The Fourth Day (30-Day Writing Challenge

Today I wrote an article. It is an angry article. An afraid article. A feminist article.

I am considering it day 4 of the 30-day writing challenge.

It is a political article.

It comes with a trigger warning. TW; politics, religion, human rights.

I hope if you decided to comment that you will remember to be kind with your words. Please don't attack those who disagree with you.

Here is my fourth day of the 30-day writing challenge.

Front and Center - Don't Feed the Patriarchy

The U.S. is so fucked up right now.

Roe v. Wade overturned, SCOTUS deeming loud, ostentatious prayer surrounded by high school kids as a private moment, 45 knowing and not caring about insurrectionists being armed (because they weren’t coming for him, what’s to care about?).

Everyone I know is afraid and angry. We talk about these things, my friends and I. One of my very near and very dear friends and fellow editor, Reuben Salsa, made a statement of solidarity the other day. Reuben doesn’t live in the United States. He doesn’t have the ability to get pregnant. He isn’t personally affected by prayer in schools.

But he cares. And I love him for that.

Reuben brought up the latest SCOTUS insanity. The school prayer hot topic. Briefly (very briefly) a high school coach disagreed with his school district for telling him he couldn’t pray on the sports ball field after the games. The man would pray loudly and ostentatiously while surrounded by some of the sports ball team. He decided to sue. The lawsuit went all the way to SCOTUS. On Monday SCOTUS ruled in favor of the former coach. They ruled 6 -3 that the man’s religious freedoms had been violated.

Reuben, and many more like him, spurred on by the media frenzy of OpEd pieces, are up in arms that SCOTUS is now allowing prayer back in schools.

Here's the thing about prayer in schools. It's never been not allowed. It is just not mandatory and the school staff isn't allowed to lead the prayers. School employees are allowed to pray but on their own time and in a private place. Employees are forbidden to pray in such a way that students feel compelled to join. It really pisses me off when people say prayer isn't allowed in school. Kids can pray if they want to. Here in Texas, before every game, a student will lead a sports prayer. Because the gods all concern themselves with high school team sports, right?

SCOTUS judged the man was praying quietly and privately. Technically SCOTUS did not change any laws. They interpreted a situation (wrongly) in order to let a Christian, conservative, white, cis, male get away with bending the law. It's bad what they did. Really bad. And I hate it so much right now. They didn’t “bring back prayer in schools.” They didn’t even (technically) narrow the separation of Church and State. All of the news articles out there saying they did are opinion pieces.

I am so far from a champion of the Supreme Court of the United States.

Precision is important.

Especially during these days of fear and hair-trigger tempers. I'm so angry right now. So so so angry.

I don't want to take focus from the fact that the biggest issue today is (especially) black and brown women and people who can get pregnant. Women are now slaves owned by the government. We do not own our bodies. We do not own our decisions regarding our bodies.

Black and brown women will be affected most harshly, people who can get pregnant next, and white women last. But it is a fact that people who can get pregnant are being attacked. We are now second-class citizens. The highest court in the land said it is ok to enslave us. It is ok to put our lives at risk.

It is only one step further to imply it is ok to violently attack us and beat us and kill us. We are terrified.

And yes. The man getting away with loud, ostentatious, obnoxious prayer during extracurricular school-sponsored activity is bad. Very bad. SCOTUS is broken. Very broken. But I would like to keep the most dangerous issue front and center.

I would like to keep our eye on the ball and not let the 15-minute media cycle overshadow the very dangerous situation our country has thrown us into. I won’t allow women to fall even further through the cracks.

I won’t allow the enslavement of women and people who can get pregnant. I won’t allow myself to be classified as a second-class citizen. I won’t allow the media to take a women’s rights issue away and focus on a man’s right to religious freedom. I won’t allow the focus to be taken off of us. I will keep women and people who can get pregnant FRONT AND CENTER.

Women are already dying in childbirth. The United States has one of the highest rates of childbirth mortality. Black women are 3 times more likely to die from complications of childbirth. Taking away the option of abortion, and potentially revisiting the laws surrounding birth control and trans rights is a DEATH SENTENCE. So many teens will die by suicide or botched abortion. A trans man forced to carry a pregnancy is a recipe for suicidal disaster either immediately or down the line from PTSD. Poverty may very well kill those unborn once they are born.

The message SCOTUS is sending to the world is women and people who can get pregnant are not protected under our laws. Their bodies are not their own. It is ok to harm those bodies because those bodies don’t belong to themselves. Abusive husbands can now control their partners even further by forcing them to carry an unwanted pregnancy. Random thugs have absolute permission, granted by the highest court in the land, to hunt, beat, rape, and kill women.

Don’t let this be part of the 15-minute news cycle. Don’t allow this gross violation of human rights to be swept under the rug by male-centric opinion pieces. Don’t allow the orange traitor to steal the righteous indignation of our country.

Don’t feed the patriarchy.