An Invitation to Inclusion
by Max Mapes (they/them)
CW: TRANSPHOBIA
Whenever there’s a push toward progress, there’s always a push back. Today, we’re seeing a push for gender-inclusive language in conversations about abortion with push back against the inclusion of trans men and non-binary folx in that conversation. This push back ranges from denying the manhood of trans men to insisting that abortion is a women’s issue and only a women’s issue. I don’t engage in conversations about the legitimacy of trans people, so if that’s what you’re looking for: #bye. But I do think it’s important to talk about why we’ve created a false binary between Women’s issues and gender-inclusive language. So…let’s talk.
We were all raised in a society that essentialized gender based on biological binaries, meaning we are taught to see people as male or female, man or woman, masculine or feminine based on whether they have a penis or vagina, more testosterone or more estrogen, xy chromosomes or xx chromosomes. But neither gender nor biology is binary.
About 1.7% of people are born intersex, meaning they have “differences in sex traits or reproductive anatomy.” For example, they may be born with a vagina but no uterus. We’ve constructed a gender binary based on the myth of biological binaries. So it shouldn’t be a surprise that 6 in 1,000 US adults don’t identify as the gender they were assigned at birth. That means that — if we assume that the 50:50::masculine:feminine ratio for transgender people is the same as for cisgender people — we are leaving 700,000 adults out of a conversation that directly impacts their reproductive health and rights. And that’s not okay.
That doesn’t mean this isn’t a women’s issue; in fact, it is specifically a women of colors’ issue. Reproductive rights haven’t always been up for debate. For the majority of human history, abortion was either totally unregulated or loosely regulated. In the US, it wasn’t until 1880, when a white, male OBGYN, Horatio Storer, convinced the American Medical Association (AMA) to pressure the government to tighten regulations, that the US got its first abortion ban. Storer began campaigning the AMA because he was concerned about how many babies non-white immigrants were having and how that could undermine white supremacy. That’s right, abortion was a-ok until white people were getting outnumbered, and then all of a sudden abortion was a sin, carrying steep legal and social punishments.
Shall these regions be filled by our own children or by those of aliens? This is a question our women must answer; upon their loins depends the future destiny of the nation — Storer
Intentionally or unintentionally, the criminalization of abortion forced cis women into motherhood and domesticity. To this day, abortion is about stripping cis women of their bodily autonomy and restricting their social mobility. And for that reason, abortion will always be a women’s issue. But that does not negate the 700,000 trans men and non-binary folx whose reproductive rights are, intentionally or unintentionally, also being trampled. They are also being forced into parenthood. They are also being stripped of their bodily autonomy. Where is their national outrage? Where is their march on the capitol? Where are they in this conversation? Abortion access is bigger than women. It is a matter of oppressive patriarchal and hetero-cisnormative forces that are meant to keep certain people in their “place”.
As our definition of women changes, so too should the language we use to talk about abortion. For far too long we have sacrificed trans visibility in the name of uplifting cis women. But these are not mutually exclusive objectives. We can affirm the targeted, disproportionate, negative effects abortion restrictions have on cis women without further marginalizing the most marginalized: trans men and non-binary folx. As activists for gender justice, we must affirm everyone’s gender-based oppression, and that means moving beyond trans-exclusive language. When we reframe abortion access as an issue for people with uteruses instead of cis women, we invite everyone with a uterus to join the conversation. Welcome.
