Reproductive Rights: The Debate over Abortion and Birth Control in the 1930s

Brookes, Barbara

doi:10.7810/9780868616100_8

“…In these global feminist STS debates, Aotearoa is not widely featured. Instead, research here is often focused on the social history that has influenced the small snapshots of the contraceptive history of Aotearoa (Brookes, 1981;Brookes et al, 2013;Smyth, 2000). This research sits within the field of feminist STS; however, it also draws on the social history aspects of the research completed in Aotearoa, both of which have influenced the research for this thesis.…”

Section: Feminist Science and Technology Studiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Contraception in Aotearoa: Shaped by and Shaping Family, Morality, Religion, Science, and Women's Reproductive Rights

Gilling¹

2021

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0

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<p>Throughout the history of contraception in Aotearoa, the position of women as contraceptive users has been shaped by society and legislation. At the beginning of the twentieth century, due to the racial fears of the time, legislators banned contraceptive use from the feared mortality of white New Zealanders. The eugenic and racial logics that drove the original prevention of access to contraceptives were also influential in the establishment of organisations like the New Zealand Family Planning Association that was able to work towards establishing birth control clinics. Family and religious morality played a major role in how people responded to contraceptive use. In 1954, they were mobilised in the Mazengarb Inquiry, condemning parents who did not fit into the narrow roles expected of them by the Inquiry members. They appeared again throughout the 1977 Royal Commission into Contraception, Sterilisation and Abortion. Family and religious morality not only shaped these investigations, but also the ways individuals responded to different aspects of contraception and the surrounding conversation. The personal morality of individual Members of Parliament shaped their position in the debate of the 1977 Contraception, Sterilisation and Abortion Bill and with how doctors and other medical professionals responded. This culminated in decision-makers and individuals in the public sphere imposing their own morality to justify conflating abortion and contraception, which resulted in doctors and other medical professionals controlling access to contraception. In Aotearoa, women’s ability to access contraception and contraceptive information, controlled and restricted by these political, legal, and moralistic forces as exemplified and focused by these key events, has shaped their position as contraceptive users.</p>

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“…The poorer female Pākehā (white settlers) were also excluded from full reproductive citizenship rights during the 20th century. For example, during the New Zealand Inquiry into Abortion 1936–37 (Brookes ), committee members declined to provide the access to family planning services that public submissions and certain women's groups had sought, suggesting that maintaining the illegality of such devices would provide a welcome opportunity for citizens to develop the virtue of “self‐restraint.” In a similar mismatch between public and elite ethical opinions, the Royal Commission on the Contraception Abortion and Sterilisation Act delivered its findings in 1977 by suggesting a further tightening of the restrictions (Molloy ). This was the case even as approximately 3,000 citizens a year were being admitted to New Zealand hospitals as a result of botched abortions and a further 4,000 a year were traveling to Australia to make use of more liberal abortion laws there.…”

Section: Truth Discourses Of Reprogenic Moral Reasoningmentioning

confidence: 99%

Choice, Rights, and Virtue: Prenatal Testing and Styles of Moral Reasoning in Aotearoa/New Zealand

Fitzgerald

¹

,

Legge

²

,

Park

³

2015

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Using a Foucauldian biopower analytic, this article combines insights from several ethnographic research projects around the moral reasoning styles underpinning debates over selective reproductive technologies in Aotearoa/New Zealand. We show that divergent or shared public, private, state, individual, and community moral reasoning styles become highly politicized truth discourses that have the potential to, and at times do, affect one another, modifying a dominant, state-supported, principal-based bioethics framework. The styles of moral reasoning that we identify pivot on an aspirational cultural ideal of the provision of choice to citizens, which is taken as an appropriate position from which to regulate selective reproductive technologies.

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“…Despite how useful and widely used condoms became during the early twentieth Century, there was a stigma around them. This stigma was because of condom distribution to soldiers during the wars and the association with prostitution (Brookes, 1981), "venereal disease and illicit sex" (Brookes et al, 2013) and moral codes underpinned by the idea that they were "not something married people would use" (Brookes et al, 2013). This attitude also existed amongst groups who supported birth control (Brookes, 1981;Smyth, 2000) and continued through the rest of the twentieth century.…”

Section: Early Use Of Contraceptionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…This stigma was because of condom distribution to soldiers during the wars and the association with prostitution (Brookes, 1981), "venereal disease and illicit sex" (Brookes et al, 2013) and moral codes underpinned by the idea that they were "not something married people would use" (Brookes et al, 2013). This attitude also existed amongst groups who supported birth control (Brookes, 1981;Smyth, 2000) and continued through the rest of the twentieth century. Although, once the Pill was introduced in 1961, this stigma became less of a concern for married couples (Brookes et al, 2013).…”

Section: Early Use Of Contraceptionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…At the time, the items that were prohibited contraceptives were medicines and condoms. These were most commonly sold by pharmacists (Brookes, 1981;Brookes et al, 2013;Smyth, 2000). However, this Bill was not successful in preventing the sale of contraceptives, with the Wellington Pharmaceutical Association stating: "[…] that in the opinion of this Association the Sale of Preventatives Bill is an interference with the rights of the public" (Telegraph Parliamentary Reporter, 1901;Telegraph Staff Author, 1901).…”

Section: Population Anxiety and Eugenics Logicsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Contraception in Aotearoa: Shaped by and Shaping Family, Morality, Religion, Science, and Women's Reproductive Rights

Gilling¹

0

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<p>Throughout the history of contraception in Aotearoa, the position of women as contraceptive users has been shaped by society and legislation. At the beginning of the twentieth century, due to the racial fears of the time, legislators banned contraceptive use from the feared mortality of white New Zealanders. The eugenic and racial logics that drove the original prevention of access to contraceptives were also influential in the establishment of organisations like the New Zealand Family Planning Association that was able to work towards establishing birth control clinics. Family and religious morality played a major role in how people responded to contraceptive use. In 1954, they were mobilised in the Mazengarb Inquiry, condemning parents who did not fit into the narrow roles expected of them by the Inquiry members. They appeared again throughout the 1977 Royal Commission into Contraception, Sterilisation and Abortion. Family and religious morality not only shaped these investigations, but also the ways individuals responded to different aspects of contraception and the surrounding conversation. The personal morality of individual Members of Parliament shaped their position in the debate of the 1977 Contraception, Sterilisation and Abortion Bill and with how doctors and other medical professionals responded. This culminated in decision-makers and individuals in the public sphere imposing their own morality to justify conflating abortion and contraception, which resulted in doctors and other medical professionals controlling access to contraception. In Aotearoa, women’s ability to access contraception and contraceptive information, controlled and restricted by these political, legal, and moralistic forces as exemplified and focused by these key events, has shaped their position as contraceptive users.</p>

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Reproductive Rights: The Debate over Abortion and Birth Control in the 1930s

Cited by 10 publications

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Contraception in Aotearoa: Shaped by and Shaping Family, Morality, Religion, Science, and Women's Reproductive Rights

Contraception in Aotearoa: Shaped by and Shaping Family, Morality, Religion, Science, and Women's Reproductive Rights

Choice, Rights, and Virtue: Prenatal Testing and Styles of Moral Reasoning in Aotearoa/New Zealand

Contraception in Aotearoa: Shaped by and Shaping Family, Morality, Religion, Science, and Women's Reproductive Rights

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