US Abortion Pre Roe WEB
Metadata
- US Abortion Pre Roe WEB
- October 18, 2022
- Content Type Package
- Language English
- Transcript/Script English USAGM SHARE ((PLAYBOOK SLUG: US Abortion Pre-Roe)) HEADLINE: Before Roe v. Wade There Was the Jane Collective TEASER: After Roe v. Wade reversal, revisiting the Jane Collective PUBLISHED AT: 10/18/2022 at 10:00am BYLINE: Penelope Poulou DATELINE: WASHINGTON VIDEOGRAPHER: VIDEO EDITOR: Penelope Poulou SCRIPT EDITORS: Bowman, MAS, DJONES VIDEO SOURCE (S): All interviews are VOA original HBO; Zoom, AP PLATFORMS (mark with X): WEB __ TV X RADIO _X_ TRT: 3:43 VID APPROVED BY: mia TYPE: TVPKG EDITOR NOTES:)) ((INTRO )) [[Women going to extraordinary lengths to get abortions is not new in America. The procedure was banned in much of the country before the Supreme Court's landmark 1973 Roe v. Wade decision that legalized abortion nationwide. Since the high court overturned Roe in June, a number of states are banning or severely restricting abortions. VOA's Penelope Poulou looks back at an underground network that helped women get abortions in the 1960s - an effort that has renewed relevance today.]] ((NARRATOR)) ((Mandatory Courtesy: “The Janes”/HBO)) Before the Supreme Court legalized abortions nationwide in 1973, there was the Jane Collective, a clandestine society of young women that helped pregnant women get safe abortions. In the late ‘60s, using the code name “Jane,” the group operated from Chicago, Illinois. “The Janes,” a documentary film by Tia Lessin and Emma Pildes, chronicles their story. ((NAT SOUND – Activist voices under b-roll describe the Jane Collective)) ((Mandatory Courtesy: “The Janes”/HBO)) “For most of the nation, in ‘72, abortion was illegal. We had to go underground.” ((Heather Booth, Jane Collective Founder)) “They had ads around the city, posters up saying ‘Pregnant? Don’t want to be? Call Jane,’ and had a phone number.” ((NARRATOR)) Heather Booth, a civil rights activist, founded the group. She told VOA it all started quite accidentally. ((Heather Booth, Jane Collective Founder)) “In 1965, a friend of mine told me that his sister was pregnant and nearly suicidal and not ready to have a child, and he asked could I help him find someone to perform an abortion.” ((NARRATOR)) A doctor she knew helped. But steep medical fees and an overwhelming number of underprivileged women requesting the procedure prompted a dozen women volunteers to learn how to perform the procedure themselves. ((Heather Booth, Jane Collective Founder)) “The women of ‘Jane’ performed themselves 11,000 abortions that were safe, that were done in a caring community. But it wasn’t legal.” ((NARRATOR)) ((Mandatory Courtesy: “The Janes”/HBO)) On May 3, 1972, police raided the place where the Janes operated. Seven were arrested. ((NAT SOUND –Member of the Jane Collective)) ((Mandatory Courtesy: “The Janes”/HBO)) “There were eleven counts of conspiracy to commit abortion. 110 years, for each of us.” ((NARRATOR)) The charges were eventually dropped. Criminalizing abortion has returned in some U.S. states since the Supreme Court overturned the 1973 Roe v. Wade ruling in June. For Booth, the battle to ensure access to the procedure has come full circle. ((Heather Booth, Jane Collective Founder)) “The question of abortion: This is the most intimate decision of a person's life about when or whether or with whom we have a child. It's one of the deepest freedoms in our lives. And there's no reason that a politician should come in between a woman and this most personal decision of their life.” ((NARRATOR)) Carol Tobias, president of the National Right to Life Committee, an anti-abortion group, disagrees. ((Carol Tobias, National Right to Life Committee President)) ((VOA Original)) ((Mandatory Zoom)) “I think we will see more and more people coming to understand that the unborn child is a member of the human family that should be protected. I mean how many people now for how many years have as their first baby picture, the ultrasound, not the cute little picture of mom holding the baby in a pink or blue blanket, but the ultrasound before birth? So, we've got people that are seeing this baby is already alive and is already here.” ((NARRATOR)) But for Heather Booth, an activist who fought and sacrificed decades ago for women’s reproductive rights, banning abortions in 2022 is a step backward. (Heather Booth, Jane Collective Founder)) “It will be the unraveling of freedoms in their lives. And really the unraveling of hopes for their own future and the future of the children they either have or hope to have. And so, this struggle continues.” ((Penelope Poulou, VOANEWS))
