Legislating Women's Bodies
[UPBEAT MUSIC]
- Welcome to the
Let's Talk CJ podcast.
I am your host, Dr.
Pat Nelson, a member
of the Department of Criminal
Justice at Minnesota State
University, Mankato.
Thank you for joining us as
we explore different topics
about criminal justice
and also profile
current and retired
professionals
from the criminal
justice system.
We hope you learn
some new things
about these topics and amazing
people, so please enjoy.
Today, we are talking with
Dr. Laura Harrison, who
is the chair of the
Department of History
and Gender Studies at Minnesota
State University, Mankato.
Dr. Harrison received her
doctorate in gender studies
from Indiana University.
Her most recent book
project, Losing Sleep--
Risk, Responsibility,
and Infant Sleep Safety,
takes on socially
constructed beliefs
about infant safety,
including how medicine, law,
and policy reward some parents
while punishing others.
Her first book, Brown Babies--
sorry, let's try that again--
Brown Bodies, White
Babies, the Politics
of Cross-Racial Surrogacy,
examines the implications
of surrogacy arrangements for
contemporary understandings
of race, kinship, and gender.
She works on subjects ranging
from reproductive justice,
surrogacy, representations of
motherhood, race, and public
health, and gender and feminist
backlash, appears in journals,
including Signs, Frontiers,
Feminist Formations, Genders,
Feminist Media Studies, and
Women's Studies International.
She also serves on the advisory
board for the Minnesota State
Mankato Scholars
Serving Time Program.
Thank you for joining
us today, Dr. Harrison,
to talk about legislating
women's bodies.
- Thanks for having me.
- So I know I just said
legislating women's bodies.
It's a large concept.
Could you give us an overview
before we start talking
about specific examples?
- Sure.
So when we talk about
legislating women's bodies,
we're thinking about
ways that women
are policed,
criminalized, or targeted
for issues that may
be reproductive,
particularly issues that relate
to pregnancy, to childbearing,
and the way that the law focuses
on controlling or limiting
women's reproductive autonomy.
- So I know many
of our listeners
have heard of the
women's suffrage movement
to get the right to vote.
But we're moving way past that.
We're talking about
specifically things
that women physically are
penalized for or maybe judged
for.
So maybe let's jump into
the most controversial
and the biggest case
in the last year,
talking about Dobbs versus
Jackson Women's Health
Organization, which
addressed Roe versus Wade.
So can you give us an overview
in how that impacts women?
- Right.
So in 1973, the Roe
versus Wade gave women
a constitutionally
protected right
to abortion in
the United States,
which was later
divided by trimester
in terms of when the state
can intervene on that right
to abortion.
And the Dobbs v.
Jackson decision
overturned Roe v.
Wade, which meant
that the right to abortion
went back to the States
to decide whether or not
women would have access
to abortion rights.
And that is a perfect example
of legislating women's bodies
because the state
then has the right
to determine whether women
have access to what is often
considered just general health
care in terms of their access
to an abortion.
- Right.
And I think it's
important to note--
and you'll probably
agree with me--
abortion is a medical procedure.
And there's many ways
that it could happen.
And there's many reasons
why it could happen.
And before Roe versus Wade,
it was up to each state
to identify that in
legislation, if they decided to.
But Roe v. Wade gave the
national protection for that,
but they took that
National protection away.
- Exactly.
And I think that it
is important for us
to understand that
that does not mean
that all women
don't have the right
to an abortion at this time.
In the state of
Minnesota, for example,
we've actually expanded
women's access to abortion
since the Dobbs v.
Jackson decision.
So it really depends on
what state you live in.
But what researchers find
is that the factor that
impacts women's ability to
access abortion the most
is their economic status.
So low-income women
and women of color,
prior to the overturn
of Roe and today,
have the most limited access
to that health care because
of things like transportation
barriers to a clinic,
especially now, if a
clinic is not available
in your state, childcare
issues, and, of course, cost.
- Well, and doesn't this
also impact just general
reproductive health care?
Like, an OB-GYN may decide
to not practice in a state
because they're worried about
the state restrictions on that.
And haven't we seen some
OB-GYNs actually flee states
so that they don't
get caught up in that?
- Yeah, absolutely.
There was a case
in Indiana in which
a young girl was raped
and became pregnant
as a result of a rape.
And I believe what happened is
her OB did perform the abortion
but was then under
scrutiny for whether or not
that violated the law
in the state of Indiana.
