Sandra Fluke, Georgetown University Law Students for Reproductive Justice

This blog is part of the #HERvotes blog carnival.

As you may have recently read in the New York Times, although Georgetown’s student health insurance doesn’t cover contraception, it does cover birth control pills when they’re prescribed for medical reasons other than preventing pregnancy (e.g. severe acne, mood disorders, etc.).  This is called the “over-ride” process because it over-rides the usual ban on contraceptive coverage.  Unfortunately, this over-ride process is terribly flawed and fails many women at Georgetown.  The problems with this process illustrate the consequences for women’s health when university administrators dictate which reasons for a birth control prescription are the “right” reasons.

Because of an obsession with preventing students from fraudulently using the over-ride to get contraception coverage for the “wrong” reason (preventing pregnancy), students who attempt to use the over-ride process are sometimes subjected to questioning and accusations that they are lying about their qualifying medical needs.  This is followed with long delays and bureaucratic barriers that don’t exist for any other prescription covered by Georgetown’s insurance.  The Times profiled how Georgetown’s policy resulted in a medical tragedy for one woman.  In response a Georgetown spokeswoman said that:

problems like this were rare and that doctors at the health service knew how to help students get coverage for contraceptives needed for medical reasons.

If only that were true!  Georgetown Law Students for Reproductive Justice actually surveyed students at the law school about this.  For some students, the over-ride process works adequately, but 65% of students attempting to utilize the over-ride process reported being subjected to extensive questioning, inordinate clerical issues, extensive delays, or other complications because of disbelief from doctors and insurance administrators.  20% either never received their medication or were never reimbursed by the insurance company.  Here are the experiences of just a few students:

I was without birth control for many months because of problems with the over-ride.  I spoke with people at [the student health] clinic, the Georgetown main insurance office, the insurance company, the drug insurance company, and a pharmacy.  I was put on hold multiple times and had to call some of these people multiple times.  After investing at least ten hours in the process, I gave up. . . .

Simply because I am sexually active, the doctor assumed I was lying even though I have medical needs.  I struggled with getting an over-ride because the doctor was hesitant even though I reported severe pain and mood changes that affect my functioning as a student. . . .

[M]y OB/GYN suspects that I have endometriosis and I took a specific pill to help control it.  Endometriosis cannot be definitively diagnosed without surgery, and obtaining a waiver was stressful and time consuming.  It unnecessarily distracted me from my classes. . . .

I have found the health care coverage ban on birth control embarrassing and potentially harmful.  When scheduling a yearly gynecological exam, I was subject to a line of hostile questioning twice: once by the person scheduling the exam and once by the doctor performing the exam.  The questions included queries about my sexual history, which seems appropriate for the doctor to ask about, but not the scheduler.  A yearly gynecological exam is a recommended procedure and may not even be tied to a birth control prescription.  Georgetown’s refusal to cover birth control creates a potential burden on a woman getting this exam at all. . . .

Tragically, Georgetown’s policy has also created rampant misinformation regarding student insurance coverage of women’s reproductive healthcare generally, leading to some students foregoing essential medical care:

[I] was intimidated by the [‘override’] process and thus I did forego OBGYN care for over a year.  More importantly, the reputation that Georgetown has as being . . . unsupportive of women’s reproductive health prevented me from seeking out STD testing after I was sexually assaulted.  (I assumed [Georgetown] would not cover my HIV/STD testing because when I was tested last year at my provider’s office . . . as part of a regular/routine exam, I paid $500 due to lack of coverage.  It was not until several months after I was assaulted that I found out . . . that [Georgetown] would cover such tests.  In general, there is a problematic lack of info about women’s health coverage on campus.  I did not even know I could get an OBGYN exam at the law center until a friend told me my 2L year.  While I support Georgetown’s Jesuit identity and am a person of faith myself, I find our school’s policy to be . . . harmful to students. . . .

I’d say “harmful to students” is putting it lightly.  That’s why we’re so thankful that the new Affordable Care Act regulations will protect vulnerable students and end these types of dangerous insurance policies!

