Because history left unaddressed becomes the present

[maynardsong]

Mods, can we have tags for birth, reproductive justice, and/or midwifery? Also, I thought this was incredibly on-point, and does a fantastic job addressing the racism and classism behind "choosing" a "natural" birth. I actually think this can be extended to breastfeeding and living eco-friendly.This was a quote from my eighth grade history class,

Comments

[farting_nora]

I added a birth tag.

[apis_cerana]

Excellent article. Thank you for sharing.

[seasontoseason]

This is an interesting article, but I don't quite get what the takehome message is. It almost sounds as if the author thinks because of the fact that many people use homebirth as a way to distinguish themselves from the racially "less-desirable" the answer is to stop advocating for midwifery.

Other than what I said above, though, I do think that this is a really interesting article and an important one. This is a phenomenon we see in everything from food issues ("organic" or gardening at home for food, etc) to reproduction issues, and I think it is important to see that and to think this through. how can we stop history from repeating itself? Well, in this case I think universal healthcare would help.

[maynardsong]

I didn't get that at ALL. I think her point is that it sucks that midwifery advocates ONLY seem to address the concerns of rich white women instead of every woman. And agreed on universal health care.

[apis_cerana]

Precisely. Frankly, the wording on some of the "natural parenting" forums are sickening -- they magical negro the hell out of some POC by saying that "what they are doing is ~*~closer to the earth~*~ and it's the right way to do things!" etc.

[elialshadowpine]

"It's fascinating how homebirth changed from something poor, non-white and immigrant women did to something more of a status symbol in the modern era."

Not to derail, but I think you see this as a trend in more than just homebirth. I've seen a lot of white middle-class people, say, for instance, raise chickens because it's cool and a status symbol, or start a vegetable garden in the city because it's cool and a status symbol. Never the mind that for a lot of people both past and present, these things aren't choices and they would love to have the options that these people are sneering at.

[elephantus45]

There also was a lot of propaganda against Hawaiian Native mothers, as part of colonization. But today its getting better, there are more alternative birth methods available, and there are resources for women about breast feeding (which was considered dirty when coming from Hawaiian women, maybe every other woman I'm not sure about that during this time or if the white missionaries or others did breast feed or not). But its not the rich white people pressing for this. So the outlook is not entirely so bleak on this.