virtual event; open to the public
including all mentees, mentors & alum
Join Girls Write Now for an important and timely Salon as a part of our celebration of Women’s History Month.
A central tenet of the women’s liberation movement is speaking and writing about common-but-silenced experiences like abortion. Writing and truth-telling has been and continues to be crucial in the fight for women’s full human rights.
Reproductive rights icon Merle Hoffman will discuss her work creating one of the nation’s first abortion clinics, the role of writing in that work, and why writing from experience and empathy are such powerful tools.
Choices: A Post-Roe Abortion Rights Manifesto
In the wake of the Supreme Court overturning Roe V. Wade and a country divided, a pioneer in the pro-choice movement and women’s healthcare offers an unapologetic and authoritative take on abortion and women’s right to choose.Merle Hoffman has been at the forefront of the reproductive freedom movement since the 1970s. Three years before the Supreme Court legalized abortion through Roe v. Wade, she helped to establish one of the United States’ first abortion centers in Flushing, Queens, and later went on to found Choices, one of the nation’s largest and most comprehensive women’s medical facilities. For the last five decades, Hoffman has been a steadfast warrior and fierce advocate for every woman’s right to choose when and whether or not to be a mother.
Now, amidst the aftermath of the Dobbs Decision, Hoffman has carefully compiled her decades of analysis, research, and experience into a tour de force manifesto that sheds light on the catastrophic repercussions of overturning Roe, and what we must do moving forward to ensure the safety and legality of abortion nationally. In Choices, Hoffman expresses her views on where we are and what lies ahead. She covers topics ranging from: revamping the healthcare system to support women’s rights; combatting rising authoritarianism; the weaponization of religion; fighting the antis; practicing courage; sabotage from within the movement; and activating the next generation in the fight for reproductive justice.