So it's raising really
thorny issues for health care
providers about whether or
not they're putting themselves
in legal peril by
performing, again, really
basic acts of health
care for women and girls.
- Well, and think this is also
bleeding over into things such
as sexual assault victims who
are asking for what's known
as the morning-after pill
and that kind of medication.
That medication right now is
in a fight in Texas courts
that they think will go to the
Supreme Court about access.
So how does that impact our
victims of sexual assault
and what kind of health
care they can get?
- It's a good example
of how politics impact
our understanding of science and
medicine because technologies
like the morning-after
pill are not what we call
abortifacients, meaning they
don't cause an abortion.
Intrauterine devices, IUDs,
do not cause an abortion.
And medicine is quite
clear on this issue.
But if you were to listen to
political debates, for example,
you might hear people say
that the morning-after pill is
an abortion pill.
And you really have to use
your critical thinking skills
to be able to think
and do some research
and understand
what you're hearing
and whether or not it's
medically accurate.
- Well, and before we leave
Dobbs versus Jackson Women's
Health Organization,
I think this is also
a good example of how
people thought that once
the Roe versus Wade Supreme
Court decision was locked in,
and it set a precedent,
and it actually
faced quite a few
challenges, that the people
on the legislative side
never took the step
to codify in our legislation
this same protection.
And now we're seeing
that not only this one,
but several other
cases are being
overturned, even though
precedents are actually
existing.
Minnesota was a forerunner.
We put it right into
our state constitution.
But we're seeing other states
around us now scrambling.
And now they're scrambling
at the federal level too.
So it's a good example
of how you have
to have both branches working.
You can't just rely
on one or the other.
- It's raising concerns
for other human rights,
like gay marriage and even
interracial marriage, that
are being questioned of whether
or not those Supreme Court case
decisions that gave
us those rights
could be overturned in the same
way and, like you're saying,
whether or not
states need to ensure
that we have those written
into our constitution
at a state level.
- Actually, we're
seeing one come up
about people that have
a domestic restraining
order against them.
There's a case that's being
brought to the Supreme Court
about overturning a 1994
amendment that they could not
have guns.
So we're bringing back
that gun violence scare.
- Mm-hmm.
- All right, so let's
talk about contraception.
I'm sure most people don't
realize it took a Supreme Court
case to ensure that a married
woman could get contraception.
Can you speak to that at all?
- Yeah.
So there were two important
Supreme Court cases,
Griswold v. Connecticut
and Eisenstadt v. Baird,
that decided when married people
could access contraception
and when single people
could access contraception.
And those were
relatively recently.
And I think, again,
contraception, we assume,
is somewhat settled in that
access to contraception
is a basic component
of bodily autonomy,
meaning your right
to control your body.
But we shouldn't feel
so sure about that
because the intent to limit
access to contraception
is closely linked to
limiting abortion.
And both of those, again, are--
they come from a desire
to control and limit
bodily autonomy.
- And I know we are talking
about Supreme Court cases.
And those that work in the
criminal justice system
might be thinking, well,
that's nothing to do with me.
But before 1965,
you could have been
called to a doctor's
office to arrest
a woman who was married that
was requesting contraception.
I mean, technically,
it was against the law.
So it's something
to think about.
- Totally.
- So let's move away
from the Supreme Court
and talk about how we
criminalize women's
bodies in different ways.
Should we start with pregnancy
and how that happens?
- Yeah.
So I was just reviewing a
really important article by--
Paltrow and Flavin
are the authors--
that looked at cases between--
they looked from 1973 to 2005.
And they found 400
cases, which is surely
an undercount, but
400 cases of women
who had been
targeted for arrest,
detention, or forced
intervention because
of their pregnancy.
And some of the main
themes that they
found of what women
were being arrested for
or have these
forced interventions
were things like women
who had miscarriages
that were then investigated
as potential crimes--
and we've only seen an increase
in this in recent years--
women who were wanting to
deliver their babies naturally
vaginally and instead were
forced to have C-sections.
They found women who were
arrested for using drugs
while pregnant, even cases
where women were arrested
for using drugs while pregnant
and then charges were dropped
if they had an abortion,
which is creating
a lot of coercive pressure
on women not to continue
their pregnancies, especially
women who have other children
and fear what could
happen with their families
if they're arrested or
if they're imprisoned.
Could definitely
feel coerced not
to continue those pregnancies
if they're drug users.
