The following historical background on forced sterilization of minority girls and women in the U.S. and beyond runs long, even without delving into the Nazis’ study of U.S. 17th-19th century policies toward indigenous people and the disabled as a basis of some of their own approaches toward people they deemed unfit in a civilized world. Implications reverberate into the present. ### Some links, most bolding, and other emphasis in the quotes are editorial additions.
Readers who prefer can skip this section by scrolling down to the heading IN OTHER NEWS beside an enlargement of this image…
<big>With horrific irony, the backhistory of forced sterilization figures in an article from NativeNewsOnline: <big>Indigenous Women Navigate Abortion Access Hurdles Post-Roe</big></big>
…Since the reversal of Roe v. Wade … demand for the services of Indigenous Women Rising] has skyrocketed. They funded 37 abortions in 2019, 600 in 2022 and over 300 in the first six months of this year, from January to June spending more to help people than in all of 2022, for airfare, bus, gas, child care, elder care, after care for the individual who’s getting an abortion, [and the traditional ceremonies that follow]” said founder Rachael Lorenzo, who is Mescalero Apache, Laguna and Xicana, “If there are special needs that they have, we do our best to fund that, as well.”
[States with some of the largest Indigenous populations also have some of the strictest restrictions on abortion [but it] was never readily available to Native Americans, thanks to a federal law that has prohibited nearly all abortions at Indian Health Service clinics since 1976…
…In the 1970s, doctors in the U.S. sterilized an estimated 25 to 42 percent of Native American women of childbearing age, some [even younger than] 15…. The sterilizations … often without consent or under great duress, marked the culmination of a long history of efforts by federal and local authorities to [colonialize] the reproductive lives of Native families…
h/t Paul Frea
The Family Planning Services and Population Research Act of 1970] subsidized sterilizations for Medicaid and Indian Health Service patients. Many Native people received their [only] healthcare through the Indian Health Service (IHS) … On the Navajo Reservation [alone, sterilizations] doubled between 1972 and 1978. [Altho’ not all were performed coercively, the subsidization together with] the increased legitimacy of sterilization as a form of birth control at the time facilitatedcoercive use of the technology….
In other cases, sterilization was performed without the adequate understanding and consent of the patient, including [when performed on children]. A compounding factor was the tendency of doctors to recommend sterilization to poor and minority women in cases where they would not have done so to a wealthier white patient… Other [forms of coercion have been documented as well, such as health providers] threatening to take away their [social safety-net public benefits].[2]
<big><big“Where they would not have to a wealthier white patient” — </big></big> is verified further in the late 1960s and through the 1970s in the form of:
…reports of coercive, involuntary, and otherwise non-consenting sterilizations of … African American, Mexican, and Puerto Rican origin women [beginning to surface[1] …at a time of intense civil rights activity and political consciousness among non-“white”[2] groups in the U.S. American Indian and African American women and girls were especially impacted by sterilization abuse.
h/t The Marti
In a well-known [November 1972 case, a twenty-six-year-old Native American came to a clinic to ask for] a “womb transplant.”[3] [— she’d had] a full hysterectomy (for alcoholism) at age twenty after being told by an IHS doctor that the procedure was reversible. Other scholars have noted cases of American Indian women receiving hysterectomies as young as age eleven.[4] These cases are similar to the experiences of African American women and girls, such as the Relf sisters, ages twelve and fourteen, unwilling and unknowing recipients of tubal sterilization as well as guinea pigs for intrauterine devices and what were then experimental Depo-Provera shots (along with their older sister, Katie) in the early 1970s.[5] African American civil rights leader Fannie Lou Hamer was compelled to get involved in the modern civil rights movement, in part, after receiving a <big>“Mississippi Appendectomy”</big> [End Page 17] (an unbeknownst hysterectomy) upon visiting a doctor to have a benign fibroid uterine tumor removed.[6]
<big><big>Even after legislation designed to protect women from forced sterilization was passed in 1974,</big></big> this violence upon girls and women continued, in various forms, clear into the 21st century, a continued government policy…
On October 2, 2020, the United States House of Representatives passed a resolution condemning unwanted, unnecessary medical procedures on individuals without their full, informed consent [approximately 2018-2020] …. The resolution [was] in part a reaction to a complaint filed to the Department of Homeland Security on September 16, 2020, expressing concerns about unnecessary hysterectomies performed on detained immigrant women without their informed consent.