Emily T. Wolf, Vice-President, Fordham Law Students for Reproductive Justice

This blog is part of the #HERvotes blog carnival.

Fordham University is a Jesuit school.  Because of this, students are not able to get birth control prescribed to them at the on-campus health centers.  Fordham LSRJ wanted to provide Fordham students with a way to have access to doctors and birth control prescriptions.  Here’s how we did it:

Step One:  Identify a Specific Problem

The problem that we chose to tackle was the fact that there was no notice on the health center’s website that students would not be able to receive standard health care.  There was no information that stated the health center is not able to prescribe birth control.  Under the heading “Women’s Health,” the site stated, “routine gynecological exams are available.”  If you searched further, you would find a question under the FAQs about scheduling a gynecological exam with some additional language:

“Remember, Fordham University is a Catholic and Jesuit University. As such, the physicians, nurse practitioners, and staff of the Health Center abide by the Ethical and Religious Directives for Catholic Health Care Services.  Those interested in these directives can read them, usccb.org/about/doctrine/ethical-and-religious-directives/ (You will leave this website.)”

If you follow that link, you will need to click on the 43 page document, and read it.  If you do a search for “contraception,” “birth control,” or “condom,” you will find zero matches within the document.  If you search for “contraceptive,” you will find three matches, including text that states, “Catholic health institutions may not promote or condone contraceptive practices but should provide, for married couples and the medical staff who counsel them, instruction both about the Church’s teaching on responsible parenthood and in methods of natural family planning.”

This was sufficiently vague and hidden such that students were not likely to be aware of this practice.  It does not state that Fordham University forbids its nurse practitioners from prescribing birth control at its on-campus health centers.  It is especially confusing given other language on the website that explains the health insurance offered by Fordham is required by New York law to cover birth control prescriptions.  So students who need birth control will need to go to a different health care provider and incur additional costs.

Fordham LSRJ spoke to the Director of Student Health Services at Fordham, who explained that there is a medical exception to these birth control directives.  So, theoretically, students who have health reasons for which birth control is standard treatment should be able to get a birth control prescription.  However, this is not the case.  We have information from many students who went to the health center with documented medical reasons to be on prescription contraceptives (endometriosis, ovarian cysts, dysmenorrhea) and were denied birth control.  We have not heard from any student who was prescribed hormonal contraceptives for any reason.

Step Two:  Identify Solutions

Our first solution was to ask the health center to update the website to reflect that students could not receive birth control prescriptions at Fordham.  This sounded easy and entirely reasonable!  We thought that it was a simple oversight on Fordham’s part not to include this information on their website.  We were wrong.

We began by writing a letter to the president of the University in October, explaining the situation and how it could be resolved.  We made this request from the position of consumers of Fordham’s health insurance looking for information, rather than as a group making demands.  We explained that adequate notice of Fordham’s policies were imperative in order to allow students to make the best decision regarding their health care.

We received an answer to our letter about two weeks after we sent it.  The response was basically that the University would look into making the communications and policies more clear.  (The website was eventually updated on January 23.)   Our follow-up questions to where these policies exist were met with a vague response stating the policy is reflected in the mission and tradition of the University.

At this point, we wanted to do something to draw attention to the issue and also something to help provide health care to the students who needed it.  And so we arrived at our next solution:  host a birth control clinic on or near campus!

Step Three:  Use the Resources in the Reproductive Justice Community to Make It Happen

Of course, we didn’t know exactly where to start.  We began by contacting the national LSRJ office, as well as some of our professors for names of doctors or nurse practitioners who would be willing to help us.  We were eventually put into contact with the amazing Institute for Family Health here in New York.  The doctors there were more than willing to come to Fordham to put on a clinic that would provide health care access to students.  They were also able to do this at no cost, which was a great help, since Fordham had asked us not to use any University funds for this event.

We also held our event just off campus at the New York Institute of Technology.  Fordham would not allow this event on campus.  NYIT was generous to provide us with a perfect space for the clinic without cost.