It also really creates
barriers to women seeking
help for drug addiction
while pregnant
if they fear that
they will be detained
or have their other children
removed from their custody
- Did that article talk
at all about punishments
for those that were arrested?
Did they end up
getting sent to prison?
Did it talk to
anything about that?
- Yeah.
There's a wide array
of punishments.
Women were charged with
things like child abuse.
I think it's really
fascinating if you
look at cases of women who
are charged with child abuse
while they're pregnant, because
what ends up happening is,
often, laws that
were not created
for this specific intention are
utilized in unexpected ways.
For example, women who test
positive for drugs when they're
pregnant will be charged with
child abuse for the period
of time before the cord is cut.
So after the child has
come out of the womb,
but the umbilical cord
is still connected.
They'll be charged with, like,
delivering drugs to a minor.
- Oh my gosh.
Wow.
- Mm-hmm.
Another example
of that, the kind
of laws that are used in
unexpected ways, some of us
may remember the
Laci Peterson case.
She was a woman who was
murdered by her husband when
she was about to deliver, nine
months pregnant or something.
And after that case,
there were laws
put in place that
would punish someone
further if they killed a
pregnant woman, the idea
being that there are two, quote,
unquote, "lives" being affected
by that murder.
So its intention was to
protect pregnant women
but has been used
since then to charge
women who have miscarriages.
- Wow.
Well, in Minnesota
here, we have a statute
for murder of an unborn
child and manslaughter
of an unborn child.
I had not even thought
that that could be
used against the woman herself.
Wow.
- It's so tricky
because, again, if we
look at it on the surface,
we might say, of course,
if a family's expecting a
baby and something happens
that causes the death of
both the mother and the baby,
that is a crime that's more
severe in certain ways.
But what we see is it introduces
this idea of personhood,
viewing the fetus
as a separate person
from the pregnant woman that has
been twisted in ways that then
go after pregnant women if
they're suspected of activities
that could have
harmed the fetus.
And when I say that some people
may think, oh, activities,
again, like, drug use
or like, I don't know,
wild things that you could
do that could harm your baby.
But I don't mean that.
I mean falling down
the stairs, riding
on a boat in choppy water,
going downhill skiing when
you're four months pregnant.
These are the kind
of things that women
can and have been investigated
for if they have a miscarriage.
And it should really
concern all of us.
- Oh, yeah.
Absolutely.
Because you're right.
When you first said
that, I'm like,
oh, maybe drug use,
maybe jumping off
of buildings, things
that seem really
dangerous, but
everyday activities,
and they could get
charged for that.
Wow.
So along with pregnancy,
what about the loss
of a young child?
We know SIDS is a legitimate
thing that happens.
But there are several--
I mean, there are several
steps to the investigations.
And have you seen
a criminalization
of the death of young children,
especially towards the mother?
- Yes.
So my most recent book that
you mentioned, Losing Sleep,
one of the chapters looked at
29 cases of parents who were
charged in some way criminally--
the charges varied quite
a bit--
after they had an infant
who died while co-sleeping.
And co-sleeping just
refers to any sleep surface
that's shared between
an adult and an infant.
So it could be sleeping
in a bed with a baby.
It could be sleeping
on a couch or a chair
with a baby, a mattress on the
floor, any kind of environment.
There's a lot of evidence
to suggest that co-sleeping
is, in fact, not
dangerous for infants
if it's not done alongside
other risk factors.
Like, if you smoke
cigarettes, you
shouldn't sleep with the baby.
If you're taking sleeping pills
or using drugs or alcohol,
you shouldn't sleep
with the baby.
Parents have to be really well
informed about safety, right?
But these are cases
in which parents
were charged with a death
or with some sort of crime
after their child died
while co-sleeping.
And like you said, sudden
infant death syndrome
is what's diagnosed if a
child under the age of one
dies and there's no
cause that can be found.
So co-sleeping complicates this
because if a child is found
in an adult bed, an
infant, then the argument
can be made that
there is a cause
and that that cause
could be suffocation.
In fact, there is
no physiological way
to differentiate between
sudden infant death syndrome
and suffocation, which
seems kind of surprising,
but it's true.
- Right.
Right.
- So in these cases,
parents were charged.
And what I found was
that typically, there
were three themes of
parents who were charged.
They were charged if they had
had more than one child who
died as an infant.
