{"id":6125,"date":"2020-04-25T13:54:45","date_gmt":"2020-04-25T17:54:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs-test.newschool.edu\/tcds\/?p=6125"},"modified":"2020-04-25T14:15:39","modified_gmt":"2020-04-25T18:15:39","slug":"the-pandemic-and-womens-hell-in-poland","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs-test.newschool.edu\/tcds\/2020\/04\/25\/the-pandemic-and-womens-hell-in-poland\/","title":{"rendered":"The Pandemic and ‘Women\u2019s Hell’* in Poland"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

If protest is made illegal, make daily life a protest. <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

By Zuzanna Krzatala – graduate of The New School for Social Research and TCDS alumna. Social activist focused on women\u2019s and minority rights. Currently based in Warsaw, working with a foundation supporting low-income seniors.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Warsaw, Poland, April 20th 2020<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Official poster of the protest from the FB page of Strajk Kobiet <\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The outbreak of the coronavirus has stoked up\nisolationist sentiments everywhere, shutting down borders and imposing bans\nakin to those of a police state almost overnight. With the world coming to a\nstandstill, Poland\u2019s increasingly autocratic government has taken advantage of\nthe pandemic to restrict not just freedom of movement but the freedom to make\ndecisions in matters unrelated to COVID 19. Though fear of the elusive virus\nhas brought about fear and uncertainty for women everywhere, as many suddenly find\nthemselves trapped in unwanted pregnancies, dependent upon the lawmakers who\ndecide when to ease the restrictions and open the borders, the situation in\nPoland is exceptionally dire.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

With access to abortion thrown into jeopardy,\ncountries like France and England have looked for ways to safeguard women\u2019s\nrights during the pandemic. France extended access to medical abortions to nine\nweeks of pregnancy with medications prescribed by video consultation, and\nEngland allowed for home abortions up to ten weeks. Even Northern Ireland,\nafter weeks of delays, has finally authorized free abortion services, putting\nan end to one of the world\u2019s most restrictive abortion laws.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, in Poland the pandemic has presented\nitself as a perfect opportunity to further curb women\u2019s rights and push through\ndangerous legislation. In the midst of the chaos and anxiety surrounding the\npandemic, when millions of people around the world are losing their livelihood\nand fear for their lives, the Polish parliament has decided it is of the utmost\nurgency to discuss a bill which outlaws abortions in the case of fetal\nabnormalities. Rather than fighting the virus, the politicians of the right\nhave once again declared war on women, striving to remove a remaining remnant\nof choice that Polish women have.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ironically, the struggle over reproductive\nrights in Poland began in the early stages of democratic transformation, and\nsharpened in 1993, when an \u201cabortion compromise\u201d was struck between the\nCatholic church and the Polish political class, and was then successively\ntightened by almost every democratically elected parliament. Today, the\nprocedure is allowed in Poland only in the case of rape, incest, severe fetal\nabnormalities, or if the mother\u2019s life is at risk. Those strict limitations put\nthe official number of legal abortions performed annually in Poland (population\n38 million) at around 1,000. Despite the draconian laws — and the so-called\n\u201cconscience clause\u201d frequently evoked by doctors, which reduces access even to\nthose abortions considered legal — Polish women continue to terminate unwanted\npregnancies. The activists from Abortion\nDream Team<\/em> estimate the true number to be closer to 150 thousand. Women do\nit either by themselves behind closed doors, or abroad, free from the fear of\nbreaking the law. However, their choice comes at a cost many can\u2019t afford.\n\u201cWomen who have money have abortions, and those who don\u2019t – have babies,\u201d says\nMara Clarke, of the Abortion Support\nNetwork<\/em> in the UK. Accessing safe abortion services is a matter of\nprivilege, whereas it should be an unquestionable right.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thanks to financial support from Clarke\u2019s\norganization and a network of pro-choice campaigners \u2013 the Abortion Dream Team<\/em> and Kobiety\nw Sieci<\/em> in Poland, Ciocia Basia<\/em>\nin Berlin, Abortion Network Amsterdam<\/em>,\nand the international Women Help Women <\/em>—\nan initiative was launched last year offering Polish women advice and funding\nto seek safe abortions abroad. The project Abortion\nWithout Borders<\/em> defies national laws and celebrates transnational solidarity.\nWithin days of launching, its activists received hundreds of calls, showing\njust how necessary the initiative was.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The author<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

