Why Using Pro Choice Tag-lines for Covid-19 is Wrong

I have been writing and re-writing this post over the past few days so I can make sure I am getting it out there well and not coming off like I’m on my feminist soapbox, but I’m not sure that is possible. So all I ask is you read the post in full before commenting. 

Recently there have been protests breaking out all over the country of people yelling about the government having too much control over them with the stay at home orders. They have been holding up ridiculous signs that say things like “I demand a hair cut” and “I miss going out to eat, let me out!” and throwing fits about how the government is lying to them. So first I would like to just throw it out that risking someone else’s life is not worth being able to get a haircut. It just isn’t. And no they are not lying; the virus is deadly and they are still learning new things about it every day. But the main point of this post is to talk about how so many people are using the slogan “My body, my choice” as a means to protest why people should be allowed to leave their homes. This. Has. Got. To. Stop. 

This is the slogan, tagline, whatever you want to call it, that pro-choice people use when protesting for more reproductive rights. Over the past year, access to abortion has been getting destroyed by various states as they attempt to make it illegal. Before the pandemic started, several bills were floating around the federal government trying to get rid of abortion in the US completely. Obviously, this has all been put on hold, and I would like to think it won’t pass, but it is still a fight women in this country have to battle every day and using it for signs because you don’t want to stay home is appalling. Being asked to stay home for your safety and the safety of those at risk is not the same thing as women not being able to choose what happens to their bodies.  Being asked to stay home is also not controlling your body to the extent that women's reproductive care is limited. They are such different issues that by using “my body my choice” to protest being asked to stay home, the other movement loses credibility and is taken less seriously. 

I hate quarantine. I am going nuts, not sleeping very well, full of anxiety, unemployed, and miss the world. This is how most people are feeling when it comes to staying at home so the people protesting are not alone in their feelings. But the thing is we are still allowed to go for walks and hikes as long as you stay away from others. Walk around your neighborhood and get some vitamin D to help you relax. If you have a  yard, sit in your yard and work and drink, and enjoy your day! None of that is illegal. While it is super stressful, the government is not taking away your rights to bodily autonomy, which is what “my body my choice” is representing when women shout it to gain access to safe abortions. Your inability to get a hair cut right now is not the same as women not having reproductive freedom. It is like comparing apples and Brussel sprouts at this point. 

These protests have shown how when white straight people throw a fit in America, they become memes, they get sent home peacefully and without penalty, and no one does anything. But when Native American’s protest to save their water and their land they are pelted with rubber bullets and have tear gas unleashed on them. They are arrested. When Black Lives Matter protests they receive the same treatment. And when women protest their bodily rights (white, straight women) they are harassed by men on the streets, arrested, and then still nothing changes. Quit using “my body my choice” for your stupid protest over not being allowed to go out to eat. We are all suffering. Stop stealing slogans you don’t understand for something so trivial. Our lives will eventually go back to normal, while women still have to fight for reproductive rights. You are demeaning the movement women are fighting for. 

Madey

Cover image found here