Fresh New Hell For Polish Women

Poland for few years now is slowly walking towards nationalist and right-wing tendencies. Catholics are feeling oppressed, because of the drive for equality of people they don’t feel worthy - homosexuals, transsexuals and unmarried people - and as a result are pushing for radicalisation of many aspects of social life.

First, the current ruling party - Law and Justice, was against Convention on preventing and combating violence against women and domestic violence, claiming that it goes against traditional catholic values. Main reservation was that it expands the definition of family outside of traditional view, i.e. married men and women with children.

Second, Poland is one of the few countries that has no legislation for same sex couples. There are some ways that same sex couples can tie themselves together legally, but recently it has been made more difficult if not impossible. Government reserves right to forbid couples from getting married abroad, doesn’t accept valid marriage certificates and makes it more difficult to obtain citizenship for children of same sex couples.

But it wasn’t enough. Now there are making moves to threaten women’s reproductive rights, women’s right to health and women’s right to bodily autonomy.

The anti-abortion organisation proposed the bill to totally ban abortion. The right would allow only for actions to save woman’s life when there is immediate threat and there is no other option. It plans to introduce new crime: “prenatal murder” and punish women and health care providers who terminate pregnancy for up to 5 years in prison.

Right now, we have some kind of “trade-off” regarding abortion rights. Abortion is legal, but only in three cases:

1.     Rape and incest

2.     Danger to mother’s health and life

3.     Serious fetal abnormalities

However, Poland also protected “conscience” of doctors by introducing “conscience clause”, where doctors are allowed to refuse medical treatment if it’s in disagreement with their moral compass. Furthermore, current law doesn’t require the doctor to indicate another health care provider who could terminate pregnancy, leaving women stranded, on their own, in a limbo, unable to find the doctor to provide the service and going against the clock to be allowed abortion on the legal grounds.

This situation led to serious human rights and patient rights abuses: from harassment of raped girls and refusal of abortion up to women having to give birth to seriously ill babies, which died an agonising death shortly after.

There were cases, when women were refused abortion in pregnancy defects that rendered them sterile.

Babies were born without bones, with hydrocephalus and other abnormalities. All of those instances qualified for legal abortion in Poland, but the choice was taken away from women and instead there were forced to see their babies die in pain. If abortion is murder, then I don’t know what kind of sadistic satisfaction anti-abortion people can have in this situation.

There is a controversy regarding abortion on down syndrome fetuses. Although there is a huge amount of people living with Down Syndrome who are fully functional in our society, but having such child poses serious problems to families: men usually cannot handle handicapped children and leave mothers to raise their child alone; children that end up in foster system are at serious threat of abuse and neglect; parents are constantly worried of how they can provide for their children and who will take care of them after their died. Those are serious issues that many families are facing daily without almost no support from government.

At the moment, if we compare and analyse maternal deaths and infant deaths both in Poland and Ireland, one begs the question of the consequences of anti-abortion legislation. Right now, Poland have one of the lowest maternal mortality in Europe. That’s something to be proud of! While Poland rate for maternal mortality is 3 per 100,000, for Ireland is 9 per 100,000 (Human Development Index, 2015). In statistics the numbers are negligible. In real life? Not so much.

However, if we look at child mortality, the numbers are more grim. In Ireland child mortality is 3.2 per 1,000 while in Poland its 4.5 per 1,000. So let’s imagine this in numbers. It’s estimated that in Poland 360-380 thousands babies are born each year. So it means that each year 1620 infants die each year (Human Development Index, 2015). Looking at the numbers above, it means that yearly around 10 women are dying at the childbirth (fun fact: during 12 year of Polish involvement in Afghan war, 43 soldiers died).

Every life lost is one to many.

The reasons for sure vary and it’s not all due to abuse of women’s rights, but it begs the question why Polish government is so fixated on saving a fetus, when there is clearly much to be done in saving already born babies and complete grown-up human beings.

