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Justice

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Submitted By shereebriana
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Sheree Oats Oats 1
April 9, 2012
Dr. April Mcray
LIT 2110

Angela Davis, the daughter of an automobile mechanic and a schoolteacher, was born in Birmingham, Alabama, on 26th January 1944. Davis was brought up in an all white neighborhood where segregation was seen in every part of her life. She learned at an early age about racism and the implications that came along with being black. Her high school and college years were filled with many accomplishments. In high school Davis got the opportunity to study at Elizabeth Irwin High School in New York City where she gained an interest in both socialist and communist philosophies. Davis's scholastic achievements earned her a scholarship to Brandeis University in Waltham, Massachusetts. After graduating she became joined the Black Panthers, the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), and Ron Karenga's US-Organization. In 1968 she became a member of the Communist Party. (Encyclopedia of World Biography) Angela Davis life took a tragic turn for the worse when she became a public figure for being on the Federal Bureau of Investigation "most wanted

Oats 2 criminals" list. On August 7, 1970 Davis was tied to a murder of four individuals who had been gunned down in a Marin County Hall of Justice Courtroom. The guns used in the crime were registered in Davis’s name. According to Davis became only the third woman in history to appear on the FBI's “Top Ten Most Wanted List”. Davis went into hiding for two months but then was arrested and charged with aggravated kidnapping and first-degree murder. After spending sixteen months in jail, Davis went to trial and was acquitted of all charges. In an attempt to get her life back together while still doing what she loved, Davis taught black philosophy and women's studies at San Francisco State College. (Nadelson, Regina. 1972) In her free time Davis has wrote several books with an array of topics. After conducting research on her different books, the one I found most interesting was entitled “Women, Race and Class” published in 1981. According to sources the book became an instant feminism classic. Amy Winter, a writer for the Feminist Reprise wrote a literary analysis of “Women, Race and Class”. She wrote that a chapter in Davis’s book discussed racism, birth control and reproductive rights. “Davis discusses the connections between the early birth control movement and the eugenics movement, and emphasizes that birth control and sterilization, services that
Oats 3 white women often see as liberating, have been linked to poverty and used as forms of genocide against Black, Hispanic, and Native American women in the U.S. and Puerto Rico”.
Organizations like Planned Parenthood Foundation as some can argue is used to limit the reproduction of poverty stricken minorities. In the early 1900s Margaret Sanger founded the American Birth Control League and was heavily critizied for her affiliation with the Eugenics movement, although denied it. I have prior knowledge on this topic after researching and writing a paper surrounded upon Planned Parenthood secret history. The father of the Eugenics movement, Thomas R. Malthus warned, “that overpopulation was a dire problem for the future well-being of the human race, that it was a prime cause of poverty, and that the only solution was a purification of the race through a purging of the “unfit” from the gene pool”(bloodmoneyfilm.com). The poor, physically and mentally handicapped, and the racially inferior were targeted as a means of stopping reproduction. Society today still reflects this in some ways. Free contraceptives are usually found in walk in clinics, which are usually in poorer neighborhoods. I can understand that with the steady incline of birth rates in minorities and in particular African
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Americans being on a rise but after reading about the eugenics movement I can’t help but wonder if organizations like Planned Parenthood are just trying to decrease the reproductions of minorities by purposely targeting them. Too many times than not I hear about sex safe and contraceptives being preached in majority all black schools, but having attended an all white high school, I can barely remember these things being stressed other than what was mandatory in health class. Does Planned Parenthood really have our best interest at heart? Or are they only interested in decreasing the sterilization of Blacks, Latinos and Native Americans that Angela Davis wrote about in “Women, Race, and Class”. Its an interesting question that I don’t think many people every consider. Now I do not doubt that Planned Parenthood has the best intentions and is needed in society today but in regards to its history I don’t believe that we as a society have come as far as we think we have. If we did, we wouldn’t need to rely on organizations like Planned Parenthood. Instead we as a society would be better informed about its history. More importantly we would be better educated in regards to practicing safe sex.

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Some of these same issues are still relevant that Angela Davis discussed in 1981 however are not talked about because of a lack of knowledge that our society has on this topic. The current Planned Parenthood Foundation as some can argue is used to limit the reproduction of poverty stricken minorities.

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Trailblazing Activists of the Civil Rights Movement
Gladys L. Knight,

Angela Davis Lends Authenticity To Occupy Oakland Protests via newsone.com

Oats 7 biography.com Outloudmag.org

Oats 8 MajorHazEnt.

blackbookmag.com

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Works Cited

Davis, Angela Yvonne: Angela Davis - An Autobiography. New York, Random House, 1974

Davis, Angela Yvonne: “Women, Race, and Class”. New York, Random House, February 1981.

Nadelson, Regina: Who is Angela Davis? The Biography of a Revolutionary. New York, P.H. Wyden, 1972.

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