We are Pro-choice and Proud Of It !
ARA fights all forms of oppression. We support a woman's right to have total control
over her body. We will fight people who try to take that basic right away. ARA sees the
anti- abortion movement as one based around silencing a woman's voice, keeping women
submissive and pushing them back into oppressive roles. A challenge to a woman's
personal reproductive choice is a challenge to her freedom... and that needs to be
confronted.
The Threat of the Christian Right....
For many people, religion is a central, helpful and supportive part of their life. However,
ARA believes that the christian right is not a religion but a powerful and dangerous
political action group that has a specific agenda- we fight the movement, not the religion.
Not only is this movement the biggest threat to women's free choice, they are also racist,
homophobic and promote hatred towords any religion aside from their own.
On the surface, the people of the chrisitian right call for a return to the traditional
family... mom,dad good kids, house, lawn. Taking it further their arguments stress that
the man's role in marriage is to make the family's money while the woman makes babies
and dinner.
Beneath this perfect picture is the fact that not that many people can fit this description
and some poeple just don't want to. This is where the christian right gets vicious. Anyone
who isn’t living their way is a threat to their movement. They're trying to roll single
moms, families without the funds for a house, mothers who have to work outside their
home, gay people who want to have children, lesbians who might not, and just about
anyone who doesn't fit their narrow definition of whats right.
The danger is that these are not just words that people of the christian right are saying.
Members of the christian right include members of congress. people editing our local
papers. mayors and governores. corporations, school boards, cops and some who work
with groups like the KKK and neo nazis. Their influence shows up in welfare cuts, anti
immigration policies, discrimination laws against lesbians and gays. Besides the legal
battle, the are strait dirty in the streets-they advocate and in many cases are the
perpetrators of abortion clinic bombings and the murders of several abortion doctors.
Their numbers are growing, drawing mostly from a white working- middle class that sees
joining as a key to the 'american ideal'. But this ideal leaves many people behind and is a
direct threat to being able to live the way you choose.
Choice Means Complete reproductive Freedom For All Women.
Being truly pro-choice goes way beyond keeping abortion legal. It means women
choosing when and with who they want to have sex, given access to accurate information
about birth-control and making all birth control (including abortion) accessible and
affordable to all women. We all know the anti-choice movement isn't 'really about life or
saving babies, the Christian Right see abortion as a tool women have used to take control
of their bodies and their lives and that's why they want to stop it, it's not even about their
fetus fetish. At the same time in the name of population control, (which was created by
rich white people who were freaked out by poor women andwomen of color "breeding")
in the US women are being forced or coerced into sterilization and pressured into
birth-control methods like depo provera and norplant without being told about the
extreme side effects they nave on our bodies. Just as we fight for the right to not be
forced into an unwanted pregnancy. we as women posses the power to reproduce and we
should fight just as nard when someone tries to take that from us. Keeping a race, culture,
or community from having children is slow genocide. Population control is aimed at
keeping poor women and Women of color from having children, and has been used to
crush social change movements. in the 50s population control pro, paganda claimed that
over population caused communism. We need to see the abortion issue for what it is, our
right to have total control over everything we do with our bodies.
We value motherhood and invision a movement where parents and children are able to
actively participate. We have mad respect for anyone willing to raise a kid in this fucked
up society. Being pro-choice is the opposite of being anti-mother it acknowleges the
awesome responsibiliy and importance of mothers. and recognizes that women should be
able decide when and if they want to take that on.
Feminism, Girls Rule.
Feminism is is a way of thinking and acting that takes into account how women are
oppressed in this society by patriarchy. Patriarchy is a wrong system that gives men
power over women. Feminists fight and struggle for women's liberation. Women define
feminism, but both women and men can be feminists.
Minneapolis Anti-Racist Action has a strong committment to building an anti-racist
movement that is also anti-sexist. All forms of oppression are interconnected and they all
need to be smashed. For example when a poor latino woman on welfare is wrongly
criminatized in this society for just struggling and trying to survive we need to see this as
racism, sex-ism, and classism all working together to keep her down. The real criminals
are the rich white men and all those who are inspired to be like them and take up their
values.
We want to build an anti-racist movement that supports women's liberation. We actively
engage in struggles against forces in our society that are trying to take away women's
freedom. We oppose the Christian Right movement and there blatant attacks on abortion
and imposition of abusive male defined family values. We oppose rape and domestic
violence and all forms of physical and mental abuse inflicted on women by fucked up
men.
We oppose images of women made by men that disrespect women's bodies and minds. In
contrast we encourage and empower young girls and women to develope skills to push
back oppression. Girls Kick Ass!
We want to build a feminist movement that is anti-racist. That means that "white" women
do not always get to define the terms of struggle and that feminism should have a deep
understanding of how class works. The realities of the particular struggles of
African-American, Native American, Latina, and Asian- American Women must be a
part of any feminist movement that is also anti-racist.
Women and young girls represent a rebellious social group in our socity. We respect and
value their contributions in society and in the anti-racist movement we are trying to build.
We recognize that women can be strong anti-racist fighters in there own right and don:t
want or need leadership from men in our scenes. We struggle to make room for women's
lives and experiences and don't focus our scenes around the interests of men. We listen to
and value womens ideas about anti-racist strategy and revolution.