A project called \u201cStop Abortion” was\nfirst introduced to Parliament in the fall of 2017 through a citizens\u2019\ninitiative spearheaded by Kaja Godek, a prominent anti-abortion figure and\nmother of a child with Down\u2019s Syndrome. Named after Godek, the proposal aims to\neliminate irreversible damage to the fetus as a legal ground for abortion even\nthough it accounts for nearly all legal terminations conducted in Poland (98%\nof abortions in 2018).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A first reading of the Godek\u2019s legislative\nproject, along with an alternative progressive \u201cSave Women\u201d proposal that\nsought to liberalize abortion law, took place over two years ago, in January\n2018.  Whereas the \u201cSave Women\u201d proposal\nwas rejected outright, Godek\u2019s regressive project proposal was given a green\nlight. It took massive nationwide protests in March 2018 for this anti-abortion\nproject to be stalled in committee until the end of the parliamentary term.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

After the 2019 parliamentary elections, in\naccordance with provisions on civic projects, the Godek project was moved to\nthe next term and was due for mandatory review within six months. Some may\nargue that this is a mere formality and that the governing Law and Justice\nparty is not necessarily in favor of passing the stringent bill, but would\nrather have it out of sight in a \u201cparliamentary freezer.\u201d But on March 20th\nPoland announced the imposition of a \u201cState of Epidemic\u201d, that is, a set of\nregulations that affect civic freedoms but are introduced by a state\nadministration — the Ministry of Health — and not by the Parliament. The\nregulations give considerable arbitrary power to\nthe state administration.And it is\nin these extraordinary times, when other European Union states are\nextending rights to accommodate women and provide them with a social safety\nnet, that Polish parliament is \u201cdebating\u201d the final erasure of any vestiges of\nthe reproductive rights of women, disproportionately targeting those who\nalready face economic and social deprivation. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Poles are known to take to the streets en masse<\/em> whenever their freedoms and\nrights are endangered. Whether or not the abortion debate was indeed just an\nuntimely formality, the state cynically exploited the nationwide lockdown,\neffectively banning all public demonstrations. Unable to take to the streets,\nwomen took to social media instead, with virtual protests held across all\nplatforms. Selfies of women donning black face masks with an image of a red\nlightning bolt flooded the official Instagram feed of President Andrzej Duda, a\nfaithful attendant to the ruling party who immediately signs any parliamentary\ndecisions into law. Duda was tagged in images signed with the hashtag\n#WomensHell and #RejectGodekProject.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

From posters and banners with a thunderbolt\nhangingfrom apartment windows, to\nblack umbrellas sticking out from balconies (umbrellas are a symbol of the\nmomentous \u201cBlack Protest\u201d that took place one rainy October day in 2016 and\nbrought down an earlier bill proposing a total abortion ban), women have made\ntheir resistance visible to the public. \nWith traditional protest made impossible due to lockdown, daily life\nbecame a protest, turning ordinary activities into subversive acts. Standing in\nline for groceries, walking a dog, or riding a bike have become opportunities\nto display revolutionary signs. Some made \u201cthunders\u201d by banging pots and pans\nfrom balconies. Others honked their horns and waved flags with the thunderbolt\nfrom their car windows as they blocked off one of Warsaw\u2019s main roundabouts. A\nbanner scream: WE WEAR FACE MASKS BUT THIS HAS NOT SILENCED OUR VOICES. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

On April 14th and 15th, when a heated battle\nof words was taking place in the parliament with lofty opinions on what\u2019s moral\nand immoral, women who had had abortions, or knew someone who had, or may need\none themselves someday, continued their resistance. With coronavirus disrupting\ninternational travel and delaying the shipment of precious cargos of\nmifepristone and misoprostol — otherwise unattainable in Poland — women have\nposted images on social media of their hands holding pills with the description\n\u201cmy life, my choice, my abortion in my hands,\u201d promoting self-managed medical\nabortions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On April 17th, parliament had the choice to reject the regressive bill or fast-track it to a second reading. It voted to delay the final decision, sending the legislation for further work in committee, the so-called parliamentary freezer, where it could still resurface when another opportunity for distraction, like another global pandemic, arises. Faced with yet another abortion stalemate in this \u201cWomen\u2019s Hell\u201d, Polish women may have to take matters into their own hands.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

* \u201cWomen\u2019s Hell\u201d is the title of a superb essay from 1929 by Tadeusz Boy-Zelenski, liberal writer who was also a trained pediatrician and gynecologist. The essay scrutinized a Polish law that denied women access to contraception and abortion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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