Katie Gillum

ED @inroadsGlobe // former co-convener @freesafelegal // advocacy producer & strategist // fooood // thinking long & hard abt human interaction &rights

[Katie Gillum @slowtext]

@paulmurphy_TD And keeping miss x pregnant long enough for a forced c section. He did that

[Katie Gillum @slowtext]

@amelsoueu completely. The 2 msgs are laughably off "bend your body, pump it w/ hormones. but also be ready to have sex WHENEVER & prevent the HORROR of becoming pregnant, needing an abortion" versus "TRY to remember to keep a lil piece of latex on you so you can fuck but not get sick"

[Katie Gillum @slowtext]

@inroadsGlobe Support is not visible enough or isn't there. We need to look at our selves, our language, and our colleagues. We need to address those stigmatizing ideas when they're intoned, impiled, written in policy. Not after the meeting. Not after the vote. NOW. #MultipleAbortionStigma

[Katie Gillum @slowtext]

@SpencerTootle RIGHT! Abortions are wanted. Abortions are chosen. Abortions are good. The LAST options should surely be going through the work of bringing to term another human that you can't/won't/don't want to raise and care for.

[Katie Gillum @slowtext]

@inroadsGlobe thoughts whenever birth control comes up in discussion abt abortion: people seem to only be ok w/birth control if it's *pregnancy prevention*. If the point of bc is to control birth and not control pregnant people, we should call abortion birth control #MultipleAbortionStigma /3

[Katie Gillum @slowtext]

@inroadsGlobe Thinking of birth control as a way to "prevent" creates this paradigm: having abortion means you made a mistake/didn't use bc. So someone who has more than 1 failed multiple times. But bc fails, wasn't an option, OR pregnancy was wanted but isn't now #MultipleAbortionStigma /2

[Katie Gillum @slowtext]

@inroadsGlobe #MultipleAbortionStigma We can be pushed by coalitions, policy processes to differentiate between the right kinds, # of abortions. Especially important to be out about refusal to differentiate between abortions in pro-choice groups. that stigma will end up as discrim in laws. /2

[Katie Gillum @slowtext]

@inroadsGlobe It's a mistake to accept any false morality, binaries attached to abortion as a starting place. We should flatly reject to start from that paradigm. Define abortion by our experiences, assocations with it. #MultipleAbortionStigma /1

[Katie Gillum @slowtext]

#MultipleAbortionStigma This one & done support's nothing new to (some)women, queer folks, and POC. We get a single chance to live up to a standard, take the right path. So this conditional sympathy/care is a deeper problem we need to root out in our movements, care systems. /2

[Katie Gillum @slowtext]

#MultipleAbortionStigma It's not a myth but it's a current present across the world: that we get one "mistake", one undo in abortion. And that empathy, access, care run out if we want or need to have another abortion. /1

[Katie Gillum @slowtext]

@inroadsGlobe #MultipleAbortionStigma language is everywhere. "repeat, return" abortions has the effect of linking abortion w/criminal justice system which is both an inappropriate association but also a tell. Crim Justic stigma also unduly pathologizes complex lives into stats, "bad paths" /3

[Katie Gillum @slowtext]

#MultipleAbortionStigma Focus on # or frequency again erases the individual experiences that lead a person to abortion. We don't live our lives at the population level. Abortions aren't popcorn, and they also aren't eclipses; they should happen whenever they are needed. /2

[Katie Gillum @slowtext]

@inroadsGlobe #MultipleAbortionStigma the orig crappy language the emphasized number of abortions was "safe, legal, rare" as though you could reduce the need by just telling people it's better to have fewer of them. They should be as plentiful as the number needed by people who have them. /1

[Katie Gillum @slowtext]

@inroadsGlobe #MultipleAbortionStigma providers can lose sight of the individual experiences we have in healthcare. We don't treat two surgeries for separate injuries as part of the same "problem" or two different childbirths... abortions are distinct experience happening across a varied life.

[Katie Gillum @slowtext]

@inroadsGlobe #MultipleAbortionStigma that frame puts all the empathy w/ drs. No question of whether this person returning for #2 might be there b/c bc offered didn't work, reproductive abuse may be at play, this just needed to happen. it's a wrong-headed way to provide service. /2

[Katie Gillum @slowtext]

@inroadsGlobe #MultipleAbortionStigma I've heard a dr express frustration that a woman is "back for another" as though she just couldn't follow the instructions on her body or were annoying that she didn't follow the doc's expertise. /1

[Katie Gillum @slowtext]

@inroadsGlobe But we could treat each abortion like the choice, experience, circumstance that it is not a series of actions that need to be changed or averted. Could stop thinking that people who get pregnant need to be carefully shuttled toward the "right" outcomes #MultipleAbortionStigma /3

[Katie Gillum @slowtext]

@inroadsGlobe #MultipleAbortionStigma also seems to be a default attitude for some, assuming that the stigma/trouble people go to to get the abortion is a punishment/hardship that they'll fear to experience again so "naturally" all the focus will be avoiding another experience /2