Conversation Pushers #2: Abortion by Jessica Valenti
This is one of the most important books you could possibly read as we head into a second Trump presidency.
Hi, friends.
In the wake of Election Day, I came up with the idea for this column as a way to use the time I spend reading and writing this newsletter as a force for change. Each month, I’m publishing in-depth coverage of a book that arms us for critical real-life political conversations. In case you missed the kickoff post, you can read it here:
I had hoped to have this edition out before the holidays, but alas, it was not to be. Still, I hope you’ll take a few minutes of your December-twenty-whatever couch time to talk about Abortion: Our Bodies, Their Lies, and the Truths We Use to Win by with me, because I really think that this book is one of the most important things you could possibly read as we head into 2025 and face another Trump administration.
What is Abortion about?
Valenti publishes an excellent and critical newsletter called
, where she tracks the daily news cycle related to abortion and calls attention to the ways anti-abortion politician and activists are advancing their agendas by slowly, sneakily lying to voters, manipulating the media, and chipping away at our rights. (I wish that radical-sounding sentence were an exaggeration, but it’s not.)With this book, Valenti aims to “arms the choir” with foundational background, trends, and statistics that will enable us to notice and resist the very smart, calculated game that anti-abortionists are playing. It also serves as an excellent primer for her newsletter, which you should absolutely subscribe to.
What are the key conversation points?
I strongly encourage you to read the book, but here are some facts and takeaways to get you started in those real-life conversations. All of this information is thoroughly cited in the book and Valenti’s newsletter.
Abortion is popular, politically. Anti-abortionists know that. So they reject the language that would throw up red flags for voters and the media and introduce their own terminology instead.
They are calling proposed bans “minimum national standards,” enabling them to successfully push anti-abortion legislation under the radar. Other words to look out for include “consensus” and “reasonable limits.”
Politicians are doing things like define “late” term abortions as anything after 12 weeks in proposed policy documents, but just allowing voters to assume they mean the third trimester.
They are turning “abortion” into a moral term, not a medical term. One of their main talking points is that an abortion is never necessary — instead, they say, women can elect to have “maternal-fetal separation procedures,” aka induced vaginal births or c-sections. This casts ALL abortions as “elective,” which will enable them to outlaw them and vilifies women who choose to have them.
They are also redefining medical terms to suit their own purposes. For example, many anti-abortionists are pushing the idea that Plan B and even hormonal birth control are “abortifacients” (when in reality, they are actually contraceptives, meaning they prevent pregnancy, not terminate it). This is how they will eventually outlaw birth control without SAYING that they want to outlaw birth control.
Anti-abortionists are engaging in polling and statistical manipulation to suit their own ends.
For example, more than 80% of voters believe abortion should be unregulated by law, a decision solely between patient and doctor. However, polls tend to ask WHEN people want abortion to be limited instead of IF they want that, which enables anti-abortionists to say that people support limiting abortions at a certain point in pregnancy.
These days, the majority of abortions are done by medication, not office procedures. This is why anti-abortionists are turning their attention to abortion pills — manipulating medical statistics to make them sound unsafe (in reality, they’re safer than Tylenol or Viagra) and trying to make it illegal for them to be shipped across state lines. The fastest way to effectively ban abortion will be for them to cut off access to this medication.
Because anti-abortionists know that abortion wins with voters, they are doing literally everything in their power to keep it off the ballot. This is a direct attack on our democracy and should enrage all of us.
Anti-abortionists talk a big game about putting “exceptions” in their abortion bans (for things like rape and pregnancies that threaten the life of the mother), but the wording of these exceptions makes them completely useless. For example, they know most rapes go unreported, so they require the rape to be reported to the police within a certain time frame. Or they hold doctors to an unrealistic level of certainty that conditions be “universally diagnosable,” which doesn’t exist in medicine.
This is getting long, so I’ll stop there, but there is so much more; I have only scratched the surface. PLEASE read this book.
What can we do right now?
Buy the book and read it. If you buy through my Bookshop.org link, I will donate the commissions to the Center for Reproductive Rights, which fights against this unconstitutional BS in the courts, and also MATCH that amount with a donation with my own.
Commit this information to memory and actively talk about it, even when the conversation is hard. Call it out when you see it in the news. Don’t be quiet.
Order abortion medication for your medicine cabinet, even if you don’t think you’ll need it. Valenti explains why here.
Donate to the Center for Reproductive Rights, with a recurring monthly subscription if you can. They have a 5X match going through the end of the year.
Donate to abortion funds, which are doing incredible work to help the people who are most affected by these policies — poor people, young people, and people of color — get the care they need.
Further reading
Subscribe to Abortion, Every Day, with a paid subscription if you can. Here are a few that have incensed me lately:
Peruse and bookmark the Abortion, Every Day resource page.
Next on my TBR on this topic: New Handbook for a Post-Roe America: The Complete Guide to Abortion Legality, Access, and Practical Support.
This is my first newsletter in this Conversation Pushers column, so if there’s anything you’d like me to add or do differently next time, please let me know in the comments! I’m also always open to recommendations for books you’d like me to cover here in the future.
Until next time,
– Deedi (she/her)
I have the ebook and am planning on reading it this month!