The US Moves Backward as Cuba Moves Forward!

Photo by LVR.

US Women and Cuba Collaboration and WILPF US Cuba and the Bolivarian Alliance Committee Joint Statement,
May 2022

On the Occasion of the Leaked SCOTUS Draft Ruling Promising to Overturn Abortion Rights

Endorsed by WILPF US

The US Women and Cuba Collaboration, and the WILPF US Cuba and the Bolivarian Alliance Committee, in the strongest terms, support the reproductive rights guaranteed by Roe v. Wade. We are alarmed and appalled by the reasoning of the leaked SCOTUS draft ruling that would end abortion rights and that portends grievous threats to other human rights in the U.S.

WHO WE ARE: US Women and Cuba Collaboration works to empower diverse women in the US and other parts of the world. We organize in solidarity with women throughout Cuba and work to end the US economic blockade of Cuba.

WILPF's Cuba and the Bolivarian Alliance Issues Committee works by empowering and educating diverse U.S. women to normalize relations between the US and the countries that comprise the Bolivarian Alliance through education, advocacy and travel.

The reasoning behind the SCOTUS attack on the rights of women is part of a coordinated wave of attacks in the U.S. that include threats on voting rights, on education, on transgender youth. The implications of the SCOTUS draft’s reasoning, that “‘unenumerated rights’ to privacy or autonomy in general have no constitutional grounding,” is a bone- chilling and dire threat to human rights. If the rule of law is going to say that we have only those constitutional rights formulated and specifically enumerated by White men in the late 18th century, then other rights such as access to contraception, the right to same-sex marriage, and the right to challenge the gender binary and to affirm trans choices will also be lost. As voting rights continue to be eroded by voting restrictions and gerrymandering, policies supported by a powerful minority who are anti-woman, anti-BIPoC, and homo- and trans-phobic will be enforced. These policies, including policies that force people to remain pregnant and give birth against their will, are cruel and immoral; their impact will fall disproportionately on poor people and people of color. The same ultraright-wing forces that oppose reproductive rights also oppose funding for prenatal care, healthcare in general, parental leave, and childcare.

Women in the US and globally are working to develop alternatives to violence, and striving to end poverty and discrimination, and to prioritize human development including the rights to health care, housing, education, and reproductive freedoms which provide the conditions for full social, cultural, and political participation for all. We want not only access to contraception and full reproductive healthcare, including abortion, but also the ability to have children and to parent and care for them in an environment free from violence, including state and police violence, in communities that support healthy families of all kinds.

Cuban Women and Families March Forward!

The women of Cuba, led by the Federation of Cuban Women (FMC), participate in this global labor. Because of the Cuban Revolution, the people of Cuba have significantly realized a vision of human development that is a global model. Due to a US government information embargo, supported by US corporate media, most people in the US do not know about the spectacular gains made by Cuban women since the Cuban Revolution.

Cuba legalized abortion in 1965. That is 8 years before Roe v Wade in the US in 1973. It is 23 years before Canada's equivalent Supreme Court decision. Cuba was the first country in the western hemisphere to allow women control over their own bodies. Cuba has free and universally accessible community-based healthcare, and within this system both termination of pregnancy and support of pregnancy with excellent prenatal care is available. Community medicine and support have reduced Cuba’s infant mortality rates below those of the US. In Cuba, families have guaranteed parental leave rights. Cuba meets the UNICEF standards for parental leave. The US, with no legal support for parental leave, does not meet these standards.

In 1979 the UN General Assembly approved the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) and Cuba was the first to sign and the second to ratify this Convention. The US has never ratified CEDAW. Even prior to this, all discrimination against women had been outlawed by the Cuban Constitution. These protections have only been strengthened and increased in subsequent Cuban constitutions, most recently in 2019. In the U.S., the Equal Rights Amendment to the U.S. Constitution has never been adopted.

Cuba is now creating a revised legal code that will become part of their Constitution. The code protects the rights of all people to form a family without discrimination; it updates the legal definition of family institutions, with inclusive rather than heteronormative models; it establishes the right to a family life free from violence; it treats children as the responsibility of their parents rather than as possessions; and it centers values of love, affection, solidarity and responsibility.

Women in Cuba are well represented in all areas - 62% of all doctors, over 70% of judges and attorneys general, more than half of all scientists, 53% of the representatives in Parliament, and 52% of the State Council.

The hateful and illegal US blockade is not only an economic and financial blockade, it is also a media blockade that impedes the free flow of information about Cuban women and the achievements of Cuba. The blockade is a cruel policy, one that causes suffering, deprivation, and shortages to Cuban families. It has been deliberately tightened during the COVID-19 pandemic; it hinders access to medicines, supplies, and necessary equipment. Please join our work to end the blockade, and to educate the U.S. about the model of Cuba as we fight in the U.S. for reproductive rights and justice.

www.womenandcuba.org
Cuba and the Bolivarian Alliance | WILPF 

WILPF US offers a brief overview of the Supreme Court abortion rulings, starting with Roe, and related information about the U.S. legal terrain on reproductive choice and abortion rights. For this background document, collaboratively developed by Darien De Lu, President, and Joan Goddard, Convener of the WILPF Advancing Human Rights Committee, click here.