Month: March 2017

The Huffington Post recently got a chance to sit down and chat with 20-year-old actress and singer Zendaya. One of the main topics of discussion? How to pronounce her name. 

Turns out a lot of people have been saying it wrong for years, so we’re here to set the record straight once and for all. And no, it’s not “Zen-die-ya.”

Again, it’s not:

It’s actually:

Glad we cleared that one up!  

Subscribe to The Tea to read exclusive interviews with Keke Palmer, Noah Cyrus, Jacob Sartorius and more here!

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Source: HuffPost Black Voices

This piece by Michelle Marie Wallace originally appeared on The Establishment, an independent multimedia site founded and run by women.

“Maybe I should stop my periods.”

It wasn’t something I had ever before considered and I had, in fact, wondered if there could be potential, unknown, long-term ramifications when friends of mine stopped theirs. I had never considered my periods an inconvenience or gross or annoying; in fact, I had liked the rhythm of them. The times I had been on birth control I resented how it made me feel divorced from my body.

When I asked this question, I was sitting in my doctor’s office, nine months into antiviral treatment for chronic fatigue syndrome, 11 years after starting treatment for Lyme disease. The previous year had been hard. Though I had been significantly healthier than I’d been in a long time and had started running again, working hours that were closer to full-time and going out with friends, every month, in the week before my period, I collapsed.

In these weeks, I felt ragged, frayed; the simple act of my body functioning with regulatory actions felt like too much of a drain. My life required too much of me in these weeks and I’d stumble through work, cancel plans, and do as little as possible. I’d get cold and not be able to warm up again, no matter how many burning hot showers I took; fevers would flash through me, but I never retained the heat and I’d collapse in a heap of fatigue, wracked with fevers and chills, muscle pain, sore throats, and mental confusion again. When my cycle was over, I’d be better than I was during the flare-up but worse off than I had been before my period. Every month, I’d take another step down in my health.

Every month, I’d take another step down in my health.

I always wonder how to describe a fatigue so profound it feels like a weighted shroud, especially as so many doctors have not believed me. This is not just being tired, it’s a fatigue of dangerous proportions that feels like an emergency in my body, threatening to take me down again. When I was finally diagnosed with chronic Lyme disease, I’d been sick for over 11 years — 11 years of doctors who refused to believe that I wasn’t just seeking attention, 11 years of worsening chronic fatigue and tick-borne illness. These are diseases that, when not addressed, become steadily more serious and more difficult to treat.

When I was 24, I moved back in with my parents, deep into third-stage Lyme. My hairline had receded dramatically, deep purple rings dragged on my always bloodshot eyes, my skin had gone gray and papery. My body was wracked with so much pain it felt like simple daily use of my joints was causing them to degenerate. I wondered if I would be able to walk in three years. I couldn’t follow conversations, words had lost significance for me, I could no longer read. My inability to engage with the world mimicked that of my grandfather’s Alzheimer’s Disease. I was so tired that I hadn’t laughed in years.

A decade-plus of treatments has stripped me of most of the worst effects of CFS and Lyme (the symptoms often overlap) and returned me to living a life more fully than I had ever been able to before. But I still declined each month with my period, and never quite got back to where I had been before the decline. I was doing better than I had been before I started my antivirals, I told my doctor, but I felt that I would never be doing well — unless I stopped menstruating.

I was doing better than I had been before I started my antivirals, but I felt that I would never be doing well  — unless I stopped menstruating.

My doctor, Jennifer Sugden, N.D., had treated me for Lyme and CFS with a variety of different protocols, including hormone replacement therapies. But I’d never suppressed my periods before. I had always collapsed the week before my period, but I thought that this was one more thing that would resolve as I got better. Instead, it seemed that the hormone changes around menstruation would always be an Achilles heel.

This is a common experience among patients with Lyme and chronic fatigue syndrome and some other tick-borne illnesses. Dr. Sugden says that when she discusses Lyme and CFS within the medical community of Lyme-literate doctors, they talk about how “women are typically harder to treat and some women really decline before or with her period.” Jose G. Montoya, director of the multidisciplinary division of Stanford’s Myalgic Encephalomyelitis/Chronic Fatigue Syndrome Initiative, concurs, saying that “this phenomena is really pronounced in some women. You don’t have to dig this [information] out…that is so clear in some cases, that the disease is significantly worse right around their menstrual cycle.” He acknowledges that “we will have to be treating women and men differently, there is no question.” (It’s important to note here that menstruation is not just a “women’s issue,” and can affect trans and nonbinary bodies as well.)

