Part Two: The Jane Collective: Direct Action Abortion Access Works

that I've been trying to run with. This is how I make friends by trying to tell them I'm cool. So this is perfect. So I'm going to be on the show about people would do cool stuff because I want to be cool, Like That's that's how it works, right, and then people want to be friends with me? Yeah definitely. Okay, That's what I'm relying on as well. At time, I'm

going to channel this. Let's go yeah uh. And we also have Sophie with us, who is not only the producer of this show, but and the coolest and it's also basically the Pope of podcasts. Um. Yes, that's the charge of all podcasts. And much like the Pope she decides who lives and who dies. Yeah. Yes, and much like the Pope, direct tells us what's moral than what's not, even if we don't believe her half the time, and then we just act on whatever Sophie says instead of

actually listening to her. Sorry, we painted you into a corner here, so I too, like fun hats Yeah it's true. Um, it's true, you do. Yeah, but you know it's not about me. Let's go, let's go. Okay, Okay, So today we're doing part two of our two part series on the Jane Collective, who are a badass crew of underground abortionists and pre Roe v Wade Chicago. And this episode will make approximately zero sense if you don't go back and listen to part one. So go listen to part one.

We'll wait. Okay. So Jane offering abortions no longer reliant on crime guy Nick Mike, but are doing it themselves Mike, Nick, Yeah, Mike next. Sorry, Um, and I'm just making sure we have both versions in so that we are correct. But we did forget the title sexy, so sexy Mike Nick sexy Nick Mike right, right, totally, Yeah, that is the title of the Yeah, like, yeah, um okay, So so

Jane is offering abortions for every trimester. Uh, and this is like really not how to d I y an abortion podcast, although if those exists, you should go listen to them, but this is not one of them. And the techniques I'm going to be talking about are like fifty years old and are transmitted through me, who is an absolute lay person who doesn't have a uterus and is completely grossed up by the idea of the inside

of my own body. Um Like, if I go to a training about how to apply a tourniquet, I what I do is I am pretend like I'm not there, and then learn the information. Um, so just keep things, pretend you're not there, and just learn. Yeah, exactly. And but it it feels important to me to understand some of the ways that people have historically and contemporarily go about ending unwanted pregnancies. For some weird reason, it just

seems like really important right now. It's hard to say why as a person in Georgia, but many laws of floating I don't either. Yeah, it's so it's so weird, just someone in the air, I don't know. And and one thing I talked to when I was talking through this show with one of my friends is a reproductive rights justice activist person all of those words in the

proper order um. One of the things that they were pointing out is that it's important not to present this dark age before Roe v. Wade legal abortion access matters,

and we need to defend that. But we need to like soberly recognized that people can and have learned how to take care of not just their own health, but like on a community level and on a like a real level, UM, so that people recognize that they do have real options if we lose Roe v. Wade, right, so that it's not like your only option is to go to someone who's really sketchy, uh, because we need to instead fight to make sure that that doesn't become

the case. So when Jane started, they were mostly doing a style of abortion called dilation and CURETAS or a

d n C, especially for first trimester abortions. And what they do is they injected a local anesthetic and then they scraped the walls of the uterus with a loop shape instrument called a cut, and they then provided pills and injections to stop infection and bleeding, and they recommended a gynecologist, or they recommended getting a dialogical check up, and if you didn't have one, they recommended you won. And d n C, at least as it was performed originally,

is a fairly dangerous procedure. It's it's not a bad procedure. It's important that people be able to do this, but it's a it's a it involves sharp objects in sensitive areas. And Jane was really fucking good at it. But it it seems like some of the worst ways that inexperienced abortionists UM funck patients up is with d n C, and especially also with herbal abortions, but we're not going to get into that on the show. Um and Jane

didn't funk with herbal abortions. To my knowledge, d NC is still used today, although the term is a wider usage now basically to include things, um other than a sharp curet. They like suction curets, vacuum inspiration as it's sometimes called, where they vacuum things out instead of scraping them out. But to tell you about vacuum inspiration, I get to tell you about a bunch of other really

cool people. Let's go with people who are complicated who did cool things for some of these people instead of people who I want to blanketly tell you are cool. Because Harvey Carmen was not an m d uh. Some reports claimed that he is a psychology doctorate, so he was technically a doctor. Others claimed that he just had a master's degree in theater, and while that is vastly that is it is. He might have had both. He might have later gone back and got a doctor a

degree in psychology. I don't know. Okay, when he was still a student, he was practicing abortion in California and one of his patients died and he served two and a half years in prison for it. And I literally don't have a means by which to judge whether or not he was a responsible practitioner who happened to lose a patient due to the circumstances that he was forced into by criminalization, or whether he was a sketchy, fucking,

shitty abortionist. I literally don't have a way to at least my information gathering powers did not answer this um. But he was an innovator, and which really doesn't answer the question of whether or not he was responsible or ethical, because just because you want to try new ship doesn't necessarily make it good. Right. It's kind of like when doctors were practicing curing hysteria on women and we know

what that led to, right totally. But one time, when he's in jail for practicing abortions, he invents a new abortion technique which has revolutionized first trimester abortions. And it's like largely the reason, as far as I understand, um,

that we have safe first trimester abortions. However, when I say revolutionize and invented, you'll be shocked to know that Chinese doctors figured it out a long time early, um, and that information was not transmitted to the West until after Western practitioner figured it out, which happens time and time again. Every time you're like this guy invented a thing, You're like this, this guy invented it for the Western world.

