Dehumanized: A Reflection on the Misogynist Texas Tragedy
Today, women’s bodies are on my mind. I think of this precious essence of womanhood with outrage as Texas’s abhorrent anti-abortion law in all its horror becomes inevitably clear.
Yet despite my anger, I’ve always recognized that women are considered secondary in our society. It’s something I’ve read about in more stories, essays, and articles than I could ever recall, watched on most every type of television program and movie under the sun, and personally experienced throughout my own life.
Overall, in every sector, women just don’t count.
But Texas’s appalling SB8 law takes misogyny to a whole new, horrendous level that feels painfully surreal due to its gleeful cruelty. In all honesty, I find it difficult to encapsulate the hideous nature of this legislation through description alone. The state’s broad ban of abortion feels shocking beyond the capacity of words. But I can say that at the heart of this draconian rule is an effort to erase a woman’s humanity, to ensure she has no agency, no ability to make meaningful decisions about her own health.
It’s, quite simply, dehumanizing.
According to this law, it is now illegal for a woman to get an abortion after six weeks. Most women aren’t even aware that they’re pregnant by this benchmark. That span amounts to little more than one missed menstrual cycle. And the Republican leaders who formulated this rule are conscious of that reality. The cut-off for legally accessing an abortion is by design.
Not only that, these lawmakers make the trauma of needing an abortion colossally worse. They encourage frivolous lawsuits to be brought against anyone involved in this process. From those who might transport a woman to the nearest clinic to the front-desk staff at a health care center to any number of people in between, these innocent individuals might find themselves crushed by financial hardship as a result of their compassionate participation.
This ban is, above all, intended to punish. And the penalties are severe.
Any person who may have helped a woman along the way in her quest for an abortion could be sued, facing a ten thousand dollar fine. If defendants happen to win, they’re released from paying such exorbitant damages. Yet they still must contend with extensive legal fees, potentially insurmountable costs that could devastate the average worker. Accusers, on the other hand, have no responsibility to cover the defendants’ legal bills, should they lose. Even absolutely absurd claims won’t warrant economic consequences, thereby encouraging the most ridiculous lawsuits imaginable. Because whether or not the plaintiffs prevail in their cases, they don’t have to worry about paying the other side’s legal fees. Yet a possible victory could translate to a reward of thousands of dollars just for being an avid whistleblower.
It’s a win-win scenario for anyone looking to earn serious money without substantial risk.
To make matters even more atrocious, a random person from out of state could file a lawsuit against someone who allegedly assisted a Texas resident in any way to obtain an abortion. This means pro-life zealots, right-wing extremists, and others who subscribe to this enraged contingency, possibly living thousands of miles away, are empowered to turn on whomever they please, all in the name of controlling women’s bodies.
Essentially, Texas’s regulation urges people to take the law into their own hands, betraying relatives, neighbors, peers, anyone they wish, with the ultimate objective to eradicate women’s choices. While the pregnant woman herself isn’t subject to any lawsuits, her ability to decide whether or not she wants to carry a child is entirely taken away after the first six weeks. It’s yet another form of dehumanization, where she doesn’t even figure into a court case beyond being the vessel that holds this pivotal fetus. In every sense, she’s immaterial and has no voice outside of those initial six weeks, when the pregnancy may not be apparent to her yet.
Indeed, genuine concern for the woman herself is completely absent from Texas’s law. Unless an abortion has to be performed after six weeks due to a medical emergency, she must fulfill the pregnancy to term. Rape, incest, the inability to support a child, or a valid disinterest in motherhood is not an acceptable rationale for terminating a pregnancy in Texas anymore. This means that women of child-bearing age in that state cannot define their destinies, standing up for their right to lead the lives they please, if an unexpected pregnancy occurs.
Instead, they’re heartlessly penalized for a situation that might be well outside of their power because of tragic circumstances. And even if a woman’s pregnancy doesn’t result from the perpetration of violence, she still cannot choose how to proceed, something that has been a constitutional right for almost fifty years. Once again, the woman is reduced to a physical form synonymous to an object, owned by an entity indifferent to her personal needs or desires. More monstrous still, others can and actively are encouraged to benefit from her helplessness.
She is dehumanized.
It’s disgraceful that the Supreme Court allowed this terrible abortion ban to take place without any objection whatsoever. In effect, the majority of justices are reinforcing the notion that women’s bodies belong to the government. Furthermore, these supposed objective representatives of the law, situated at the highest standard of legal jurisprudence for the nation, now endorse the toxic hatefulness of everyday people victimizing women at their most vulnerable.
Even though, as stated, the pregnant woman cannot be sued in court under this law, she’s deliberately isolated just when she needs access to resources. Texas’s new law guarantees that everyone around her will immediately hesitate about having any role in her pursuit of an abortion. So not only is she without medical help except in life-threatening circumstances, this individual has no support network, no one willing to help her due to an appropriate fear of outrageous fines.
It is yet another form of dehumanization. That’s because the woman seeking relief effectively becomes invisible, irrelevant, heinously inconsequential beyond a body that generates an infant after nine months. This law steals her humanity, denies her say in the matter, and strips her of any options as long as she resides in Texas.
That’s another point worth mentioning. Women without the means to travel out-of-state for an abortion, who lack the funds to secure transportation, who live in impoverished conditions, are hurt the most. They’re trapped, forced to have an unwanted child, even if the pregnancy happened as a result of violence imposed on them. Their struggles don’t matter in the least simply because they aren’t recognized as human beings under this law. So brutality after brutality, the savagery of rape or incest, for example, and then the systematic, deliberate refusal to assist the victimized individual, show exactly how Texas regards women who live in this state.
They are without any value except as a mechanism to bear children.
And it goes without saying that once the child is born, this infant loses all rights as well. In a state where an epidemic rages without mitigation, where the governor actively balks at mask mandates meant to preserve life, where common sense gun laws are pretty much nonexistent, the child’s well-being is certainly not a consideration.
So, once born, children are stripped of their humanity, too.
I’d like to think this terrible law will be short-lived and reversed at some point. That’s my hope because if Texas’s ban remains, other states will follow suit. Therefore, this ghastly dehumanization will be as widespread and as poisonous as an uncontainable virus.
To me, such a mindset must be stopped in its tracks. And, in my opinion, it begins with expanding the Supreme Court. We need additional justices who represent the view that the majority of Americans support. Women should be allowed to choose whether or not to continue a pregnancy without question. It’s a constitutional right we’ve had for decades and the fact that a state can decide to erase women’s voices is reprehensible. Furthermore, any government’s ruthless interference in a woman’s agency over her own body cannot be tolerated.
Whether or not Texas accepts the reality, women are human beings, not possessions of the state. So the best thing we as women can do is to fight for our humanity, to push for a nation that embraces our right to be in charge of our futures. Otherwise, we’ll be nothing more than incubators and that’s certainly not the fate I want for American womanhood.
We as women must never, ever allow ourselves to become dehumanized.
