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In a time of accelerating crises and eroding protections, what does it look like to practice change? We’ll be exploring this question and how we show up for the future that we all deserve at the upcoming CTZN Summit - September 1-4, 2022. [ [link removed] ] Our virtual journey will be inspired by movement leaders like Dr Jasmine Syedullah, Nicole Cardoza, Dr Sará King, Rae Leiner, Frank Escamilla, Kennae Miller, Kerri Kelly and more as we build the courage and capacity to navigate this transition and build a better world. Registration is “pay what you can”.
Save your seat [ [link removed] ]!
It is becoming increasingly dangerous to be pregnant in the United States. Not just because of increasing maternal mortality rates, or our compromised healthcare system, or the criminalization of pregnancy in the post-Roe world, but because of the surveillance and policing of pregnancy that is putting so many at risk.
This week we learned that facebook gave police a teenagers private chats [ [link removed] ]about her home abortion which police then used to prosecute her and her mother. Emerging threats to bodily autonomy, when coupled with policing, the surveillance state and the erosion of democracy (making it harder to impact politics and protect the rights of people) is setting us up for a dark future.
But it is also revealing how our struggles are connected. How protecting abortion is connected to abolishing the many systems that surveil and control bodies like policing and prisons and even medicine. The long history of reproductive control, involuntary treatment and institutionalizing people in the US exposes the truth of the medical industrial complex and its roots in oppression.
But if criminalization is the playbook of the right, then collective care must be the playbook of the people. Because the survival of the many systems of oppression - white supremacy, capitalism, colonization, etc - relies on our consent and willingness to allow people to be held down. Surviving this moment is refusing to comply with systems of domination and violence. But it is also choosing NOT to abandon one another. We are our best chance for a better future, so let’s start acting like it.
Kerri (she/her)
There are good reasons to defund the FBI. They have nothing to do with Trump. [click to tweet] [ [link removed] ]
The policing of pregnancy and homeland security are intimately enmeshed. Here’s what you need to know about the history of motherhood in the US and how the post-Dobbs landscape is evolving. [click to tweet] [ [link removed] ]
If you want to map inequality in New York, you can just count trees. Why an East Harlem Street Is 31 Degrees Hotter Than Central Park West. [click to tweet] [ [link removed] ]
Calls to “show up as your whole self” is not without risk. Code-switching and why we are never getting back together. [click to tweet] [ [link removed] ]
What does organizing look like in a post-Roe world? Andrea Ritchie breaks it down and explains what people can do. [click to tweet] [ [link removed] ]
In the face of mounting threats and criminalization by the state, we are all we have. How we show up for each other will determine who we are as a collective and as a country. We must follow the people who know the way and learn how to take care of each other. Here’s a roundup of resources for how to resist, organize and build a culture of safety and care:
No more police [ [link removed] ]. How we interrupt and end the growing criminalization and incarceration of women, girls, trans, and gender nonconforming people of color for criminalized acts related to public order, poverty, child welfare, drug use, survival and self-defense, including criminalization and incarceration of survivors of violence.
Community Safety. [ [link removed] ]The Get in Formation toolkit is a collection of security and safety practices built by years of learning in the streets from Black, Indigenous, and People of Color movements within the U.S.
Transform Harm [ [link removed] ]. A hub full of accessible resources about transformative justice, community accountability, restorative justice, healing justice, abolition, and carceral feminism
Beyond Courts: [ [link removed] ] How criminal courts work, info about limits to commonly proposed reforms, and tools for abolitionist alternatives.
Art by @itsmonicatrinidad, Resource thread by @josstgreene
The attacks on bodily autonomy are not just about healthcare, they are about self care. When systems of power deny us choice and self-determination, they deny us our wholeness and dignity. They assume one-size-fits-all solutions to what is often diverse and complex needs. Of course Black, Indigenous people of color, women, immigrants, poor people, LGBTQIA and disabled people will bear the brunt of these strategies. Self care understands that we have different needs AND we are a part of a bigger whole. How we take care of ourselves includes how we take care of each other. And in the face of accelerating crises, we are all we’ve got. Here’s some questions for reflection:
How do you practice resistance as a part of your self-care routine?
What does it look like to be in solidarity with those who are most impacted by threats to bodily autonomy?
What is needed for collective care and safety?
What is your right role and responsibility in disrupting systems of power and building structures of care?
Art by @femalecollective
Discomfort is a teacher. Listen.
Art by @shopsundae
CTZNWELL is community powered and crowd-sourced. That’s how we keep it real. Please consider joining us on Patreon [ [link removed] ] for as little as $2/month so that we can keep doing the work of creating content that matters for CTZNs who care.
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