Credit for it, Yeah, totally, but he uh. He invented something called the Carmen canula, which is a flexible curet and it it basically allows vacuum aspiration. It allows the idea of using in this case originally a syringe to suck things out with a flexible tube instead of using a sharp, you know, curet and it dramatically reduces the risk of perforat and the uterus, and it reduces the need for anaesthesia to relax the cervix and it um. I mean, it's just a fucking flexible tube as far

as I can tell. And and it gets called vacuum aspiration or the non medical term, and I'm gonna talk about this in a little bit is called menstrual extraction. The former, as best as I understand it is like the medical name, and the latter is it's dem class name used in different people by two women who immediately took upon his concept and improved upon it. Carol Downer and Laurie Anne Rothman were two of the most important

underground abortion providers at the time. Yet they're rarely referred to as that because what they did is they invented and again I can't speak to everyone ever having done

this before, but they invented a menstrual extraction. They took the existing vacuum aspiration and they added um both a one way valve in order to keep air from accident going into the uterus, and then also a jar mason jar that's attached to it so that more supterial can be removed at once, and so now you can do a full menstrual extraction, which is basically the idea of like you can pass all of your men sees all at once instead of waiting for it to slowly pass.

And what happens when you do that is if you happen to be pregnant, and if with the first traemester abortion, you are suddenly no longer pregnant. Okay. And they didn't like advertise this as an abortion technique because that would have been illegal. Instead, they like were like, oh, groups of women could just all get together and provide this service for each other. Because it actually takes multiple people

to use this device. You can't necessarily self administer it um just because of angles and I don't know UM, And I to be frank, I had never heard of this. And about half of the people I've talked to whom have unteruses had heard of this, and half of them hadn't. And I don't know other myself like that, not in person, like I obviously have seen the pictures of so as

you're describing, I'm like, oh, yeah, yeah, okay, I get it. Yeah, And it gets called their inventions called a dell M d E L space e M in case you all want to go look up how to do this kind of interesting thing. In V one, they invent this thing and then they downplay the abortion side of it. But they go to the National Organization Conference of Women, the NOW Conference in California one so they can announced this invention to the world, and um, they were like, hell, yeah,

everyone's gonna love this. But instead the NOW organizers were like, this is a little bit much for a booth. I don't think you can have a booth for an abortion here. Um, And they're like, what does prevent structs? Right now? I'm putting words in their mouth. But and so they put up flyers saying, hey, come to our hotel room and we'll show you how to use this device. And everyone

fucking loved it, right because it fucking ruled. And so they gathered this list of names and they went on this greyhound tour across the country giving presentations about the del M. And I just love how like scrappy it is that they like invent this thing that involves Mason jars and they don't have a car, so they're just like, again, I mean, maybe a car, but they go on a

greyhound tour and that that rules. And Lorraine has a quote from two thousand two that sums up the sort of de medicalization approach that was popular with a lot of the underground abortion access people before in n What did women do before there were doctors. Let's stop the humiliation of trying to persue aid the powers that be to legalize abortion. Let's just take back the technology, the tools, the skills, and the information to perform early abortions and

be in charge of our own reproduction. And once again, you'll be shocked to know that this device is having something of a comeback in the modern era. Mm hmm. And so Jane didn't use the Dell M specifically as far as I can tell, but they did use the Carmen canula extensively, and I think in generally in combination with vacuum aspiration. They also, and this gets into the sketchier side of some of it, they use another one of Carmen's inventions that was a lot less successful. They

use something called the super coil. I'm actually curious if you heard of this. I'm trying to figure out how known this is. And I don't think so. But it's one of those I'm like, as you describe it, I may know of it. I'm not trying to put you on the spot. Yeah, I'm trying to be like yeah, because I'm sitting here like, Okay, We've gotten through several

devices and I think I'm glazed up. But yeah, you going no, no, no, So the super coil is not around today, um because it is a bad idea as far as I can tell, and it was meant to revolutionized second trimester abortion. Basically, he was like, I have revolutionized first trimester abortion and made it easier for lay people to do it. Now I want a revolutionary second

trimester abortion. And so the super coil involves coiling up like like tightly coiled plastic rings basically attached to a string that are inserted into the uterus and then left to expand um so that they could be pulled out and then clear out the area as they you know, causing the I did not know what this is horrifying though, Yeah,

I feel like I've had Sophie. Um. Yeah, so my last interaction with Robert when Sophie was them talking about a birth control that attached itself and tore out people's shooters. So this is amazing. I feel like we've comfort circle. We definitely have come full circle. That them on that episode with Robert was like one of the like I

it like makes me itchy. I'm like it was so terrifying. Yeah, I still see people post, but yeah, like that, we're back here to something that goes out, expands and tries to pull things out of people's vagina. So I'm like, Okay, we're back. We're back that certain things. Samantha, I love me to dissociated with this. Let's keep going. This is amazing. I mean I'm now like, yes, this is my world, let's go. This is the This is the darkest chunk of this episode. I believe even later they get arrested

and it's not as dark as this chunk. So they helped Carmen test it. They sided with him in debates to come, and they were probably wrong about it. It was meant to help lay people provide abortions, but it was it was probably too good to be true. Basically, like they were. At least one person I read argued that basically they were like sucked in by the idea of like, oh, we have a nu miracle device. This rules because they had just gotten a numerical device from

the same guy. Not numeracle but not number, but miracle device that is new. Um. So he goes and tests it, and he first tests it through and with international planned parenthood in on Bangladeshi women at a large scale, and it I'm not aware of it killing anyone, but it did not do incredibly well. Uh, and there were a

lot of complications. I would say it sounds like I could cause permanent damage, which is kind of the horror stories people tell that our anti choice about the permanent damage, and this seems to follow suit, because I can't imagine something just at that point in time being like, oh, it's self working. It just expands and grabs the right things,

but doesn't exactly. And Uh, there's a lot of different arguments about or I've seen a couple of different things about whether or not Jane was involved in using this or testing this. I do believe they did use this successfully for a number of abortions, and again, their overall results were that they were as good as any medical facility at that time. Right right, Um, But anyway, this is a darker saying that they were involved in, right.

