Honoring A Reproductive Justice Pioneer: An Interview with Loretta J. Ross
Image of Black feminist organizer, activist, and reproductive justice pioneer, Loretta J. Ross. Photo courtesy of Loretta J. Ross.
By Jaimee A. Swift
Black feminist activist, educator, and scholar Loretta J. Ross has paved the way for reproductive justice activism. In contemporary discourses on reproductive healthcare and abortion access, let’s not forget the leadership of Ross and other Black feminists who have and continue to be at the vanguard of reproductive justice.
When news surfaced on September 1st, 2021 about the Texas abortion law (formally known as the SB 8 law) and the United States’ Supreme Court’s upholding of the anti-abortion ban, many were shocked and outraged. Overturning the 1973 landmark case, Roe v. Wade, the SB 8 law (informally known as the “heartbeat bill”) seeks to ban abortion in Texas at approximately six weeks, which is usually when people can detect or know when they are pregnant. The law makes no exceptions, even if the pregnancy is a result of rape, sexual violence, and incest. Moreover, the SB 8 law not only criminalizes abortion but it permits private citizens to sue people who are trying to obtain abortions as well abortion providers.
Protests against the abortion law have taken place in Texas, Chicago, and on social media.
However, with the outrage about the Texas abortion law and in other discourses on reproductive healthcare, Black women, trans, queer, disabled, and gender expansive people are often left behind, as writer Karla Mendez has noted. Moreover, due to mainstream white feminist washing and cis-heteronormalizing of reproductive healthcare, it is often overlooked that Black feminists have pioneered and continue to be at the vanguard of reproductive justice (RJ) activism.
With this, contemporary reproductive rights activists and organizers are indebted to the leadership of Black feminist activist, educator, and scholar Loretta J. Ross, who is one of the founders of the reproductive justice framework and movement. Today and everyday, we honor her leadership.
“With this, contemporary reproductive rights activists and organizers are indebted to the leadership of Black feminist activist, educator, and scholar Loretta J. Ross, who is one of the founders of the reproductive justice framework and movement. Today and everyday, we honor her leadership.”
About Loretta J. Ross
Born in Temple, Texas in 1953, Ross was catapulted into activism during the 1970s, when she was tear-gassed at a demonstration when she was an undergraduate student at Howard University, a historically Black university in Washington, D.C. During that time, she was involved in Black nationalist and Marxist-Leninist politics, tenant organizing, and South African anti-apartheid advocacy. Ross was one of the founders of the National Black United Front, a “freedom-fighting organization working for the cultural development of African people.” The death of Ross’ friend and comrade, activist Yulanda Ward, changed her life and further ignited her fight for equity and justice.
Ross’ activism and advocacy is also shaped by her experience as a survivor sexual violence and reproductive injustice. When Ross was 11 years-old, she was raped by a stranger. At 15 years-old, she was a victim of incest by a relative and she gave birth to her son in 1969. At 23 years-old, Ross was a victim of forced sterilization, after using Dalkon Shield, an intrauterine contraceptive device (IUD). She was one of the first people to win a lawsuit against A.H. Robins Company, the manufacturer of Dalkon Shield.
Throughout her career, Ross has accomplished a series of “firsts”. In 1979, she was one of the first Black women to direct a rape crisis center–D.C. Rape Crisis Center–the first and the oldest rape crisis center in the United States. At the time, the D.C. Rape Crisis Center was the only rape crisis center serving primarily Black women and women of color in D.C. In August 1980, Ross organized the first National Conference on Third World Women and Violence in D.C. According to Emily Thuma, “...the conference marked the first time that Black, Latina, Asian, and Native American women working in rape crisis centers and battered women’s shelters convened both nationally and autonomously.” From 1985 to 1989, Ross served as the Director of Women of Color Programs for the National Organization of Women and in 1987, Ross organized the first national conference on Women of Color and Reproductive Rights. After the ruling of the 1989 case, Webster v. Reproductive Health Services, where the U.S. Supreme Court upheld a Missouri law regulating abortion care, Ross was one of 16 Black women who published “We Remember: African American Women Are For Reproductive Freedom”.
From 1989-1990, she was the program director for the National Black Women’s Health Project—now the Black Women’s Health Imperative—which is “the first nonprofit organization created by Black women to help protect and advance the health and wellness of Black women and girls.” As the program director, Ross “coordinated the first national conference of African American women for reproductive rights.”
In 1994, Ross was a part of the group “Women of African Descent for Reproductive Justice”, where she and others co-coined the term “reproductive justice” at a meeting in Chicago, Illinois. According to SisterSong Women of Color Reproductive Justice Collective, reproductive justice is “the human right to maintain personal bodily autonomy, have children, not have children, and parent the children we have in safe and sustainable communities.” SisterSong is “a Southern based, national membership organization; our purpose is to build an effective network of individuals and organizations to improve institutional policies and systems that impact the reproductive lives of marginalized communities.” From 2005 to 2012, Ross was the National Coordinator of SisterSong and is a co-founder.
