Abortion and Online Networks of Care in Latin America — and Beyond
What can the US and other countries learn from the region’s success in advancing reproductive freedom?
On March 8, 2018, International Women’s Day, a stream of people flooded the streets of Buenos Aires, Argentina. Protesters walked, sang, and chanted, many of them wearing green, the color associated with the movement for safe and legal abortion. I joined the massive crowd headed to the Argentine Congress, where the march culminated. Protesters and activists had long been putting political pressure on officials, calling for Argentina to decriminalize and legalize abortion. The demand they brought to the Congress that day, and others before: Abortion will be legal, safe, free. Aborto legal, seguro y gratuito.
I was living in Buenos Aires at the time, doing fieldwork in intensive care units in public hospitals for my dissertation. All over the country, abortion was a topic of conversation among friends and family, an issue debated in the media, and on the ground in activist organizing that was gaining strength and momentum. In the hospitals where I was doing research, physicians had seen the consequences of unsafe and poorly managed abortions firsthand, including severe complications and death.
Before 2021, abortion in Argentina was only legal in cases of rape, incest, or when a woman’s health or life was deemed at risk, as established by a medical team. As a result, thousands of illegal abortions were performed each year, and those who received or performed a voluntary interruption of pregnancy were subject to criminal prosecution.
All the while, networks of organizations, volunteers, and collectives actively worked to provide abortion information and care through online campaigns, marches, and education. Among others, the National Campaign for Safe, Legal, and Free Abortion applied political and cultural pressure to change the narrative. Their main message and demand: Educación sexual para decidir, anticonceptivos para no abortar, aborto legal para no morir. Sexual education to make decisions, contraception to not have abortions, legal abortions to not die. Hashtags like #seráley and #abortolegalya flooded social media.
At last, in December 2020, the Argentine Congress legalized abortion up to 14 weeks. Activists and organizers had worked tirelessly toward this result for decades, using a variety of tactics and avenues: aiming to shift popular opinion, apply political pressure, and assemble a massive presence on the streets. All of those efforts were both galvanized and sustained via digital activism.
Across Latin America, activists celebrated Argentina’s win as it blew new wind in the sails for the rest of the continent, and the Green Wave — Marea Verde — expanded. Since early 2021, Mexico’s Supreme Court declared the criminalization of abortion unconstitutional. Ecuador made abortion legal in cases of rape. In February of this year, Colombia legalized abortion up to 24 weeks, placing it among the countries with the most liberal abortion laws in the Americas.
In Latin America, central to many activist efforts has been the notion of cuidado — which means “care” in Spanish, and carries several meanings when it comes to the workings and ethics of social relations. This cuidado has been the basis of mobilization and solidarity, the idea that “we can take care of each other” both despite and because of conditions of abandonment, oppression, and violence. Caring for each other also means destigmatizing abortion by saying the word out loud. Practicing cuidado with a feminist intention undermines traditional notions of care that are usually associated with gendered expectations of invisible labor. Instead, cuidado becomes the basis for a collective worldbuilding that has its roots in mutual aid and reciprocity.
Acompañar y Cuidar
Since 2012, the Argentine network Socorristas en Red (feministas y transfeminista que abortamos) has been connecting women and other birthing people with the information and care they need to get and self-manage abortions outside the formal healthcare system, and to access services within it when possible. The network’s name, which can be roughly translated as “Helpers in a Network” (feminists and transfeminists who abort) conveys the ethics of reciprocity and care that informs their actions.
The Socorristas partner with different collectives and groups across the entire territory of Argentina, so that each collective can best serve the needs of their community. Since 2014, they have helped around 50,000 people get an abortion outside the healthcare system. Self-managed abortion has been recognized by the WHO as “non-invasive and highly acceptable,” and as a safe alternative to in-clinic care.
Information, education, and support has been at the heart of this mutual aid model. Along with cuidado, activists practice acompañamiento — walking with, along, and side-by-side with those who find themselves wanting to terminate a pregnancy and needing information and help. This acompañamiento became even more relevant during the pandemic and Argentina’s long quarantine and lockdown, as the digital space became an ever more critical venue.
In Mexico, GIRE — El Grupo de Información sobre Reproducción Elegida is doing a different kind of work, yet applying the same principles of care and accompaniment. Mexico decriminalized abortion on a federal level in 2021, although its legislative status varies state by state. While Mexico City has been a safe haven since 2007 for those seeking a voluntary interruption of pregnancy, access to abortion services is patchy and uneven throughout the country. Through legal support, political engagement and public policy advocacy, and research, GIRE focuses on changing the conversation about abortion, fighting to reframe it as a human right. The organization also has a consultation database that makes publicly available information and data about abortion legislation in Mexico, maternal mortality and reproductive health, and obstetric violence and domestic informal labor.
Both the Socorristas and GIRE are carrying out digital activism that translates into actual care and legislative action. Their work on data collection is also integral to advancing the cause.