I mean, that makes me question did they give the people who came in, the patients and clients a choice on what kind of procedure they could have? Uh? And I know they were pretty good about giving like risk statistics and let them know aftercare and all of that. So I wonder if there was like a moment of like, you have these options, now, which would you like to do? I I would like to get off of them the benefit of the doubt of that around that, But I

I don't know. And because I honestly did not know this part of this history, I was like, oh, yeah, that's that's a little alarming. You don't want to start testing things. And when you have someone testing on a different group of people, you know it's probably not good, which is the history of all medicine essentially. But you know, that's a whole different rabbit hole that I will not

do as a negative Nelly moment though. No, No, I mean like, and this is like, this is the most warts and all that I'm going to get around this, and even this is like a complicated thing. Um. You know. One of the things that I read one of the black women who volunteered for this was like basically defended her position being like I'm paraphrasing, but like if I'm kidding me saying that I can't consent to this just

because I'm a black woman, you know. And so there's this like I'm reading biased reports, right, I'm reading people who are trying to make positions to either claim that this was this terrible thing that people did or this brilliant, brave thing that people did. And I don't have anything near the right position to understand what isn't is an't ethical for for what happened here, and like what level

of informed consent was available? Um, but I'm also under the impression that a lot of their other options were worse, right, Um, So we come back to the fact that there's so many things that pushes people to a certain point, and when it's not accessible and it becomes looked out as again unlawful, then people are pushed to the point that is is extreme. So you do what you can, and people being in that point, we are going to choose

what they think is lesser evil for them. Yeah, and it's not the case like that he shouldn't have to be even that conversation. Yeah, totally, And and so as a Carmen. He kind of disappears after this whole fiasco. He's like, I try to invent a thing and it didn't work, and he kind of his trub was called. At least from my my sloping at this point, it wasn't a medical doctor, right, You're saying that he's either maybe maybe in psychology, but also maybe just theater, Like

he just did a thing. However, as as a different states would legalize abortion, he was so well known that he would be invited to come participate in legal abortion

areas because he was a really experienced abortionist. Um, but that also empowered him to do all of these things that a real messy and so it's just like kind of interesting that like this is the person who did the thing that got safe first trimester abortions available, you know, um right, I mean some good did come of it, right, and now we have chemical abortions for first foremaster that are are safer and better than this method is as far as I understand the circumstances, but I don't know.

There's so many things to this in this conversation about what this looks like when it is not considered healthcare and why it's so blase, and yet some good did come of it, but some bad to come of it. And then there's this need of like understanding it is healthcare. Yeah, totally okay, But but who is cool? Yes, I will, I will go on. I don't know him to say, is another abortionist to popularize some ship that Jane wound

up using a guy named Robert Spencer. And Robert spend who was a true believer and he was not a grifter. He was a doctor and actual medical doctor and the coal fields in Ashland, Pennsylvania, and he cut his doctor in teeth inventing new ways to treat black lung and coal miners um, including a lot of pioneering work and I don't know a pronounce this where broncos scopy, bronchios is taking cameras down people's throats, I don't know, looking at people's throats, and and and he did experiment with

black lung. But this is also a situation where like, oh, these coal miners are dying and no one here is like paying attention to black lung except me. And so he's very well liked, this doctor in this town. And then sometime in the early twenties he starts a coal miner's wife is like, Yo, I'm pregnant. I'd really rather not be uh, And I tried calling Jane, but the number is an active yet or something. I'm like forty

years too early. So he um, he performs an abortion, and then he just starts performing abortions in this town. And he single handedly performs something like forty thousand abortions. Um. He died in nineteen sixty nine before his work could become legal, and his wife burned all of his records. I guess to either protect his legacy or maybe his

staff or maybe herself. I don't know. And he uh. Eventually, the entire town's economy, like huge chunk of the town's economy relies on this guy because people are coming from all over the place to get abortions here, and they like staying at hotels and ship but the hotels didn't some of the hotels at least didn't let black patients stay. So he built accommodations so that black patients could still come and get abortions in this town. He was arrested

three times for providing abortions. One of the times he was arrested at least was because a patient died. Um, they died from anesthesia problems. And you know, I'm not a doctor. I know that anesthesia is a complicated thing, especially eighty years ago. You know, I'm not trying to like lay judgment on him for this, but he was acquitted two of the times he was arrested, um, because I think everyone in town was like, you can't convict this guy. What are you what are you talking about?

Like this is a guy like this guy were like abortion yeah yeah, and like um, and he also had union protection. The United Mine Workers had his back, okay, okay, yeah, and they're like union miners did not funk around back then as our boy, don't touch you. Yeah. And his quote about why he why people liked him. I've been here since nineteen nineteen. I dare say I've helped out half the town, even on the abortion end. There's probably one of my patients related to a family in half

the town. I think most of the town would stand up for me. That's just like I think they would stay up at me. I think I think we're cool. Yeah. And so he's seventy nine years old. He keeps going into retirement and then coming out of retirement. Because people need his help, right, because he's really fucking good at his job, and he provides abortions for cheap And I'll get to that. Um. And he's seventy nine and he's on he's waiting awaiting trial for a third time, and

he dies of old age while like actively practicing. And he was performing three to four abortions a day right up to the end. Um. There's this whole article from Village Voice from nine I think it's called the Death of an Abortionist, and it's a journalist who travels down there to basically just to meet him, just to be like, you are amazing. You are the reason that people feel safe, you know. Um. And he charged the cheapest rates, some

of the cheapest rates of anyone. His first abortions cost five dollars, and then there's the cost of drugs, and overhead went up. At the end. He was charging two hundred dollars in the late sixties, but again most abortions were costing six hundred to two thousand dollars. He was this like lovable weirdo. He treated everyone kindly. He covered his office and like weird weird plaques from tourist traps

