Mainstream TV Gives Abortion Dignified Story, Now Online

The ABC medical show, Private Practice, included a dignified abortion story on its May 12, 2011 episode, viewed by 7.2 million people, according to Wikipedia stats. It can also be viewed online now at links at the bottom of this post.

The episode, called God Bless the Child, was #21 in the season. Melissa Silverstein at Women and Hollywood, now carried on INDIEWire, described it this way:

"Private Practice created by Shonda Rhimes stood up again for a woman’s right to choose. This episode was written by Jennifer Cecil and Barbie Kligman.

Here’s what happened. A woman (Patty) walks into the doctor after she’s had an abortion because she has discomfort. Turns out she is still pregnant. This is a rare occurrence, and the pregnancy is much more complicated because the fetus is now 19 weeks. Now I’ve been told that the show got the medical info correct, but to me what is equally important here is the continuing conversation this show has on the topic.

Addison Montgomery played by Kate Walsh is the ob/gyn. She battles politically and morally with Naomi Bennett an infertility specialist (who by the way wanted her teenage daughter to have an abortion when she got pregnant) played by Audra McDonald. Some of the dialogue:

'Addison: My new patient is 19 weeks pregnant and wants an abortion.
Naomi: A partial birth abortion?
A: Partial birth is not a medical term, it is political and you know it.'This show time and again has given realistic and thoughtful scenarios on the issue.

Another scene is in the bar where Patty works and she is conflicted about whether to have the abortion she wants because Dr. Bennett has crossed the line and counseled her against going ahead with the procedure with Addison was not present. That scene felt like the clinic became a crisis pregnancy center. Here’s what Addison says to Patty:

'I can’t tell you what to do. I can only tell you that it is your choice.'

'Patty, when it comes to abortion everybody has an opinion. Everybody’s going to tell you what to do. If this were 1972 it would have been a back alley and not my elevator that you would have collapsed in because back then you didn’t have a choice. Now you do. But it’s still hard. And even after you make the most difficult and personal decision it’s still not safe because you have some fanatic who claims to value life who can walk into an abortion clinic and blow it up.'

Addison is conflicted about performing the procedure. She had an abortion 6 years earlier and many of the recent episodes have focused on her wanting to have a kid and her fertility issues. She says it was the right choice for her at the time, but she is conflicted.

Here’s Addison’s commentary (to Naomi) before she performs the procedure:

'Why can’t Patty get what she needs, a safe and legal abortion without judgement? Why does she have to go through this? Why do I have to go through this? I hate what I am about to do but I support Patty’s right to choose. It is not enough to just have an opinion because in a nation of over 300 million people there are only 1700 abortion providers. And I am one of them.'"

The ABC 'Private Practice' page has the episode, directed by Jeannot Szwarc, on the Private Practice site: a description and clips are here; and the full episode is viewable online here. HULU also carries the five last episodes, which means that it should be viewable through the summer, and that is online here. Unfortunately,anti-abortion people, as usual, have used the comment section to spread their propaganda, so if you feel that the show has a positive prochoice representation, post a positive comment.

Posted by Cindy Cooper
Pictured above: Clip from ABC-TV's Private Practice site

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Voices and Choices Puts Reproductive Freedom on the Radio

Radio -- especially radio in the age of the Internet -- is an excellent medium for sharing information and stories. "Voices and Choices," a weekly radio program in Cleveland, Ohio, is making especially good use of the airwaves to open conversations about reproductive rights and gender justice.

Voices and Choices airs live every Tuesday from 9pm -10pm at WRUW-FM, 91.1 in Cleveland, broadcasting from the campus of Case Western Reserve University. The show is also streamed live at http://www.wruw.org. Accessible in online archives are 41 shows that are posted online.

The Mission Statement of Voices and Choices explains that it is dedicated to sharing news and perspectives on gender and justice. "We believe in the importance of public awareness and conversation about these issues," it says. "We aim to foster a forum for discussion where we can raise voices and perspectives that are otherwise not heard, and encourage action that will generate change."

The many good conversations on Voices and Choices have included wonderful leading lights and perspectives from the pro-choice community, including policy advocate and thinker Loretta Ross, poet and writer Judith Arcana, filmmaker Dorothy Fadiman, abortion provider Dr. Susan Wicklund, filmmaker Angie Young, clinic workers, founders of Cleveland’s contraception museum, members of the Ohio Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice and the National Network of Abortion Funds, and many more.

A show on May 17, 2011, which can now be accessed in the archives, modeled a discussion among four women who talked about their personal abortion experiences, a format that the Cleveland group, www.myabortionmylife.org is suggesting people do in private gatherings in their own homes and communities to break through the silence that too often surrounds abortion experiences. [Follow on Twitter @pretermmaml]

Other shows have touched topics of gay marriage, justice for sex workers and other concerns related to women's lives.

In addition to its website, Voices and Choices, has a page on Facebook, where upcoming shows are announced.

Wherever you are across the country, give Voices and Choices a listen. Great music intros, too! And kudos to Voices and Choices for giving such a great example of how to take reproductive freedom to the airwaves!

Posted by Cindy Cooper
Pictured above: Logo from Voices and Choices

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Diana Whitten: TEDx Spreads Repro Rights! (at last)

Reproductive rights don't often make the agenda of 'TED' conferences so there is something of grand excitement that Diana Whitten was invited to speak about Women on Waves and the film, Vessel, about the ship that travels the world to educate people about abortion options.

