As a nursing major, we learned briefly about Margaret Sanger as a women’s rights activist and founder of Planned Parenthood. However, it’s interesting that her racist beliefs leading to the finding of Planned Parenthood is not mentioned. Margaret Sanger wanted to advocate for abortions on African-Americans in order to obliterate “socially undesirable people” as she stated. Margaret did not want to create choices for all women. She wanted to “exterminate the negro population”. How can feminist expect for blacks to feel welcomed and associated with such movement with a dark history of racism? There are feminist women who still have this deep seated racist feeling that makes racial identity more essential to every encounter with a minority race.
Safi Parker
Safi,
ReplyDeleteThis is such an important point. Did you read about this or know about this outside of this class? How? Because this is exactly what Angela Davis will say when you read her later in the semester. It is a big part of the reproductive justice movement to recognize and learn from the mistakes of the previous birth control movement. I wonder, though, if we should teach Sanger in Women's and Gender Studies classes, given her racism. There are other feminists who fought for women's rights during that time who did not align with racist movements. Emma Goldman is a great example. At the same time, teaching Sanger allows me to teach Davis....
-Lisa