and the Village Voice journalist who showed up. She asks him, like, why did you perform abortions when the people first asked you? And he said, because I could see their point of view? Mhm, And I just I love that as an answer, you know, um, just like basic human empathy. And his name never really appeared until he died. His name like didn't really appear much in print. I think one place Dockston or whatever, but he was always just printed as the legendary doctor

s and okay. And he popularized a technique or using something called I don't pronounce this word loundbacks paste loan backs paste two to help dilate the cervix. It's like a soft soap um is not currently in use, but but Jane used it and was very glad for it. It helped make their whole anesthesia process much safer. And they I don't know whether they made their own or got it from Robert Spencer, because Robert Senser was making his own because it was no longer commercially available. I

don't know. I think he's cool too, and I really like that Jane was building from this was part of this larger framework of people who were like, how do we do this like absence of like the medical industry, how do we actually like figure out how to do this safely and well? Right? Actually caring about their patients. That's revolutionary. Yeah, totally. God, I wish I wish that revolution. It's stuck. Yeah, you know who does care about their patients?

I'm ready. Well, potatoes, I've been I've been trying to get advertised by potatoes. I don't know how potatoes have become doctors, but I think potatoes are great. And um, I want to be sponsored by entirely wholesome things. So if you hear anything unwholesome in the ads, that was a mistake. It's Robert's fault. It's Robert's fault. Agreed. Yeah, And so here's some ads for potatoes and maybe some

other stuff. And we're back and we're discussing whether or not we should actually expand our list of sponsors to include kittens. I mean, I think, I think yes, I mean it's good to diversify. I mean, I think it's important that we talk about kittens, and right, I think so we just have to make clear that we're advertising the concept of kittens and puppies, not the people who tradition really go about selling kittens and puppies. Yes, yes, it's very clear. Not not a kitten mill or puppy

bill type situation. Rescue is the idea of just cuddling with some kittens or cuddling with a dog maybe, or at least looking at cute pictures. Yeah, while one kitten is in one arm and one puppy is in the other armaid when kittens and dogs are friends, Yeah, totally. I can't wait to introduce my dog to more cuts. It's actually never gone. Well, so I actually my dog does not love cats either. My dog loves the castle, love the dog, that's fair. He does not know how

to play. So so I want to quote a little bit at length from why Jane Collective did this work. It's from a statement about why they did is a pamphlet that they gave to prospective clients. Abortion as a social problem. We are giving our time not only because we want to make abortions safer, cheaper, and more accessible for the individual women who come to us, but because we see the whole abortion issue as a problem of society. The current abortion laws are a symbol of something subtle

but often blatant oppression of women in our society. Women should have the right to control their own bodies and lives. Only a woman who is pregnant can determine whether or not she has enough resources economic, physical, and emotional at a given time to bear and rear child. Yet at present, the decision to bear the child or to have an abortion is taken out of her hands by government bodies, which can have only the slightest notion of the problems involved.

The same society that glamorizes women as sex objects and teaches them from an early childhood to please and satisfy men, views pregnancy and childbirth as punishment for immoral or careless sexual activity, especially if the woman is uneducated, poor, or black.

Our society's view of equal opportunity means that lower class women bear unwanted children or face expensive, illegal, and often unsafe abortions, while well connected, middle class women can frequently get safe and hush hush d n c s and hospitals. Only women can bring about their own liberation. It is time for women to get together to change the male made laws and aid their sisters caught in the bind

of legal restrictions and social stigma. Women must fight together to change the attitudes of society about abortion and to make the state provide free abortions as a human right. I like that. I like that. There's so many things that like it just applies today. I know we're talking about that, but m but the problem is because it is women centered typically, and especially during that time, people see that as being a less important in conversation has become.

It made it a moral ground even though it's very political obviously. But yeah, I do love I do love that sentiment and and we still need that sentiment. Yeah, No, I I like like sometimes when I get lost in the weeds about like this is how they did this one thing, and this is how they did this other thing.

And then instead of just kind of like here's like a hundred people who got together to commit felonies to try and keep people safe, it's just like that's always cool, you know, like like and there's always something I don't know, So I like hearing the the why they did it. But speaking of felonies, this is not an ad transition. I'm not advertising felonies on the I'm probably advertising felonies on this show, but not from the point of view

of a sponsorship not trying to get money for it. Yeah, well you gotta go and get them your own money, you know. Yeah. So, so Jane is this big open secret and everyone knows about it. They advertised and they had security procedures in place, but clearly the police knew about them, And most of the reporting about Jane basically says the cops didn't bust them because the cops kind of liked them. They were clean and safe and no

one was dying, so so why bust them? Right? To me, this this fundamentally misunderstands the nature of the police, especially the Chicago Police Department. In a nation of corrupt police department's Chicago like consistently stands out as one of the crookedest. And the other thing you hear is that police put up with it because the wives of police and the wives of politicians were amongst their clients. And this feels

more plausible to me. But I suspect that politicians wives at least could afford a trip to New York, and so I feel like there's some kind of like. To be clear, I think crime is cool. But the same accounts also say that mafia didn't come after them for similar reasons. They're like, oh, well, they're not really making a profit, so why would the mafia care? And this doesn't sound like if that doesn't sound like the police,

and that doesn't sound like the mafia. Um, So this is amazing, all of this, all of this moment is amazing. Thank you. I'm just I'm enjoying this entire thing, all right. And the other part of this is because they don't see this as an issue for them, because at that point in time, I think the majority of the police were men. Yeah, just speaking those it was a woman's things. Also kind of the same level of like not talking

about periods and being shameful about women's bodies. So it was we're going to pretend that you don't exist because it's easier for us to you ikey, even though I mean to be frank, the majority of the times kind of like today when we talk about abortion, uh and abortion rights and abortion being healthcare, men typically outside of the morally loud like this isn't just whatever, I just don't care because it has nothing to do with them, and it's just gross and it's like, uh, it's women's issues,

