Dear Right-Wing, Evangelical Extremists,
I was going to include “white and men” in this salutation and title, but alas, I can’t.
I can’t because there are extremist women, LGBTQ individuals, and people of color who join the insanity of this current barbarism happening in the United States, the “land of the free” and the “greatest country on Earth.”
I’m a woman. I’m mostly Hispanic. I’m straight. I vote. I’m educated. I work. I pay taxes. I’ve traveled. I’ve been married and divorced. I’ve been through hell and back. I’ve had sex in and outside of wedlock. I’ve used contraception. I had an abortion – shame on me. I have a daughter. I have hobbies. I’ve lived life, but I have never had to worry about losing my bodily autonomy. My brain hurts, and I couldn’t be more disgusted.
So, Right-Wing Extremists – that is the best salutation I can do right now without using every cuss word I can think of – what, exactly, do you think you will accomplish with overturning Roe v. Wade and then trying to pass a federal law outlawing abortion in all 50 states? Do you think removing the right to an abortion is going to stop abortions? Do you think women will just go along with your psychopathic agenda?
Tell me, what gives you the right to invade my uterus?
I’ve been in a fog and so have other women.
In all honesty, I’ve been in a sort of forced, soft trauma since the SCOTUS leak. I will call it that – a soft trauma, although I am thinking the word “soft” is not the best word to use here. I will call it soft because, well, it’s not like I was raped recently or anything like that (at least not in the last two decades or so) and am experiencing horrible trauma.
I will tell you what soft trauma is, though – and don’t be fooled by the word, soft. It’s anything but soft. It’s more like an insidious, enduring, engulfing, never-ending worry that eats away at your insides every day.
I will also tell you I haven’t been able to write (until now) due to this unrelenting toxicity all around me. The trauma I feel is from everything that is happening all around me, not just the abortion issue. There is a heavy, toxic cloud above the United States, no matter where I go in this country: at the grocery store, the post office, the bar, the coffee shop, anywhere. It’s like a fog that never goes away. It’s so heavy that you can’t see what’s in front of you. You hope you are headed in the right direction and wish for the best, every single day. It’s an ongoing, soft trauma. You can see it in the eyes of people everywhere. The questions that are swirling in the minds of every child and adult of any age, race, gender, or color: “When will we be okay?” “Am I safe?”
Right-wing, Evangelical Extremist, why are you hell-bent on taking away the bodily autonomy of every woman in this country on top of all the other problems the U.S. is experiencing?
Women’s lives are being attacked from all directions. In Oklahoma, abortion has recently been outlawed from fertilization with exceptions for rape and incest and the life of the mother. In Idaho, abortion is outlawed after six weeks of pregnancy, and similar to the Texas abortion law, anyone can sue health care providers (or anyone else) accused of helping terminate a pregnancy. Louisiana recently considered charging women with murder if they were caught having had an abortion.
And, my God, you think this is reasonable and sane? What the fuck is wrong with you?
We live in crazy-making times. And in the next two weeks or so, women will be reduced to second-class citizens with fewer rights than a corpse by the Supreme Court of the United States if Justice Alito’s leaked draft overturning the precedent set in Roe v. Wade is not thoroughly revised.
I’m waiting for the floor to fall out from under me. Every day that passes by, I am closer to that horrible opinion that will change the essence of this country. I feel like I’m in a room with the walls closing in ever so slowly, and I’m frantically trying to escape before I am crushed. Any day now, SCOTUS will proofread and edit that draft and will take away bodily autonomy from every woman and every person with a uterus in this country.
It is coming.
The Right-Wing, Evangelical Agenda
Extremist Evangelical, you must think women are just stupid, fragile, little ladies who can’t govern their own lives or bodies. Or, rather, you are afraid of educated women who lead successful and happy lives and don’t need to be controlled by men. Do you think we don’t see your end goal – to get us back in the kitchen, and yes, barefoot and pregnant? Your ultimate goal is to put women back in the home and use them as host bodies to produce children. No agency. No autonomy over their lives.
Back to the 18th century for women in 2022.
Basically, The Handmaid’s Tale. And here is how you will do it:
#1. First, the reversal of Roe v. Wade.
Your agenda is to enslave women by taking away their bodily autonomy so they can produce more children, specifically white children because you cannot fathom being a minority in the United States.
Interesting, isn’t it?
It is estimated that by 2045, white people will be the minority in the United States. This scares you. According to The United States Census Bureau, old people, by 2030, will outnumber children. This scares you, too. Do I dare wonder why? (I’ll leave the reason for THAT for another article, but I know you know what it is.)
