A Feminist Response to LaBruzzo's Sterilization Plan | A Katrina Reader

A Feminist Response to LaBruzzo's Sterilization Plan

Date Published:
09/27/2008

For those who are not aware, on Tuesday, September 23rd, Rep. LaBruzzo of Metarie, Louisiana (a suburb of New Orleans) made the statement that, so that Louisiana wouldn't be in an economic crisis, he's looking to propose a bill to "voluntarily" sterilize the number of people he feels are dependent on the government as a way to decrease the state burden.

Attached is the official response from the WHJI and the NOWHC, as well as two articles that appeared in local newspapers within a day of LaBruzzos racially and gendered coded statement.

An Intersectional, Reproductive Justice Feminist Response to LaBruzzo's Sterilization Plan . . .

The Women's Health & Justice Initiative[1] and the New Orleans Women's Health Clinic[2] condemn Representative John LaBruzzo's recent legislative plans to pay poor women to get sterilized and reward rich, educated people to have children. The sterilization policy currently being advocated by Representative LaBruzzo is a blatant form of reproductive violence and population control policies of blame and disenfranchisement, rooted in this country's long and continual history of eugenics. The legislation and criminalization of black and poor women's bodies, sexuality, fertility, and motherhood are being used as regulatory tools for economic and ideological justification for eugenics. If Mr. LaBruzzo is really concerned about ending poverty and reducing social burdens on the state, he would not be advocating punitive social polices that restrict women's reproductive autonomy, but instead would be focusing his attention on ending corporate welfare and holding the corporate giants of Wall Street accountable for the disastrous state of the country's economy. Stigmatizing and blaming the bodies and reproductive capabilities of black and poor women, and other marginalized communities, as the cause of poverty, mask Representative LaBruzzo's unwillingness to fully examine the complex structural causes of poverty and inequality in our society. Reproductive violence and sterilization abuse at the hands of elected officials should be challenged and condemned. Women receiving public assistance and housing subsidies have RIGHT to have or not have children, as well as the RIGHT to parent the children they do have and control their birthing options[3] without punitive racial discrimination and economic exploitation policies designed to denied their RIGHT to exist and achieve full protection of their human rights. All women, regardless of their race, sexuality, ability, household size, economic, housing, and citizenship status, have the right to live whole healthy lives free of control, violence, regulation, and coercive social policies designed to exploit their economic vulnerability for sterilization and contraception abuse.

Social justice organizations, activists, organizers, and advocates are encouraged to use the following as talking points challenging Representative John LaBruzzo's eugenic agenda.

Eugenics, Reproductive Violence, Population Control, and Sterilization Abuse
The sterilization policy currently being advocated by Representative John LaBruzzo is a...

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ANOTHER God Damned Nazi Republican. May he get cancer and his wifes womb be barren. shitbag.