By Jeff Winbush
As the far-right majority of the Supreme Court rolls back the clock to the day when abortion was inaccessible, unsafe, and illegal, I feel sorry for my daughter and other young women of color, as well as poor and working-class white women.
The rest? Not so much. If you’re a white woman who voted Republican over the past 30 years or so, I’m sorry to say I have no sympathy for you. Sympathy, like water, is finite and I’m going to save mine for those deserving of it.
White women who voted Republican deserve none. Four white men, one white woman, and a small “b” black dude who wishes he was white took away their reproductive rights. They don’t care if you get pregnant and have a miscarriage. They don’t care if you have a septic uterus. They don’t care if you have an ectopic pregnancy.
You are going to have that baby and Clarence Thomas and the Supremes don’t care if you die. More white babies are needed before the Black and brown ones take over the country.
The ruling that rolls back the reproductive rights of American women was bought and paid for by rich men worried about the falling birth rates and the terrifying future where whites don’t make up the dominant populace of the country. For years, they bought and paid for conservative politicians from Mitch McConnell to Donald Trump to pack the high court with judges who would roll back Roe v. Wade.
Should white women be blamed at all for what may possibly be the end of legal abortion in America?
Certainly not all of them, but enough of them voted against the future of their own reproductive rights by voting for McCain over Obama in 2008, Romney over Obama in 2012, Trump over Clinton in 2016 and favored him again over Biden in 2020.
I blame white women for voting for Donald Trump. Not once, but twice. I blame them for putting Trump instead of Hillary Clinton in the position of appointing not one, not two, but three rabidly anti-abortion nominees to fill Supreme Court vacancies, including the seat McConnell flipped off Obama to hold open.
This made a difference and so did the White women for gave Trump that opportunity.
According to exit polls conducted by CNN in 2020, while 90% of Black women voters supported Joe Biden, along with almost 70% of Hispanic women, up to 55% of white women voted for Trump.
White women are often problematic allies when it comes down to fighting for the issues Black people face on a daily basis, and if they aren’t motivated to look out for their own best interests, they can’t be trusted to look out for anyone else. Why should any white woman who voted for Republicans be mad?
The GOP have never hidden their agenda, which is to protect the fetus in the womb and do nothing for it once they are out of it.
It took them 50 years, but they did what they always said they would. Next stop: contraceptive access and same-sex marriage. Say “bye-bye” to that, too, as soon as this right-wing, activist Supreme Court gets a case brought to them that fits the criteria. It’s too late for buyer’s remorse.
The only reason interracial marriage will still be allowed is Clarence Thomas would sooner eat his own foot than leave his white woman.
Seemingly, no discriminatory policies or hateful speech will stop these voters from supporting Trump, or the next candidate just like him.
Within that 55% of white women are your friends, your family and your co-workers. I can’t gather them up and ask them, “What were you thinking of when you voted for that guy?”
Tough conversations, but only white women can have them. It’s their circle that brought American women to face this dismal future where they will have to fight long and hard to get back the rights that were snatched away.
But unless suburban, college-educated women are ready to battle it out around the dinner table before and after the November elections and vote for pro-choice Democrats, there is little reason to hope they are going to stand up and protect their own interests.
White women vote the same way white men do — they vote Republican. They did it in 2016, repeated it in 2020 and are poised to do it again and pull the lever for Donald Trump or Rick DeSantis or Ted Cruz, or some other misandrist who hates women but loves “The Handmaid’s Tale.”
White women voting Republican was the catalyst for the upcoming chaos, but they sure didn’t slow it down. I’m laying the blame at the feet of naive white women like Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) who is now upset Brett “I love beer!” Kavanaugh lied to her in his confirmation hearings that he would not overturn Roe. You got played again, Sue.
Legal abortion will exist as long as it takes for a Republican Congress and president to pass a national ban, and then only rich people will still have access to safely terminating an unwanted pregnancy. This is the culmination of a five-decade war to eliminate abortion without any exceptions in the United States, and while it might have been difficult to win, it’s difficult to say the pro-choice forces always waged the battle to protect reproductive rights with the same fervor and financial support as the pro-life forces had to take them away.
We knew there was nothing but ill intent and dirty deals coming from a Supreme Court with three Trump appointees in charge. Now we all know that was true. White women are yelling and crying that they will fight for their reproductive rights, but they might not be in this mess had they fought harder to keep right-wing judges away from their uterus two or three presidential elections ago.
This time Black women can’t save white women from themselves. They have their own problems and white women just helped to create a brand new one.
Disclaimer: The views, thoughts, and opinions expressed in the article belong solely to the author, and not necessarily to the author’s employer, The Philadelphia Sunday SUN, the author’s organization, committee or other group or individual.
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