“Dawn Wooten’s whistleblower account [of the Irwin County Ocilla, Georgia ICE Detention CenterDK posts]is terrifying and brings to light the generational trauma caused by efforts to exterminate communities of color and people with disabilities. We need an investigation,” said Rep. Deb Haaland (D-N.M.), a tribal citizen of the Laguna Pueblo. Haaland and 172 other Congressional members signed a letter calling on the Inspector General of Homeland Security to open an investigation. It states, “The reports of mass hysterectomies cause grave concern for the violation of the bodily autonomy and reproductive rights of detained people. Everyone, regardless of their immigration status, their language, or their incarceration deserves to control their own reproductive choices and make informed choices about their bodies…”
“While we applaud the resolution, we are greatly concerned that it illustrates the United States as a government that continues a policy of forced sterilization,” said Lucy Simpson, Executive Director of [National Indigenous Women’s Resource Center/NIWRC]. “As an organization dedicated to ending violence against Indigenous women, we know all too well the end result of such a federal policy.”
The Trump administration is trying to deport several women who allege [medical abuse] by a Georgia gynecologist at [the Irwin County Detention Center in Ocilla, Georgia] according to their lawyers.
[ICE] has already deported six…
…While people who have been deported might still be able to serve as witnesses in a criminal or civil case, many end up in unstable countries or situations where it becomes difficult to maintain contact with them. The deportations are occurring in the last weeks of President Donald Trump’s administration following his defeat by Democrat Joe Biden.
<big>“ICE is destroying the evidence needed for this investigation,” said Elora Mukherjee, a Columbia University law professor who is working with several of the women….</big>
(Bogota, 2021 — Thomson Reuters Foundation) – A 25-year legal battle by thousands of indigenous Peruvian women who say they were forcibly sterilized during a 1990s birth control drive will go before a judge on Monday, raising hopes they could finally see justice, their lawyers said.
About 350,000 women were sterilized under a program launched in 1996 by former strongman President Alberto Fujimori, who has said the procedures were carried out with patients’ consent and aimed to tackle poverty by cutting birth rates.
For more about compulsory sterilization in general and where and “why”:
<big><big>Regarding forced sterilization of minority men/males</big></big>, there is little to be found in readily accessible sources (but see INDIA in the links just above), E.g., The Indigenous Foundation includes vasectomy in its list of definitions, but no cases in its article. To all reasonable appearances, and by some explanations,
Female hysteria [for hundreds of years in Western Europe] a common medical diagnosis for women … was described as exhibiting a wide array of symptoms, [together comprising, in effect] a “tendency to cause trouble for others”.[1] including [both physical and behavioral symptoms, often contradictory, e.g., “lack of interest” in sex, OR] sexually forward behavior… [never] synonymous with normal functioning female sexuality [even when resisting rape]…
Western medicine categorized hysteria as a disease both common and chronic among women … In extreme [but numerically not unusual] cases, the woman may have been forced to enter an insane asylum[vulnerable to any “solution” medical men proposed] or to undergo surgical hysterectomy…[2]
From wik’s article on Eugenics in the United States, we do learn that public acceptance for preventing reproduction by any individual deemed mentally defective (which commonly involved ethnic prejudices as well as beliefs about women in general) is well on a roll in the late 19th century.
Beginning with Connecticut in 1896, many [state legislatures attempted to enact] marriage laws with eugenic criteria, prohibiting anyone who was “epileptic, imbecile or feeble-minded“[37] from marrying.[38] The first state to [try for] a compulsory sterilization bill was Michigan in 1897 [- it failed.]. Eight years later, Pennsylvania‘s state [bill passed but] was vetoed by the governor.[40]Indiana became the first [with] sterilization legislation in 1907,[41] followed closely by Washington, California, and Connecticut in 1909[42][43][44] [— thirty states in all….] Sterilization rates across the country were relatively low (California being the sole exception) [for a few years, Indiana’s law being] overturned by their Supreme Court in 1921,[83] [until] the 1927 case Buck v. Bell [when] the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of the Virginia Sterilization Act of 1924, allowing for the compulsory sterilization of patients of state mental institutions.[84]
The [numbers and rates then] increased until [SCOTUS] case Skinner v. Oklahoma, 1942 … ruled that under the 14th Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause, laws that permitted the compulsory sterilization of criminals were unconstitutional if these laws treated similar crimes differently…[85]
and that men and women were compulsorily sterilized for different reasons.
