Podcast Summary

New Books Network: “Abortion and Reproductive Justice: An Essential Guide for Resistance”

Guests: Dr. Marlene Gerber Fried and Dr. Loretta J. Ross
Host: Dr. Christina Gessler
Date: January 22, 2026

Overview

This episode of the New Books Network dives into the themes and activism embedded within Abortion and Reproductive Justice: An Essential Guide for Resistance by Dr. Marlene Gerber Fried and Dr. Loretta J. Ross. The conversation traverses the historical and contemporary landscape of reproductive rights, centering the concept of reproductive justice—a term and movement developed by Black women in the U.S.—and contextualizing it within global struggles against oppression, eugenics, and the fight for bodily autonomy. Both authors share personal stories, key insights from the book, and the broader implications of their framework for understanding and resisting reproductive injustice.

Guest Introductions and Paths to Activism

• [01:44] Dr. Loretta Ross introduces herself as an associate professor at Smith College and one of 12 Black women who co-created the reproductive justice framework. She underscores her five decades of human rights activism.
  • “I've been a human rights and social justice activist for over 50 years. And I'm one of the 12 black women who co created the theory of reproductive justice.” [01:44]
• [02:06] Dr. Marlene Gerber Fried shares her background as an emeritus professor at Hampshire College, her first-generation status, and her trajectory from antiwar, civil rights, and women’s liberation movements into reproductive rights work.
  • “Like many people of my generation...the social and human rights movements of the late 1960s and 70s...really shaped my subsequent academic and political career.” [02:06]
• [04:10] Both see themselves as “scholar-activists,” with activism at the heart of their academic identities.
  • “Activism is the art of making your life matter, and I like to think that Marlene and I embody that.” —Dr. Loretta Ross [04:10]
• [04:38] Ross details her nontraditional academic path—dropping out of college, returning decades later, and being invited into academia for her lived experience as an activist.
  • “No one is more surprised than me that I've ended up spending the last years of my life in academia, because when you're a college dropout at 19, that dream never feels real to you.” [04:38]

Why This Book? Reproductive Justice as Framework

• [06:21] The book emerged from the political climate of the Trump presidency and authors’ frustration with the narrow, often single-issue lens of abortion in U.S. politics, especially given the prevalence of white women voting against reproductive rights.
  • “...For us, understanding the centrality of race, white supremacy, and the breadth of reproductive issues is essential...you can't really understand what's going on with abortion unless you really see it in this broader frame.” —Dr. Marlene Gerber Fried [06:21]
• [07:59] Ross emphasizes the need for intersectional analysis, highlighting that race, class, gender, citizenship, and religion cannot be separated from discussions about reproductive rights.
  • “You really have to use an intersectional lens in order to understand how people are denied the right to control their bodies...” [07:59]
• [09:27] Fried points out that unlike in some global contexts, U.S. abortion politics have been isolated, failing to integrate broader human rights struggles.
  • “[Reproductive justice] is a global concept, but it was especially important to bring it to the United States...” [09:27]
• [10:52] Defining principles of reproductive justice:
  • The right to have children.
  • The right not to have children.
  • The right to raise children in safe, loving environments.
  • The right to bodily autonomy.
  • “Four principles, essentially...The last one is embedded in the first three.” —Dr. Marlene Gerber Fried [09:27]
• [11:34] Ross ties U.S. reproductive justice issues to international policies and abuses, emphasizing global implications.
  • “The United States...cause[s] such misery and death around the world because of our disproportionate economic and military power.” [11:34]

From Legal Rights to Human Rights

• [13:05] The book critiques the U.S. focus on legal rights over human rights, framing human rights as a moral and political claim before a legal one.
  • “We have to talk about human rights through a moral lens...Only then...can we adjudicate it, take it to the courts...But when we lead with the legal dimension...we always lose.” —Dr. Loretta Ross [13:05]
• [14:26] The “choice” framework is inadequate; it ignores structural constraints and unequal access.
  • “It's choices for whom? Choices within what constraints? Choices relying on. What else do you need in order to be able to make choices?” —Dr. Marlene Gerber Fried [14:26]
• [15:01] Critique of “pro-life” vs. “pro-choice” as reducing a spectrum of needs into a divisive binary.

