The Ugly Truth
In March of 2019, the Pinkhouse Defenders were joined by Maureen Holohan, an athlete, writer and activist, as well the founder and director of Mo'Motion, Inc., a youth basketball non-profit in New York City. Maureen contacted us and came to Mississippi to learn more about abortion access and what is happening at clinics every day across America.
Earlier this month, thinking about the upcoming election, Maureen posted her thoughts and video from her time here in 2019 on Facebook.
This video was from Saturday, March 23, 2019.
Thank you, Maureen.
I went to Mississippi when I was 15 years old for one of the most impactful AAU basketball events in my youth. I remember being surrounded by fun, tough and silly girls who loved to frequent the buffet at Shoney's. On that trip, we all took turns getting our butts kicked on the court as a rite of passage in our journey to see what the national hoops landscape looked like for us and where we fit in it. I thought I knew what toughness meant back then, but my definition was so narrow, so defined by sucking it up, muscling through, playing in pain; and so limited by my belief that our sport, our place, our country, our world was fair or that it would be soon-if we just tried harder, if we just kept playing through it, if we just showed everyone that we worked to have a fair place in the world. I spent many years waffling between a belief that it was fair or would be and I could help make it fair, and knowing it wasn't through what I saw, experienced, and what I wrote about the places I'd been, the people I met and what they taught me. I tried to remain idealistic and positive, and in no way was able to wrap my head around the same old, the never changing attitude held by Nina Simone in her fierce song, "Mississippi, God Damn."
In November 2018, after seeing Amy McGrath in KY lose a race by 2-3 points thanks, in my opinion, to an 11th hour late-term abortion "baby killer" propaganda ad, I had to find out more. I read a few books and watched a few documentaries and sent a few emails.
That following March I returned to Mississippi 30+ years later to find out an ugly truth about our country, and about how we treat women and girls who didn't have the protections that our team, our parents, our sport gave us for most of our lives. It is a truth that I have not been able to shake, and, given what is at stake this fall and winter, I probably won't be able to let go of it any time soon.
In March 2019, I spent time with The Pinkhouse Defenders, a group of volunteers who protect the only abortion clinic in Mississippi. Fearing that none of my friends would believe what i saw on the front lines outside, I asked two young women to drive my car rental through the protestors on a rally day while I sat in the back seat filming under a wig and glasses. It changed my life, my view of our country, and made me angry that our country's claim of separation of church and state is an outright lie. I watched the risks taken by unarmed, ordinary people for the sake of the our country's most vulnerable. The people who took me into their world in Jackson, Mississippi, gave me a course on what it means to be a brave and patriotic American.
Regarding the footage you are going to see in this short clip, the most striking reactions I had were when I saw a team of home-school girls putting a full court press on cars coming up the road. I thought 1) someone is using them 2) someone is abusing them and 3) someone is teaching them to think that what they are doing is their business, when it is not, just like parents home-schooling kids is not any of my business. I could be wrong about #1 and #2, in spite of those being my first gut reactions, but I have no problem standing firm on #3. If the temple or mosque members next door came with you to the doctor or stopped you out front and told you that you couldn't get cancer treatment - just live with it as "God's will" - and if they told you not to get a new knee or that bad hip fixed or to get on those opioids or off of them, or to take Viagra even if you lose your vision because sex is more important than eye sight because i said it is, you'd report them to the police, no? If they stuck their nose into life-and-death decisions, and basic living and functioning decisions because their religion told them to do it, you would again, call the authorities or complain to the front desk. The businesses would have the power to remove them or would they not? That is what appalled me the most -- the invasion of privacy, the fact that the police, the city council doesn't do much to nothing because "they're just women."
I am pro-mind-your-own-business when it comes to health decisions that are between you and your doctor (and as it pertains to relationships because those decisions do not impact me). I am in favor of standing up for women and girls who are raped, victims of incest, violence, and for those who are simply not ready to be a mother, or those who already have kids and cannot handle the responsibility or financial stress that comes with having more.
It is now being reported that 60-70 percent of Americans are pro-mind-your-own-business. I haven't been to church in a while because the one I grew up in doesn't let women speak from the pulpit still, but can I get an "Amen?" But wait, no, I can't. We can't. Why? The Rapture Amy-like radical right are shoving their religion and alleged morals on all Americans, and there are not many who will stand in their way, except a handful of people in rainbow colored vests as you will see in this video. And the terrorists that they are pushing back away from a medical building are the same obnoxious, insecure clowns who don't use condoms because it's "God's will" and "Jesus will provide." These loud mouths and their female accessories are just like our president - against abortion in public. "Fellas, we've got to be good men (who have unprotected sex because our wives must submit) and we've got to save them babies." But it's okay for some of the female protesters to use the clinic themselves and hop back out in the protesting line. It's also fine to do what the president did and be pro-stem cell research where fetal tissue is used to save their asses from viruses like COVID-19. That's fine for them. But not for you or me or the next female that pulls into the parking lot, the girl who "needs to be saved."
From them.
Jesus said nothing about abortion in the Bible. But he did give us one fine anecdote in what it means to be a Good Samaritan.
And if you think you know what Jesus said, and you like it and it serves you, then by all means, go ahead and let it apply to you and your family.
And I will end with a short, sweet position by Lois Anne Polan, my Jewish grandmother in Kentucky who has never imposed her religion on me (I'm not even sure if she's religious). Lois Anne, like me, thinks we've got too many issues that require our worry and attention, not to mention that the harassment and bullying outside of the clinics by loud-mouths and hypocrites simply does not work.
"If you don't believe in abortion," Lois Anne says. "Then don't have one."