We are afraid that restricting already strict abortion laws in Poland will result in more maternal deaths and more infant deaths. We are afraid that the legislation will lead to doctor’s reluctance to start life saving procedures faster out of fear of prosecution. We are afraid that the criminalisation of abortion will lead to investigation and (God forbid!) prosecution of miscarriages.

Although the legislation has been proposed by anti-abortion group it has been now widely supported by politicians from Law and Justice party, including our prime minister Beata Szydlo and the leader of the party - Jaroslaw Kaczynski.

The legislation has been widely supported by Polish Catholic Church and the letters from Episcopate supporting “Stop Abortion!” initiative had now been read in every church in Poland. It is also widely known that the current government is under pressure from the Church to introduce legislation highly abusing and restricting rights of women, non-binary people and other-than-heterosexual relationships.

If you encounter any news saying that the government is backing out from their statements - their not. It’s a lie. They are very much against abortion and they are very much against women.

As a result of this situation, social activist group emerged - Dziewuchy Dziewuchom. Although the group has been set up on 1st April 2016, it already have 100,000 members and supporters. Polish Women from around the world are organising protests and manifestations, everything what’s in our power to stop this all from happening.

We are working alongside various groups such as Ratujmy Kobiety (Safe the Women) and their initiative Moje Cialo, Moja Broszka (My Body, My Business) not only to stop the legislation, but also to abolish “conscience clause” and maybe even liberalise the current abortion law.

We are fighting so that women’s right to health and bodily autonomy is respected and protected.

Written by Vespertillio

for Dziewuchy Dziewuchom Irlandia

Sterilisation? Take my wife!

Have you ever thought of undergoing the sterilisation procedure? Of the everlasting freedom you would get from all concerning thoughts about whether you are pregnant or not, simultaneously without losing your sexual abilities? 

Everything sounds nice if it is your own choice. But 83 women who were recently sterilised in Chhattisgarh, India, within only six hours, cannot admit they made their decision without any pressure from the family, health workers, and the society as a whole. 

Encouraged to undergo the surgery by getting between $10 to $23, 13 of them died and dozens of them fell sick because the doctor used contaminated medicines and rusty surgical equipment. The Mass Sterilisation Camp in Chhattisgarh saw the highest death toll due to the procedure in its recent history, shedding the light on the most common birth control method used in India. 

As many as 65 percent of Indian women aged between 15 and 49 have chosen the sterilisation as the form of preventing themselves from getting pregnant, according to the United Nations figures. Did you know that female sterilisation is globally the most common method of contraception? 

In fact, contraceptive pill is most common only in developed countries, while developing countries prefer to rely on the irreversible procedure, which basically always means female sterilisation, a much more risky surgery than vasectomy. 

Let’s take a look at some figures:

• 37 percent of all sterilised women on earth come from India
• 47 percent of women in the Dominican Republic chose sterilisation as contraception
• 39 percent of women in Puerto Rico also underwent the sterilisation
• Around 4.6 million women were sterilised in India between 2011 and 2012
• Only 1 percent of Indian men have had a vasectomy, compared to 36 percent of women having undergone sterilisation

Now the question arises, why so many women have undergone such a risky and difficult procedure across so many countries if the vasectomy is a much simpler surgery? A woman after sterilisation usually must stay in a hospital for a few days. A man after vasectomy can go home after this simple 15-minute-long procedure. 

In order to make a woman infertile, her abdomen must be open with an around 5 cm long cut to have her tubes tied. This usually involves a general anaesthetic. After the surgery, a woman can feel pain and all in all the surgery is much more invasive. A man needs a local anaesthetic to have his tubes that connect testicles to prostrate cut and tied. There is no pain as such involved in the procedure, apart from the one felt during the anaesthetic injection. 

A man could possibly make much more women pregnant within nine months than a woman deliver babies throughout her lifetime. If the government’s goal is to apply social birth control, why do they target women, and not men? 

Although vasectomy is a simple and non-invasive procedure, there is much more fear throbbing around it than around female sterilisation. First is the fear of pain. Ask any guy, everyone is doddering, shrinking and fretting on the thought of a surgery around their testicles. Unlike to what they show in the movies, to all those heroes who can stand any pain, have their arm or leg cut off without anaesthesia, in general men are indeed less insusceptible to pain than women. 