Like, if they had a previous
child who died of SIDS,
they were more
likely to be charged,
which is sort of
illogical because SIDS
can reoccur in siblings.
We don't understand
the cause of SIDS.
They're more likely
to be charged
if they had been
previously counseled
not to co-sleep with a child.
This is really disturbing
to me because it suggests
that public health education
can be used as a tool
sort of weaponized against you.
We would hope that all parents
would receive education
about how their infant
should sleep safely.
And then third, if
those parents had
a history of drug
or alcohol abuse
and if drug or alcohol
abuse was not connected
to the death of that child.
- Well, I actually
saw this firsthand.
And one of the calls I
went on in Minneapolis
was an infant that died
during co-sleeping.
And the mother was
treated like a suspect.
And I felt so bad
for her because I
was with the first
responding officer.
And I saw how
devastated she was.
And then I saw her go
through the process.
They ended up not charging her.
But I mean, she spent
the first two days
after the death of
her five-month-old
being considered the suspect.
And it had to be devastating.
I mean, it was a hard
call to go to anyway,
but that had to be devastating.
- There's really interesting
gendered things around that.
For one thing, mothers are
more likely to be the ones who
are suspected in that
case because mothers
are the primary
caregivers of infants.
So the person who was last
in contact with that infant
is going to be the
first one who's
questioned as to what happened.
And therefore, that's
more likely to be moms.
Also, things like, when
you read police reports
about these cases, if
their house was dirty,
if they just don't have a
clean home, that's always
mentioned in the police report.
Again, that speaks to our
ideas about a good mother
and good women and how
they care for their homes
and their families.
In trial transcripts,
they'll talk
about piercings and tattoos
that women have to sort of speak
to their overall character.
So it's really interesting
to see how the expectations
we have about being
a good mom impact
how we criminalize
and then even attempt
to legislate those actions.
- Well, and you're bringing
up the definition of child
neglect, which is in statute.
They tell you, look at the
condition of the house.
How much food is in the fridge?
Is there food sitting out?
Well, we all have
different definitions
of what's a clean house.
And it depends on when
you've just walked in.
I mean, if it's just
right after dinner,
it's probably going to
look like everything's out.
So, oh, yeah.
So before we go
past women, I know
we have seen women who are
users of drugs, especially
like fentanyl and meth and some
of the more current ones, where
we've seen them arrested
because they've used drugs
and their children
are with them.
But we don't see
their male counterpart
charged with that
child abuse, even
if they're both in the same
car or both in the same area.
Have you seen
anything about that?
Is that aligning
with the research?
- I mean, I saw similar things
with this with the parents who
were arrested after co-sleeping.
There was a case of a mother
who wasn't even in the room.
She put the baby to
bed in the same bed
as her partner, male partner.
She went to take a bath.
When she came back, the
baby was unresponsive,
so she called 911.
There was drug
paraphernalia in the home--
again, not evidence that she
had been using or her partner
had been using at that time.
But she was the one who
was arrested and charged
for child endangerment,
child abuse.
There's a huge range
of charges with this.
And there was no mention of
him being charged at all.
So again, I think it's that kind
of social assumption we have
that women are the
ones who are ultimately
responsible for child safety.
And it's important to say
too that the factors that
lead to things like
unexplained child death
are prematurity, birth defects.
They're things that are tied to
structural racism and poverty,
not the bad choices of mothers.
- Right.
Right.
So, well, let's stay
in this age range.
What about-- I mean, we've seen,
especially with social media,
about people being confronted
about breastfeeding in public
and breastfeeding in areas
that other people don't
think are appropriate and even
police being called on it.
What are your thoughts on that?
And how is that
impacting everybody?
- Yeah.
I think that's really
interesting, especially
in Minnesota, you have a
right to breastfeed in public.
But I mean, as your
listeners know,
having the right
to do something,
having the law on your
side doesn't necessarily
mean that if an individual
confronts you or an institution
that you're in confronts you,
that you have any ability
to enforce that right.
So there are commonly cases
where women will be told,
you can't breastfeed here.
Let me show you where
the bathroom is.
Ew.
Ew.
- Yeah.
Yeah.
- As a person who has
breastfed in public,
the last place I would take
my baby to breastfeed would be
in the bath-- do you want
to eat in the bathroom?
- No, thank you.
No.
- Or do you want to eat with a
blanket over your face, which
is the other thing that
women are often told.
Cover that up, right?
That's not a comfortable way
for infants to eat, either.
