Jane Roe’s Anti-Abortion “Conversion” Truth Is The Most Disappointing Revelation Of All Time
You might not know Norma Leah Nelson McCovey but there’s no doubt that you know her story. Or at least, you thought you did.
Norma McCorvey AKA Jane Roe was a woman who had one of the greatest impacts on U.S. history. Her role as a plaintiff in the landmark lawsuit Roe v. Wade of 1973 saw a ruling that determined that the Constitution of the United States protects a pregnant woman’s right to choose to have an abortion. The U.S. Supreme Court ruled that laws banning abortions in individual states was unconstitutional. The decision was monumental and yet, as great of a part in the historical decision she played, McCorvey quickly and publicly went onto reject her decision to have an abortion and became a mascot of sorts for the anti-abortion movement.
Recently, a documentary exploring the case “AKA Jane” uncovers the truth about McCorvey’s actual beliefs.
In a deathbed confession captured in the documentary, McCorvey admitted that her conversion to the anti-choice movement was “all an act.”
In the years after her abortion and landmark case, McCorvey became a Roman Catholic activist in the anti-abortion movement. In the documentary, McCorvey delivers the ultimate punch in the gut to women around the country when she admits that the only reason that she later became the face of the anti-choice movement was that she had been paid by the Christian Right Movement to do so.
According to the Daily Beast, AKA Jane Roe “finds documents disclosing at least $456,911 in “benevolent gifts” from the anti-abortion movement to McCorvey.”
In the film, McCorvey made the death bed confession.
“This is my deathbed confession,” McCorvey explained in response to a question about whether or not evangelical groups used her. “Of course,” she replies in the documentary. “I was the Big Fish… I think it was a mutual thing. I took their money and they took me out in front of the cameras and told me what to say. That’s what I’d say.”
The documentary reveals that McCorvey was a poor, queer, and a sexual abuse survivor.
While rallying for anti-abortion agendas, she was manipulated into becoming a figurehead and made to break up with her long time partner. But her 40-year long role in the anti-abortion movement, touting messages she didn’t actually believe is such a betrayal. Of course, it’s sad that McCorvey felt she needed to choose between a life of comfort and the values she believed in, but the idea that she went back on them at the expense of millions of women in this country for monetary reasons… ay ay ay.