One, almost equally massive fear that predominates among men, is losing their virility after the vasectomy. It is a myth that a man will cease to be masculine together with the procedure. Actually, erections and sex drive stay unaffected. Plus, the freedom from worry of pregnancy can even enhance a couple’s sex life. 

Moreover, quite many rumours persist about the complications of such a surgery, while, in fact, vasectomy is one of the most studied of all medical procedures and everything indicates that it is safe. 

Shouldn’t such information be spread all around the world? Why is it that women have to sacrifice their lives only in order to safe a man from his mythological fear of losing his virility? Women in developing countries should be informed of other contraceptive options, which are often safer and much less invasive. It is always about the right to choose and once again that right being taken away from women. 

Other side of the lack of choice emerges in Poland, where apparently limiting people’s freedom of choice is a commonly used practice. There, it is illegal for a doctor to conduct a sterilisation as the law says a person who deprives another person from the ability to procreate, risks spending 10 years in prison. You cannot legally sterilise yourself in Poland, even when you have seven children, you are poor or unhealthy or another pregnancy could pose a risk to your life. 

While in most of developed countries sterilisation is officially recorded as one of the birth control methods or it is simply legal, if you happen to live in Poland or be poor in India, you can find it challenging to decide about your procreation rights and your own future. 

But who else will live your life for you rather than yourself?

Written by Nakshatri

Open Letter to All Negative and Hateful People

It’s been a while since we posted something on our blog, and we’re sorry for that. Reasons for that varies: lack of time, holidays, new places, new people, new adventures.

Mainly we haven’t written anything, because we are tired. Since we started to write this blog, we follow various news outlets and women-centered stories and we are surrounded by enormous pile of shit, it’s unbelievable. 

Of course, we should expect that, nobody promised us roses and daisies and that all be just cuddly, sweet and super – duper cool and we all be friends once we start the feminist blog.

We knew it’s going to be hard.

Nevertheless, the amount of hatred and negative energy and resentment towards women and any subject (even remotely) connected to feminism is just suffocating. It’s overwhelming. It’s appalling.

If I see any bit of news where the rape victim is blamed for her assault; where somebody is saying something so absolutely and terrifyingly sexist and stupid; where an influential speaker lacks the understanding of basic mechanisms of functioning of society, human body or psychology; where a person gets criticized for defense of somebody’s rights – I swear to God, I’m going to scream, yell, throw a tantrum and go on maniac spree where I will be painting dicks on government’s buildings. 

I’m serious.

In terms of gender equality, feminism, sexual orientation, sexual attraction, gender roles, sexual violence, misogyny and patriarchy, there is whole wide world out there of different opinions. Unfortunately, those most offensive and hateful are the one that are yelled the loudest.

I just cannot understand how much hate and negativity people bear inside of them. Is it really that difficult to understand that everybody wants normal and happy life? Is it so terrible that I, as a woman, may see the problems in modern society and just want to feel safe and have the same prospects as men? I don’t want your money, I just want the sense of security that I’m protected by law and government from exploitation, sexual assault, domestic violence, trafficking and discrimination. Is it really that much to ask?

And what about all other-than-heterosexual people? Is it really that much of a tragedy that they will commit to a person of the same sex? Many countries are accepting gay marriage and somehow the world didn’t devilishly turned upside-down. So why is it still such a tragedy to “God fearing” but really hypocritically backwards societies to accept that everybody has a right to a family, to love and be loved by a person of their choice?

Transgender and transsexual people! They are just want to bring the world to an end! If we ever see the world crumbling down, it’s because of them. How DARE they defy God’s decisions? If the God gave them penis, they are bound to love that penis and cherish that penis for the rest of their life. If the God gave them vagina, it’s designed to give pleasure to the penis, so don’t you dare getting rid of it!