So we had an idea for an event (check), event space (check), doctors to prescribe birth control and answer questions (check), food (check – paid for by an anonymous donor), and prizes for reproductive rights jeopardy (check – thanks LSRJ!).  Now we just needed to let people know about the event.  We went to the press, submitting dozens of tips to any news source we could think of, which ended up being very successful.  The attention from the press led to even more support for our event, and we were able to get literature and support from other reproductive rights organizations, such as NARAL and Catholics for Choice.

Ginormous event poster - check! Photo of Leila and Emily in our lovely cafeteria courtesy of Bridgette.

During the event-planning process we ran into some roadblocks.  We weren’t able to put up posters around the law school advertising the event (our posters were not approved by Student Affairs), so we emailed the student body and asked students to put up mini-posters on their lockers that line the hallways of the law school.  We got an amazing response to this, and soon the school was full of posters anyway.  We also had some difficulties with our first space that we rented for the clinic.  We chose a space in a building just off campus that housed several floors of Fordham classrooms.  We thought that it would be convenient since students were already familiar with the space.  After we signed a rental contract, the organization refused to let us use the space. This was frustrating, and meant a time-consuming scramble for a new space, but we got it done.

So, how did it go?

Our birth control clinic and sexual health fair was a huge success!  Over one hundred people came to support us and forty women received birth control prescriptions.  The students who came engaged in small discussions around the room, and it was great to see many of the issues surrounding birth control at Fordham being hashed out.  It was also amazing to provide answers to questions that students had about Fordham policies or anything else, and to direct students to other resources when we did not know the answers.  We were so happy to have helped these students receive health care that they may not have received otherwise.

Lots of quality discussion! Photo courtesy of Fordham Observer.

Our event drew some local and national attention, largely due to the timing of the Department of Health and Human Services debating whether to extend the religious exemption to include religious universities in November and determining against this decision this January.  Our event was discussed in diverse media sources, such as Fox News, the New York Times, the Fordham Observer (here and here), Jezebel, RH Reality Check (here and here and here for podcast), Above the Law, the New York Daily News, Slate, the Huffington Post, the Daily Mail, and the National Catholic Register, among others.  We were interviewed for some of these publications, but not all.  In some cases, the authors of the articles misunderstood our event, and we made an effort to contact those authors to correct them in order to ensure our message was clear.  It was really interesting to read about our event in these sources, and to read the many (positive and negative) comments generated by those articles.

Bridgette being interviewed by Fox News. Photo courtesy of Emily.

We had our event attendees fill out a brief exit survey, which was helpful in determining how many people attended and the issues that mattered to them.  We received a lot of positive feedback from the students who attended, and got some great ideas for future birth control events.  For example, we heard several comments asking for “more diverse types and sizes of condoms” and “guest speakers for next time.”  My personal favorite piece of feedback was from an undergraduate who stated she said, “I posted about the event on my Facebook wall, and then got a message from my father, telling me to ‘grow up.’  Being conscious about my sexual health is growing up!”

This January, the University did update the website to address some of our concerns about the lack of clarity on Fordham’s policy.  We are glad that some progress was made.  The website now discusses birth control in two places – once in the FAQs and once in the Women’s Health Care section, where it is explicitly stated that “[n]either contraceptives nor birth control are distributed or prescribed on premises as a standard practice. Student Health Services does make limited exceptions for the treatment of medical conditions accompanied by supporting documentation.”  The language here is very clear, which we appreciate.  However, we still want to know what medical conditions are considered, of what severity, and what documentation students need if they have a medical reason to be prescribed oral contraceptives.  Given the requirement of documentation from and outside doctor, we also want to know why the people treating us aren’t allowed to make these diagnoses themselves.  We hope to continue working with Fordham to clarify these policies and educate students about the policies as much as possible.

Our impressions of this process left us in awe of the support that we received from the reproductive justice community.  We got many emails from students, professors, and alumni who were behind us.  We also were happy to see that it was really easy to put together the event with the support of the community.  But best of all, we helped Fordham women receive health care.