She has co-written three books on reproductive justice: Undivided Rights: Women of Color Organize for Reproductive Justice; Reproductive Justice: An Introduction; and Radical Reproductive Justice: Foundations, Theory, Practice, Critique. Her current book, Calling in the Calling Out Culture, is forthcoming in 2021.
In December 2019, I conducted a phone interview with Loretta J. Ross and she shared with me her thoughts on her pioneering work as a reproductive justice leader; who and what inspired her activism; why Black feminists bring her joy; and what a Black Woman Radical means to her.
You are a reproductive justice (RJ) pioneer, as you are one of the co-coiners of the reproductive justice framework. How does it feel to see the political and academic progress and impact that the reproductive justice framework has made?
Loretta J. Ross (LJR): I'm always surprised at the reach and the political impact of the reproductive justice framework. When we created reproductive justice in 1994 as Black feminists, we were trying to define what we needed from healthcare reform by centering ourselves in the lens. We had no intention of transforming the pro-choice or pro-life movement debate, or a matter of fact, creating a framework that others would find useful. We were trying to see what we needed. So we created the reproductive justice framework and probably no one is more astonished than the 12 of us about the international outreach, impact, and success the framework has. A paper was sent to me today on reproductive justice in South Korea. There was not a national or global campaign on reproductive justice to make this a dominant way people talk about reproductive politics. I think that's a tribute to the sturdiness of the framework and its capaciousness with the way people want to use it, even if it's not accompanied by a protracted campaign.
Yes, the reproductive justice framework definitely has a global reach. As a follow-up, how do you feel when this generation of Black feminists say they look up to you because of your pivotal and pioneering activism?
“When we created reproductive justice in 1994 as Black feminists, we were trying to define what we needed from healthcare reform by centering ourselves in the lens. We had no intention of transforming the pro-choice or pro-life movement debate, or a matter of fact, creating a framework that others would find useful. We were trying to see what we needed.”
LJR: To be honest, I'm a little embarrassed by it because it simply is not necessary. Every Black feminist that I've ever worked with, we work best in the company of our sisters. We know that we never do anything alone. We do things collectively. Matter of fact, we collectively do things because we can't do it all by ourselves. We're all linked in a long chain of freedom. I don't care much for the celebrity culture that insists that great people do great things when it's really a collective of people who all do the piece that they can do best. When you put it all together, that can result in something great or something transformative.
When my mother sent me off to college at 16 years-old, she told me I should not let success go to my head or failure go to my heart. That advice put me in a good way all my life. I don't necessarily let what people say to me about whether they see me as the founder of reproductive justice and stuff like that go to my head because it's simply not true. I'm one of many founders and I don't let our setbacks go to my heart. I just keep working. That's what all activists need to do: we look at the ugliness of the world and we keep on working.
In your opinion, what needs to be done to ensure that reproductive justice is a tangible and sustainable reality for Black women around the world?
LJR: Reproductive justice can’t become a reality for Black women around the world until human rights become a reality. Reproductive justice is based upon the global human rights framework. It's actually a portal for bringing human rights to the United States. Globally, people are using the human rights framework. I think that's one of the things that makes reproductive justice so attractive to people transnationally because it resonates with what they're very familiar with, which is embedding our demands for bodily autonomy, the right to have children, and the right not to have children, and the right to raise our children in safe and healthy environments in the global human rights framework, which has to be respected, protected, and achieve for any of these other things to take place. I'm really energized and excited about the way people use RJ in a very localized context and they are doing it in a very adaptable way.
“I’m really pleased at how people are finding [reproductive justice] capacious and flexible in order to adapt to what their particular local needs are, but also in its movement building properties, because reproductive justice is an organizing framework based on human rights.”
For example, when Indigenous women use reproductive justice, they incorporate a conversation on sovereignty. When I see Latinas use it, they're talking about immigration rights in a way that is very particular and important to their community. I see other people talking about it in terms of disability or transgender rights and access. I see so many adaptations of reproductive justice, both domestically and globally. I'm really pleased at how people are finding it capacious and flexible in order to adapt to what their particular local needs are, but also in its movement building properties, because reproductive justice is an organizing framework based on human rights. You're inviting people to bring their human rights issues into conversation so that the rights to affordable housing becomes a reproductive justice issue or the right to reduce the military industrial complex is a reproductive justice issue or the right to a quality education becomes an RJ issue. People liked the fact that we can talk about how people's bodies matter and whose bodies are valued or devalued and this can be done through the use of the reproductive justice framework.