For crying out loud, it doesn’t hurt society and people if one person just changes some things about their body. You can’t see it from the Eiffel Tower, you can’t see it from the moon, so it really doesn’t destroy the grand scheme of things. But it might, just MIGHT make somebody happier about and with themselves.

That’s just the few examples of the hatred and discrimination and hostility that other people endure. Most often the people who dare to be different, who dare to stand out, who dare to disagree with generally accepted norms and who dare to speak up are the ones who takes the most beatings.

So I have a message to all of those hateful and discriminating people. And other people as well.

In life and in society there are two things: things that matter and things that don’t matter.

What doesn’t matter is your opinion.

Sure, you have a right to an opinion, but generally speaking, your opinion is irrelevant. It doesn’t matter if you are a “normal” person and it shouldn’t definitely matter if you are a politician or a public person. And most importantly, nobody’s opinion, that is in any way potentially discriminatory, should be taken into consideration when deciding about other people lives. Somebody’s interpretation of religious norms cannot be considered when implementing a piece of legislation. It cannot be considered when talking about other people freedoms and rights. And it unquestionably cannot lead to limitation of the rights of others.

The thing that matters is whether every person that is a part of a society, community or locality has equal rights. Can he or she do whatever they want with their life? Their career? Their future? Their body? Can her or she participate in a social life in the same way than another he or she can?

The thing that matters is that you have no right to limit freedoms of others. You have no right to spread your hate and suffocate others with your bigotry and self-ideation. There is a freedom of speech, you have a right to speak – but have also the right to remain silent. But it would be advisable for you to use the second option more often.

You have a right to have an opinion, to have your say, but don’t think for even the moment that you have a right to shove it in the faces of the others that you deem unworthy of existing. You are not creating a better future with your hatred, you are not creating anything. You are leading to a destruction of norms and deterioration of society.

I’m watching the news and I don’t believe in what I’m seeing. In Poland there is a medieval level discussion about domestic violence, with politicians and priests speaking against European Treaty on Violence Against Women. They cannot come up with a comprehensive legislation, because some politicians are against any other definition of family than “catholic” one. Also Poland is dragging its feet in terms of civil partnership or same-sex marriages, because… it’s against the “normal” definitions of families.

I see here four families? What about you?

You know what you can do with your limited definition of family? You can stick into your… significant bottom of the body. I don’t care whether you think that me and my partner are a family. I don’t care. For me, we ARE and that’s what matters. And only that should matter.

I hear the cavemen-style conversation about women being subordinate, wanting to be raped and deserving to be beaten. I see people protesting against equal rights for gay or transgender people, sex education, contraception, abortion, just basically anything that doesn’t concern them, but could somehow make other people’s life easier.

It’s sickening.

I just encountered the story, where anti-abortionists suggest euthanasia for raped women, because if they are willing to “kill” one of the rapists victims – a child, we can also kill the second victim as well. I will not even go into deeper discussion about abortion and all of the shit that “pro-life”, but really pro-nobody-f****-knows-what (because definitely it’s not life) claims. But how can a person, a man, who will NEVER get pregnant, be so fast to judge another person, their decision, their willingness to pick up the pieces after a traumatic event and carry on with what’s left of their normality. 

If you are a man, shut up on the topics of how it is to be a woman.

You are a woman who leads happy successful life? Shut up when the women who didn’t have as much luck as you do speak up of what happened to them.

You are white? Never dare to say that racism doesn’t exist and black people do not encounter any discrimination. And don’t you ever dare to say that immigrants are to blame for any mishaps in your country. You and other citizens fucked up, not them.

You are heterosexual person sure of their sexuality? Just don’t talk about how confused gay, bisexual or other-than-heterosexual people are. You now nothing, you are not them, so just shut up and let them be.

Are you happy with God-given gender? Good for you. But don’t use that God to bring down, humiliate and bully people who are convinced that God might have made mistake and they are on the path to correct that mistake.

Or maybe he is a guy who wears dreasses. Good for him, most of dresses are super comfy. You think he is disgusting? You are disgusting. He doesn't impact on your life, so stop trying to impact on his.