so would rather just ignore it and doesn't think it's necessarily important. Of course we've got the religious bits. Yeah, no, this is actually it is actually that helps sell me on it better because like all I can see, I am again really not trying to accuse anyone who might be alive of any kind of crime, but it seems like the mafia might have been getting a share out of this. I don't know again, like no judgment of what are people need to do to keep keep the

ship running? But but yeah, because because everyone knows about this and no one's doing anything about it. But but the thing you're saying and also about like basically people being like we're just not gonna touch it is also completely possible. Um. And then the way it all falls apart, well, it doesn't actually really fall apart. The way that some people get in trouble can be told a couple different ways of run across one probable story and then one

maybe story. One day in three a Catholic woman comes to get an abortion, and at the time I actually behind the Bastards did a better podcast. But this never remember exactly when the Protestants started carying about abortion, but for a while, like only the Catholics cared. Catholic woman comes in to get an abortion, and she was a

mixed minds the whole about the whole thing. A Jane volunteer named Jeannie Galatz or Levy spent a long time talking with her about it and like counseling her, and later she's really bitter about the long time she spent

talking to her about it. Her sister in law, the patient's sister in law, was there with her, and her sister in law called them in, And what I've heard is that she didn't call him into the police station like in the district where they like seeing as friendly, but instead called them into a different district, and so subtly bad things happen. But that's that's that's the story

I hear most often told. Another account is that the anti abortion lobby was trying to get some arrests in to do some damage on the legal front because Supreme Court was about to see Roe v. Wade and which spoiler alert legalized abortion federally across the U. S and a seven to two ruling, So maybe someone wanted to

get some abortionists on trial and hurry. And then there's a third story which comes from the person who's very critical of their super coil testing, that the bust happened on a day that they were planning on doing super coil testing, and that it was like related to all of that. I tend to believe that the Catholic story best, but I feel like there's something I actually don't believe any of these stories. Frankly, that's what I I don't know what it is. Yeah, we just know that they

got rated, and we don't know how it began. But yeah, it could be any of the stories. But that's the one I've heard too, is the Catholic Catholic women have accorded them, but any physical reason. Again, it was coincidentally around and I will use a quotes more coincidentally around uh ro versus Wade and then the big backlash and back and forth and controversy with that. So yeah, yeah, yeah, I think I would. I would put the most likely

is the combination of the first two things. Is the Catholic woman and um and some people trying to get some shipped on going on. I don't know, but yeah, they get rated um May Third two, Genie is working at the front and she's caring for three children left behind by a patient. When she hears a knock at the door. She thought it was another Jane who had just like dropped off some snacks, come back to to drop off more snacks, or maybe forgot something or something,

and instead it was cops, really really tall cops. Genie is like let them in and told everyone in the waiting room, these are the police. You don't have to tell them anything. And then Genie, describing the event, says, they were really tall, really weird. I developed this whole theory. I love crackpot theories. I intend to be a crack pot when I grow up. This is Genie, not me, although it is also true of me. I love no I know, yeah yeah, yeah quote. I intend to be

a crack pot when I grow up. My theory is that you had to be really tall to be a homicide cop. These were homicide cops because abortion was a homicide, and they were homicide cops who hated being there. You know, it's not easy to make homicide detective. You have to be really good. It's not even political, like taking the sergeant's exam. You have to really do something, and they do it because they want to. And by and large, what they do is track people down who kill other people.

And they think of themselves as good guys and they hated being there. This was not their kind of crime.

End quote. That is an interesting theory. I really like, there's so many observations about just the male appearance, that these characters are so like that they're all tall, very tall though I know right all the all the cops are like five ft seven, you know, right average, but they're tall because I'm four ft totally, or maybe they like sent there like there are three people who are you know, six ft six over to go arrest everyone? Um uh. And so they detain everyone at the front

and they started asking everyone questions. And the way they figured out who the Jains were, apparently is that when they asked the James questions, the James refused to answer. And while this did get them separated out for arrest, it it probably saved them later in court, or at least it was very helpful in court. Their lawyer later thanked them, was like, I'm so glad you all didn't say anything, right And patients, though, were asked all kinds

of questions and they largely answered. One question that left the cops completely confused was they kept asking how much the Jans charged, and everyone gave wildly different answers. The police came, I guess, maybe expecting a mafia style for profit enterprise, and they didn't find one. And at the same time, the cops arrived at the place and arrest everyone there. And apparently they showed up and they were like,

where are all the men? Though, you know who's doing the abortions, right, And so I guess they actually really didn't know Jane inside it out, you know, if they think all these things, um and so at least they probably weren't infiltrated, right, if this is what the cops

think and spies. Yeah, I did to think that, like the cops know everything, right, because we talked about how we live in a pen opticon and we're all being studied all the time or whatever, and then like every now and then the cops are just like, they don't know ship. I want to tell a completely off based

story about all of this. Right, one time, my friend was being um investigated as the leader of international anarchism by the FEDS and never mind, I'm not going to tell that story, Okay, So um, there's so many levels of understanding why I'm like, yeah, I have I have a cookie cutter, vani little life. And I'm really sad that I'm not a part of this. I don't want to be investigated because I do not have the anxiety to go through an investor. But just knowing someone, I'm like, yeah,

they are. Yeah. Well the spoiler there is no leader of international anarchism. It goes against the whole idea. And eventually Defense figured that out. But the more personal details about it, I'm not going to get into. You're not You're not gonna do that, okay, yeah, but so okay,