So far, the research on ME/CFS has been meager at best and without a focus on female endocrinology. Stanford’s ME/CFS Initiative is currently recruiting subjects for a neuroendocrine study with women of child-bearing ages to hopefully give some answers on this subject. Eventually, Dr. Sugden says, “it wouldn’t surprise me if stopping periods becomes a part of protocol.”

My doctor said it wouldn’t surprise her if stopping periods becomes a part of chronic fatigue syndrome protocol.

So what is it about periods that can compromise some patients with ME/CFS and tick-borne illnesses so dramatically? Dr. Sugden points to an underlying problem: overworked adrenal glands. The adrenals produce cortisol, which regulates our circadian rhythm, and DHEA, which is the building block to produce estrogen and progesterone. “It’s having to produce DHEA on a cyclic pattern when the adrenals are not strong enough to produce it on a monthly cycle,” Dr. Sugden says about the monthly decline some people experience. “But when you replace the hormones and suppress periods, the glands can focus on healing themselves. You allow the adrenals to NOT produce DHEA and your body can produce cortisol at the rate it needs to.”

After three months of supressing my periods, I realized that I hadn’t had any extreme crashes in my health. While I wasn’t fully well, my health was steadier and I was incrementally getting better. Six months later, I was stable enough to start chasing dreams again. I packed up and moved to Mexico City, a place I’d been talking about moving to for years. I never did because I needed my family and my doctors close and I didn’t want to move abroad when I would have to live my life tight, watching to never do too much.

It’s been a year now and I live more easily than I ever thought possible. I’ve settled into my new home and language, work full time, and still have energy left over for friends, exploring, and climbing trips. In many ways, stopping my periods helped give me back my life.

You can support The Establishment’s independent media work by purchasing a ‘Member of the Resistance’ tee or making a donation here.

Other recent stories include:

The Dirty Politics Of Period Sex

Yes, Trans Women Can Get Period Symptoms

The Establishment Means The World To Me, And It Needs Your Help

The Agony And Ecstasy Of Masturbation

‘It’s Because You’re Fat’ — And Other Lies My Doctors Told Me

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Source: HuffPost Black Voices

How “true loyalty,” political connections, and conservative ties fueled his ascent

In November 2004, Neil Gorsuch oversaw legal teams in Eastern and Central Ohio for the Bush-Cheney campaign. In an email to President George W. Bush’s Political Director Matt Schlapp, he cheered, “What a magnificent result for the country. For me personally, the experience was invigorating and a great deal of fun.” (The experience for up to 15,000 people unable to vote in Columbus, Ohio, because lines stretched for hours was probably less invigorating or fun).

Gorsuch continued, “While I’ve spent considerable time trying to help the cause on a volunteer basis in various roles, I concluded that I’d really like to be a full-time member of the team.” 

His resume describes the various roles in which he was politically active to “help the cause,” with greater specificity than his Senate Judiciary Questionnaire ― Co-Director of Virginia Lawyers for Bush-Cheney; Bush-Cheney Marshal; RNC Bronco; and Co-Chairman of the Republican National Lawyers Association Judicial Nominations Task Force ― for which the Senate Republican Conference cited his Distinguished Service to the United States Senate for his work in support of President Bush’s judicial nominees.

As Gorsuch began his effort to “be a full-time member of the team,” the way he started and then advanced his public service career raise troubling concerns regarding his nomination to the Supreme Court.

A “True Loyalist”

In March 2005, Gorsuch interviewed at the Department of Justice to become Principal Deputy Associate Attorney General, and his candidacy was sent to the White House Office of Political Affairs for review. So he reached out to his former law school roommate ― who happened to be Chairman of the Republican National Committee ― and Ken Mehlman told the White House that Gorsuch was “a true loyalist” and “a good strong conservative.” A month later, Gorsuch formally got his job offer.

