LOOK BEYOND THE INITIAL ISSUE
Ihate to circle the narrative of race with a ruling that ultimately affects all women, femmes and gender-expansive human beings’ access to abortion care services. However, I can’t seem to shake the disparities that overwhelmingly place Black women at the top in maternal complications by death; according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, per 100,000 live births, Black women make up 41% of all pregnancy-related deaths, with deaths among American Native and Alaskan Native women closely alongside at 30% and white women at 13%.
The National Black Women’s Reproductive Justice Agenda reports that although Black women only make up 13% of the U.S. population, we make up 38% of all U.S. abortions. Its 2021 policy agenda also informs that Black women are more likely to lack economic resources, to be unemployed and/or underinsured and to be insured by programs that restrict coverage for abortion care. The agenda also reports on the myriad factors contributing to Black women and girls’ overall health and reproductive outcomes.
I bring this to attention when discussing reproductive justice: what it means to mobilize, to encourage the music community to look further than Roe v. Wade or the right to bodily autonomy and take a deep dive into the historic and systemic injustices that continuously place the lives of Black women and men on the back burner of discussion, when statistically we are ahead at the coroner’s office.
If you are motivated to act, I implore you to further discover and advocate for organizations focused on reproductive health and also uplift organizations that service communities in an effort to reduce poverty, overincarceration and sexual violence and increase access to healthy food, mental health, sex education and health care services. Review the Fall of Roe Resource Guide; some highlights include the Reproductive Health Access Project and In Our Voices: Black Woman’s Reproductive Justice Agenda.
If this all feels overwhelming, it is because it is — but we got this.
—Noelle Scaggs co-lead singer,
Fitz & The Tantrums; co-founder, Diversify the Stage