Planned Parenthood not a Racist Organization

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[email protected]

To the Editor.

In an unneeded and inappropriate insert published by the Human Life Alliance entitled Think outside the Box and handed out with the March 22nd edition of the Collegian, found among all of the lies and scare tactics was an article on “Reproductive Racism” that spouted the laughable theory that Planned Parenthood is a racist organization. What was brought up as evidence was century old connections between Margaret Sanger the founder of Plan Parenthood and the American Eugenics Society. I am by no means an expert on the history of Planned Parenthood sad to say, but I do know that the picture made of Margaret Sanger was extremely misleading, what one gets from reading this segment found on pg. 9 of the insert is that Mrs. Sanger was an elite racist. One look into her background and you can find nothing of the sort, she in fact was a radical socialist (some even would classify anarchist). She worked hard for the rights of all minorities including woman of all races. She saw birth control and family planning as a necessity for woman to be able to be in full control over their own bodies. You see there was a time when woman where the subordinates of their male counterparts and sex was a duty of servitude. Without the sweat and blood that woman like Margaret Sanger gave society might still be as such. I am not denying that the American Eugenics Society in there role of effecting in a very negative way American public policy, but to say that a majority of feminists saw a correlation between there fights for civil rights and the eugenic society’s agenda is a very unfortunate and misleading lie.The sad fact remains that today minority and poverty stricken woman fair fare worse in their access to equal health treatment, especially when it comes to equal reproductive rights. Planned Parenthood and like other like minded organizations do great work in providing education and family planning services to these segments of society, they are not, nor ever have been working toward the creation of a master race.

Patrick QueryBrookings, SDSenior Political Science Education Major. 605-691-1197