So they're all thrown into patty wagons. They're taken off to jail, and Genie says that, Um, when they were taking off to jail in the patty wagon, all the all the other women in the in the patty wagon sex workers who kept everyone in good spirits by just like telling fun horrible stories about their lives or whatever. Um, and I really like that they were there to keep

everyone's um spirits up. And then in the pattiwagon, the Jains all pulled out all the index cards with all of the patient info and ship and they ripped them up in the little pieces, passed them out and ate them, which is great badass, and they only spent one night in jail, probably because their middle class white women. Uh one of them, I think one of them, who was a nursing mother, was let go that night because she

had to go home and feed her kids. Uh. And Jeannie talks about how the cops like treated them all well as fellow middle class white people while being rude to any of the patients who ended up in jail and all the other people and all the other women in jail, which yeah, I guess doesn't really surprise anyone who's listening to us. But in jail, they all all the only food they got offered was Bologney sandwiches, which

which Jeannie couldn't eat, presumably because she was vegetarian. And the reason that I include this is because one time I was arrested at this anti IMF demonstration in d C, thirty years after all this ship and two thousand two, and they gave us all bologna sandwiches and we all just like sat there and like laughed at or bologna sandwiches because we were all fucking like vegans and vegetarians and Ship, We're like, what are we gonna do with this? Um?

And it was it was mostly a bad experience. But I was only in jail for like thirty six hours. Um uh, possibly because I'm middle class and white and I don't know, so I didn't get to eat in jail and sucked. But whatever. I just like that this has been like a true thing forever. Is that like when hippies and activists and ship get arrested, they're like, what funk am I gonna do this? A bologna sandwich? Um?

So they get let out on bail. Uh, And they're each facing a hundred and ten years because the eleven counts of homicide and conspiracy to commit homicide in the case that will be known as the Abortion seven. And at least according to Genie, Jane kind of distances themselves at this point from them and they, I guess, like as like they were like, oh, it's the strategic necessity, We're going to keep going. And Jane did keep going

while the trial was ongoing. But it still doesn't sound good to me, honestly, um and Genie at least felt really betrayed. According to the interview I read with her, the rest of the feminist movement kind of though had her back. Um there was a defense committee formed with the sick name of the Abortion Task Force the a t F, and several of the arrestees were part of

an organization called Leche League, which is a pro nursing organization. Nursing, I guess was out of style at the time, and le had their back, which fucking rules that the like the Mother's Association was like, yeah, of course we're defending these abortionists, you know. Um, And I don't really know what the distancing looked like because several the Abortion seven actually went back to work for Jane while they were out on bail, which is also fucking badass, and they

spent a while finding lawyer. Most of the lawyers they found were terrible. One guy was very movement focused and wanted them to basically go to prison. Was like, yeah, you're gonna be martyrs for the cause, you know, And they're like, we don't like that very much. This is not actually their plan um And so finally they settled on Joeann Wolfson, who one to count calls the Queen of the Hopeless, and she once ran away from home

to join the circus and like work with elephants and ship. Okay, so her brother was an attorney to who once got sentenced to seventy years in prison in after pleading guilty to racketeering in an anti corruption case in Chicago. That's all a ton of the judges, lawyers and cops sent away for organized crime ship. So mafia and corruption ship just runs deep. And anyway, so this is their lawyer and she is the what I do know about her,

She was the right lawyer for the job, and she rules. Um, she saw rov Wade on the horizon and she was like, all right, here's the plan. Let's delay this ship as long as possible. And the court was fine with that plan too, because frankly, they saw the writing on the wall and they didn't want to waste court resources on it.

So in January, the Supreme Court decided that the Fourteenth Amendments guarantee the right to privacy included the right to have abortions and a very I had my lawyer friend try and explain this whole thing to me recently, and Roe v. Wade is like complicated as a from a legal perspective, but it worked for now for good. We'll

see maybe, but time you're listening to this anyway. Whatever, So prosecutors knew if they wanted, they could come after them for practicing medicine without a license, but they decided was more trouble than it was worth, and they really just didn't want to make a fuss out of it. That said, also, my lawyer friend was explaining to me that most Supreme Court decisions are not retroactive. But basically they're like this ship. As far as I can tell,

they're like, this ship is way too political. We don't want to touch this case. So they made the cut of deal. We don't charge you with practicing medicine without a license, you don't ask for your medical equipment back, and the Jane seven said, oh my god, yes please. They took their deal and the charges were dropped. The end of Jane. That's the name of my little section in the script. Rovi Wade fucking rules, and I don't want to pretend like it doesn't. The fact that it's

under threat is fucking bad. You know. I hope that this doesn't sound like we're talking from distant utopian past when you all hear this episode come come out, because this episode will probably come out about a month after we record it. But it's it's not enough, and that the women of Jane knew that right. Because abortion was legalized, but it was also re medicalized. It went back in

the hands of mail doctors. It became it tied once again into an inaccessible medical system that treats women like bodies like cars to be fixed. Jane actually continued for a few weeks after the ruling, but everyone was just so fucking exhausted and burned out and the fire was gone. And ironically they were afraid that they might catch charges for because the for profit medical industry might lead the charge for on them for practicing medicine without a license.

They threw a funcket We're done now party, and and Jane was over after their funcket We're done now party, which is the way I'm praising it. And people miss the intensity of it. Jane activists Ruth Sergill put it like this. For the people I know, it was the single most intense period of our life. And when it stopped, there was something missing, and you couldn't find anything to do that carried quite that energy for a long time.