…Men were sterilized to treat their aggression and to eliminate their criminal behavior, while women were sterilized to control the results of their sexuality<big>*</big>.[87] <big><big>Since women bore children, women were held more accountable than men for the reproduction of the less “desirable” members of society[87][Women were] therefore predominantly targeted <big><big>in efforts to … “protect” white racial health, and weed out the “defectives” of society.[87]
The most significant era of eugenic sterilization was between 1907 and 1963, when over 64,000 individuals were forcibly sterilized under eugenic legislation in the United States.[88]Beginning around 1930, there was a steady increase in the percentage of women sterilized, and in a few states only young women were sterilized.
*whosesexuality? <big>–►</big>
…Although [upholding procreation as a fundamental constitutional right, however, Skinner v Oklahoma] did not denounce sterilization laws … its analysis was based on the equal protection of criminal defendants specifically males, anyway, therefore leaving those seen as “social undesirables”—the poor, the disabled, and various ethnic groups—as targets of compulsory sterilization …[7]<big><big><big>Therefore, though compulsory sterilization is now considered an abuse of human rights, Buck v. Bell has never been overturned,</big></big></big> ….[86]
…The 1978 Federal Sterilization Regulations, created by the U.S. Dept of Health, Education and Welfare or HEW, (now the Dept of Health and Human Services) outline a variety of prohibited sterilization practices … used previously to coerce or force women into sterilization … to prevent such eugenics and neo-eugenics as resulted in [… large groups of poor and minority women [subjected to it]. [Prohibited] practices include: not conveying to patients that sterilization is permanent and irreversible, in their own language (including the option to end the process or procedure at any time without conceding any future medical attention or federal benefits, the ability to ask any and all questions about the procedure and its ramifications, the requirement that the consent seeker describes the procedure fully including any and all possible discomforts and/or side-effects and any and all benefits of sterilization); failing to provide alternative information about methods of contraception, family planning, or pregnancy termination that are nonpermanent and/or irreversible (this includes abortion); conditioning receiving welfare and/or Medicaid benefits by the individual or his/her children on the individuals “consenting” to permanent sterilization; tying elected abortion to compulsory sterilization (cannot receive a sought out abortion without “consenting” to sterilization); using hysterectomy as sterilization; and subjecting minors and the mentally incompetent to sterilization.[130][131][72] The regulations also include an extension of the informed consent waiting period from 72 hours to 30 days (with a maximum of 180 days between informed consent and the sterilization procedure).[131][130][72]
However, several studies have indicated that [methodology for conveying rights and accurate information remains severely inadequate, and] federal enforcement [of the 1978 regulations] is inconsistent [such that] prohibited abuses continue to be pervasive, particularly in underfunded hospitals and lower income patient hospitals and care centers.[131][72]
h/t officebss
[and among imprisoned women, a population with a higher rate of minority identification than in the free population of the U.S.]…
In September 2014, California enacted Bill SB1135 that bans sterilization in correctional facilities, unless the procedure is required to save an inmate’s life…[135]
<big><big>‘I held my tongue and walked the yard just stunned, like somebody had just shot me.’</big></big> In 2005, in the then-Valley State Prison for Women, a terrified Moonlight Pulido agreed to the doctor’s undetailed advice that he remove tumors he’d detected inside her. She woke from surgery with her uterus gone….
California’s 2021-22 state budget packageincluded $7.5 million funding for the California Forced or Involuntary Sterilization Compensation Program legislation proposed by Assemblymember Wendy Carrillo(D-Los Angeles) in AB 1007.[25] It began Jan. 1, 2022, administered by the California Victim Compensation Board — click that link to see the full scope of the CalVCB; it was not created to serve this legislation — for survivors of state-sponsored sterilization 1909 through 1979[26] and survivors of involuntary sterilizations in women’s prisons after 1979[27]. The bulk of the funding was earmarked for compensation payments, with lesser amounts for outreach to help identify and encourage survivors to ask about and apply to the program — www.victims.ca.gov/fiscp or reach out to CalVCB at 800-777-9229 or fiscp@victims.ca.gov) — and for public acknowledgement installations. Researchers estimated hundreds of Californians are still alive —if many of very advanced age— hypothetically qualifiable before the December 2023 deadline, But reportedly as of early September 2023, only 101 applications had been approved, with seven cases closed as incomplete, and 339 denied.[28]Nearly ten years ago, North Carolina and Virginia implemented similar programs with varying degrees of success. California is the first state to include modern-day survivors of forced sterilization, but the logistics pose massive barriers. Likely, the main outcome will be very large awards to very few applicants, and a sprinkling of historical plaques in various locations around the state.