Now, questions are being raised about Gorsuch’s tenure at the Department of Justice—essentially whether he was, in fact, too much of a “true loyalist” and did not demonstrate enough independence when it came to issues of national security, including torture and warrantless surveillance.

For instance, Gorsuch developed talking points to defend the use of torture, or “enhanced interrogation.” In response to the question “Have the aggressive interrogation techniques employed by the admin yielded any valuable intelligence?” he handwrote “Yes” and made a to-do list that started with “Examples of Intell on GTMO.” This is especially troubling because then-candidate Trump repeatedly offered the same justification for reinstating torture ― that it “works” ― as he cavalierly said, “Would I approve waterboarding? You bet your ass I would.”

This is just one example why serious doubts are being raised over whether Gorsuch would serve as a check on executive overreach ― not be truly loyal to it. It also has led Judiciary Committee Ranking Member Dianne Feinstein to call on Judge Gorsuch to immediately provide missing documents and information regarding his role at the Justice Department, particularly in matters of executive power and national security. Judge Gorsuch must now supply this material so that Senators and the public can evaluate his complete record.

How a web of ties to a conservative billionaire landed Gorsuch a judgeship—when he wasn’t even a finalist

Concerns regarding Judge Gorsuch’s independence also have been magnified by the recent New York Times discovery that conservative billionaire Philip Anschutz “successfully lobbied Colorado’s lone Republican senator and the Bush administration to nominate Judge Gorsuch to the federal appeals court.”

Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer has described Anschutz as “one of the leading advocates for a hard-right pro-corporate agenda.” Anschutz owns conservative publications such as The Weekly Standard and The Washington Examiner, and from 2013 to 2015, his foundation donated $500,000 to the Heritage Foundation and $150,000 to the Federalist Society.

In January 2006, there was an opening on the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals, and on January 10, 2006, the Denver Post reported that there were three finalists—all women—with no mention of Gorsuch. This is not surprising—although Gorsuch had roots in Colorado, he had never practiced law there, compared to the three finalists who had deep ties to the Colorado legal community: a former Colorado Supreme Court Justice; a federal district court judge; and Colorado’s Solicitor General and professor at the University of Colorado. Also, at the time, the twelve-member court only had two female judges, and Colorado had never had a female circuit court judge (and still hasn’t).

What is surprising is that just two days after the Denver Post article, Anschutz’s lawyer sent the White House a letter on Anschutz’s behalf recommending Gorsuch, and three weeks later, Gorsuch was interviewing with the White House Counsel. By mid-March, President Bush had approved his nomination, subject to background clearances.

Anschutz’s success in securing this judgeship for Gorsuch is just one connection in a “web of ties” between the two men, and according to Senator Schumer, this history “suggests a judge whose fundamental economic and judicial philosophy is favorable to the wealthy and the powerful and the far right.”

Furthermore, although Judge Gorsuch has recused himself from most Anschutz-related cases (with one exception that his spokeswoman said was inadvertent), questions regarding his independence also have been raised by the New York Times’ assessment that Judge Gorsuch “appears to be leaving the door open to participating in Anschutz-related cases on the Supreme Court.”

Not a finalist for the Supreme Court? Still not a problem!

Especially given the timeline around Judge Gorsuch’s circuit court nomination, there are questions around how—ten years later—history has repeated itself.

During the presidential campaign, Trump made the unprecedented decision to release a list of Supreme Court finalists, and he outsourced the selection process to two conservative, ideological interest groups: the Federalist Society and the Heritage Foundation. On May 18, 2016, he released his list of 11 judges as potential United States Supreme Court Justices. Another finalist list without Gorsuch.

On September 23, 2016, Trump released a second list, with 10 more names, and declared, “This list is definitive and I will choose only from it in picking future Justices of the United States Supreme Court.”

Judge Gorsuch had made it this time.

In fact, according to The Weekly Standard (again, owned by Anschutz), “a main reason [for the second list] was to put Gorsuch’s name on it. But by adding 10 more names, it didn’t create a stir or look like favoritism.”

What happened in these intervening four months that changed the dynamic so radically in Judge Gorsuch’s favor?

What did it take to convince the Heritage Foundation and Federalist Society?

According to The Weekly Standard, Judge Gorsuch was not included on the first list because Trump’s advisors “hadn’t fully studied his judicial record, his years as a private lawyer, and his personal life.”

