Agitating for pearls: an interview with Bill and Joni Baird.

BILL BAIRD OPENED THE FIRST abortion and birth control facility in 1964 and has devoted his life to the cause of women's reproductive freedom and rights to privacy. He won all three of his Supreme Court challenges toward this end and has been jailed eight times in five different states for lecturing on and exhibiting birth control methods. He's been called everything from a pioneer to the devil to a "sexual pied piper" with a "savior mentality." Baird is the co-director, along with his wife Joni Baird, of the Pro-Choice League out of New York and Massachusetts (they can be reached through ProChoiceLeague. org). Here they discuss the motivation, inspiration, and concern that encompasses their activism.

The Humanist: You are both devoted activists for reproductive freedom and privacy rights. Bill, you've even been called "the father of the abortion movement." How do you each define the term "activist"?

Bill: An activist is someone committed to righting a wrong, in contrast to merely talking about issues. In the early 1960s thousands of women came to me for help and I risked a ten-year prison term for "aiding and abetting" an abortion in each of those cases. Had I not felt their pain and then taken action, they would have been forced to go through a pregnancy or perhaps take desperate measures.

Joni: I've heard people say, "I'm not the activist type." In my view one can't escape that role because history has shown that inaction is a form of action that can result in much human suffering.

The Humanist: In any movement there are leaders and those who support them. Surely it takes both for any cause to gain footing, but what are the pitfalls of taking a leadership role, especially for a controversial cause?

Joni: I saw a great bumper sticker that said: "If the people lead, leaders will follow."

I'm nearly finished with Bill's biography and I've encountered so many news articles where he would say to an audience, "Walk beside me not behind me." I love that concept, but realistically it seems we must rely on social reformers--those who former Humanist editor Fred Edwords once told me are the "workhorses of society." I do hope that paradigm will eventually be replaced by a system of shared power and responsibility.

Bill: The hazardous nature of my work forced my first wife and four children to move hundreds of miles away from me due to death threats. My clinic was firebombed and destroyed by an anti-abortion terrorist and I have been shot at in my home, punched, kicked, and spat upon. Obviously, going to jail eight times in five states during the 1960s (for lecturing on birth control and abortion) could be classified as a pitfall.

As shocking as it's been, what has surprised me most are the attacks by my own "allies." It seems I had been naive in thinking that if our skills and resources were pooled we could defeat our common opposition, which in the early days was the Catholic Church and timid Massachusetts legislators. But in taking a leadership role, one puts himself or herself up for ridicule--from all sides.

The Humanist: Along these lines, how can the internal dynamics of a movement adversely affect it?

Bill: Corruption within a movement is not nearly as harmful as the reluctance by its members to expose and correct it. We are quick to point out our opposition's faults but allow skullduggery and discrimination to go unchallenged among ourselves.

Movement "turf wars" are particularly destructive and substitute for unity. I experienced this firsthand as I battled in the courts in Baird v. Eisenstadt (which resulted in legalizing birth control for unmarried people). Planned Parenthood officials publicly stated that there was "nothing to be gained" by my case, that I was an "embarrassment" and "overenthusiastic" and that "every movement requires its nuts." Years later, The National Association for the Repeal of Abortion Laws (NARAL) kicked me off their board of directors because they felt that my arrests in challenging birth control and abortion laws would hurt their fundraising efforts.

Sexism has hurt our movement and has dissuaded many qualified men from joining. A former editor of Ms. magazine once wrote that I was a male-supremacist and went on to hypothesize that "men frequently support these issues in the hope that abortion reform and more easily available birth control will make women 'come across' better and more often." (If that were my goal I would have found an easier way than being firebombed and shot at as well as going to jail.) Conversely, on the anti-abortion side women and men join forces, something we've witnessed personally when attending the convention of the National Right to Life Committee for over thirty years.

Joni: Adverse effects of internal dynamics--I could write a book on this topic! There has been a deliberate effort to revise, suppress, or invalidate the contributions made to the reproductive movement by men. For example, feminist professor Sylvia Bashevkin, in Women On The Defensive, falsely wrote that Planned Parenthood successfully brought Baird v. Eisenstadt to trial and "put the issue in motion by showing contraceptives and giving away sample products to Boston University students" when in fact it was Bill who had taken those actions in challenging the law.

Likewise, I've encountered one blockade after another by feminists and other groups who refuse to allow Bill to speak. And it isn't because he's an ineffective speaker. In fact, most of his talks result in standing ovations. The effect this has on the movement is that young people miss the opportunity to hear from the direct source how anti-birth control and anti-abortion laws were changed and how their rights are in jeopardy, especially in terms of the recent conservative U.S. Supreme Court appointments.

This undercurrent of sexism sometimes emerges in more subtle ways that are equally damaging. Bill participated in a panel discussion at a law school this past March where a young law student asked how he and other males could contribute to the pro-choice movement. One feminist on the panel told him he should support women to be leaders and to essentially take a backseat. Had men such as Bill, Roy Lucas (the architect for Roe v. Wade), or Dr. John Rock (who discovered the birth control pill) taken a back seat, our quantum leap forward in overturning discriminatory laws would not have happened. If we're all starving, what does it matter who catches the fish? If women are dying at the hands of quacks, what does it matter if it is a man or woman who changes the laws?

The Humanist: Perhaps women feel they're more entitled somehow.

Joni: Reproductive rights are not only a women's issue. Men control their reproduction to prevent early parenthood through condom use and vasectomies. Birth control for men is being researched diligently. Environmental pollution associated with overpopulation is certainly not a one-sex issue.

