The Journey That Matters: What It Was Like, Directed and Produced by Arwen Curry, Featuring Ursula K. Le Guin [reading her essay 'What is Was Like' (2004), in Words Are My Matter. Writings About Life and Books, 2000-2016, Small Beer Press, 2016], 2023 [Literary Hub]

Cinematographer: Jeff Streich Editors: Maya Curry, Sarah Cannon Composer: Will Fritch Location Sound: Anna Rieke Motion Graphics: Alexandra Petrus, Kia Simon

Archival footage and stills: The Ursula K. Le Guin Foundation; Schlesinger Library, Harvard Radcliffe Institute

What It Was Like A talk given at a meeting of Oregon NARAL in January 2004 «My friends at NARAL asked me to tell you what it was like before Roe vs. Wade. They asked me to tell you what it was like to be twenty and pregnant in 1950 and when you tell your boyfriend you're pregnant, he tells you about a friend of his in the army whose girl told him she was pregnant, so he got all his buddies to come and say, "We all fucked her, so who knows who the father is?" And he laughs at the good joke. They asked me to tell you what it was like to be a pregnant girl—we weren't "women" then—a pregnant college girl who, if her college found out she was pregnant, would expel her, there and then, without plea or recourse. What it was like, if you were planning to go to graduate school and get a degree and earn a living so you could support yourself and do the work you loved—what it was like to be a senior at Radcliffe and pregnant and if you bore this child, this child which the law demanded you bear and would then call "unlawful," "illegitimate," this child whose father denied it, this child which would take from you your capacity to support yourself and do the work you knew it was your gift and your responsibility to do: What was it like? I can hardly imagine what it's like to live as a woman under Fundamentalist Islamic law. I can hardly remember now, fifty-four years later, what it was like to live under Fundamentalist Christian law. Thanks to Roe vs. Wade, none of us in America has lived in that place for half a lifetime. But I can tell you what it is like, for me, right now. It's like this: If I had dropped out of college, thrown away my education, depended on my parents through the pregnancy, birth, and infancy, till I could get some kind of work and gain some kind of independence for myself and the child, if I had done all that, which is what the anti-abortion people want me to have done, I would have borne a child for them, for the anti-abortion people, the authorities, the theorists, the fundamentalists; I would have borne a child for them, their child. But I would not have borne my own first child, or second child, or third child. My children. The life of that fetus would have prevented, would have aborted, three other fetuses, or children, or lives, or whatever you choose to call them: my children, the three I bore, the three wanted children, the three I had with my husband—whom, if I had not aborted the unwanted one, I would never have met and married, because he would have been a Fulbright student going to France on the Queen Mary in 1953 but I would not have been a Fulbright student going to France on the Queen Mary in 1953. I would have been an "unwed mother" of a three-year-old in California, without work, with half an education, living off her parents, not marriageable, contributing nothing to her community but another mouth to feed, another useless woman. But it is the children I have to come back to, my children Elisabeth, Caroline, Theodore, my joy, my pride, my loves. If I had not broken the law and aborted that life nobody wanted, they would have been aborted by a cruel, bigoted, and senseless law. They would never have been born. This thought I cannot bear. I beg you to see what it is that we must save, and not to let the bigots and misogynists take it away from us again. Save what we won: our children. You who are young, before it's too late, save your children.» – Ursula K. Le Guin, Words Are My Matter. Writings About Life and Books, 2000-2016, Small Beer Press, Easthampton, MA, 2016

If there’s one thing pro choicers love more than abortion, it’s ableism!

Corina, Kim Gordon, Lady Miss Kier, MC Lyte, Kate Pierson, Crystal Waters, and Tina Weymouth for NARAL (1991)

I’ve got two new designs up on my store based on the historic connection between witchcraft, occultism, and abortion. All proceeds from the sale of these products will be donated to pro-choice action funds. 

The first design (white mug) benefits Planned Parenthood, while the second design (black mug) benefits NARAL Pro Choice America. Both designs are available as a coffee mug, a cloth face mask, a tote bag, a sticker, and a shirt or tank top from S to 3XL. 

You can buy them from my merch store. 

Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine v. FDA Court Case

Access to mifepristone could be eradicated in every single state in the country, including in states where the right to abortion is protected—amounting to a backdoor nationwide ban on medication abortion.

Last updated: 2/7/23. This is an ongoing case—we’ll periodically update this page with the latest updates.

The Case Anti-choice groups filed a federal lawsuit in a Texas district court challenging the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in its decades-old approval of mifepristone, one of the two medications typically used to provide medication abortion care. The lawsuit seeks to revoke the FDA’s approval of mifepristone in an attempt to effectively ban medication abortion nationwide.