Telling Different Abortion Stories: Complexity, Inclusion, and Community

• [15:19] Both guests stress the importance of moving beyond binaries and building communities that respect a range of beliefs and needs.
  • “We were able to coexist in a community of care and well being.” —Dr. Marlene Gerber Fried [15:19]
• [16:49] Fried recalls helping a Catholic mother whose daughter needed an abortion, demonstrating how reproductive justice can be inclusive and bridge divides.
  • “She believed that to save her daughter, she would go to hell.” [16:49]
• [17:45] The conversation highlights that lived experiences, not just legal milestones (like Roe v. Wade), must be centered.

Origins and Evolution of Reproductive Justice

• [18:39] Ross recounts the pivotal 1994 meeting in Chicago where Black women coined “reproductive justice” after recognizing the limits of both pro-choice and pro-life perspectives.
  • “We spliced together the concept of reproductive justice and reproductive rights and social justice to coin the term reproductive justice.” [18:39]
  • Reproductive justice is now customized by many global populations for their unique needs.
  • “It’s like an open code, an open source code that people can maintain integrity with the original code but also adapt it to their own particular circumstances.” [22:09]
• [23:23] The human rights movement itself had to be pushed to recognize women’s rights and bodily autonomy as central issues.
  • “The human rights framework...also very male centric. So women had to fight to get rape as a weapon of war recognized as a war crime.” —Dr. Loretta Ross [23:55]

The Hyde Amendment and Structural Injustice

• [25:46] The Hyde Amendment (1976) barred federal funds for abortion, disproportionately impacting the poor, people of color, and other oppressed groups.
  • “Is Roe v. Wade going to cover everybody or not? And the answer was pretty clear, not.” —Dr. Marlene Gerber Fried [25:46]
• [28:28] Hyde must be seen as part of a broader “tax revolt” movement—an erosion of public empathy and care.
  • “It really legitimated a public lack of empathy for people whose situations were not yours.” —Dr. Loretta Ross [28:28]
• [30:11] Personalizing the policy, Fried tells Rosie Jimenez’s story—the first woman known to have died after Hyde passed due to being unable to afford a safe abortion.
  • “Real people did these things. Real people were victims of oppression and real people had everything to do with changing the world to make it better.” —Dr. Marlene Gerber Fried [30:11]
• [32:42] Jimenez’s plight—forced to choose between her education and bodily autonomy—illustrates the fatal consequences of legal and economic barriers.

Historical and Systemic Contexts of Reproductive Injustice

• [34:44] Abortion is an economic, racial, and health justice issue. Poor women bear the brunt, living in “maternity care deserts” with high risks.
• [34:44–37:08] Ross and Fried highlight long histories of reproductive self-determination, including enslaved women’s use of abortifacients. Laws and power structures have always attempted to control women’s fertility for state and economic benefit.
  • “Breeding or who has children is a need of the state of the government...for their ends, not for my end.” —Dr. Marlene Gerber Fried [37:08]
• [37:40] The anti-midwife campaigns by doctors demonstrate the use of systemic tools (Comstock Laws, eugenics, medical gatekeeping) to control reproductive knowledge.
  • “They wanted to take [the trade] from them.” —Dr. Christina Gessler [37:40]

Eugenics, Sterilization Abuse, and “Reprocide”

• [38:57] Chapter 3 explores the history of forced sterilization, including modern examples (California prisons, ICE detention), and the manipulation of “choice.”
  • “Often the prison officials would describe this as they were giving the incarcerated women the same choices that people had on the outside, which of course was not true.” —Dr. Marlene Gerber Fried [38:57]
• [40:11] Ross defines “reprocide” as the targeting of certain populations for reproductive suppression—an act linked to genocide by international law, yet disavowed in the U.S. context.
  • “Many scholars of genocide had not really paid sufficient attention to how genocide was being committed through reproductive control.” [40:11]
• [43:34] The Buck v. Bell (1927) Supreme Court case legalized forced sterilizations, targeting marginalized populations (poor, disabled, nonwhite, and even “the wrong kind of white”).
  • “Three generations of imbeciles are enough.” —Dr. Marlene Gerber Fried paraphrasing Justice Holmes [43:34]
  • Ross notes, “That has never been overturned.” [41:57]
• [49:29] Eugenics was mainstreamed through education, media, and church sermons, amounting to an “indoctrination campaign” [49:29]