- Well, and that even kind of
speaks to what is considered
indecent, is the focus on
breasts being indecent, where
men can walk around
without shirts on,
and women can't,
even though there
are men that have some
larger breasts than women
we have seen.
So there is a
fascination with that.
- My children are
obsessed with this.
They're 11 and 9.
And when we see men that
don't have a shirt on,
they'll say, why can they walk
around without their shirts
on and women have to wear a bra
or women have to wear a shirt?
And the answer is
that it's entirely
a social construction,
what parts of the body
we deem to be sexual,
and the fact that we
deem women's breaths
to be sexualized,
even when they're
serving a function
of keeping an infant alive.
- Right.
Well, and we do know
people that weaponize this.
So even though it's
legal in Minnesota
to breastfeed in public,
it doesn't stop somebody
from calling 911.
And even I, as a responding
officer might know it's legal.
And I have to walk up.
And it's still embarrassing
that now the police
have been called.
You may not even know
the police are called.
And they may not even
come and talk to you.
But they talk to the caller,
and you know why they're there.
It's still an embarrassment.
And it's still using
the law against you
to provide that embarrassment.
Yeah.
- Yeah.
I mean, you can tell
me the answer to this,
but I would imagine that
if an officer is called,
they probably don't have
much choice but to respond,
even if they know the person
has not committed a crime
or isn't responsible.
And then, like you
said, the public shaming
and embarrassment results,
even if the officer themselves
is saying, I'm sorry
this is happening.
I know you're not
doing anything wrong.
- Right.
Right.
And that's exactly it,
because like I said, on that,
I would respond.
I'm like, this is not an issue.
But I still have to
talk to the caller.
And then the person
who was called on
is going to know why the caller
called because there's probably
been some sort of statement
or confrontation about it.
And that's just going to be
embarrassing, no matter what.
So let's talk a little bit
about forced sterilization.
I know that it's not as
prevalent now as it was.
But can you explain
what that was
and how, legally,
that could happen?
- Yeah, absolutely.
I talked about this with
my class for an hour and 40
minutes yesterday.
If you're interested, take
Health, Wealth, and Power.
Yeah, so the history of forced
sterilization in the United
States is really
shocking to those
who maybe aren't familiar
with this, that in the United
States, forced sterili--
well, when we say
forced sterilization,
what we're referring to
is both men and women
having their reproductive
capacity surgically eliminated
or limited without
their full consent.
So for men, that could
look like vasectomies.
For women, that could look
like tubal ligations primarily.
And in the United States
for many years, the state,
the government actively
wrote forced sterilization
into the law, meaning
that there were-- again,
to return to the Supreme Court,
there were Supreme Court cases,
like that of Buck v. Bell, which
said that states have the right
to limit the reproductive
capacity of those
who are deemed unfit.
That unfitness could
mean that someone
had a physical disability, had
a developmental disability,
mental health issues.
Perhaps they were a
criminal, because the belief
was that these traits, abstract
traits that we would, today,
not consider-- most of
us wouldn't consider
to be heritable, like
intelligence or criminality,
were considered to be things
that would be passed down
to one's children.
So kids who ended up
in juvenile facilities
were often sterilized
based on the belief
that it would be better
for society if they
didn't have any more children.
And while those laws are
no longer on the books,
we still see really recent
cases of forced sterilization.
I would highly recommend
the documentary film,
Belly of the Beast.
It's about forced sterilization
in California prisons
just a few years ago, women
that were going in for--
they might have a
cyst on their ovaries
or other relatively
minor reproductive issues
and wouldn't even be told
that they had been sterilized.
- Wow.
I will have to watch that.
- They would be told they need
a full hysterectomy, which
is the removal of the ovaries,
the uterus, the fallopian
tubes without any actual
medical reason for this,
but, again, based on the idea
that if a woman's in prison,
she must be bad.
And she she's a
bad mom and doesn't
deserve to have any more
children or have any.
Some of the women had
never had children at all.
So unfortunately,
there's reports
of forced sterilizations
in ICE facilities,
Immigration and-- what is it?
Immigration and--
- Immigration and
Customs Enforcement.
- Customs Enforcement.
Thank you.
In ICE facilities in
Georgia in 2020, 2021.
- Well, and that kind of segues
into the right of women to keep
their children with them.
We've been seeing
this, especially
down on the southern
border, where
children are being forcibly
removed from their mothers.
Well, kind of somewhat
their fathers.
