as a way to avoid responsibility for their actions. In this view, the woman is perceived to be enjoying freedom without sacrifice, or in a way stealing enjoyment (often at their own, the “honest, hardworking taxpayer’s,” expense). 

Thus, I don’t think that Brown’s strategy of consciousness-raising as a sufficient radical praxis holds water. Yes, shouting about one’s abortion can be deeply empowering to women and help to remove the shame that surrounds abortion. Yet, this shamelessness translates into a form of excess enjoyment. The conservative views this liberation as a form of non-castration, which while illusionary, ultimately engenders envy and anger. By recognizing this false impression (ie. the Other is a subject wholly without lack and enjoys without restraint) we can begin to build a universal struggle against the forces of capitalism, which is the most pressing source of contradiction that drives our desire today. 

Likewise, as Brown makes clear, we need to raise awareness of the issues that have been wrought by late-stage capitalism to generate a popular mass movement. Yet, in the face of a deeply partisan Supreme Court and a legislature chained to the demands of capital, it is difficult to imagine a way forward without also seizing the levers of legislative power. This is especially true in the United States, where the Left, while slowly resurging, is still deeply fractured and largely unorganized. To do so, we must build a broad coalition of anti-capitalist organizations that can resist and offer an alternative vision of a collective, dignified public space.

Conclusion:

Overall, Without Apology is a quick and accessible account of the abortion struggle throughout American history, as well as a bold strategic plan for ways abortion rights activists can organize and continue the fight for reproductive justice today. While Brown’s uncompromising and direct language can alienate all but the most like-minded, her work serves as a challenging and much-needed critique of the stunted political discourse around reproductive rights. As such, no matter where you stand on the issue of abortion in America, Brown’s honest and refreshing account is a necessary read, especially in a post-Roe America.