Image of activist Loretta J. Ross. Photo courtesy of Loretta J. Ross.
Who are Black women in your life who inspire you?
LJR: Well, most of the Black women I had the joy of working with when I was a youngster–you know, 16, 17, 18, 19 years-old–who developed my Black feminist consciousness, are not well-known. I think of Ethel James Williams, an amazing Black women who I met when she was in her sixties. It was in Washington, D.C., where I developed my consciousness, so I guess that is where I should start. D.C. was a Black feminist hotbed, and had been so ever since the 1930s. To come of age and into my consciousness in Washington, D.C. gave me the privilege of learning Black feminism from Black women. Long before I understood white women and feminism, I learned from Black women. I was privileged to see Black women who were active, who were having an impact. I mean I lived off of Nannie Helen Burroughs Avenue! [Laughs]
“To come of age and into my consciousness in Washington, D.C. gave me the privilege of learning Black feminism from Black women. Long before I understood white women and feminism, I learned from Black women.”
These are the things that Washington, D.C. afforded me that I think was special. I'm so thankful I was lucky enough to have gone to Howard University and grew up in Washington in terms of political consciousness. I am grateful there were Black women doing amazing things and who were willing to mentor an insufferably arrogant person like me and helped me develop my own activism and consciousness.
What led you into activism?
LJR: The things that got my attention were personal things that happened to me. I am a survivor of childhood sexual abuse, incest, and rape. I took that legacy, that history, and that trauma with me to Howard University. At 16 years-old as an entering freshman, I was already a parent because I was co-parenting with my rapist, but I really had not put together any kind of analysis of what had happened to me. I was given two books my freshman year: one was The Black Woman by Toni Cade Bambara and the second one was The Autobiography of Malcolm X. Those two books changed my life. I also had a tendency to leadership that I didn't quite recognize or acknowledge at the time. In high school, I started the girls drill team in the 10th grade because there was not one for girls and only the boys.
When I got to Howard and people were putting their names in hats to run for class offices. I ended up being vice president of my freshmen class because I chose to run for office. I didn't know that was the emerging leadership thing I had in me. I liked stepping up to the plate and taking responsibility for stuff. College is where you're supposed to find out things about yourself, discover your voice, and discover what moves you and what makes you passionate. Howard University was definitely that for me, particularly because there was so much political and social upheaval taking place. I mean, my first year at Howard, there was a riot in Washington, D.C., and my dormitory, Meridian Hill, was tear gassed. And I was like, ‘okay, this is what activism looks like’! [Laughs] I was on Euclid Street and suddenly the police are shooting tear gas at your dormitory and pointing guns at you.
These were the kinds of experiences that I treasure now because they helped me develop my consciousness. They helped me attach words to the things that I experienced and was experiencing. I came from a very conservative family. My mother and father were religious and in the military. We didn't talk about politics at all in my family. So coming to Howard at 16 years-old was a brain explosion for me because I got exposed to so much new information, radical analysis, and opportunities to be an activist in a way that I really didn't have before.
At what point did you realize you wanted to be a lifelong political activist?
It is unknown who took the black-and-white photograph of Yulanda Ward and when it was taken. Yulanda Ward was a 22 year-old student at Howard University and community activist at several organizations, including the City Wide Housing Coalition and D.C. Rape Crisis Center, when she was killed in November 1980. Loretta J. Ross Papers. Courtesy of Smith College Collections.
LJR: I decided to become a lifelong political activist in 1980. I would have been 27 years-old, I believe at the time. And that was because of comrade of mine, Yulanda Ward, was assassinated in Washington, D.C. on November 2nd, 1980. We were a part of a group called the Citywide Housing Coalition, which was trying to stop the gentrification of Adams Morgan and Capitol Hill. At the time, myself and others were trying to pass the city's rent control laws and to put a stop to the runaway rental market and condo conversions at the time. When Yulanda was killed, it caused our organization citywide to collapse because a lot of people became justifiably afraid of the political work we were doing. We didn't actually think we were doing high risk political work. We were doing everything legal. Certainly there were Black radical groups, but we didn’t consider ourselves (the Citywide Housing Coalition) a part of it.
Once the Citywide Housing Coalition collapsed, those of us who were left standing had to make a decision whether or not we were going to continue to do the work or not. It was in that process that I decided that I've seen what this kind of work can do in terms of harm, but let me see what I can do in terms of making a difference and making a change. I can't say I made the decision because I was brave or anything. I made it because Yulanda was a dear friend. I didn't want her death to go unnoticed, unmarked, and in vain. That’s when I formally decided that I was going to be a social justice activist for the rest of my life.
What advice would you give to organizers?