How can we claim to celebrate life, when most of us lack empathy, sympathy, warmth, understanding, willingness to understand (to any degree). Why is self-righteous bigotry so glorified and cherished, while any sign of solidarity with discriminated, underprivileged, victimized and invisible condemned and even socially punished?

My conclusion is as follows: if it doesn’t limit your basic human rights (below), but you don’t agree with it, just shut up and deal with it. If it does limit your rights and freedom, fight against it, but always remember – your freedom ends where another person’s starts.

Written by Vespertilio

P.S. For those who have no idea what human rights are, here is the link to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the European Convention on Human Rights. There is a high chance that you live in a country that accepted the Declaration, so get familiar with it and just try to respect rights of others.

P.S. 2. Last but not least... Song for all haters.

Let's Keep Fighting! My Body - My Rights!

Maybe we live in 21^st century, but Poland refuses to progress from Middle Ages. And many Polish people are proud of it.

Another day of Polish women struggle for their reproductive rights. Inanna and I are actively monitoring and reading new words that has been produced either for or against abortion in Poland.

After reading it all, it was really comforting to see that some doctors still abide the law and do the procedure when a women has a legal ground to ask for it.

It warms my heart to see all of those women sharing their stories, their strength and hopes for a better future. It’s amazing how many of them get support from their partners, who decided that the well-being of their woman is the most important thing in the world.

At the same time, it’s extremely depressing to see how many people spread hate and are first ones to insult other people. And it’s even more daunting how many people put the blame on women. For fighting for their rights. For wanting a better life. For wanting to be heard. For having needs. For having desires. For having dreams.

I really don’t get it how somebody, who claims to believe in a God, the merciful and almighty God, can have so much resentment toward another human being. How can somebody judge another person without knowing the whole story? Judging only based on partial information about sex life and choices. Didn’t Jesus said that “he who is without sin among you, let him be the first to throw a stone at her” (when defending an adulterous woman)? How can somebody, who claims to be a man/woman of faith can have so much hatred in their hearts?

Over the past few days I’ve read tens of articles about the situation in Poland, opinion essays, comments. I encountered billions of comments insulting women’s conscience and almost calling them monsters, if they even considered having an abortion.

Where did all of those people get the idea that somebody’s body and life is a public matter? Since when woman’s body is a public property? Since when anybody’s body is a public property?

I am a religious person, I believe in God, but right now I wouldn’t step into the church in Poland. I’ve heard to many sermons with too much judgement in it, too much hatred, too much negative messages. I’ve listened to priests who though that as they are so self-righteously pious they word is above the word of God. God can be your salvation, but a church will bring you down on your knees and be your judge. I couldn’t stand it. I believe that a God is love, he gives us strength and teaches us to show sympathy to other people and try to understand them, regardless of how different our situation is from theirs. And if we can’t, then we should stop criticizing. It’s not our place.

That case of an 11-year old girl still haunts me. How can people be so cruel and judgmental? She is a child, for crying out loud! She should be protected at all costs, her welfare should be a priority to all of us: her parents, family, neighbours, doctors, government! But we’ve heard so much bullshit from priests and politicians. About an abortion being another rape, about a girl’s maternal instincts waiting to be awaken.

"11-year-old girl should be under the care of psychologist and other doctors
and she should give birth to this child. This child we'll be on high demand
for adoption or maybe there will be a case, when the maternal instincts
will awaken in girl" Czesław Hoc

Yeah, sure, force her to be a mother. When the kid gets older, they can play together in hide and seek, help with homework and steal toys from each other. Instead of spending her allowance on sweets, she will be worrying about diapers and baby milk. Yeeeey! Who wouldn’t want that? Kids at that age should be learning about responsibility by having a puppy or kitten. Not a baby. And whoever claims that it’s the way it should be, tell it to your kid. Have them have a child right now. Is he 13? He will be a brilliant father! Is she 12? Who cares about her dreams and aspirations! Let her have babies!

