The ownership of Women's Bodies

Just now, I finished an article in the most reecent issue of Smithsonian Magazine about women traveling to North Dakota for divorces back in the late 1800's to early 1900's. This article seemed expecially prescient as we have just seen another change in the laws governing women's bodies - the overturn of Roe versus Wade, shuttled back to the States for their patchwork of revolving laws. Back in the time of the Dakota divorcees's, the states all had their own laws governing who could divorce under what circumstances and who got control of the children, men. For the most part, in most places, because women were not enfranchised, they had little control over how the laws were created and passed and as a result little control over their own lives, especially once married. Up to that time, in most places, women had NO legal protections whatsoever. They couldn't own property, sign contracts, inherit from parents or be prepared in any way for independent life through education as most higher education was denied to women. There were few ways for women to earn money outside of service such as laundry, or cleaning, service jobs, or of course, the selling of their own bodies in prostitution which especially in those days doomed them to death from veneral disease and violence.

Women had fought piece meal for changes but it wasn't until the Suffragists that real strides began to be made. Even in the Suffrage battle, the lines were drawn between the Suffragists who believed it should be fought at the State level, and those younger, next generation Suffragists like Alice Paul who believed it had to be fought at the Federal level with an amendment to the Constitution. During the time when women had no legal protections, even if a woman found a job at a mill, for example, her husband could legally claim her wages. He ould legally claim her body, and it was even legal for men to reape and beat wives as long as they didn't use a stick thicker than their thumb "rule of thumb" - and although marriage was the only course open to women for their adult lives for their survival, it was another kind of trap.

My great heroes have always been Margaret Sanger (birth control pioneer) and Alice Paul (Suffrage activist). At present I am reaading the biography of Alice Paul written by J.Zahniser and Amelia Frye. It seems so pertinent in this particular time of attack upon the rights of women to control their own bodies. Birth Control saved us. I was able to get my own education because I had access to birth control pills via Planned Parenthood. In those years from 20 to my thirties, I was able to get two college degrees and a career with a livable wage and benefits. Those benefits support me now in my old age. That living wage made it possible for me to buy a small house in which I still live.

I was divorced thirty-seven years ago. A long time ago I was able to forgive my ex-husband for his abusive, threatening behavior because I learned more and more about mental illness and I realized a lot of his rages and destructive outbursts were out of his control and the result of his illness. Nonetheless, I am sure he and I have vastly different opinions on whether I should have had to stay and endure them, and even if they were abusive. He probably felt justified in expressing his volcanic rage when it overtook him, and in breaking things and terrorizing me. I am sure he didn't even suspect the effect of his behavior on others, his parents as well as on me. Anything could set him off, most usually car trouble, but also anything going wrong in the home. Then he turned his fiery temper on me, because I was there, and because I was physically weaker, and also observably non-violent. He had nothing to fear except that I could leave him.

Recently, a 40 year old man was burned to death in a crash of a jet fueled stunt truck. Beneath the news article was a comment vilifying the way yahoo described the accident and accusing the news service of engaging in "leftist war on testosterone."

There is a gender battle going on in America today, not to mention in many parts of the world. The war is one of women trying to escape male domination. Often general public opinion seems to reflect the idea that any rights for women is a direct attack against male privilege. It is true that it is an attack on male domination over women. The main ways we must achieve independence is through control of our reproductive lives, education, careers that pay enough to live, and a voice in the laws that govern our lives. Sadly, the most excessive male domination is on world-wide display currently in Afghanistan where women can no longer be educated, move through their communities independently without a male guardian (guard) or exercise any control over their lives at all. They must be covered from head to toe because women are even held responsible for male lust in the world of the more backward Middle Eastern countries like Afghanistan.

What surprised me was how recent the divorce laws changed in places I thought of as bastions of liberal thinking - New York didn't change their divorce laws until 1960. When I got divorced, my exh-husband started the process because he had moved to Colorado and could use the no-fault laws to divorce me without having to give me any share in our joint property. What kept me from fighting him on the property issue was that he had a gun and that he was mentally unstable. In other words, he intiidated me with the threat of violence. I figured I could always get another house but I couldn't get another life. It was a price I was wiing to pay to be free of him. There is where gun violence figures into the equation too - domestic intimidation and violence through GUNS. The woman who had traveled to the Dakotas for her divorce, Blanche Molineaux, was seeking a divorce becaue her husband was in prison for murder. Even murder wasn't considered a sufficient cause for divorce in her own state of New York. The only cause was adultery. Interesting, because in the earlier part of the 1800's, a man could murder his wife and be exonerated if he suspected she had been adulterous. Most of the people in the Dakotas seeking divorce in the heyday of the divorce colony were women. Later Nevada became the new mecca for quick divorce.

Personally, I think animal agriculture has a lot to do with the struggle over control of our bodies. Since people can kidnap and enslave animals, breed them, imprison them and kill them, it is a short step to expand that domination to the control of women, much like the dystopian novel and recent tv series portrayed it - The Handmaid's Tale. Lots to think about, especially if you are a woman and a woman with a daughter! But just as our determination and perseverence has brought us this far, it will carry us forward to battle against the rising tide of injustice that faces us now.

May justice prevail! Jo Ann