I am incredibly troubled by what these interest groups were “fully studying” during this time. For example, the Washington Post describes this highly inappropriate area of inquiry:

Gorsuch has been aggressively vetted for the court by conservative groups such as the Heritage Foundation, and they have backed him enthusiastically. These groups even scrutinized his attendance at St. John’s Episcopal Church — which draws from the largely liberal population in Boulder, Colo., calls itself a largely liberal congregation and advertised on its website for the Women’s March in Washington last month — and concluded it was not a strike against him.

When it comes to evaluating Judge Gorsuch’s adherence to the rule of law, I am at a complete loss for why his choice of which church to attend would need to be scrutinized at all ― and I have experience evaluating and recommending hundreds of candidates to President Obama for potential judicial nomination.

But even more concerning, once they embarked on this line of questioning, what did it take to “conclude it was not a strike against him?”

On August 1, 2016, an anonymous judge on the Tenth Circuit requested that all of the judges on the court rehear the case Planned Parenthood Assn. of Utah v. Herbert ― even though neither party had made such a request ― to reconsider a decision that provided a preliminary injunction against the Governor of Utah, who tried to block Planned Parenthood of Utah from receiving federal funding. As Judge Briscoe noted, it was an “unusual procedural step” and would “surely come as a surprise to the parties, who have clearly moved on.”

Judge Gorsuch wrote a dissent in this denial of rehearing, escalating this procedural issue to what one progressive legal commentator called a “crusade against Planned Parenthood.” While we do not know for certain which anonymous judge set this process in motion, a conservative legal commentator, who praised Judge Gorsuch’s dissent as “powerful,” noted that “it’s not climbing out on a limb to surmise that it was Gorsuch who made the sua sponte call.”

Could the sua sponte call in this case—with the future opportunity to write a dissent—have been enough for these interest groups to conclude that Judge Gorsuch’s attendance at his church was not a strike against him?

Or maybe Judge Gorsuch’s August 23, 2016, concurring opinion in Gutierrez-Brizuela v. Lynch —to his own majority opinion—proposing an end the long-settled legal principle known as the Chevron doctrine satisfied any lingering questions. After all, this opinion helped establish Judge Gorsuch as being to the right of Justice Scalia, who believed that Chevron “accurately reflects the reality of government, and thus more adequately serves its needs.”

Or maybe Anchutz’s support for Judge Gorsuch ― and Anchutz’s hundreds of thousands of dollars in donations to the Heritage Foundation and Federalist Society—convinced them.

With all of these questions about Judge Gorsuch’s independence, we deserve to know how the Federalist Society and Heritage Foundation communicated with him ― and with Trump’s campaign, transition team, and administration ― in vetting him and resolving “potential strikes” against him. Senator Richard Blumenthal has asked for this information, and a thorough evaluation of Judge Gorsuch’s nomination cannot be complete without it.

The Supreme Court must protect our constitutional rights and serve as an effective check and balance on the other branches of government. Judge Gorsuch’s rise from a young private practice partner to Supreme Court nominee raises many questions and concerns about his independence and ability to serve as the Supreme Court Justice we need.

In next week’s hearing, Senators must ask these questions—and Judge Gorsuch must answer them. 

This post has been cross-published at the American Constitution Society blog.

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Source: HuffPost Black Voices

WASHINGTON ― Last week, the Metropolitan Police Department sent out a series of tweets publicizing the disappearance of 10 D.C. teenagers who were considered “critically missing.” The tweets themselves didn’t garner much attention, but the photos and information of some of the teens tweeted by influential Twitter user @BlackGirlMarvel went viral within hours.

On Twitter, many Black women users posted viral tweets of the missing reports, encouraging others to share while questioning why they hadn’t heard about the disappearances on the nightly news — in the same way the disappearance Tricia McCauley, another woman who went missing in D.C., had been covered.

The total number of people reported missing in D.C. has remained constant since 2014, said D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser during a Thursday press conference, addressing online speculation and concern about a rise in reports of missing teens. The mayor added that there is no evidence to support an increase in missing persons, nor is there evidence that recent reports are related to human trafficking.  