But you know what does carry energy is potatoes. And you should eat food of some type, whatever type you like. But it is healthy and good and that's why we advertise it on this show. The concept of potatoes. Yeah, all potatoes. All potatoes are great as well as whatever is that being advertised. And we are back and so this this intensity leaving, uh, it's something that I think is familiar to a lot of people are involved in activism,

especially like more intense activism. I'm guessing that anyone who was radicalized by the demonstrations has has felt this when you leave this moment of intensity, But people keep going right. TRM. Howard, the black civil rights leader who is the first abortionist the network called. He kept providing abortions now legally and his his private black owned practice offered abortions for fifty

dollars less than what local hospitals charged. The Defense Committee with that sick name, the A t F. They switched to, becoming a new group that also had a sick name, Health Evaluation and Referral Services HERS. It's a shitty name, but it's a great acronym. And I feel like they really, I don't know, they started off with not strong naming game, but I think that they over the course of time they figured it out again. There yeah, so so hers

and Heather Booth, Jamee's founder. They went on to start the Chicago Abortion Fund in Chicago, which is a nonp fit that is still around today and it's a simple, clean, honest name that does what it says on the tin. And as the host of Cool People did Cool stuff, I appreciate a thing that just does what it says

on the tin. So I want to talk about some of the other direct action abortionists who have who have come since, because this need continues right and there are there are millions of people who have done this kind of work. Probably as long as there's been legal restrictions

on abortion, there have been people fighting against it. You talked about some of them actually at the beginning of the show, and I'm hoping you chime in with more of them as I as I go through some of these um and I want to do more episodes about more of these people, or I think people can listen to other podcasts that talk about it too. Um Yeah, So normally a stick with people in the past for this show, but this issue just feels too important to

me right now to not include some of these. So there's Women on Waves, which is a Dutch organization that was started by the physician Rebecca Gonpert, and she used to be the ship's doctor aboard a green piece ship and she was like, oh, boats are fucking cool, which is my paraphrasing, not a direct quote. So she got a boat and she headed out to various countries with active abortion practices. She loads up patients on shore heads

twenty miles out to sea. And since it's Dutch ship, Dutch laws and effect, though even the Dutch are a little wary about the whole thing. And the ship is only authorized to provide the abortion pill uh, non surgical abortions to pregnancies up to nine weeks. And they don't

just provide abortions, they provide education, contraception and education. And the first place they go is Ireland, because, um, you don't have to go very far from the Netherlands to go to a country that had terrible abortion laws in two thousand one. Ironically, Ireland is liberalizing as abortion laws just as the US is regressing. And this this boat is super contentious. And also it's contentious when you tell people who have ships that they're called boats, because they

don't like that. Um, they like to be like, this is a ship not a boat, but I think it's funny because boat is a cuter name. So Portugal blocks women on waves from approaching with a fucking warship. And then in Guatemala they make it less than a day before a warship comes and pushes them out to sea. And oh and then you actually we talking about Poland earlier women on way this once fluid drone carrying abortion

pills into Germany from Poland. In case anyone needs any ideas, um and Rebecca Gomperts goes on in to form a nonprofit called aid Access that focuses on helping pregnant people self managed their own abortions with abortion pills, which are generally a combination of I don't know how to pronounce these words. I'm terribly sorry, Maybe you do, myfi press

stone and my supposed at all. These are the primary abortion pills that people are taking right now to end first trimester abortions and sending them through the mail in the US and to other countries that are increasingly criminalizing abortion. And they feelded about fift requests in the first year that they were operational. At least one organization is bulletproofing vans getting ready to help people safely leave Texas to get to states where they can get the healthcare they need.

They're like part getting ready to park the van's right outside the border of Texas. And and frankly, what isn't isn't legal doesn't dictate what is and isn't safe. Right. During the fifty years we've had Roe v. Wade in the US, abortion workers have regularly risks and sometimes lost their lives in order to help people terminate on wanted pregnancies. Receptionists, security guards, and clinic escorts have all been murdered, kidnaps,

attack threatened, you name it. Um. And one of the reasons I bring that up, I hate ending on this kind of darker note, But the one of the reasons I bring that up is because we can have this concept that direct action abortion can only happen when it's illegal, and that's just not true. Um. Like, I don't know.

In one southern city I lived in, there were for years there were no clinic escorts because the people, um, and clinic escorts for anyone who doesn't know, are the people who wait outside a clinic and shield patients from the abuse from anti choice protesters. And there are no clinic escorts in this town because all the escorts have been followed home and had their windows shot out. And and my sister does clinic escorting, and I just want

to shout her out. She's a direct action hero from my point of view, even if what she's doing is legal, you know, yeah, totally. I only did it once. It was a long time ago in Louisville, Kentucky and base sickly as I understood it, I was told by the

punks in town. They were like, the anti choice protesters here are like really scary, so they want the scary punks to come be the clinic escorts, you know, because like normally, if you don't have really bad protesters, you kind of don't want the scary people to come to like help escort people in. But when people are really threatening, then you call the really threatening looking people. Which when I was twenty, I was a very threatening looking person just by being a punk. Um. I love it. I

love the best the threat punk that's right, come here. Yeah. And we were all like full of ourselves, like twenty year old anarchists who are like we'll do anything, you know. Um, And the world needs lots of angry twenty year olds. Also, unfortunately it also needs a lot of the angry twenty year olds to stop. It depends on what they're angry about, really, right, I mean just a reminder, I mean, I just want

to put this also sad little fact in here. Even after a Road versus Weight in the Supreme Court in ninety seven, we had the High Amendment which is in place and has never gone away um, which acts restricts funds UH for health care and access, which means pretty much the it's a very classist and racist amendment making sure those who really probably are the ones that need it and need this help and need this choice, are the ones that can't get access to safe abortion and

safe reproductive care in general. And then that has always been in place, and it has not been removed, and it has not even come close to being removed, and could have been and should have been by some administrations. But that's something to remember too. Yeah, but that's part of the problem is we have other things that yeah, sure, now we are supposedly yeah, we supposedly have the right to do so, but we don't have access to do so.

