" from the hell of having her life ruled by blind chance."
What a chilling thought. Hard for us to even imagine what women went through then? Forced to have sex, forced to get pregnant, forced to wear out and die in the drudgery of mere existence. No reproductive choice. Prevented by men, other brainwashed Christian women, and the politicians...to submit to whatever was done to her--and then to watch as her kids died from starvation, disease, and violence? How lucky we are today, that brave humanitarians went to jail over and over again so that ordinary people could live like human beings with high heads and a straight back.
What a wonderful nurse--what a wonderful human being--Margaret Sanger was! A TRUE HERO to humanity.
"It is doubtless hard for young people who read about birth control in magazines and newspapers, who hear it discussed from lecture platforms and pulpits, to realize the bigotry which blocked the movement in its early days. The first birth control clinic in America, which I opened in the crowded slums of Brooklyn twenty-one years ago, was closed by the police as a “public nuisance,” and I and my co-workers were arrested. As the patrol wagon carried us away to the police station, one young women, who had come too late to get advice, ran after us crying and sobbing: “Save me, save me, come back and save me.”
She wanted to be saved from the fear of unwanted pregnancies, from the torture and black despair of bringing into the world children which she could not feed or care for, from the hell of having her life ruled by blind chance.
"Young people today can plan their lives. They can decide when and how often to undertake parenthood. Modern methods of birth control permit them to consciously plan their future. No longer need they start out on their honeymoon, outwardly rejoicing, but inwardly filled with fear of the unknown."
Margaret Sanger |