But many of them come
with their mothers.
But that's not isolated
throughout our history.
That's happened quite
often, hasn't it?
- Yes.
And I mean, if we look at--
Native American children
were historically removed
from their family, again,
based on the idea that it would
be better for them to
assimilate to white culture
than to be raised in
Native American cultures.
And I think what you're getting
at, which is really important,
is that when we think
about reproductive rights,
a term you might hear more
today is reproductive justice
because it gets at
what you're indicating,
which is that we can't
just think about things
like abortion and contraception,
things that limit our ability
to have children, and that we
need that right, which we do.
I would argue that
we absolutely do.
But also, we deserve--
it's a human right to
be able to have children
and to raise the
children we have
in safe and healthy
environments.
So when we think about
forced sterilization
and when we think
about child removal,
that's part of a reproductive
justice framework
because we have to protect
the right of people
to have and to raise
their children,
as well as to choose when and
how many children to have.
- Well, that even
dovetails into,
we have criminal
justice agencies
at every level in
the United States
that don't have maternity
policies, that you could
be pulled out of
working in a jail,
you could be pulled working
from patrol if you get pregnant,
and you may not have a job.
And that falls into that
reproductive justice,
is you have to choose between
your job, your career,
your livelihood,
and having a child.
And there is no
protection for that.
There's no legislative
protection for that.
- Right.
Because there's some
sort of implicit coercion
not to have children
if you know that you'll
be put on a desk or you're
going to lose the opportunities
that you need to
advance in your career.
My aunt was an
ironworker, Chicago.
So she worked in super,
super high buildings, clipped
to things, doing ironwork.
And when she was pregnant,
after a certain point,
they told her she had to stop
working because they literally
didn't make, like, Carhartts--
the guys did-- that would
fit a pregnant body.
And so they were
like, I guess you're
done now until the baby's born.
And she said, I don't want to.
I can't afford not to work.
I can't afford to stop working.
But because she was a woman
in a job that's traditionally
considered a masculine career,
she was limited in that way.
- Yeah.
Well, like I said,
we see that all
through public safety, EMTs, and
some even health care workers.
I mean, it's hard to work
in the emergency room.
So we do still see that.
It's not always on
the criminal side.
It could impact you
professionally as well.
It can impact your life.
And if you're
victimized, obviously, it
could impact there too.
- And those ideas
are based on concepts
about protecting women.
And we don't really see
similar parallels with men,
even though there are
definitely jobs that can
impact men's fertility as well.
But there have been a
lot more restrictions
on women's employment
based on alleged concerns
about the impacts
on their fertility
or the safety of
their pregnancies,
which, again, it
tells us something
about the way we think about
motherhood and fatherhood.
And that harms men and women.
- Right.
It does.
Well, I think we're coming
to the end of our time.
Did you have any ideas
you want to wrap up with,
things that we haven't touched
on yet that interest you?
Or what are you watching
out for in the future
for your daughters?
- Yeah.
I mean, I realized after I
had said this that I actually
misspoke when we were talking
about the young girl in Indiana
who was sexually assaulted, and
then it was difficult for her
to obtain an abortion.
She was 11.
And I remember that
because my daughter is 11.
- Right.
- And the idea of my child,
who can't go to bed without me
reading her a book
and tucking her in
at night, being forced to
continue a pregnancy literally
makes me feel sick.
So I think we
can't, in Minnesota,
just rest on the assumption
that we're protected here
because there are ways
that that can change.
And so I think that's what
concerns me about my daughters.
And I know people with
kids slightly older
than mine who said, I've
started stockpiling Plan B
because I'm afraid that it won't
be available to my daughters
when they need it.
So I guess, yeah,
thinking about the future
of reproductive justice for
my children is concerning.
Also, I'm very
committed to working
with women who are in prison.
And thinking about the
reproductive rights
and limitations for women
who are incarcerated
is also something that is
really meaningful to me.
- Well, and it's almost scary,
but we have to tell women now,
when you apply for a job and
they offer health insurance,
you're going to
have to ask them,
will my health insurance cover
contraception, because there
are companies that can
opt out of that now,
which just seems illogical.
But yeah, there's a lot.
Well, thank you, Dr. Harrison.
I so appreciate your time.
And I know you and I could
talk for hours about this.
And you teach some
awesome classes on this.
But I thank you for your time.
- Yeah.
Thank you so much.
[UPBEAT MUSIC]
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