Many people say that she should have the baby, but no one ask whether it’s good for her. She went through so much and all we can do is still disallow her desire to have a normal life. Or anybody else’s desires. Politicians say what she should or shouldn’t do, but can anybody guarantee their help throughout her life? She will go through some tough times, are you, Mr. Politician ready to pay for her therapy? For a babysitter when she will want to go back to school? For all the expenses that she will need for her education and for the child’s welfare?

We are spinning like crazy towards the pit, we can’t find a way out from our own hypocrisy and ignorance.

Few years ago there was a high profile case in Yemen, where 12-year-old girl died  after she had given birth to her child. She wasn’t raped, she was a child bride, whose husband couldn’t wait with sex until she gets older. There was an uproar all over the world, there were countless quotations of doctors who said that girls at this age should not have children. That it’s dangerous to their health and life. Their bodies are not ready for pregnancy.

I can’t even count the amount of comments condemning the situation in Yemen. How could parents be so heartless and marry off their child? How can a grown up man have sex with a child? It’s paedophilia, abomination, backward culture. But all of this happened in a faraway country, in another reality and we were so quick to decry them. There were so many voices saying how we are different from THEM. How we are more civilised. How we are better. How our religion is better.

I think this whole circus shows us that Polish society is no different than an orthodox Muslim societies that we are so eager to criticize.

"If you knew anything about women, you would know,
that you always slightly rape a woman" Janusz Korwin-Mikke

Maybe I am looking at this all wrong. Maybe we should follow different examples. Maybe we should marry off young girls as soon as they can menstruate, because if she is bleeding, then she can have babies and there is no time to waste. And we should cover all women! We have to prevent these few-years-old seductresses from leading astray those God fearing, virtuous boys! And we should marry off raped girls to their perpetrators! The problem of “unwanted” babies will be solved, child won’t be fatherless, and basically the rape will cease to exist, because everybody knows that you can’t rape your wife. Wouldn’t life be sooooo much easier?

Okay, sorry for that. Jokes aside.

We want women (and girls) to take responsibility for their sexual acts, but we don’t educate them. We won’t provide them with an opportunity to choose, have easy choice and their fully conscious choice. Doctors and politicians make an access to contraception so difficult at a times and so expensive that it’s impossible to make an informed decision about your own reproductive health. And after stripping women from the power to determine their own fate, everyone is so eager to judge their lack of responsibility for their actions.

What is worse we don’t educate boys to acknowledge that they also have to take responsibility for their actions. Heck, the society is ready to take the blame of their hands at any time, when things get tough for them. Because it’s woman’s responsibility to not have sex with a man. Because if she had control over her own desire, there wouldn’t be any problem.

Are you all freaking serious?

"We have such a low birth rate caused by feminist culture,so each child, even from rape,
is worth a fortune! If we have 200 rapes a day, it doesn't mean that as many
women conceived. They have been raped, usually because of their stupidity,
and sometimes they were asking for it" Krzystof Oksiuta

Our government wants people to have more children, but they are not ready provide a dignifying life conditions for those who want to have children. Those who could provide Poland with “more hands to work”. Wouldn’t it be easier to provide better care for mothers and their children? Wouldn’t it be better to take better care of single mothers? Wouldn’t it be better if all children were wanted? There are some people in this world who would love to have loads of children, but simply can’t afford it. So maybe instead of forcing women who don’t want to have children to breed and breed and breed, maybe it would be wiser to provide better incentives? Like, better “back to work” initiatives, more available upskilling courses, paternity leaves.

When will government and clergy realise that Poland is not a good place to live for many of its citizens and it’s time to do something about it? We have so many countries around us who have successes in areas that we are failing miserably, but in our arogance we are refusing to follow their example. When will they understand that social development is as important as economic development? That without improving social sphere, we will not be able to improve any other sphere?

The struggle in Poland is not over and is far from over. We’ve raised our voices, but we can’t be silenced! Not now.

Stay strong, sisters! Keep fighting!

Spread the word! If you haven’t done it yet, SIGN THE PETITION!

Written by Vespertilio