Emily T. Wolf, Vice-President, Fordham Law Students for Reproductive Justice

This blog is part of the #HERvotes blog carnival and is cross-posted from Fordham LSRJ’s blog.

After spending the past three semesters trying to understand Fordham University’s birth control prescription policy, we recently had a small victory when the University updated the health center’s website to clarify that birth control will not be prescribed at Fordham unless the student has a medical exception.  This victory came at the same time as a larger victory announced by the Department of Health and Human Services that a religious exemption to contraceptive coverage in health insurance will not be extended.

This is great news for students.  While insured students at Fordham and in New York are already covered by a New York state law that mandates insurance coverage for contraceptives (as well as students in 27 other states), this will ensure that all students who attend religious universities will be able to receive contraceptive at a more reasonable cost without a copay.  As we know, students are a vulnerable population (almost one in five young women ages 18-24 have experienced forced sexual intercourse) and low-cost contraception is an important part of being able to foster our own sexual health decisions.  Contraception can also ensure that students are able to decide when and how to parent children, which will certainly have an effect on students’ future careers.

Students of many different faiths and experiences attend religious universities.  While those in favor of a more broad religious exemption may have a problem with contraception as an imposition to their consciences, similar exemptions are already in place in over half of the states.  The Obama administration must continue to stand up for all of us to ensure that we receive the health care we need to survive and thrive.

Joanne Caceres, Harvard Law School

It is a cold and quiet month for Harvard LSRJ. Our “January Term” is winding down, a one month term where one can take a class, write a paper, or work at an externship, and it  means that Harvard students spread out across the country and organization activities slow down. But that’s not to say we’re not revving up for the spring! We are looking forward to our regional conference in February, our annual Sex-Ed Trivia event, and an in-the-works social justice conference centered around economic justice.

In addition, Harvard is offering an International Reproductive Rights Reading Group, which I and several LSRJ’ers will be eagerly participating in. The reading group coincides with one of our goals for our chapter this term, which is to put on at least one event about reproductive justice in the international sphere. Of course, there is also plenty going on domestically, and I am disappointed with politicians on the right and left (Mitt Romney’s statement that Griswold v. Connecticut may have been improperly decided and Obama’s support of Kathleen Sebelius’ reversal of the FDA’s recommendation to sell Plan B over the counter to minors both immediately come to mind). It all reminds me that it is an important time for lawyers who care about reproductive justice to be involved.

Susy Prochazka, Thomas Jefferson School of Law

*This post is part of a series written in support of Trust Women Week Silver Ribbon Campaign and the online virtual march from January 20-27. LSRJ is proud to partner with numerous orgs across the country – join the march by sending a message to your lawmakers today! And check back here throughout the week for more posts.

As the 39th anniversary of the Roe v. Wade Supreme Court decision came and went this weekend, the TJSL chapter was excited to celebrate the decision in a variety of ways. We have a great relationship with The Lawyers Club of San Diego, a local group that focuses on empowering women lawyers, and on Saturday they hosted  an educational luncheon titled “That Was Then, This is Now: Reproductive Rights Update,” highlighting recent changes in reproductive rights and justice legislation. After the panel, we attended a Roe v. Wade Anniversary Dinner, an annual event thrown by the Coalition for Reproductive Choice. This year, the dinner focused on the global reach of RJ issues, featuring speakers discussing local, national, and international fights for reproductive rights. Mary Fjerstad, Director of Medical Affairs & Pharmacovigilance at WomanCare, spoke on the global movement in the fields of reproductive health care.  Kimala Price, Professor, San Diego State University &  Board Member of SisterSong, provided the national perspective by presenting on the anti-choice and racist billboards that have cropped up in Atlanta and New York earlier in 2011. Lastly,  Shukri Adam, Public Health Nurse Consultant Somali & Arabic at the Central Region Public Health Center, spoke of the cultural gaps that female Somali immigrants face in California in regards to their pregnancies.

