Connie Becker: “Farewell Friends”
Hi guys, I’m addressing you today with solemnity and gratitude. I will be stepping down from my position as Executive Coordinator. If I'm being honest I don't think I'm truly ready, but as the long march of time moves forward, especially after the birth of my son Joel, I've felt a strong call towards furthering my education. I’m truly appreciative of Caroline Smith for bringing me into the fold of PAAU, and for reaching out to me and offering me the chance to join this amazing community. Thank you for being patient and attentive to my perspectives and needs. I'm thankful to Terrisa Bukovinac for always being a real one and for offering me this amazing job, having faith that even though I was probably unqualified, I would help make this organization better. I want to endlessly thank Lauren Handy who has imparted wisdom to me and has cultivated me in ways I couldn't even imagine. She did this with a gentle guiding hand and through her empathy and acts of love. Honestly, there are so many people I could thank for making this great experience, but you would be reading this blog for a lifetime, so I just want to end this note by saying, thank you to many more.
To celebrate this beautiful moment, I'd like to recount some of my favorite projects and actions while I was on staff here at PAAU:
My First Arrest For Civil Disobedience
The first Week of action I experienced, a year after The Five were found, I participated in an act of civil disobedience outside of the House of Representatives in the US Capital. I was filled with adrenaline and heightened emotions as I tried to rouse my fellow activist with a speakout on the building's steps. I spoke vividly about the murder that was committed just blocks away and begged authorities to seek justice for the DC Five’s untimely death. We then went into the streets and disrupted the traffic of daily society in a desperate effort to call attention to the deaths of babies our nation's people and government choose to ignore. We were all arrested and loaded into vans one by one. I was even handled unfairly by the police. But our spirits were not dampened. Evn in the backseat of the police van we continued to lift our voices in solidarity and stomp our feet to the protest anthems.
Read more about that action HERE.
My First Rescue
This was one of the scariest experiences in all my time at PAAU. My first rescue was at a late term clinic in Northeast Ohio, renowned for its hostile security and brutality of protestors. I attempted to enter the clinic with my partner and a bag of roses. However, security ordered me to hand over the bag for search if I wanted to enter the lobby. I tried to pretend I had a medical device I needed to keep close but it was of no avail, so I left before she started to become suspicious. Downtrodden and disappointed in my plans falling though I pondered how I could possibly help save more babies. I called a friend and she suggested a parking lot rescue, leaving life saving literature on peoples cars. A light went off– that was perfect! So I quickly returned and left literature on every car in the lot, optionline.org, abortion pill reversal, a pink rose and ribbon to tie them all. I don't know what the result was that day, but I'm so glad I was encouraged by my peers to not give up and to do the best I could to love the babies and parents inside.
View the IG Reel I made about this HERE.
Feminism Stance
By far the thing I'm most proud of is the Feminism stance I helped author.. This document stands as a lasting mark I can have on this organization. It's a perfect display of the education that goes into the values PAAU holds, especially equality and non-discrimination. In writing this stance, we were careful to be informed by the diverse experiences of every type of woman, femme, and genderqueer person we could imagine. This project wasn't just about patriarchy or the sour notes of history, but it highlights our empowerment and the ways we triumph. Read the stance below:
“Critical Black Feminism has organically occurred at several different points in history. Black feminist movements didn't simply grow out of a lack of representation in mainstream feminist movements. These movements were crafted and molded because of the unique struggles of everyday Black women who experienced the reality of how race further perpetrated the misogyny they experienced.”
Repro Share Fair
My first Repro Share Fair was a great lesson in community care. It helped me become more comfortable with the idea that community outreach does not have to be perfect and it helped solidify my conviction that if the powers that be will not fill our communities' needs, we need to do it. See pictures from this event HERE.
World Beyond Abortion Art Call
Another one of my favorite events was the World Beyond Abortion art show. I absolutely adored the opportunity to watch the creative nature of other pro-life people. I got to see the vibrant images, paintings, poems, and more that my peers worked so hard on. I also debuted my poem “Their Heartbeats Beating Loud as Gongs”. This art call was a reminder of the immense community we actually have as progressive pro-life people. The enemy would like us to believe that we are alone in the way we feel, it's much easier to control us that way. The amazing submissions gave me so much more perspective on how many people see ending abortion as a social justice cause. Click here to read my poem and see the rest of the art:
LINK https://paaunow.org/paau-blog/beyondabortion
MLK Jr. Letter IG Commentary
What I really enjoyed about the “Remarks on Direct Action from Dr. MLK Jr.'s Letter from a Birmingham Jail” was that he was able to highlight the wonderful parallels the Rescue movement, and all direct action causes have to the Civil Rights Movement. It's helpful to show these tactics are not new, they’ve been proven effective, and they can bring about lasting change if enough people are willing to take the risk. King speaks of the feelings of being treated as a criminal for breaking laws against humanity and being seen as an extremist for going against the status quo. He speaks to the frustration of enduring criticism that should be aimed at oppressors. All of these things and the prophetic words predicting how people in the future will view their actions will always be comforting to me, and I hope many others. Visit that post HERE.
Native American Heritage Month post
Of all the projects I’ve completed at PAAU, this one comes the closest to the pride I feel for the feminism stance. Why? Because it highlights a topic I rarely ever see talked about: the current condition of reproductive justice in Indigenous American communities and on reservations. Many demographics take up space in the conversation about abortion and why or why not communities need it, but rarely ever is my demographic mentioned. We aren’t mentioned despite the fact that we have some of the poorest and most unfair living conditions and statistics in the country. It was cathartic to be the voice that brought our experiences to the table. And I’m so very proud of myself for how much awareness I was able to raise with just one post. Visit that post HERE.
What comes next:
I'll be stepping back into the role of a PAAU Organizer. I'll still be active within PAAU, at PAAU events, protests, and social campaigns. I'll be taking all the tools I learned from PAAU and continuing to implement them into my personal Pro-Life and Leftist activism. The world desperately needs pro-life people who are trained to organize for effective community change, and dismantle power systems. This organization was the first one to truly teach me how to organize on a community level. And for that, I am immensely grateful. The countless days we spent teaching each other, power mapping, reading and quoting radical literature, and learning from past social justice movements, have not, and will not go to waste. When abortion is no longer profitable, in demand, available, or acceptable, we can end it.
On a final note, I want to echo the fact that I believe in PAAU. I've said this before, but we are doing something almost no other organization is doing. And so many people are cultivating themselves and their activism through us. We are saving babies and changing the playing field. We are resurrecting Rescue and building up our communities. We have done the unimaginable by just being who we are and by valuing “Equality, Non-Violence, and Non-Discrimination” boldly in the world as Pro-Life people.
