Sex & Health in Brief

by ALICE BUTTRICK

October 2009

Adrienne Wallace, a junior fellow in the Sociology Department, is forming an all-University Reproductive Justice Coalition with the aim of uniting pro-choice minds across the campus towards actionable issues on Yale’s campus. Her agenda currently includes consent education, issues of access and the publicizing of resources, and initiating a much-needed escorting program at the Planned Parenthood of Connecticut on Edwards and Whitney.  Ms. Wallace is also exploring the possibility for a Doula project (inspired by the New York group, abortiondoula.org) on our campus. The Doula project trains people to follow women through their pregnancies, whether to birth or to early termination, ensuring that all women understand their options and have support every step of the way. The Coalition’s goals will evolve to include input from all levels of University life. We applaud this collaborative effort to improve the health and reproductive options of women on and around Yale’s campus. If you have suggestions for the goals of the Reproductive Justice Coalition or would like to find out how to get involved, please email Ms. Wallace at adrienne.wallace@yale.edu.

Planned Parenthood of Connecticut and Planned Parenthood of Rhode Island are combining to become Planned Parenthood of New England in the upcoming months.

A disturbing new anti-choice campaign has sprung up on campus. Images of an embryo labeled “Baby Lucy” appear each week in progressive stages of development, in an effort to portray a fetus as a baby and thereby discourage abortions. It appears to be based on a similar campaign run a few years ago at Harvard. In that effort, new posters every week showed the progression of a fertilized egg through a full pregnancy. The embryo was named and given a future as a feminist race-car driver. The success of that campaign has driven anti-choice movements to revolutionize their material strategies. “Baby Lucy” is sponsored by Choose Life at Yale, a group with predominantly male membership.

Alice Buttrick is a senior in Yale College. She is the Sex & Health Editor for Broad Recognition.