Contemporary Parallels: Neo-Eugenics and Policy

• [49:48] Neo-eugenic ideas persist in modern pronatalist and anti-immigrant rhetoric, echoing historical attempts to manipulate demographic patterns.
  • “We would be remiss if we didn’t pull this analysis from the beginning of the 20th century into the 21st century...neo eugenics is informing policies at the Trump administration now as we speak.” —Dr. Loretta Ross [49:48]
• [51:28] The current discourse mirrors the 19th-century panics about white birth rates and immigration.

Action and Global Perspectives

• [52:44] Chapters 4 and 5 share stories of resistance and organizing, showing different ways reproductive justice is enacted—from a Black doctor opening a clinic in Arizona, to international networks for self-managed abortion.
  • “There are many different ways to implement abortion, reproductive justice. There are many different avenues for people to change the world and get what they need.” —Dr. Marlene Gerber Fried [52:44]
• [54:40] Ross reflects on how reproductive justice’s global relevance surprised the framework’s originators.
  • “[Reproductive justice] has created political space and reframing in other countries like Ireland, through Latin America, on the continent of Africa and in Asia...” [54:40]
• [56:19] The most radical strategies—such as self-managed abortion with pills—have often emerged outside the U.S. “Everything was not invented here.” —Dr. Marlene Gerber Fried [56:19]

Hope, Resistance, and Moving Forward

• [57:08] Fried calls for “resistance...the determination to make something better...to always be on the lookout for new ways in which eugenics is showing up.”
  • “Playing offense, don’t play by the rules. The rules weren’t meant for us.” [57:08]
• [57:53] Ross emphasizes hope as a radical, necessary force:
  • “As long as people live their authentic lives, tell the truth of what they're going through, and offer a vision for what the world should be, we will accomplish so many wonderful things that will awe us.” —Dr. Loretta Ross [57:53]

Notable Quotes & Timestamps

• “[Reproductive justice] is the art of making your life matter.” —Dr. Loretta Ross [04:10]
• “You can't really understand what's going on with abortion unless you really see it in this broader frame.” —Dr. Marlene Gerber Fried [06:21]
• “Everything was not invented here.” —Dr. Marlene Gerber Fried [56:19]
• “Playing offense, don’t play by the rules. The rules weren’t meant for us.” —Dr. Marlene Gerber Fried [57:08]
• “As long as people live their authentic lives, tell the truth...and offer a vision for what the world should be, we will accomplish so many wonderful things that will awe us.” —Dr. Loretta Ross [57:53]

Key Timestamps for Major Topics

• 01:44 – Loretta Ross and Marlene Gerber Fried: introductions and activist-scholarly identities
• 06:21 – Why a new framework: origins and purpose of the book
• 10:52 – Defining reproductive justice: four key principles
• 13:05 – Human rights vs. legal rights: limitations of the U.S. legal framework
• 18:39 – The 1994 “birth” of reproductive justice as a framework
• 25:46 – The Hyde Amendment and its impact on access
• 30:11 – Story of Rosie Jimenez: personalizing systemic harm
• 37:40 – Systemic attacks on midwives and control of reproductive knowledge
• 38:57 – Chapter 3: “Reprocide” and abusive sterilization
• 43:34 – Buck v. Bell and legalizing forced sterilization
• 49:29 – Eugenics as mainstream policy and propaganda
• 52:44 – Putting reproductive justice in action: stories from the front lines
• 54:40 – The global reach and adaptability of reproductive justice
• 57:08 – Calls to hope, resistance, and creating change

Tone & Language

The conversation is candid, urgent, and activist-forward, blending lived narrative, personal conviction, and rigorous analysis. Both authors speak with deep empathy, moral clarity, and a call to action, always rooting reproductive justice in real lives and global systems. The focus is on building broad-based, intersectional movements that acknowledge history, complexity, and possibility.