As described by Wikipedia, "TED (Technology Entertainment and Design) is a global set of conferences owned by the private non-profit Sapling Foundation, formed to disseminate 'ideas worth spreading.'" Videos of the short talks are posted online for free. TED has expanded to TEDWomen -- but also don't count on choice being represented there, either. And then there is TEDx, described as "in the spirit of TED’s mission," and designed to give communities, organizations and individuals the opportunity to stimulate dialogue through TED-like experiences on a community-by-community basis.

Whitten was invited to tell the story of Dr. Rebecca Gomperts seafaring abortion advocacy at TEDx in Brazil, called TEDXAmazonia. "It was super exciting," said Whitten, "even at TEDWomen there was no representation from women working in repro rights - that I could find."

The talk was in November, but now it is posted online here or here, as well above. Diana is raising the last bit of funding to complete her film -- contact her: @vesselthefilm or vesselthefilm@gmail.com, or visit her site: www.vesselthefilm.com

Posted by Cindy Cooper

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Female Condom Big in YouTubeLand

Videos about how to use the female condom seem to be all the rage. A raft are online on YouTube, ranging from the extremely useful to interesting and, … well, just weird, especially in the choice of models to describe insertion. Here are a half dozen:

The National Abortion Federation (NAF) Americorps in DC created one video, 2.57 minutes in length, How To Use a Female Condom which is unadorned, but useful. This video, as do most of the useful ones, covers how to open the package, how to inspect it, and how to insert and remove it. It "looks overwhelming but it’s kind of easy," the speaker tells us. Text rolls across the screen from time to time, emphasizing certain points. To show how the female condom is inserted, the demonstrator uses an indescribably object -- a squishy square item that looks like a melted candle. The narrator tells us "There are some cool things -- you can insert it 8 hours before you have sex." The video has had a solid 77,200 viewers and does as good a job as any with straightforward and practical info.


The Sexual Health Advocate Peer Education, SHealth at Mizzou has a video, female condom, that runs five minutes in length. It has a nice score in the background, and starts with this interesting point: "The first step is to ask for consent." It also goes through basics of opening the package, checking the expiration date. Directions appear on the screen from time to time, and it shows the insertion using a medical model of a vagina. There are these bits of info: "It does not affect any spontaneity." "It’s going to be really lubricated because it’s made of polyurethane."
"You want to make sure it’s covering the cervix." It describes in detail how to remove the female condom after sex and how to wrap it up for discarding (not in the toilet, the video points out.) The video has had 51,000 views.

A female condom video from REACH (Real Education About College Health), Binghamtom University's peer education program, has managed to get nearly 500,000 viewers. Clocking in at 5 minutes, it uses a pastiche of information, chat, little "scenes" of students, drawings, demonstrations and a touch of humor. One educator says the female condom, "looks like an oversized male condom, and, guys, it doesn’t mean we think you are big." The model it uses to demonstrate insertion looks something like a plastic ring for a swimming pool. Drawings – actually useful -- say, "okay, yes; not okay." And it points out not to use a male and female condom together. The female condom, the REACH educator says, "can mean the difference between good clean fun and the gift that keeps on giving."


"How to use femidom - The female condom," (screenshot above) at Contraceptive.ozg.in -- the "in" stands for "India," is actually one of the most sophisticated videos on the subject, skipping over, perhaps, the watermelon (yes!) that is used for a demonstration of insertion in the vagina. The video, laced with music, starts asking why women have to pay more for pleasure than men. No idea of the cost in India (The female condom costs $15 for one at the local drugstore in NY) but the packaging there sure is a lot nicer ... kind of like a fancy perfume box. "It’s a bit weird to look at," says the narrator, "but don’t let it turn you off." She says, "You need a lot of lubrication, and I mean a lot." The narrator is smooth and peppy, even as she describe things like how to use tissues to clean up. At 3.5 minutes, it's had 110,350 views.

And then there are two that are so weird, it's hard to know for whom they are made, although they seem to get a lot of hits. Female condoms do exist is a soundless 41 second video of purple lettering on black text, mixed with a variety of images. It starts out by says, "EHHH disturbing as it is, the title tells it all," and ends on an equally peculiar note of the "weird ass thing that I found." For this? 359,000 hits.

How to put on a female condom, a 2.04 minute video, is kind of disturbing and strange on several levels. Peculiar electronic voices give instructions and equally odd music by Pudd. The images sometimes are mere text scrolling. But on a line on insertion, a woman stands legs spread as if she exercises on a staircase, and the under the line "The female condom is now in place and ready for use," a mannequin rolling on the floor is shown in a creepy porn imitation. This charmer has drawn 155,000 viewers.

On a more positive note, Sex Health Guru has a 45 second concise video on How to Use a Female Condom, paired with very good written instructions, along with others of similar ilk: How to Insert a Female Condom Properly and, on this Wonder How To Site, other innovative uses of condoms (but that's for another day!)

And if you want to skip the videos altogether and get some straightforward and clear information GuruHealthGuide does an excellent job.

Posted by Cindy Cooper
Pictured above, Screen Shot, How to use femidom - The female condom at Contraceptive.ozg.in

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