REVIEWED BY ROISE MCCANN

emphasise the incongruous absence of young women in Athena.

Worst of all, however, (spoiler alert here again) is the ridiculous twist at the end. All the more annoying because it’s not only unnecessary, but also more unrealistic. As the filmmakers are all too aware, the killing of young people (particularly young people of colour) by police, is a relatively common occurrence in today’s world. Indeed, this is presumably a major factor

The Janes

Directed by Tia Lessin & Emma Pildes

HBO, 2022

reviewed by roise McCann

the Janes, a recently released HBO documentary, follows the political journey of the Jane Collective, a radical underground network of women in Chicago providing abortions from 1968 - 1973 while it was illegal in most states in America. With the overturning of roe v.Wade this year, “trigger bans” on abortion have already began to take effect in states all over the US. The film is instructional, demonstrating the barbaric reality of criminalised abortion and the fight back needed to win the right to an abortion again.

The Jane Collective began as an organisation when its founding member, Heather Booth, helped her friend’s sister to access an abortion through civil rights organiser and surgeon T.r.M Howard. Before long, Booth, using the pseudonym Jane received calls from many more who were desperately seeking abortions and began to recruit volunteers from feminist activist groups.

It is estimated that in the 1960s anywhere between 200,000 and 1.2 million illegal abortions occured anually. Those seeking a back alley abortion were exploited by the criminals who could charge over $1,000 for a procedure, by inexperienced providers who often botched abortions, or by abusers who offered to conduct the procedure in return for sexual favours.

It was in these conditions that the Janes provided abortions for those who could not afford to travel to states in which abortion was legal, albeit increadibly restrictive. These are the same layers of society who are most at risk of losing access to abortion in the US today; working-class and poor women and pregnant people, and in particular women and people of colour.

The Janes rejected patrichal discrimination within the medical practice; where those seeking abortion would have faced the degrading experience of having to plead their cases to mostly male doctors to prove danger to their life. Often the procedure was rejected. in their decision to explore this theme in their work. The decision to add a far-right conspiracy – of staging police killings to further inflame social tensions – just comes across as a cop out that lets the police (which everywhere contains its fair share of far right members) off the hook.

The twist definitely takes away from the better aspects of the film, and there are other problematic issues, even so athena is worth checking out.n

Instead, the Janes not only aided pregnant people in procuring abortions, but also offered counselling services in the face of an information void.

It was only after discovering their main abortion provider was not a doctor as he had claimed, that members of Jane began to practice abortions themselves. Members were taught how to safely carry out surgical abortions by a registered gyneacologist, at the time risking their career to affiliate with Jane, echoing the recent reports of doctors withholding abortion care while their patients are in danger of losing their lives, for fear of committing a felony while doing their jobs.

Today, early abortion can be accessed with abortion pills, requiring very little medical expertise or assistance and a lifeline where abortion is banned (available via Women On Web / Aid Access via the internet & post). It’s inspiring that Jane’s young women so audaciously taught themselves how to carry out the surgical procedure, as part of their radical activism decades before.

Armed with the knowledge of how to conduct an abortion themselves, members of Jane were able