“Voluntary motherhood” is a concept coined by feminist activists to jump-start the birth control rights movement in the nineteenth-century (Davis, 1981). At the time, the idea of a woman refusing sexual advances from their husbands was controversial and was interpreted as an act of political resistance. Davis (1981) proclaims that birth control rights are necessary for all women’s full participation in society, a sentiment still just as controversial as women refusing to have sex with their husbands to avoid unwanted pregnancies. Davis (1981) describes birth control as an, “individual choice, safe contraception methods, as well as abortions when necessary”. While many women did and still agree with Davis’s sentiment, the early birth control…show more content… Even the concept of “voluntary motherhood” neglected the lives of nonwhite middle-class women, as they could not afford the same “choices” as privileged women (Davis, 1981). This epistemological framework based on “voluntary motherhood” or free choice, has thus been deeply imbedded in the modern day reproductive rights movement. For instance, Andrea Smith (2005) describes the current pro-life/pro-choice dichotomy as being rooted in the early birth control movement or what Davis might refer to as “voluntary motherhood”. In fact, Smith (2005) would even argue that this dichotomy masks out nation’s racist and capitalist structures that continue to oppress people of color and other underrepresented social…show more content… A movement that once had potential was now intrinsically racist and classist. As Davis (1981) describes the phenomena, “it had been robbed of its progressive potential, advocating for people of color not the individual right to birth control, but rather the racists strategy of population control” (p. 361). The privileged leaders in the reproductive rights movement popularized in the 1970s, during the women’s movement, failed to look at history and recognize the pitfalls in a “choice”