And that's a conversation we need to have in pretending like it's actually free and it's not or not actually free, that is actually accessible and it's not, and and who that truly affects and why it's such a bigger conversation, as well as the fact that the gag rule exists, which uh, Title ten came in trying to help out to get those funds, and then we have the gag rules saying like, well, no, I guess individuals can choose this.

So it gets so convoluted and there's so many policies and amendments on top of each each other that it becomes almost impossible to know what is accessible in what is legal. And yeah, just because it's not legal doesn't mean you can't get it or you should be. But like that's this whole whole conversation in this bigger picture of like we're coming coming back to the basics. Unfortunately, but we because we were never unable to unravel the details that really, uh find us for those who want

to get that ability to just have a choice. And again, reproductive care is not just an abortion. Like there's just a whole bigger conversation. Once again, the fact that the cob will city for black women, it's higher like, it's just there's so many conversations and what these policies are and who they truly affect, and why these policies are in place. It's supremacy, patriarchy, those things. The reason we keep harping on these two were these three words, and

people get piste off about it because it's true. There's no other I'm sorry, I'm sorry it bothers you, and that you've been benefiting from that. Fuck you is still true. No, I ran finished, No, no, no, I incredibly, this is part of why I'm really excited that you're the guest for this um is the High Amendment. Is that the thing where like I know that like at least for a while, there was only one abortion clinic in Kentucky, and it was because you weren't allowed to have an

abortion clinics. Hallways must be exactly and I'm making this number up thirty one inches wide, whereas a normal clinic has to have thirty three inch wide things. And so they would do this ship where you like cannot have any a clinic that is anything other than abortion clinic, which means that it is entirely financially unstable and impossible. Yeah, it starts stripping things. Essentially, the High Amendment really took away the funding, so any public funding could not go

into it. So if you had accessibility too, so if you say, yes, we offer abortion air, then you're automatically stripped of it. You cannot get government funds period. So any kind of like services that would take medicaid, a mate of care, you cann't go to their uh get abortion because that was restricted for government funds. So like it absolutely was a classics law, which just continues the previous status quo where the rich have access to reproductive

health and then and it's so sneaky. It's so sneaky because people don't know about it much like they really think they have access because it's a liberal state. But High Amendment, Yeah, reproductive care is so much more than you as you said, reproductive cares so much more in abortion, and like a lot of it is also about like the ability to choose to have children, right, right, people who have children. This is a high risk thing for

many many people and they need that care. Um And there's a reason why people died in childbirth and it shouldn't have to be because there are advancements that can prevent that, but people can't afford that like that, that in itself is that conversation, and we don't actually care about those who are giving birth, like to make sure

they're healthy. That's not pro life. Yeah, totally. The hypocrisy of all that stuff can like keep me up at nights sometimes because I try to have empathy with people I disagree with and it it short circuits my empathy because I I can't understand it because it makes no fucking sense that you're like claiming to be you know, this one thing and then you just don't give a ship about people when they actually have children, and like,

I love that. That's why you quoted that doctor from what was the Kentucky Pennsylvania Well, yeah, that's the same that. I'm just kidding Pennsylvania because it's just seeing their perspective that that is the true point of it. And this conversation of a late term abortions, A majority of the

people who are having late term abortions are not by choice. Uh. Typically they have been preparing for their child um and I know many of people who were anti choice for the longest time when they had to be put in that situation and understanding, Oh, this is still technically an abortion.

They may have different terms for it. Um. Realizing that, oh, and then costing thousands and thousands and thousands of dollars, putting their lives at risk, coming back to being pro choice, realizing what this conversation and what these types of laws really hurt and who they really hurt, and how damaging it is. Um, because there's this mystic religious moral background that in order to demoralize and demonize those who even

talk about it as an option. Yeah, the moral crusaders are just being used as useful idiots by people who want to do this other ship and they like get people riled up into being like this is what is moral and they're like okay, and you run off and go do the thing, and like that's not what the people controlling those people and give a shit about any

of that stuff. This is not about that. Yeah, And they're just you're being used if you made it this far and you're you're moral anti yeah, um, just more than in the first episode. Yeah, we're going to we're on this length so you know they know, no y'all know, right, but yes, thank you so much for bringing this because I love talking about this history. Yeah, I definitely learned more because I was like, what what is that? Things I didn't want to know and things I didn't want

to know, So thank you for giving me that blend. Yeah, yeah, no,

I yeah, I was realizing. I was like, this is a thing that some people know a lot about and some people don't know about it, and like, I'm really excited that more and more information is coming forward and people are coming more and more aware about Jane Collective and all of the people who have done this kind of work because like, because we fucking need it, and and we've we've already said that a bunch of times on the show, but it just it feels worth repeating.

Is that, like we need to know that we can like be brave and do the right thing, you know, and we need to know that the means by which to do it, uh do the right thing, we can have those means. We can figure that out, you know. So Yeah, well, well, thank you so much for coming on. And I am a new best friend. Yeah, well you so many new best friends also because all the listeners, but I want to be more of the best friend

than them. Um, any any plugs at the end here? Uh, Like I said, on the last episode, which I hope you listened to and you stayed around for the second part. I'm on stuff mom never told you a podcast with I Heart Radio. You can get it wherever you listen to your podcast. We are on Instagram, in on Twitter. We don't we don't type. Is that this is how old I am. We don't post a lot. I don't type things on there a lot, but we're there and

we love getting messages. Um. I'm also on the social media's obviously not very good at it on Instagram with mcmay Sam and Twitter Sam McVeigh because that's how creative I am. And you can see pictures of her dog. Yeah, yes, that's pretty much all it is pictures of my dog. So you like that, come on check it out and then we'll be back next week on Monday and one stay wherever. Talk to you all soon by listeners. Cool People Who Did Cool Stuff is a production of cool

Zone Media. Or more podcasts and cool Zone Media, visit our website cool zone media dot com, or check us out on the I Heard Radio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. M HM