At least 462 out of 708 total people reported missing this year were juveniles. Most teens reported missing were located or returned home, leaving 95 percent of reported cases this year closed.

MPD did not provide a racial breakdown of their missing juveniles data at the press conference. But at least 37 juveniles of those reported missing since January have not been located, based on an HuffPost analysis of press releases and tweets of the critically missing.

All of those 37 missing are black or Latinx.

Juveniles of all backgrounds are reported missing for a number of reasons, according to the MPD. Usually, it’s because they didn’t check in at home, work or school for voluntary reasons. More concerning cases tend to revolve around conflicts in the home. When younger children are reported missing, for instance, they could have been taken by a family member during a custody battle. Teenagers are more likely to be running away from physical or sexual abuse or a parent who’s using drugs.

Still a major concern for many is whether or not kids are being recruited by human traffickers. Forty percent of confirmed sex trafficking victims, who are overwhelmingly female, are black, according to a 2013 report from the Justice Department. And Latinx make up 56 percent of confirmed labor trafficking victims.

Black and Latinx teens, on average, are more vulnerable to the type of abuse that provokes a teen to run away from home because they are more likely to live in high-risk environments. But prevailing narratives that these missing children are just runaways leads to less sympathy and media coverage for them when they are reported as missing.

Take the case of Relisha Rudd, an eight year old who went missing in D.C. in 2014. Her case was almost exclusively covered by The Washington Post, and a handful of local and black news outlets. Cable news did not loop the disappearance of Rudd like they did for the highly publicized cases of Natalee Holloway, Elizabeth Smart or Caylee Anthony.

Little mainstream media coverage is contingent upon the belief that black and brown girls are less valuable, says Hillary Potter, a professor of ethnic studies at the University of Colorado Boulder. And she adds the lack of coverage has another dangerous effect: It can perpetuate the idea that black and brown girls aren’t victimized.

“If cars of a similar make and model were disappearing from the more affluent neighborhoods of our city, there would probably be more outrage,” wrote Courtland Milloy, a columnist for The Washington Post. “Owners of vehicles popular with thieves would be warned through various media outlets and automobile associations. Not so when it comes to black girls from more disadvantaged communities. Their family and friends often suffer in silence.”

Black and Missing Foundation, founded in 2008, is one of few organizations that aims to bring awareness to missing people of color. Derrica Wilson, the co-founder and chief executive of the organization, says 40 percent of missing persons in the United States are people of color.

Most of them are black and Latinx. “How often do you see an Amber alert for a missing black or brown kid?” Wilson said. “They like to classify our kids as runaways [and] runaways do not get the Amber Alert.”

MPD, however, is making a conscious effort to publicize missing persons cases. Chanel Dickerson, the new commander of the department’s Youth and Family division, has pledged to publicize the number of missing teens more than they have been in the past.  

Press releases and tweets are now issued for every missing person who falls into the “critical missing” category. People looped into this category include missing persons under the age of 15, those over the age of 65, anyone with a medical condition that could put them in harm’s way or any case where there’s indication of foul play. The district’s police department will create a new Twitter handle specifically publicizing missing persons.

Social media postings of missing kids can help bring them home faster, especially teenagers whose peers are more likely to see the alert and can notify police of any information they have, says Mary G. Leary, a law professor at Catholic University of America and co-author of “Perspectives on Missing Persons.”

“We’ve come a long way from putting up a poster in the local store,” she said.

Wilson encourages people to pay attention to missing person reports in their area and to be aware of recruitment efforts on social media. She also encourages parents to talk to their children as much as possible about human trafficking and monitor their social media use.

“Our people are not just falling off the face of this earth,” Wilson said, “and we need to do something about it.”

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Source: HuffPost Black Voices

At only 8 years old, Nia Mya Reese has already mastered the art of caring for another human being. So much so that she’s written a best-selling how-to book on it titled How To Deal With and Care For Your Annoying Little Brother.

It all began last year with a first-grade class assignment for students to write a descriptive piece on something they have learned to excel in. 

Nia Mya ― who lives in Hoover, Alabama ― chose her “downright annoying” 5-year-old brother Ronald Michael as the subject for the assignment, she told CBS News.

“Nia Mya shared that she was a great big sister to an annoying little brother,” her first-grade teacher, Beth Hankins, told CBS. 