And the celebrating is far from done! In February, our school is hosting the National Women and the Law Conference, an annual conference that explores the different issues that women face in the legal realm.  Our chapter has established such a presence on campus in the past that this year our faculty advisor was chosen to direct this year’s conference, and she swiftly designated the theme of Reproductive Justice.  Some of our board worked extensively on the Conference committee, performing community outreach and assisting with the hunt for speakers. All this hard work on the part of our members paid off when Sarah Weddington agreed to be the Keynote speaker.

At each initial meeting of the semester, each of our LSRJ board members shares what RJ means to us. We then carry this theme of personalizing the movement throughout the year, with each board member striving to educate and encourage interest in his or her particular niche view of RJ. Roe is incredibly important to all of us, albeit in different ways.  Roe is important to Sarah, our VP of Events, because it expanded access to abortions, making it safer to obtain one. Roe is important to Margaret because it provided an avenue to lessen patriarchal dominance in the family, potentially aiding women in abusive relationships. Roe is important to Thomas as a matter of health law, increasing the autonomy of private medical decisions. To all of us, Roe represents a pivotal decision, advancing each of our respective areas of interest in the RJ movement. 

In the space of one month, our chapter will be celebrating the continuing importance of Roe v. Wade at three amazing events, all of which present different avenues of reproductive justice. While Roe is only one facet of the RJ movement, it illustrates that the law, while never a perfect answer to society’s problems, may nonetheless be used as a tool to shape social justice movements.

Susy Prochazka, Thomas Jefferson School of Law

In our TJSL chapter, each member of the board is passionate about a different facet of the RJ movement.  This brings a great energy to our board and ensures that no one is ever bored (pun intended). To encourage this same vitality amongst our newest members, we decided early in the semester to have a different member of the board present on the topic of his or her particular passion at each monthly meeting in order to show the array of topics that RJ spans. Traditionally, our meetings were more informational and social in nature; through these presentations, we sought to increase the educational aspect of the monthly meetings.

Our secretary Margaret bravely volunteered to be the guinea pig of this experiment. As an intern at our local YWCA’s domestic violence clinic, Margaret wanted to promote October as Domestic Violence Awareness month at our school, which had remained conspicuously silent on the topic of DV in the past. Margaret did not limit herself to making a mere powerpoint citing the statistics and warnings signs of DV.  She completely committed herself to promoting the cause at our meeting by making shirts and ribbons and arranging a team for the “Mile in Her Shoes” charity walk that benefits a downtown safehouse program. Margaret’s dedication and energy was apparent during the meeting, and afterwards, two attendees, both of whom were attending their first ever LSRJ meeting, promptly signed up for the charity walk and inquired about other ways to promote DV awareness!  We considered the meeting a great success.

I went next. My interests lie in the realm of international human rights, so I focused on the theme of cultural restrictions on a woman’s right to choose. I presented on issues affecting women internationally that limit their right to exercise bodily autonomy, discussing some of the practices that impose these restrictions, such as honor killings, female genital cutting, forced marriages, and debt peonage/sex slavery.  I am no public speaker, but I tamped down my anxiety and spoke about what I am passionate about: addressing these international RJ issues. Afterwards I discussed international human rights internships with several members.  While I did not make fabulous shirts, as Margaret had, we are now planning a road trip to L.A. to see the Skirbal Museum Exhibit on the international oppression of women. With my area of focus, I felt that I was able to reach different people in the audience than Margaret had, which seems like a positive goal to have, as we are constantly engaging members in different ways. It was an experience that really let me really expound upon the area of law that I find fascinating while simultaneously snagging the attention of members interested in international law and drawing them into the discussion.

By letting our diverse interests lead the meetings, we are able to present a variety of topics to our members. We are pretty pleased with the level of interest that our presentations have generated, and the practice will continue into next semester.   Fascinated by health law, our co-president Thomas is arranging a panel regarding the legal implications of the different birthing options, whether adoption, traditional midwifery or obstetricians.  We look forward to another semester of harnessing our various passions in the RJ movement and using them to ensure our chapter’s diversity and longevity.

