“Abort with me,” says Sunni, a single mother from Brooklyn, as she twirls around her kitchen to turn on a jazzy piano, before walking. TikTok Viewers through the steps she took to end her pregnancy at home.
As states expand restrictions on abortion and the issue is likely to be at the forefront of the presidential election, women are creating social media videos describing their own abortions and sharing practical information on how to do so. obtain a.
Sunni told viewers she was hungry for information when she was planning her abortion. “This is the video I was looking for,” she said.
The reaction to his video, which has been viewed more than 400,000 times and sparked comments of both commiseration and condemnation, shows how deeply personal and controversial the issue remains as the November election approaches.
A viewer, activist from the group Protect Life Michigan, remixed the video on the group’s own TikTok account, criticizing Sunni for its light-hearted tone and for directing the video.
“I just don’t understand how we make a video, and we laugh and joke about the abortion process,” the activist said.
The Supreme Court’s decision overturning Roe v. Wade in 2022 led to a cascade of bans and restrictions on abortion across large parts of the United States. Twenty-one states now prohibit or restrict the procedure before the standard set by Roe.
In response, there has been an explosion of content on social media related to abortion – some primarily political, others informative, and some testimonials as women search for answers, seek support, or simply seek to share.
The landscape of abortion access is changing rapidly. Last month, the justices heard arguments over whether to restrict access to a widely used abortion pill, with a decision expected in June or July. This month, the Arizona Supreme Court upheld an 1864 law banning nearly all abortions.
Former President Donald Trump took credit for a Supreme Court that overturned Roe v. Wade, but he has since distanced himself from the idea of a national abortion ban. President Biden, meanwhile, sees the benefit of blaming the increasingly narrow abortion landscape on Republicans.
With laws changing state by state, Sunnis and others have created TikToks to explain how to obtain abortion pills and undergo the procedure at home. In other videos on the site, women grapple with their own experiences, expressing everything from relief to regret. These home videos became material for political campaigns, which used them to advocate either for expanded abortion rights or for new restrictions.
Unsure of where and what forms of abortion are permitted from state to state, young people seeking to end their pregnancies are increasingly turning to social media for advice, researchers have found .
“Chaos, confusion and stigma are the goal of abortion bans and targeted regulations,” said Rebecca Nall, founder of an online database, I Need an A, which directs users to Abortion resources.
“More and more people are going online to ask their most personal questions,” she added, “and more and more people are offering information.”
Before Roe v. Wade, desperate women called Jane, an underground abortion ring, for advice on what to do with unwanted pregnancies. Later campaigns encouraged women to speak openly about their abortions.
As women now turn to TikTok for information and as a means of expression, the app has also become a forum for discussion. In some videos, viewers asked practical questions about obtaining abortion medications or finding a provider. They shared fears of physical pain and anxieties about the logistical complexities of organizing such an event. Other viewers expressed regret over having an abortion.
Some voices were critical, criticizing women for having abortions and talking about them openly, without remorse.
Women who share their stories – and viewers who write to them for advice – engage in conversations that could be risky. Attorneys general of some states have expressed their desire to prosecute those who “aid and abet” abortions, including those who provide information, and to subpoena online posts.
Sunni, 30, who asked that her full name not be used for fear of being further targeted by abortion opponents, said in an interview that she became interested in health justice reproductive when she was pregnant with her daughter in 2021.
She had become active on TikTok and was alarmed to find videos of people recommending herbal remedies like parsley to induce an abortion. When she was pregnant last year, after experiencing a difficult first birth, she decided to have an abortion and share her experience with her followers.
While TikTok is flooded with activism from anti-abortion activists and abortion rights supporters, Sunni said she wants to focus on the practical aspects of a medical abortion, the most common form in the USA. This included the order in which the mifepristone and misoprostol pills should be, and the creature comforts – taken like Totino’s frozen pizza – that she relied on to help her manage the pain and recover.
“It’s something that a lot of people experience,” she said in an interview. “There are people around you going through this and until they feel normal and accepted, they can’t heal.”
The video she made received over 1,000 comments. Sunni said she received hundreds of messages from girls and young women seeking advice on how to get the pills and manage the pain.
“You have to navigate it,” she said, “and no one shows you how.”
Further testimony came from Mikaela Attu, a Canadian who said in an interview that she was shocked by the overturning of Roe v. Wade, particularly because abortion care was not difficult to access in Canada.
In a TikTok video, she took viewers on several hospital visits near her Vancouver home, from an ultrasound to confirm her pregnancy to a photo of her feet in stirrups at the start of a procedure to put them there. END.
In another video, viewed 7.5 million times, Ms Attu spoke of the heartbreak of becoming pregnant by a man she loved, but not being able to achieve it.
Ms. Attu and her husband were planning to have children, she said, but she was suffering from mental health problems when she became pregnant last year and did not feel ready to start a family.
“I wanted to show that abortion is complicated,” she said.
Other women have created TikToks to express your sorrow because of an abortion.
A spectator of video of another woman’s abortion commented that it reminded her of the pain she endured at age 16, during her own abortion.
Desireé Dallagiacomo, 33, a California writer and poet, recorded a video as she prepared for an abortion appointment.
“I’m fine and I’m stable,” she told viewers, “and I just don’t want kids.”
Ms. Dallagiacomo, 33, said in an interview that she wanted to share her story, in part, to challenge dominant narratives about why people have abortions.
As abortion rights become increasingly targeted, what women share about their abortion on social media has become central.
Attorneys general in Texas, Alabama and Louisiana have expressed interest in suing abortion providers and other groups that coordinate them, creating uncertainty over whether those who share information online could be held responsible.
“There is a movement underway to criminalize information,” said Mary Ziegler, a law professor at the University of California, Davis, who has written extensively on abortion.
In July, a Nebraska teenager was charged with concealing a death and aborted her fetus and sentenced to 90 days in jail. In that case, prosecutors subpoenaed Facebook messages she exchanged with her mother, in which the two discussed abortion pills.
The Nebraska case suggests that conversations people have about abortion can be used against them, Professor Ziegler said.
“In the post-Dobbs era, there is an interesting and complicated tradeoff,” she said, between sharing stories to destigmatize the experience “and the fact that speaking out could create legal risks involuntary”.
The specter of punishment for sharing information about abortion was just one of the ways Ms. Dallagiacomo said she found her abortion experience “isolating.”
“There are so many things that prevent us from telling our story honestly,” she said.
