DEEP DIVE On this episode we get up to our elbows into the extraordinary, highly controversial and often wildly contradictory story of one of America's most dichotomised social and cultural figureheads; and the organisation she founded to do many more things than the abortions it is now infamous for, this time, we are talking about Planned Parenthood and Margaret Sanger. Sanger began her crusade for birth control after working as a nurse among impoverished women in New York, witnessing endless pregnancies, dangerous abortions, miscarriages and women with almost no control over their lives and reproductive health. This was all transpiring at a time when even distributing information about contraception could get you arrested and jailed; banged up instead of knocked up! Sanger became one of America's most relentless advocates for women and their sexual destiny; not just with abortion or contraception though. Alongside ideas and writings about sexual freedom, bodily autonomy and reproductive technology that sound astonishingly modern, Sanger was also deeply involved in the eugenics movement and wrote openly about the “feeble-minded” and the scourge of hereditary degeneracy. She was mad for a bit of compulsory sterilisation and discussed at length the qualifications and categories of segregation of people considered unfit to reproduce. On the episode we discuss her literary work; Family Limitation, Motherhood in Bondage, The Pivot of Civilization; and we also hash out the finer details of the American eugenics movement, Roe v. Wade and the infamous Negro Project; asking whether the modern conspiracy notion of a programme designed to eliminate black Americans actually survives contact with the historical record, or whether it my have even done more good than harm. This is a story where reproductive freedom, race, poverty, religion, sex, state power and social engineering become so tangled together that every time you think you've found the good guy or the bad guy, you turn the page and are met with an entirely new set of impossible circumstances. ** You can get this episode AD FREE and in VIDEO with OVER 20 MINS OF EXTRA CONTENT for FREE when you join the TCG PATREON (so many capital letters) and you can find the episode here: and you can sign up and subscribe to a FREE Patreon account, follow TCG and get this episode VIDEO VERSION and loads more. If you then later want to support the show and throw a few bucks and get even more content and exclusives, please consider becoming a paid subscriber! Thanks to everyone who is already a Patreon supporter; I literally wouldn't be here without y'all! 3 ** Joining me on this episode are Betsy Speer and Claire Fox. You can find Betsy at betsyspeer.com and across most social media under @betsyspeercomedy and she also performs live and online comedy regularly so follow for info and updates on upcoming shows You might find Claire, in a somewhat private capacity, on IG @TCGClaire but in general she is a civilian, not in want of an audience :D Not like us comedians desperately looking for attention! :) ** CHAPTERS 00:00:00 - Start01:00:46 - Sanger, I Hardly Knew Her?01:50:35 - I Genics, Eugenics, We All Genics02:12:22 - The Feminist Revolution02:31:18 - Family Limitation03:05:55 - Eugenics Please03:31:17 - Motherhood in Bondage03:44:29 - The Pivot of Civilisation04:05:54 - The Negro Project04:39:54 - The Case for Birth Control04:54:34 - Texas Says No04:57:46 - Off The Fence Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