Her mother, Cherinita, then advised Nia Mya to extend the assignment into the summer. 

Nia Mya said it only took a few days to place all of her big sister expertise, including how to make learning enjoyable, in the book, which became available on Amazon last November. The book has since been branded with the website’s coveted best-seller tag. Hoover Mayor Frank V. Brocato even came by Nia Mya’s latest book signing.

When asked by CBS about her biggest takeaway from the experience, Nia Mya replied: “I learned to follow my own dreams.” 

You can watch more of CBS’s interview with Nia Mya below: 

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Source: HuffPost Black Voices

In a rare joyous moment amid the pure dismay of Hurricane Katrina, an Air Force pararescuer saved a 3-year-old girl and her family from the floods in 2005. After the rescue, the little girl gave the man a huge hug that was captured in an iconic photo.

The moment left a lasting impact on both LaShay Brown and Master Sgt. Mike Maroney. The duo reunited a decade later and have kept in touch ever since. Maroney has visited LaShay, now 14, and her family in Mississippi, and they speak on the phone weekly, according to People. He even taught her how to swim.

LaShay said Maroney’s support has inspired her to join the military one day. She said she doesn’t know which branch yet, but Maroney supports her.

“I am proud of her no matter what she does and will support her in everything she does,” he told People. “I think she understands service and I believe that she will do great things no matter what she chooses.”

Maroney also inspired LaShay to join the Junior Reserve Officer Training Corps at her high school.

“It was very interesting and a challenge, and because I had never done it before,” she told People. “I knew if I joined I would have help from Mike along the way if I needed it, or was confused about anything.”

Maroney, who will retire from the Air Force this month because of an injury, will accompany LaShay to her JROTC ball on Saturday. He said that he’s going because LaShay and her family “mean as much to [him] as [his] own.”

Maroney, who was suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder when he rescued LaShay, set out to find the teen in 2015 with the hashtag #FindKatrinaGirl. He said that he looked at the photo of the two while he was deployed in Iraq and Afghanistan to get him through difficult times.

When they were reunited on “The Real,” he told LaShay how much her hug meant to him.

“That small gesture, it helped me through bad days and dark days,” he told her. “You have a beautiful smile and it stuck with me and it’s helped me and has meant a lot to me. So I’m indebted to you. You rescued me more than I rescued you.”

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Source: HuffPost Black Voices

Fashion has a long way to go until it reaches true inclusivity, but something exciting is happening: Several shoe designers have responded to women’s cry for stylish shoes for wide feet. And we’re pretty much doing cartwheels over it. 

These aren’t the same uninspired sandals we’re used to seeing in extended width sizes. These strappy numbers are truly current ― each pair looks exactly like the shoes we pine for, but would often struggle to find in our size.

Well, your day has come. The shoes are here. Take a scroll, add ‘em to your cart and then click your heels together. You’ve finally got a foot at the table.

— This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.

Source: HuffPost Black Voices

Jussie Smollett is taking President Donald Trump and his administration to task in his new video, “F.U.W. (F**ked Up World).”

Directed by Smollett, the black-and-white visual clip features the openly gay singer-actor highlighting the various injustices around racial prejudice and the fight for religious, human and LGBTQ rights.

“This is not a single. It’s not a song to promote the series. It’s an artistic expression,” Smollett said in a press release for the song. “My view of this sick cycle, an era in which we must fight our way out of before it’s too late.”

“This view of unity is something they may never understand,” he added. “That is why it is up to us. Train your daughters and sons to be soldiers of love, despite and in spite of this F**ked Up World.” 

In addition to combating the race baiting, bigotry, xenophobia and “alternative facts” of the current administration, the nearly four-minute clip also shows a mask of Trump being shattered by a man in a wheelchair.

According to the “Empire” star, the mask is a representation of the “false idea of patriotism.”

“That mask is a representation of this idea of white male privilege,” Smollett explained to The Associated Press. “It’s so much bigger than him. It’s what he represents, and it’s because of that representation, that’s why he’s the president of the United States currently. It’s our opportunity to take those masks off and shatter them, so that’s what I did.”

Check out the video to Jussie Smollett’s “F.U.W. (F**ked Up World)” in the clip above.