- Transcript/Script USAGM SHARE ((PLAYBOOK SLUG: US Abortion Pre-Roe)) HEADLINE: Before Roe v. Wade There Was the Jane Collective TEASER: After Roe v. Wade reversal, revisiting the Jane Collective PUBLISHED AT: 10/18/2022 at 10:00am BYLINE: Penelope Poulou DATELINE: WASHINGTON VIDEOGRAPHER: VIDEO EDITOR: Penelope Poulou SCRIPT EDITORS: Bowman, MAS, DJONES VIDEO SOURCE (S): All interviews are VOA original HBO; Zoom, AP PLATFORMS (mark with X): WEB __ TV X RADIO _X_ TRT: 3:43 VID APPROVED BY: mia TYPE: TVPKG EDITOR NOTES:)) ((INTRO )) [[Women going to extraordinary lengths to get abortions is not new in America. The procedure was banned in much of the country before the Supreme Court's landmark 1973 Roe v. Wade decision that legalized abortion nationwide. Since the high court overturned Roe in June, a number of states are banning or severely restricting abortions. VOA's Penelope Poulou looks back at an underground network that helped women get abortions in the 1960s - an effort that has renewed relevance today.]] ((NARRATOR)) ((Mandatory Courtesy: “The Janes”/HBO)) Before the Supreme Court legalized abortions nationwide in 1973, there was the Jane Collective, a clandestine society of young women that helped pregnant women get safe abortions. In the late ‘60s, using the code name “Jane,” the group operated from Chicago, Illinois. “The Janes,” a documentary film by Tia Lessin and Emma Pildes, chronicles their story. ((NAT SOUND – Activist voices under b-roll describe the Jane Collective)) ((Mandatory Courtesy: “The Janes”/HBO)) “For most of the nation, in ‘72, abortion was illegal. We had to go underground.” ((Heather Booth, Jane Collective Founder)) “They had ads around the city, posters up saying ‘Pregnant? Don’t want to be? Call Jane,’ and had a phone number.” ((NARRATOR)) Heather Booth, a civil rights activist, founded the group. She told VOA it all started quite accidentally. ((Heather Booth, Jane Collective Founder)) “In 1965, a friend of mine told me that his sister was pregnant and nearly suicidal and not ready to have a child, and he asked could I help him find someone to perform an abortion.” ((NARRATOR)) A doctor she knew helped. But steep medical fees and an overwhelming number of underprivileged women requesting the procedure prompted a dozen women volunteers to learn how to perform the procedure themselves. ((Heather Booth, Jane Collective Founder)) “The women of ‘Jane’ performed themselves 11,000 abortions that were safe, that were done in a caring community. But it wasn’t legal.” ((NARRATOR)) ((Mandatory Courtesy: “The Janes”/HBO)) On May 3, 1972, police raided the place where the Janes operated. Seven were arrested. ((NAT SOUND –Member of the Jane Collective)) ((Mandatory Courtesy: “The Janes”/HBO)) “There were eleven counts of conspiracy to commit abortion. 110 years, for each of us.” ((NARRATOR)) The charges were eventually dropped. Criminalizing abortion has returned in some U.S. states since the Supreme Court overturned the 1973 Roe v. Wade ruling in June. For Booth, the battle to ensure access to the procedure has come full circle. ((Heather Booth, Jane Collective Founder)) “The question of abortion: This is the most intimate decision of a person's life about when or whether or with whom we have a child. It's one of the deepest freedoms in our lives. And there's no reason that a politician should come in between a woman and this most personal decision of their life.” ((NARRATOR)) Carol Tobias, president of the National Right to Life Committee, an anti-abortion group, disagrees. ((Carol Tobias, National Right to Life Committee President)) ((VOA Original)) ((Mandatory Zoom)) “I think we will see more and more people coming to understand that the unborn child is a member of the human family that should be protected. I mean how many people now for how many years have as their first baby picture, the ultrasound, not the cute little picture of mom holding the baby in a pink or blue blanket, but the ultrasound before birth? So, we've got people that are seeing this baby is already alive and is already here.” ((NARRATOR)) But for Heather Booth, an activist who fought and sacrificed decades ago for women’s reproductive rights, banning abortions in 2022 is a step backward. (Heather Booth, Jane Collective Founder)) “It will be the unraveling of freedoms in their lives. And really the unraveling of hopes for their own future and the future of the children they either have or hope to have. And so, this struggle continues.” ((Penelope Poulou, VOANEWS))
- NewsML Media Topics Arts, Culture, Entertainment and Media
- Network VOA
- Embargo Date October 18, 2022 10:30 EDT
- Byline Penelope Poulou
- Brand / Language Service Voice of America