Candace Gibson, University of Utah College of Law

Last week, the University of Utah Law Students for Reproductive Justice chapter held its first panel with the support of the awesome Women’s Law Caucus.  Why am I excited about the panel you ask? First, the panel was a discussion of what plans the Utah state legislature has in store for us in 2012.  We had an illustrious set of panelists that included: Salt Lake County Mayor Peter Corroon, State Representative Rebecca Chavez-Houck, Kimberly Myers from the Utah Health Policy Project, and Heather Stringfellow from Planned Parenthood Action Council of Utah.  All of the panelists provided insight into the political realities of working with the legislature and many issues that our student body did not know about, i.e., how do health care exchanges work.

Second, the panel added diversity to the routine doldrums of law school panels.  In my two years at the University of Utah, my peers and I have been inundated with panels that focus on job prospects in various legal fields and how to prepare oneself for these fields. With that being said, these panels are important, but at a certain point as a 3L, you already know what the panelists are going to say and you’re there because you didn’t bring any lunch.  I am glad to say that the UULSRJ panel turned out to be a panel that 30 other students wanted to attend.  It could be possible that they came for the food, but given the questions and comments that were said, it seemed like everyone really cared about women and families.

Third, the panel provided a forum to discuss women’s and family health issues that are rarely discussed at the law school.  This was the first time that the words, “abortion” and “family planning,” were publicly spoken outside of Constitutional Law I in a respectful and engaging manner.  There were many laughs but there were also many furrowed brows.  In essence, the panel established that UULSRJ will be an active, permanent addition to the student organizations at the University.  More importantly, the panel claimed public space for these important policy discussions that impact not just the general population, but that also impact women lawyers as individuals.  I think we have the tendency in law school to distance ourselves from the law to the point that we forget that we will also be personally affected by the law.

As for the UULSRJ board, we are all excited to plan another panel.  In the meantime, have a Happy Holidays!

Mallory Carlberg, University of Oklahoma

For the most part, our Law Students for Reproductive Justice (LSRJ) chapter at University of Oklahoma received positive feedback this semester. One person even said they liked being part of a group with “balls.” I, of course, corrected him and said we were a group with balls and ovaries. However, not everyone has enthusiastically supported us. Some groups fear working with us will alienate their pro-life members. A leader of one of these groups recently approached me about co-hosting an abortion debate. From previous experience as a student organizer, I know that debates about abortion are usually not a good idea. The debate tends to focus on religion and when life begins. In the process of debating, I have seen “pro-choice” groups lose sight of their original goal of supporting people with unplanned pregnancies.

Engaging in a pro-life/pro-choice style debate strays too far from the reproductive justice movement’s focus on ending reproductive oppression for my comfort. Instead of agreeing to an abortion debate with this group, I offered to discuss goals we can both work toward, such as comprehensive sex education, improved access to birth control, and improved maternal and infant health outcomes. This person was a proponent of abstinence until marriage and even suggested that some common forms of birth control were abortifactants. It was hard to find common ground, but I know there are other students who can look past LSRJ’s stance on abortion rights.

Since we are a new group, we’ve mostly focused on finding students who we consider our natural allies in the reproductive justice movement: feminists, progressives, people of color and LGBTQ-identified students. Next semester we want to co-sponsor events with groups who we might not initially consider as our natural allies: religious groups and conservative groups. We have to be strategic about what events we bring to campus. Organizing for reproductive justice in a conservative state means we must be careful to stay true to our beliefs, while, at the same time, not reinforcing the beliefs of students who have preconceived ideas of us as man-hating, baby-killing feminists. Sometimes we do the stereotypical thing (we’re excited to be the group handing out condoms on campus!), but sometimes we must decline invitations to cosponsor events because it will hurt our objectives rather than promote them.

Have you successfully organized with conservative groups on your campus? Please send your advice my way!

Joanne Caceres, Harvard Law School

Things are busy as ever as the members of HLSRJ finally dive into our long planned Speak Out Week, which aims to engage the HLS student body in honest exchanges about reproductive health, listen to and share personal stories about reproductive choices, and explore the ways in which access to abortion and other reproductive services intersect with larger social movements. Kicking off our week, our first event was “Bro-Choice,” an event geared towards men and their role in the movement. I am happy to report that we had exceptional attendance and that several men signed up for our weekly email list. We are excited for further exploration into engaging men on campus!