<big><big>For the vast majority of surviving women and women still at risk in this country,</big></big> theIrwin County Ocilla, Georgia ICE Detention Centercases may be only a handful among an unknown number of currently existing object lessons in the ongoing historical fact that women, minority and poor women in particular, do not own their own bodies even to the extent that minority and poor men do.
<big>In other news:</big>
Forbes:9 Policies That Can Increase Representation Of Black, Latina And Native Women In Tech: h/t elenacarlena
Share salary ranges on jobs
Internal job boards and career pathways
Mentors during job interviews
Paid sick leave to all workers
Expanded mental health benefits
Option to be remote, hybrid, or on-site
Flexible work policies
Professional development to grow a network and build soft skills
Actionable performance evaluation
The coalition’s CEO, Dawna Franklin notes that, “Perhaps unsurprisingly, the nine policies we identified as most impactful for BLNA women are also desirable to all other employees. The policies aren’t moonshots. The most actionable and effective policies are within reach – even in a challenging macroeconomic environment.”
Guttmacher Institute <big><big>Chiseche Mibenge and Onikepe Owolabi Join Guttmacher as Directors for International Research</big></big>
The Guttmacher Institute is pleased to share that on September 1, 2023, Chiseche Mibenge (she/her) and Onikepe Owolabi (she/her) joined the Guttmacher Institute as its new Directors for International Research. Chiseche and Onikepe—who is a former Guttmacher Senior Research Scientist—will oversee the Institute’s portfolio of international projects and manage relationships with in-country, regional and global partners. Their leadership skills and strong expertise in portfolio management, program development and partner engagement position them to take the Institute’s global program to the next level. …
Chiseche Mibenge is an expert in gender and human rights. She received her bachelor of law degree from the University of Zambia and her master’s and doctorate degrees in international human rights law from Utrecht University’s School of Law. For two decades, she has worked in the fields of gender and human rights and served as a researcher and consultant in post-conflict societies, addressing conflict-related sexual violence and access to justice for survivors. She has worked closely with multilateral agencies, international NGOs and national governments in low- and middle-income countries to generate and leverage evidence to inform national and international policies.
Onikepe Owolabi is an expert in global maternal and reproductive health. She received her medical degree at Obafemi Awolowo University in Nigeria, her master’s degree in global health at University of Oxford and her doctorate at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. Over the past 12 years, she has led and contributed to the research and design of interventions and evaluations to improve population-level measurement of maternal morbidity, facilitated access to sexual and reproductive health services for women and girls, and contributed to the measurement and improvement of sexual and reproductive health care in Burkina Faso, Central African Republic, Democratic Republic of Congo, Ghana, India, Indonesia, Kenya, Nigeria, Zambia and Zimbabwe.
from The19thNews Abortion in Florida and what’s at stake in the Florida Supreme court:<big><big>talking with political experts, abortion providers and funds ahead of arguments on the state’s 15-week ban</big></big>
from TheConversation <big><big>Research shows that trans students benefit from gender-inclusive classrooms – and so do the other students and science itself</big></big>
from NativeNewsOnline <big><big>PBS has announced the premiere of Canadian drama Little Bird,</big></big>which follows the life of a First Nations woman who was forcefully removed from her family as a child during Canada’s the Sixties Scoop of indigenous children.
The six-part, one-hour limited series, created by Canadian First Nations filmmaker Jennifer Podemski and playwright Hannah Moscovitch, stars Darla Contois and Lisa Edelstein and follows the life of Bezhig Little Bird, a victim of the Sixties Scoop in Saskatchewan. Removed from her home in Long Pine Reservation, Bezhig Little Bird is adopted into a Montreal Jewish family at age five. Now in her 20s, Bezhig longs for the family she lost and is willing to sacrifice everything to find them. Her search lands her in the Canadian Prairies. As she begins to track down her siblings, she unravels the mystery behind her adoption and discovers that her apprehension is connected to a racist government policy.
