"A Fundamental Violation of Basic Human Rights": An Interview With Loretta J. Ross

Abstract

"A Fundamental Violation of Basic Human Rights":An Interview With Loretta J. Ross Sarah Jones (bio) and Loretta J. Ross (bio) Click for larger view View full resolution Loretta J. Ross (Molly Crabapple) [End Page 24] When the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in June 2022, the Christian right rejoiced. Although the decision didn't end abortion in the United States, it generated new possibilities for abortion opponents while setting back the feminist movement. The increasing criminalization of abortion has forced doctors and patients into impossible contortions. In Ohio, a ten-year-old girl fled the state to end her pregnancy. In Louisiana, where abortion is tightly restricted, an ob-gyn said that a hospital lawyer prevented her from performing a medically necessary abortion to remove a fetus that wasn't viable; instead, she had to induce delivery. The patient "was screaming—not from pain, but from the emotional trauma," she said in an affidavit. For people who can become pregnant, the situation is not likely to improve from here. We cannot count on the courts. The police are the enemy, and politicians can be fickle allies at best. What, then, can we do? To answer this question and more, I turned to one of the nation's leading feminist activists, Loretta J. Ross. A cofounder of SisterSong, a reproductive rights organization led by people of color in the South, Ross is a recent MacArthur Foundation grantee for her landmark work in reproductive justice. As the MacArthur Foundation observed on its website, Ross worked alongside other women of color in 1994 to help design a framework that links the right to have a child or not to the right to raise a child in safety—an outcome that demands access to healthcare, housing, and a clean environment, among other necessities. Ross spoke with me the day after the midterm elections offered feminists some hope that public opinion had turned against the anti-abortion movement. Sarah Jones: I thought we could begin with the question that I think many people had after the Supreme Court announced the Dobbs decision: how do you think we got here, to the end of Roe v. Wade? Loretta J. Ross: Well, we got to the end of Roe v. Wade because of Republicans. Since the 1970s, they have been committed to building a [End Page 25] base, putting together people who are opposed to immigration, people who are opposed to integration, people who are opposed to women's rights and feminism, and people who are opposed to gay rights. They called that group "the moral majority," but there is nothing moral, or majoritarian, about them. They made a commitment to engage in culture wars as a way of marching back into power and trying to permanently hold onto it. The manipulation of the culture wars, particularly around abortion rights, is a base-building strategy for people who want to pack the Supreme Court to protect themselves from criminal prosecution for their corruption. They've learned that they're out of step with the rest of the country. They have to cheat, because they can't compete. And that's why we're seeing all this voting rights suppression, not only targeting Black, Latino, and Indigenous voters, but young voters. Eighteen-to-twenty-nine year olds in the 2020 election voted for Biden, not Trump. The results were particularly surprising with the white portion of that group, who didn't vote for the candidate that most represented white supremacy. So you're seeing the shutting down of voting precincts that are near colleges, and people who are going to school out of state not being allowed to mail in ballots. Jones: The end of Roe occurred alongside the growth of this resurgent, far-right movement. How should we understand the relationship between them? Ross: They really do believe that white men are an endangered species, and so they're trying to achieve through coercion something that they cannot get any other way: to compel more white women to have more babies. They want to push white women out of the job market, because there aren't enough jobs to go around. They want them to...