Other events this week include two intersectional panels, one featuring women of color and the pro-choice movement, with Gretchen Sisson, Reverend Penny Willis, Jasmine Burnett and Kaitlyn Soligan; and one featuring different religious perspectives on reproductive justice, with Reverend Marvin Ellison, Rabbi Peter Stein, Reverend Matthew Westfox, and Prof. Daniel Dombrowski. As with all of our events, cross promotion and co-sponsorships greatly contribute to our success. Thanks to our partnership with students from the Harvard Kennedy School, we will be screening of 12th and Delaware followed by a conversation with NARAL Pro-Choice MA.

We are also speaking out using Facebook, our LSRJ website, posters, and word of mouth. We have asked HLS and other greater Boston students share their own reproductive health stories, in the hope that doing so will open up a more honest and nuanced conversation regarding the choices women make throughout their lives. To contextualize these stories more effectively, Julia Reticker-Flynn from Advocates for Youth will join us for a strategy discussion regarding how and why to share abortion stories. We encourage all students reading this to also contribute to our survey or tell us what pro-choice means to them in our new tumblr! We hope our events will inspire other groups on other campuses to Speak Out as well!

Burke Bindbeutel, University of Missouri School of Law

Although Mizzou Law is located in what some call “red state America,” our LSRJ chapter has seldom encountered any hostility or opposition from anti-choice groups. Even the picketers outside Columbia’s Planned Parenthood have a dogged, resigned vibe. The hardest thing for our reproductive justice activism to overcome is the visceral reaction that our issues can induce in students.

I was making my schpiel for LSRJ at 1L orientation, taking care to maintain a friendly and upbeat tone. When I mentioned awareness of sexual assault, I heard sharp intakes of breath from several different points in the room, and a softly muttered “Jesus!” Perhaps I was too imagistic in describing a problem that is a serious issue on ours and every campus. But I was disappointed in the hypersensitivity of the student body. Don’t lawyers have to deal with uncomfortable subject matter all the time?

Martha Nussbaum takes on just this kind of kneejerk dismissal in her book “From Disgust to Humanity.” Nussbaum takes a cue from the New Hampshire legislator who denounced at a state Judiciary Committee hearing the act of “taking the penis of one man and putting it in the anus of another man and wriggling it around in excrement.” It’s only natural that someone who can barely countenance the idea of homosexual contact is light years away from asserting the reproductive rights of her constituents. Nussbaum describes a serious need to break through the reflex of revulsion in order to ensure the reproductive rights.

I have detected the same reflex in the law school building where I lately spend all my waking life. It’s not that my peers are stridently or unanimously anti-choice, or believers in the personhood of fetuses. It’s that they would prefer to think about anything other than forced Caesarean sections or syphilitic penises. (Prison rape jokes bafflingly remain in bounds).

At our screening of the Wednesday webinar “If You Care About Criminal Justice, You Should Care About Reproductive Justice,” we had a first-time attendee who took notes and appeared to have a thoughtful and critical attitude. He seemed like just the sort of curious and open-minded student that we seek to reach.

We were sharing reactions after the program’s conclusion, and our visitor confessed to shock over the suggestion that a mother could ever opt for a vaginal birth after having had a past Caesarean. I responded that the speaker phrased the issue not as a recommendation of vaginal birth, but as a defense of the mother’s bodily integrity. Reproductive justice would prevail, I offered, once the decision belonged to the mother, rather than to the health care provider, law enforcement officer or judge. But it was all our visitor could do not to shake his head in disgust.

I believe that the issues LSRJ has identified and pursued have workable solutions that are politically feasible. But meaningful engagement of future lawyers is so difficult because of a firewall of disgust that prevents them from taking positions. Nonetheless, university campuses are places to wrestle with ideas, and Mizzou LSRJ has a great opportunity to engage students and change minds.