https://newrepublic.com/article/148493/forgotten-war-women
"As Scott Wasserman Stern details in his new book The Trials of Nina
McCall: Sex, Surveillance, and the Decades-Long Government Plan to
Imprison “Promiscuous” Women, if a woman was found to be sick, she was
sent to a “detention hospital” (or to jail) until she was deemed cured
or “reformed.” Some of those who tested negative for disease were
incarcerated anyway, because their alleged promiscuity was deemed a
threat to soldiers’ moral hygiene. A disproportionate number of those
arrested were women of color and working class women; black women were
often kept segregated from white women and jailed in subpar facilities,
and, alongside other women of color, were subject to racist violence in
addition to sexual assaults. Some were sterilized against their will, or
without their knowledge.
Sex workers were the prime targets, but so was any woman deemed
“suspicious”—which at that time could mean anything from being seen in
the company of a soldier to eating alone in a restaurant. As the program
became more firmly rooted within the legal system, with undercover
agents from ASHA (American Social Hygiene Association) acting as its
enforcers, a stark reality became apparent: Any woman, at any time,
could legally be arrested, sexually assaulted, and hauled off to jail
with no trial, no lawyer, and no idea when she’d be released. Those who
were imprisoned in detention hospitals were subjected to involuntary
medical examinations, inhumane living conditions, and treatments for
gonorrhea and syphilis. Unfortunately, at that point, the most common
“cure” for these diseases was a strict regimen of continuous doses of
mercury and arsenic, toxic chemicals which poisoned these women’s bodies
while doing absolutely nothing to cure their ills."
Via Sheila Nagig.
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://www.xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
http://www.glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
http://www.sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
