by Patty DeJuneas
For 50 years, women across the US were free to make decisions about their bodies. No more. Last summer, the Supreme Court decimated our right to bodily autonomy. Protestors have since turned out in droves.
Boston Common – “the Common,” as its known to locals – is the oldest public park in the United States. Located across from the Commonwealth of Massachusetts State House, the Common has long been a place for public discourse.
In the 1800s, abolitionists protested slavery there. Suffragists demonstrated and demanded equality at the voting booth. In the 1900s, the Common was rife with civil rights rallies, including one led by Martin Luther King, the minister and civil rights champion who fought tirelessly for racial equality in a time when politicians ran for office promoting segregation and racism. Today, the Common is a place where people of all stripes, colors and nationalities continue to gather to make their voices heard. As many protestors shout out, “This is what democracy looks like.”
While shooting this series over the past year, I came to realize that these voices, despite their diversity, share a common goal: freedom. Freedom from the patriarchy obsessed with controlling women; freedom from dictators who impose their will and control upon their citizens; freedom from fascism; freedom from racism; freedom from police brutality; freedom for the untold numbers of innocent men, women and children who have been wrongfully convicted; and freedom from irrational and ignorant hate against our LGBTQ loved ones and friends.
I chose black and white for this series for a simple and painful reason: little to nothing has changed over the decades. In this first installment, I document the women, children and men who turned out in droves to protest the backward trajectory of women’s rights. For 50 years, the right to choose whether and when to become mothers was protected under the U.S. Constitution. But in June 2022, religions zealots and misogynists on the Supreme Court decided to take away that right. Today, many American states have outlawed all abortions, no matter the circumstances.
Within months of the Supreme Court’s ruling, an 11-year-old pregnant rape victim was forced to travel to another state for medical treatment. A right-wing judge in Texas overruled the government’s approval of a drug used in medical abortions. Women with sepsis have been forced to wait until near death before doctors will intervene for fear of being arrested and prosecuted. This is not what democracy looks like.