Frank Schaeffer, former Christian, Republican, and anti-abortion activist turned liberal, democrat, pro-choice activist, and atheist, explains your agenda in his book Crazy For God. He summarizes how the religious right’s ultimate goal is to bring about a Christian-led nation and why he left Christianity when he realized how un-American the movement is.
In case you think I have lost my delicate, fragile, little mind, you can listen to Frank directly. Christine Amanpour with CNN interviewed Frank Schaeffer on May 4, 2022:
Your solution is to force women to remain pregnant and give birth against their will.
#2. Second, the removal of privacy rights.
Do you think we women are not aware that by removing the precedent set in Roe vs. Wade, you will essentially remove privacy rights?
Once this precedent is removed, you will lick your lips in victory, won’t you? You will then attempt to outlaw contraception, marriage equality, interracial marriage, and who knows what else. The elimination of the Roe v. Wade precedent is extremely dangerous, and if you should win the House, the Senate, and the presidency in 2024, you will essentially be able to remove basic human rights from not only women, but the LGBTQ community, black people, illegal immigrants, and any group of people you deem unacceptable. But, you know that already, of course. And what is especially egregious and cruel is that you don’t care. Removing rights so you can control anyone who does not fit your Christian worldview (women and anyone who is not white or straight) is your goal.
It’s not about life. It never was.
Oh, Right-Wing, Evangelical, you do not fool me. You have made it crystal clear by your actions that the Republican Party does not care about the life of the fetus after birth.
Your party has removed or reduced programs that protect basic living standards for low-income families and single women. These cuts have caused struggling mothers to struggle even more. If you truly care about the life of the infant, you would provide for their mothers, not cut the only benefits that make it possible for them not to end up on the streets feeding their children garbage.
As if that isn’t bad enough, in May of 2022 during a nationwide shortage of baby formula, most republicans voted against a bill that would have fed hungry babies.
Your party also couldn’t give a rat’s ass about the life of the mother during or after pregnancy. Do you think that cutting the budget for poor, pregnant, low-income women demonstrates your selfless care and concern for pregnant women? Where do you expect poor women to find the money they will need to care for themselves and their fetuses if you reduce welfare, cut food stamps, and Medicaid? From under a rock?
The Republican Party is pro-birth, not pro-life.
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I am done. I am done waiting for you to become decent, compassionate human beings. I no longer have the luxury of believing that. How foolish would I be to do that?
I am livid. What I feel at this point is beyond words. When I heard the news that someone leaked the Supreme Court draft, I was numb. Just absolutely, mindfuckingly numb. I haven’t had a good night’s sleep since this news was released. I am now furious, and you have my word that I will do everything I can to win this battle and put you in your place.
I cannot understand how anyone, much less justices of the highest court in the United States of America, could think that I, as a woman, do not have the choice to decide what happens to my body. I cannot understand how anyone can come to this decision and probably never will. How is it even possible for someone else other than me to make a decision about my body? How is it even a consideration to allow any government to take control over my body?
Once again, what the fuck is wrong with you?
To say that I am appalled, outraged, and thoroughly disgusted is an understatement! And, I am not alone. NO ONE on this planet should have the rights to their bodies removed, period. Arguing about when life begins and all that goes with that is irrelevant. It’s about the right of women or pregnant people to have authority over their bodies, to decide when and if they will carry a pregnancy to term or not.
Women will not sit this one out
If you remove a women’s right to an abortion, you will not stop abortions. You will endanger and kill women. But, once again, you already know that, don’t you? And you don’t care, do you?
I thought you were the “pro-life” party? How is allowing women to die pro-life? Please explain that to me.
Oh, never mind. YOU DON’T CARE. It’s obvious.
We will not allow you to take away bodily autonomy or privacy from half of the population and make them slaves. You will not succeed. The United States is a democracy, not your dystopian theocracy.
I will say that you have accomplished two things, though:
#1. You have ignited the fire under millions and millions of women and others who will fight for the basic human rights of bodily autonomy for women in the streets, with their dollars, and in the voting booth.
Trust me.
#2. You have most likely made Margaret Atwood contemplate whether she should have written her masterpiece, The Handmaid’s Tale. “It was supposed to be fiction, not a how-to book,” she must be thinking. But, do you know what? She also wanted to write it because the contents in her book have already happened throughout history, in one form or another. She said so herself:
“I made a rule for myself: I would not include anything that human beings had not already done in some other place or time, or for which the technology did not already exist…”
– Margaret Atwood
Guess what, Right-Wing Evangelical Extremists?
We will not comply.
Sincerely,
Livid-and-Traumatized-But-Still-Standing-Strong
Vilma Reynoso 