“It is a powerful narrative that not only engages and pulls on your heartstrings but also educates on a profoundly disturbing time in North American history that is rarely portrayed,” Germaine Sweet, Managing Director, Content Acquisitions at PBS Distribution, said in a press release.. “In addition to the creative brilliance of Jennifer Podemski and Hannah Moscovitch, this series was delivered by a wealth of Indigenous talent both in front of and behind the camera….”
From CalMatters<big><big>California lawmakers send first-in-nation caste discrimination bill to governor’s desk.</big></big>Senate Bill SB 403 addressing Discrimination on the Basis of Ancestry, introduced by Afghan-American state senator Aisha Wahab (D-10th district) — the first Muslim elected to the California State Senate and one of the first Afghan-Americans elected to public office, together with fellow Dem New Hampshire state representative Safiya Wazir— adds caste — a centuries-old social hierarchy system that has historically determined what education people can attain, where they can live, what jobs they can hold — to the list of protected classes, alongside race, gender and sexual orientation.
from TheConversation <big><big>‘Girl math’ may not be smart financial advice, but it could help women feel more empowered with money.</big></big> Question is, does “feeling empowered” add up to actual power?
…Girl math introduces a spend classification system: purchases below a certain value, or made in cash, don’t “count”. Psychologically, this makes low-value spending feel safe and emphasizes the importance of the long-term value derived from more expensive items. For example, girl math tells us that buying an expensive dress is only “worth it” if you can wear it to multiple events.
This approach has similarities to portfolio theory – a method of choosing investments to maximise expected returns and minimise risk. By evaluating how each purchase contributes to the shopping portfolio, girl math shoppers essentially become shopping portfolio managers.
MONEY AND EMOTIONS
People of all genders, rich or poor, feel anxious when dealing with their personal finances. Many people in the UK do not understand [about] pensions or saving enough to afford their retirement. Without motivation to learn, people avoid dealing with money altogether.
One way to find this motivation, as girl math shows, is by having an emotional and tangible connection to our finances….
from PostAndCourierCharleston SC chamber postpones mayoral forum after non-invited Black female candidate Mika Gadsden questions exclusion of herself and Debra Gammons, the other Black woman running for the office
… the forum was originally designed for chamber members to hear from “leading candidates running for this position” and as a result “this created an environment that did not include all candidates” [said a Chamber of Commerce statement in response to Gadsden’s press conference].
Every other candidate in the race, all of whom are men, [had been] confirmed to participate in the forum. They are Mayor John Tecklenburg, former Republican state Rep. William Cogswell, Charleston City Councilman Peter Shahid and longtime political aide Clay Middleton….
from LittleRockPublicRadio <big><big><big>Mexico decriminalizes abortion, extending Latin American trend of widening access</big></big></big> as the US keeps tightening it.
from WaPo <big><big>Women win Mexican primaries; one is likely to be first female president</big></big>
MEXICO CITY — Half of Mexico’s Congress is female. The cabinet is gender-balanced. And now, women have won the primaries of the two leading political blocs — making it likely that this traditionally macho nation will elect its first female president, ahead of the United States.
Claudia Sheinbaum, 61, who until recently served as Mexico City’s mayor, defeated five men to secure the nomination of the governing party, MORENA, its officials announced Wednesday. If the leftist candidate triumphs in the election next June, she also will set another precedent, as Mexico’s first Jewish head of state.
Her victory came days after an opposition coalition, the Broad Front for Mexico, nominated Xóchitl Gálvez, 60, a business executive and senator of Indigenous origin.
<big>“This is a feminist’s dream,” said Maricruz Ocampo, a women’s rights activist in the central city of Querétaro. The 2024 race, she said, “is going to signify a turn in the way that we see women in politics.”…</big>
![Pañuelo verde - Movilización en el cierre del 34 Encuentro Nacional de Mujeres La Plata - Octubre 2019 [GoogleTrans: Green scarf - Mobilization at the closing of the 34th National Meeting of Women La Plata - October 2019.]](https://images.dailykos.com/images/1150091/large/Screenshot2023-01-06at01-00-5334_Encuentro_Nacional_de_Mujeres_La_Plata_2019-14.jpgJPEGImage1024683pixelsScaled89.png?1672995723 "Pañuelo verde - Movilización en el cierre del 34 Encuentro Nacional de Mujeres La Plata - Octubre 2019 [GoogleTrans: Green scarf - Mobilization at the closing of the 34th National Meeting of Women La Plata - October 2019.]"){kind=tracking}
