Brace yourselves for an intersectional feminist rant. Why? Because “I rather be divisive than indecisive”*. And to give you an idea of how IN I’m about to go, here’s a little anecdote: I’ve been on Twitter almost since it’s inception and, as passionately as I can get while livetweeting an event/show, I’ve only been put in Twitter!jail ONCE. It was during Wendy Davis’ 2013 filibuster in Texas. So, yeah, perspective.

You may or may not be aware of the “hearing” regarding Planned Parenthood funding that took place today. You know, the issue the government is willing to stage another unnecessary shutdown over. On the surface it appears to be a simple question of accountability of funds to an organization that apparently “sells baby parts”. Blow off the smoke from the top and the fact that the issue is more about the continual war on women’s reproductive rights, as opposed to already disproved black market human meat, becomes more obvious. This assault isn’t just about women’s reproductive rights on the whole though. What a lot of people are forgetting, whether intentionally or not, is that race factors heavily into the decision to come for PP’s neck. Socioeconomic status is a very close runner up as well and it can’t be denied that, due to our nation’s lovely relation with POC, “poor” and “POC” seem to constantly hold hands.

Planned Parenthood performs abortions, yes, ’tis true. If you don’t like it, no one gives a flying fuck because, if it’s not YOUR body having to withstand this procedure, what you do or don’t like doesn’t matter. Let me repeat: IT.DOESN’T.MATTER. And it doesn’t matter to the GOP either, the ones stirring this whole pot, regardless of the sleight of hand they’re trying to pull. It’s not about souls, or babies, or religion, or we-believe-the-children-are-the-future garbage they try to spin. It’s about maintaining control of those they feel shouldn’t have their own autonomy because of their history of being property or chattel. Anyone not in the know, this didn’t just begin and end with POC. Women, of every shade and station, used to “belong” to a man. From father to husband, hence the whole hand exchange aspect of traditional wedding services that persists to this very day. A woman is given because she never belonged to herself in the first place. Throw race in there?! You already knows what happens next. I digress. The GOP is an interesting animal, a beast. And even those women/POC who drink the Kool-Aid to placate their subconscious desire or fear for survival (via assimilation to the dominant class) fail to lend it credibility. Because that’s what really feeds this party; fear of not being in power, of not being the status quo, of ending up the oppressed after so many centuries of holding the literal and proverbial whip. Anything that is a threat must be quashed and after systematically chipping away at the right granted by Roe v. Wade, here we are, wasting taxpayer money to defund an organization that provides both a legal right and preventative healthcare to low-income women throughout the country.

But the racial aspect of this ongoing campaign against reproductive freedom is simply too huge to ignore or blur. Let’s remove the discussion from our current American climate, shall we? This country has a long history — rarely sufficiently taught in our schools — of not only forcing WOC (usually Black women) to bear the unwanted young of their owners during slavery, but also of forced sterilization of other ethnic groups (e.g. Native Americans and Puerto Ricans). All for the same reason rape is still used in war time; it’s a tactic to physically and mentally subjugate a population through demoralization and dominance of its women. Restriction on the reproductive rights of women, at the core, isn’t much removed from all of this. Is this not another bunch of White dudes in power disgustingly trying to dictate the use of our organs to their satisfaction?

The GOP needs the disenfranchised in order to continue both its subtle and overt reign of terror on the American people. It needs to keep a significant portion of the population sick, ignorant, and reproducing into the same maligned status so as to be the eternal cogs in the capitalist machine. The capitalist machine that the GOP runs and fills their pockets with while POC are restricted, through their economic polices, from an equal starting foot. The capitalist machine that’s the ardent lover of patriarchal ideals and continues to pay women less on the dollar than men. Notice how public education in this country is subpar, universal healthcare has been railed against, and access to birth control/sex education/abortion like the kind attained through Planned Parenthood has been demonized. Meanwhile, the GOP folks (read: primarily upper class, cisgendered, straight, White men in charge) have incredible access to all those things and always will. Money will forever enable those who wield it to possess certain liberties regardless of legality. Creating a populace that can think for itself, make its own healthcare decisions, and be progressively upwardly mobile would reverse all the hard “work” the GOP has put in to ensure they never really have to earn their privileges.

They grow rich off our labor and subverting that is dangerous.

The truth of GOP “pro-lifers” is seen in their distinctly unChristian approach to the poor, time and time again. Thank you for having that baby after we made it near impossible to have that abortion you wanted, after we made it near impossible to access birth control, after we made it near impossible for you to have basic sex education when you needed it most. But now that we’ve herded you down the path we wanted you to take, don’t you dare desire any sort of government help for your wanton Jezebel ways! Because, you know, misogyny. Misogyny that loves to police and punish women’s sexuality and just…punish women for fucking existing at all by cutting off cancer screenings and well-woman visits. All so the GOP majority can walk around swinging the dicks they’ll never be pregnant from, delighting in how they’ve still got it made.

Cecile Richards is the President of Planned Parenthood and today she stood toe to toe with individuals, one being Rep. Jason Chaffetz, who proceeded to disrespectfully interrupt and talk over her. At one point, Cecile was asked whether she thought they would take it easy on her because she was a woman and that right there represents everything crystal clear. Don’t talk, you’re a woman. But lemme condescend to you and taunt that we hope you didn’t think we’d take it easy on you because you’re a woman. Har, har, harrrrrrrr, I don’t know anything about women’s reproductive health but I’m still going to tell you whether or not you’ll get funding for it because fictional back room baby parts! The stupidity literally hurts and yet we can’t just shrug it off because defunding Planned Parenthood would be a terrible blow to women the country over. This was never about fetal tissue and if you’re still believing that it’s time to start looking at the bigger picture (see above). Side note: Cecile was asked if Planned Parenthood profits off abortion so to answer everyone’s question, yes, they do but only if you consider “profit” to be insomuch as to cover the costs of fetal tissue donation which is LEGAL for scientific purposes. In reality, this profit isn’t profit at all.

At the end of the day, I didn’t write all this to convince any pro-lifer to be pro-choice. We can agree to disagree. But your personal health decisions should be just that. Yours. Mine should be mine. Random ass Sally’s down the block should be hers and no one else’s opinion has a place in whatever doctor’s office we should individually find ourselves. Be pro-choice for you and leave my and everyone else’s uterus the fuck out of it.

*Courtesy of Lin-Manuel Miranda via “Hamilton”