What does Motherhood in a just world look like?
Walking into a store around Mother’s Day, one would think from all the greeting card images that all mothers are white, able-bodied, middle-class, straight, feminine and female-identified women in nuclear families.
This narrow view of who a mother is excludes so many of us - Immigrant women raising their children in bilingual homes, Transgender moms with disabilities, Masculine-identified women raising their nieces and nephews, Incarcerated mother maintaining connection through barbed wire and concrete walls, Indigenous women honoring both their children and Mother Earth in the struggles against colonization and tar sands, Women of color serving in the military and parenting from overseas, Breast-feeding working-class queer mamas, Survivors of sexual violence who are transforming pain and trauma into creating a safe home for their little ones, Mothers working as domestic workers - separated from their own children to raise the children of upper-class families, Mothers of all skin colors and their little ones who may or may not be the same color, Teen mothers taking good care of their babies, Single moms and multi-generational households, Mothers that cross borders and endure separation from their families in order to provide for them, Mothers by blood, adoption, and chosen-mothers.
This year, let’s honor all mothers!
Let’s celebrate midwives, doulas, and other birthworkers! Let’s take this day as an opportunity to learn more about our own birthstory and send some love to uteruses all over the world! Let’s support motherhood and parenthood as a whole, and create and nourish culture/communities where families are included and valued.
To all those who help build strong and resilient communities by creating inclusive,
multi-generational spaces-
To all the mothers and allies working collectively for justice in the realm of
motherhood/parenthood and other aspects of community justice –
To all artists who are creating vivid reflections of families in all their vibrant, simple,
complicated, and loving manifestations -
THANK YOU!
-and their Mama's Day Our Way campaign - beautiful and free e-cards here, created by
a network of artists and organizations. Some of their cards are included below.
More resources:
Art of Favianna Rodriguez and Dignidad Rebelde
Radical Doula
The Shodhini Institute
Campaign for Prison Phone Justice - please sign their Mother's Day petition here.
Brown Boi Project
The Native Youth Sexual Health Network
National Day Laborer Organizing Network
You can click on images below to make them larger.
"My mom would cross 100 borders to give me a better future."
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Please sign the petition here. |
"Our souls are so much bigger than this" |
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