Beyond Latin America
I was born in the US, but grew up in Bologna, Italy, a quite progressive and left-leaning part of the country. The Italian Law 194, which guarantees the voluntary interruption of pregnancy, was passed in the country in 1978 and abortion has been legal since then. Yet the Catholic Church has historically exerted intense cultural pressure on issues of reproductive freedom. A large number of medical professionals are obiettori di coscienza, or conscientious objectors, and do not perform abortions on personal moral and religious grounds. As a result, access to abortion in the public system is uneven and difficult. Recently, under the leadership of Giorgia Meloni, the newly elected prime minister and head of the neofascist party Brothers of Italy, abortion opponents and support for the “traditional family” have gained ground, with the formation of the Ministry of Family, Natality, and Equal Opportunities (Ministero della Famiglia, Natalita’ e delle Pari Opportunitá).
As the debate on abortion is reignited in Italy, a country with low birth rates and demographic anxieties, both digital and on the ground activism has questioned the inherent cultural value of “natality” and motherhood, and worked to destigmatize abortion and raise awareness about the issues of conscientious objection in a public healthcare system.
The online network IVG, Ho abortito e sto benissimo (literally, I got an abortion and I’m feeling great) along with others like Libera di Abortire have modeled themselves upon other feminist networks. They are effectively using social media to ring the alarm bell on what might lay ahead, providing information on where to receive services and gain access to pharmaceuticals like misoprostol, and accompany people in their decision. The initiative Obiezione Respinta provides a crowdsourced map that tracks the availability of services, hospitals, and health clinics throughout the peninsula. Users anonymously report their experiences with conscientious objectors who refuse to provide abortions or the morning after pill. During the COVID-19 pandemic, Obiezione Respinta created a Telegram channel called SOS Aborto that functions as a network of solidarity, mutual aid, and accompaniment for those who seeking an abortion.
In the US, networks of care, activism, and amplification of resources have acquired new relevance after the Supreme Court’s repeal of Roe vs Wade. These networks builds on a tradition of solidarity and reciprocity that long predates this moment. Care and accompaniment were at the center of the Jane Collective (officially known as the Abortion Counseling Service of Women’s Liberation) that operated in Chicago from 1969 to 1973. Activists and organizers in more conservative states have been facing the restriction of abortion rights for decades, as well as violence against abortion clinics, medical professionals, and organizers.
Since the repeal of Roe, many conversations about abortion, reproductive health, and “the digital” have revolved around issues of data security and privacy, the tracking of reproductive health through period apps, and the impossibility of keeping a pregnancy private. Yet digital networks have also enabled great exchange of information, resources, and direct abortion care. National Abortion Funds has played a critical role in providing resources and funding for those seeking an abortion, with state-by-state information on how to access services. Websites like Safe2choose and How to Use an Abortion Pill provide safe and certified training and information.
In the recently concluded Midterm elections, abortion proved to be a key electoral issue. US activists are already drawing inspiration and momentum from the Green Wave and connecting to the global struggle for bodily autonomy, sexual education, and reproductive freedom. Digital networks of care from outside the US have come to the aid of Americans seeking abortion. For example, Mexican volunteer networks have been helping women in Texas get access to Misoprostol. Activists from Mexico can provide an effective model on how to move forward, and Mexico City has been identified as a blueprint for how more progressive US states might provide abortion services.
These networks of care and accompaniment are not only geared towards those who need abortions, but also toward medical professionals who want to provide them or who find themselves in ambiguous legal situations in states with abortion bans.
At a recent Now this presidential forum, President Biden expressed surprise when an OB/GYN resident from University of Texas Southwestern in Dallas explained that she had organized an after hours group to teach how to perform abortions. They do so by practicing performing abortions on a papaya, an accurate model of the uterus, using materials and methods offered by The Papaya Workshop, a digital hub of information and education that seeks to demystify abortion care.
Amplifying the Green Wave
As I write this, I have returned to Buenos Aires after a three year hiatus. While the battle for equal access is still underway, abortion is now legal. The green handkerchief has moved from the streets of Argentina to the rest of the world, reaching protests in the rest of Latin America, Europe, and the US. Friends here are surprised by the reversal of progress in places like the US and Italy, yet amazed and encouraged by the global impact of the Green Wave.
Where the right to abortion is under threat, activists in Latin America have shown the importance of being proactive and prepared, of connecting social media and the streets, and of applying cultural and political pressure to push for legislative action. That’s what cuidado is about: a deep knowledge and understanding of mutual reciprocity and interconnectedness. Around the world, digital networks of abortion care can enable collaboration and exchange, and provide a model for how to keep pushing, no matter the forces arrayed against them.
On Thursday, November 17, I will be joined by Eugenia Ferrario from Socorristas en Red in Argentina and Rebeca Ramos, from GIRE, to discuss how cuidado shows up in their work and activism, how an embodied sense of caring for ourselves and each other can be found online, and how it can lead to political action, legislative change, and reproductive liberation for all. Learn more and RSVP here.