— This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.

Source: HuffPost Black Voices

Women’s rights activist Zainab Salbi, founder of Women for Women International, has worked with some of the world’s most resilient women ― women who have experienced the horrors of war, survived extreme poverty, bravely spoken their truths and transcended their pasts. Inspired by these indomitable spirits, Salbi wrote a poem that appears in If You Knew Me You Would Care, a book she collaborated on with renowned photographer Rennio Maifredi.

In the above video from “SuperSoul Sunday,” Salbi reads her powerful poem aloud as Maifredi’s striking images showcase the strength and goodness in these female survivors. 

What if I’m not sadness?

What if I’m not grief?

What if I’m not my victim’s story,

Nor am I my pain?

 

What if they are all part of me,

But not fully me?

What if I am just me?

 

What if I’m joy without reason,

Happiness in all seasons?

What if I am love for all?

What if I laugh for no reason and all reasons?

What if they are all part of me?

 

What if I don’t hate my enemy?

What if I forgive?

What if I see without judgment,

Love without reasons?

What if I give and receive without worry?

What if I can be all, and still be me?

 

What if this is it?

What if this is perfect?

What if I don’t doubt?

What if I just believe?

 

How would life be if I let it be?

How would I be if I accept fully me?

What will I be if today I am free?

What if this is the new story?

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— This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.

Source: HuffPost Black Voices

Last year, the state of Texas gave anti-abortion organization Heidi Group $1.6 million to provide every health care service to women except abortions. Eight months later, the Heidi Group appears to have fallen flat on its promise. 

This week, the Associated Press reported that the organization has failed in its million-dollar endeavor to “strengthen small clinics that specialize in women’s health” but that don’t offer abortion. And this report comes at a particularly important moment: The GOP’s proposed alternative to the Affordable Care Act would defund Planned Parenthood, something House Speaker Paul Ryan called part of “a conservative wish list” at a press conference last week.

The AP reported that the Heidi Group, which is part of the state’s Alternatives to Abortion plan and whose funds subsidize Crisis Pregnancy Centers throughout the state, “has done little of the outreach it promised, such as helping clinics promote their services on Facebook, or airing public service announcements. It hasn’t made good on plans to establish a 1-800 number to help women find providers or ensure that all clinics have updated websites.” 

The Texas state government’s logic behind the Heidi Group initiative was that women’s health care ought to be provided separately from abortions. The issue, though, is that Crisis Pregnancy Centers don’t employ medical professionals or provide medical services.

CPCs are women’s centers funded by anti-abortion groups (like Heidi Group), with the implicit aim of convincing women not to have abortions. Though many CPCs claim to offer a full range of services to pregnant women, the nearest thing that many CPCs have to medical professionals are sonogram nurses. 

Unlike Planned Parenthood and other health care providers, CPCs do not offer STD tests, Pap smears, contraception advice or implantation, cancer screenings or prenatal care. 

What CPCs do offer is faith-based counseling (often from volunteer counselors, not certified psychologists or psychotherapists) and short-term, quick-fix help often in the form of diapers and baby beds. CPCs are often located within walking distance to abortion clinics, and often place volunteer anti-abortion protestors outside of those clinics to hand out fliers and pamphlets to patients encouraging them not to go to their appointment. Many of them also have misleading names that could easily be confused with the names of actual abortion clinics, like Pregnancy Resource Clinic in Phoenix, Az. or Women’s Care Center, a chain of CPCs in Indiana. 

“Crisis pregnancy centers are given millions of dollars in state funding to manipulate and shame Texans considering having an abortion,” Sharmeen Aly, Communications Coordinator of NARAL Pro-Choice Texas, told The Huffington Post on Wednesday. “They are not comprehensive health centers and often provide no medical services. Crisis pregnancy centers exist to prevent people facing unintended pregnancies from accessing abortion care and delay their care to the point where they’re not able to access abortion.”

It is unconscionable that [Crisis Pregnancy Centers] continue to receive millions from the state to peddle their baseless anti-abortion agenda.
Sharmeen Aly, Communications Coordinator of NARAL Pro-Choice Texas

Of course, the presence of CPCs isn’t just limited to the state of Texas. 