The Humanist: Does it take a certain sensibility to be an activist? Which personality traits are common to most activists?

Joni: Activists are like the sand in an oyster. They're willing to agitate or challenge the status quo in order to produce a "pearl." They don't fear being unpopular or risking financial or personal loss, and they're empathic to suffering.

Activists aren't always compassionate and some are motivated by sheer ego or by external rewards, however those with a more altruistic bent seem more prone to longevity. Religious right leaders are fascinated by Bill who, as a humanist, isn't motivated by some supernatural force--but rather by an inner core of humanitarianism.

Bill: One of the most important traits an activist can possess is sensitivity to injustice. Sometimes the ability to sacrifice one's own needs for the good of the "extended family" is necessary. Unblocking fear that can cause inaction also needs to be addressed. I've lived with the fear of death threats and attacks for forty-four years. All of us can muster the courage to face our fears.

Activists must also be creative and employ creative means. When I picket I carry an eight-foot wooden cross, inscribed with the slogan: "Free Women From the Cross of Religious Oppression--Keep Abortion Legal."

The Humanist: What type of person seeks the role of activist leader or pioneer? What motivates people like you to risk personal relationships and even bodily harm for a cause such as women's right to birth control?

Bill: I am motivated by a horrific experience I had in 1963. An African-American unmarried mother with nine children died in my arms of a self-inflicted abortion while I was doing research at a New York City hospital as clinical director for EMKO, a birth control manufacturer. She stumbled into the hallway covered in blood from the waist down.

When I set up the nation's first abortion and birth control facility in 1964, thousands of women came to me seeking help. Their stories of botched abortions, rape, and suicidal threats continue to keep my commitment alive.

Joni: I never sought out the role of activist. I'd rather be gardening! However, when you see a world with so many calling for help how can you not answer?

Despite the corruption and sexism of some of the prochoice leadership, I continue to be active in this movement because of the women who call the ProChoice League for help. A single young pregnant woman called recently trying to find someone to help her with an abortion. Her state has no Medicaid and since she had no money she considered drinking turpentine, which her friends said would cause her to abort. Fortunately, we were able to help her in time.

My resolve is also galvanized by the thousands of letters in our archives sent to Bill in the 1960s from desperate women begging for his help. Then in 2000 there was a seventy-four-year old Pennsylvania woman who approached Bill after his speech. Wracked by tears she finally was able to say, "My mother left home when I was eight and never returned." Her mother had died from an illegal abortion.

The Humanist: Bill, you'll be featured in the new documentary Lake of Fire directed by Tony Kaye (American History X) and will appear in a 2008 VH1 documentary about the sexual revolution. Do you feel like your efforts are finally being rightly acknowledged?

Bill: The truth about anyone's efforts needs to be told so that future generations have a better sense of how such challenges were overcome. That way history will be less likely to repeat itself.

Joni: I'm hoping that when Bill's biography is published it will set the record straight and overcome the blockade of discrimination against a male feminist leader.

The Humanist: From what you've witnessed, are there differences between activists today and those of the past four decades? Do young people today have a sense of the history of activism and the changes such action has wrought?

Bill: A little known fact is that during the 1960s and '70s the backbone of the reproductive rights movement wasn't comprised of feminists but rather college and high school students. They helped me to establish the first birth control clubs on college campuses in 1965 and the first college abortion slush funds in 1966.

Joni: The apathy of a portion of today's youth towards activism is troubling, however, the gap in the amount of activism there was in the 1960s and now is beginning to close. For the longest time it seemed like picketing was out of vogue. In 2001, when the Associated Press asked NARAL President Kate Michelman why her organization didn't join Bill and I, the only two picketers at the National Right to Life Committee's annual convention, she said, "We feel it would only inflame the debate and, personally, as President of NARALI take it as my responsibility to engage in thoughtful discussion of the issues, not engage in tit for tat."

The Pro-Choice League's Director of Youth Outreach, Brandon Scott, age twenty-one, says that many young people have no time for altruism when they are often burdened with up to $100,000 in debt after graduation and feel overwhelmed by the "world's mess" they'll inherit.

The Humanist: What advice would you impart to those who feel strongly about a law they either want to change or protect in the United States? How can people position themselves to really make a difference?

Joni: Either take action or, if you can't, offer financial support to those who can. However, first determine if your donation will be used effectively or if it will instead go to bloated executive salaries and expense accounts. Also, don't you assume that bigger is better when it comes to effective organizations.

Another way for activists to succeed is by dovetailing their talents. A broadcast called The Reverend Is In at ReverendBookburn.com uses comedy to impart progressive ideas. Sandy Rapp, a lifelong gay rights activist, produces CDs that contain political ballads including one about Bill.

Bill: First, educate yourself about your opposition. Read conservative and religious right publications. From there you can develop working strategies. We need to turn the tables on the opposition and put them on the defensive. This can be accomplished by reclaiming the moral high ground and framing issues more effectively. Joni and I both speak to various groups on such strategies. Inviting speakers to educate your community is a powerful tool as is Internet activism.

In the end one must think as a humanist and an "equalist" (to quote my wife). Humanist Manifesto III, of which I am a signatory, states, in part: "The joining of individuality with interdependence enriches our lives, encourages us to enrich the lives of others, and inspires hope of attaining peace, justice, and opportunity for all."

This is the essence of what guides our activism.

Jennifer Bardi is the editor of the Humanist.