Timeline The Trump-appointed federal judge could issue his ruling as early as Friday, February 10.

Why does this court case in Texas matter? The judge could grant an emergency injunction that would force the FDA to withdraw its approval of mifepristone—which would pull it off the market and, in effect, ban it nationwide. Medication abortion is the most commonly used method of abortion. Banning mifepristone nationwide would have severe consequences on people’s ability to access critical abortion and miscarriage care. Abortion access in our country is already in crisis after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade. If this judge takes medication abortion off the market, even more people will lose the freedom to make their own decisions about their lives, bodies, and futures.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is mifepristone? Mifepristone is one of two pills typically used in medication abortion care. For over 20 years, medication abortion has been a safe and effective FDA-approved option for ending an early pregnancy. It’s also used for miscarriage management.

I live in a state where abortion is legal. Will this affect me? Yes. A federal ruling means health care providers would be banned from prescribing mifepristone for medication abortion and miscarriage treatment, no matter where you live.

Will I still be able to access abortion care? Yes. In-clinic care for procedural abortion access will not be affected by this ruling. It is likely that with the removal of medication abortion options, the availability of clinic appointments will be impacted and make it much harder to obtain one. To learn more about where to find abortion care, visit https://www.ineedana.com/.

What’s the difference between medication abortion and birth control pills or emergency contraception? Birth control and emergency contraception (such as Plan B) prevent pregnancy in different ways, while medication abortion ends an early pregnancy. Medication abortion (also known as abortion pills): Medication that is taken to end a pregnancy. The two medications typically used in the U.S. are mifepristone and misoprostol. Birth control: There are many different birth control methods to prevent pregnancy. The most common include condoms, birth control pills, IUDs, and diaphragms. Emergency contraception (also known as Plan B and the morning-after pill): The morning-after pill is an effective emergency form of birth control that is used to prevent pregnancy after sex.

Wife-beaters and T Roosevelt

TR evidently wanted women enslaved and forced to reproduce–so long as they are not beaten by hubby! For THAT we have proper officers of THE law.  Roosevelt’s usual style was to express support for two opposite things in a single breath. This enabled wags favoring either of the two contrary positions to brag that Teedy was in favor of their demands. Mr Dooley’s example is the clearest: “The…

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NARAL Changes Name to National Association for the Repeal of Abortion Laws #abortion #naral #plannedparenthood #prochoice #prolife

Nariyal burfi or Naral VadiCoconut fudge

Nariyal burfi or Naral VadiCoconut fudge

(archive link)

What is a woman? was a question Sen. Marsha Blackburn posed to Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson during her confirmation hearings. She was at a loss for words.

Corina, Kim Gordon, Lady Miss Kier, MC Lyte, Kate Pierson, Crystal Waters, and Tina Weymouth for NARAL (1991)

Synastry placements that can indicate marriage 💍🤍

Saturn conjunct/trine/sextile Venus

Saturn conjunct/trine/sextile Moon

Saturn in the 7th house

Saturn in the 4th house

Jupiter in the 7th house

Jupiter in the 4th house

Jupiter conjunct South Node

If you're in a heterosexual relationship - the woman's Jupiter should conjunct the man's Venus or the man's Jupiter should conjunct the woman's Mars

Juno in the 7th house

Your Moon sign is the same as your partner's sun sign or vice versa

Juno conjunct Moon

Juno conjunct Venus

If you're in a heterosexual relationship - the woman's Mars sign should be the same as the man's Venus sign

Vesta in the 7th house

Amor conjunct/trine/sextile Venus

Amor conjunct/trine/sextile Moon

Amor in the 7th house

Moon in the 10th house

Dm me for a synastry reading! ✨

when i was a teen it bothered me but now i think it is iconic and awesome that my mom is like. yeah abortion is murder. but sometimes you gotta do a little murder.

I do need to point out as I've said before that like...when I went to NARAL events in New York in 2017-2018 their mission was specifically to get out the IDC (a group of people who ran as Democrats and then caucused with the Republicans, preventing a true Democratic majority in the state legislature and stalling state-level abortion rights legislation). We phone banked and asked people to make sure they were registered and informed for the state primaries and local elections, and the IDC did get voted out in November 2018, and New York did pass those laws. If you do even the most cursory glance at any significant group dedicated to abortion rights they will tell you to vote at the local, state, and federal level. They also are going to organize protests and solicit donations, but voting is and always has been part of their advocacy.