The 2016 documentary film “JACKSON,” explored what the health care landscape looks like for women in Mississippi, where only one abortion clinic remains. Shannon Brewer, director of Jackson Women’s Health Organization, told HuffPost that what CPCs do to young women is provide a “false hope” that they’ll have support in raising unplanned children. 

“By the time [patients] realize that it’s false hope,” Brewer said, “they’ve already had another baby, and they’re already in the same situation or a worse situation.”

Other states have also had to deal with CPCs, which often outnumber abortion clinics. In Charlotte, N.C., two mobile crisis pregnancy centers park outside A Preferred Women’s Health Center every day to try to get women to pull over before they park at the abortion clinic. The CPC, PRC Charlotte, boasts “no cost” services and “walk-ins welcome” ― traits that many women look for when seeking reproductive health care. PRC Charlotte offers free ultrasounds in their RVs, but otherwise offers zero medical services. 

Some of the pro-choice volunteers outside A Preferred Women’s Health Center told HuffPost in December that PRC Charlotte often uses misleading information, or flat-out lies, to get patients to carry their pregnancies to term.

“Patients have been told that their pregnancy wasn’t ‘attached properly’ and that they would miscarry, so they should cancel their [abortion] appointment,” one volunteer clinic escort told HuffPost. “Another was told that her pregnancy was too far along for an abortion, and that she should cancel, too, even though it wasn’t.”

PRC Charlotte denied these practices, but research has shown that misleading patients is common practice for CPCs, and, back in Texas, Sharmeen Aly agrees.

“These centers use scare tactics and provide scientifically inaccurate information to their patients,” she told HuffPost. “It is unconscionable that they continue to receive millions from the state to peddle their baseless anti-abortion agenda.”

CPCs have become increasingly powerful, with the Heidi Group able to convince the Texas government to give it more than $1 million last year. And in Boise, Id., Brandi Swindell, who started CPC chain Stanton Healthcare, is hoping that CPCs can replace Planned Parenthood altogether. (Though in contrast to the care most CPCs provide ― or rather, don’t provide ― Swindell has said she wants to make STI testing and diagnostic ultrasounds available in her clinics.) 

Swindell told Cosmopolitan last June: “We hope to be much like Margaret Sanger was, a revolutionary of her time… I know, can you believe I’m using her?”

But CPCs still cannot replace the thing that women arguably need most: actual comprehensive health care, provided by licensed medical professionals. And state governments are noticing. 

The Heidi Group’s failure to provide what it set out to provide has been noticed by the commission that provided the group with funding.

Texas Health and Human Services Commission spokeswoman Carrie Williams told the AP that “the bottom line is that we are holding our contractors accountable, and will do everything we can to help them make themselves successful.”

And in Oakland, Ca. last summer, the City Council passed an ordinance requiring CPCs to be transparent about their provided services ― and, perhaps more importantly, what they don’t provide. Oakland Vice Mayor and District 4 City Councilwoman Annie Campbell Washington, who co-authored the ordinance, told HuffPost that her biggest issue with CPCs is their misleading advertising practices.

“I take truth in advertising very seriously. I believe that CPCs are part of a pro-life strategy. They are completely misleading pregnant women who are vulnerable and specifically looking for abortion services,” she said. “If they were marketing their services as ‘We will help you through your pregnancy’ that’s fine. But that’s not what they’re doing. They’re lying to women.” 

She also believes that the government should “absolutely not” be funding CPCs. 

“They’re not providing the services that they claim to be providing,” she said. “They’re misleading women into believe they can get some sort of medical care, which they can’t. They should absolutely not be receiving government funding.”

Local governments in Baltimore, Los Angeles and San Francisco have also put into place legislation meant to combat misleading CPC practices, and now, even in an actively anti-abortion state like Texas, it’s becoming increasingly clear that CPCs are not the answer to expanding women’s access to health care. 

It turns out that the care Planned Parenthood provides to 2.5 million men and women per year is not as easily replaceable as anti-abortion groups want it to be. The Heidi Group’s founder, the staunch anti-abortion advocate Carol Everett, acknowledged her organization’s shortcomings in Texas last week.

“It’s not as easy as it looks,” she said. “Because we are not Planned Parenthood.”

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Source: HuffPost Black Voices