“Do the work, but also make sure you intentionally bring joy into your life because our job is to look at the worst things people do to each other, the ugliness—what I call the vomit of humanity. ”
LJR: One thing that I probably would say to organizers today is first of all, don't take yourself too seriously. Do the work, but also make sure you intentionally bring joy into your life because our job is to look at the worst things people do to each other, the ugliness–what I call the vomit of humanity. If you don't intentionally work to bring joy into your life to see that life is still worth living and that people are actually basically good to each other and surround yourself with people who are positive and do good, then all of your joy of life will be sucked out of you by the work that you're doing. You have to be very intentional about packing as much joy and pleasure into your life as you do the serious political work, so that you can have a sustainable long-term career and doing this work and not burn out in a few short years.
I find that people who take themselves too seriously burn out really quickly because they become very cynical because they've become very overwhelmed. When you're overwhelmed, the most common response is to check out mentally because everything is so overwhelming. So I think that my best advice is to party as hard as you work and have fun doing good work! [Laughs]. And that way, you'll be in it for 50 or 60 years, like I’ve been.
What has been the most rewarding aspect of your activism?
Photo of activist Loretta J. Ross. Photo courtesy of Loretta J. Ross.
LR: Well, the most important part of my activism is seeing the ripples that you don't expect to see. The first rape crisis center in the United States was the DC Rape Crisis Center. I was lucky enough to have been its executive director from 1979 to 1982. As the first rape crisis center, we were in a good position to watch how the movement on violence against women rippled across the world. Now, there is not a portion of the earth where people are not fighting to end violence against women. To have been on the ground floor where that movement got started, makes me feel like what we did mattered.
In a different way, it was very common in the seventies to be part of the South African anti-apartheid movement amongst the social justice work that we were doing. Thinking about the 1970s, we didn't think apartheid was ever going to end because they had all the power. They had all the money, they had all the visibility, and half the support of the U S government, particularly in the 1980s within the support of Ronald Reagan and George Bush. We just thought that we would be fighting apartheid for the rest of our lives. And when the crescendo of change started happening in the late 1980s with the collapse of the Soviet Union and the release of Nelson Mandela from jail in 1990 and then his election as president in 1994, that was when you could see all the little things you've done for 20 years, suddenly crescendo and make a big difference.
“...even if you can’t see the changes that you want to see immediately, you just keep on doing the work and eventually they will radically change in a way that’s totally unanticipated...”
Those are the kinds of things I've been lucky enough to witness that let me know that even if you can't see the changes that you want to see immediately, you just keep on doing the work and eventually they will radically change in a way that's totally unanticipated but at the same time is what you're working for. I think about what we did as Black women at the DC Rape Crisis Center in the 1970s laid the ground work for Tarana Burke to lead the Me Too Movement. These are the kinds of things that you can't anticipate, but you're glad that you were part of the foundation from which these wonderful things can spring. And this is what keeps me going.
What gives you joy these days?
“This is what Black feminism looks like in real life and in the day to day. It is the way we are there for each other, not just politically, but in every way. That matters in life.”
LJR: Oh, what gives me joy?! Oh, first of all, the Black feminist posse that I'm a part of! I mean the fact that we are a good old girls network across the country, that there's probably not a state-except maybe Wyoming-I couldn't find some Black feminists and network with them [Laughs]. It's not just the politics that keep us together but the fact that we're in each other's lives as an active and visible support network. Without any formal process, I know that there's a network of people I could call across the country that I could borrow a couple thousand dollars from if I needed to, or that I can count on to attend my funeral.
I remember when my son died three years ago, I was amazed at how, without any effort on my part, my Black feminist posse started a GoFundMe page to pay for his expenses and then came to Texas to the funeral to be there with me. This is what Black feminism looks like in real life and in the day to day. It is the way we are there for each other, not just politically, but in every way. That matters in life.
What does a Black Woman Radical mean to you?
LR: Well, the Black Woman Radical moniker is actually quite ironic for me because back in the 1960s and 1970s, when you called yourself a Black feminist, that was a very controversial thing to do. Most people assumed that you were a man hater and that you were anti-Black because you were following blindly behind white women. It was quite controversial to use the “f-word”. To be in conversation with a whole movement of Black feminists who stand in radical politics is wonderful because it feels like this is the movement I've been waiting for all my life and to be able to own this radical politic in the company of Black women is so fulfilling. We were always there. We were always in resistance, but we would come to the conferences either in the Black movement or in the white feminist movement, and we would all try to find each other. We would caucus in our hotel rooms and we would secretly meet. I mean, reproductive justice was founded by caucusing in a hotel room at a white women's conference. And so y’all are who we've been waiting on and we couldn't be happier.
For more information about the work, activism, and leadership of Loretta J. Ross, please visit her website here.