On a spring day in Brooklyn, Jennifer Baumgardner, 37, is tending to her three-year-old son Skuli, who is home from nursery with a temperature. She is composed, and striking to look at, 15 years since she first arrived in New York City to begin a modeling career. In fact, there is no indication whatsoever that this is the headquarters of one of the most controversial feminist campaigns in recent decades, or, indeed, that Baumgardner is the woman behind it.
Three years ago, Baumgardner designed and distributed T-shirts declaring, “I had an abortion,” selling them out of her tiny apartment while she was pregnant. They were soon being bought in their thousands. And she has now launched a new, potentially even more provocative campaign, selling T-shirts that bear the slogan, “I was raped.”
The abortion T-shirts incensed anti-abortion campaigners, as well as some women who felt they suggested that the wearer was a victim. Baumgardner says she hadn’t thought a lot about that initial design, but it was a reaction to the tone of the ongoing abortion debate in the US. “I’d gone to many abortion rallies with these crude declaratory T-shirts. But the most declaratory thing you could say at an abortion rally is, ‘I’ve had an abortion.’ It didn’t need extra editorial.” Baumgardner caused controversy when she wore one at a rally while heavily pregnant. “I felt nervous, because I thought, ‘Am I making myself a target? I really want to keep this baby.” She went ahead and did it anyway.
The rape T-shirts, launched earlier this year, depict a safe containing a card, on which is written a barely discernible “I was raped.” It’s a more subtle message. “It means, ‘This is something I’m letting you in to tell you about. It’s not an identity but it’s part of me, and I’m taking this moment to let you in.’”
Baumgardner insists that it has never been her motive to shock. It wasn’t even her intention that the T-shirts should necessarily be worn in public — although that’s what’s happened in both cases. “I wanted to create something that someone could have as a tangible object or acknowledgement of either a personal experience they have had, or as an acknowledgement that this happens all the time,” she says. “It’s psychotherapy. In terms of healing from any kind of trauma, acknowledgement is very important.”
This includes getting women to share their experiences on camera. The “I had an abortion” campaign was accompanied by a video documentary of women telling their stories, and there is one in the pipeline for the rape campaign. “Every woman says, ‘Well, I bet this isn’t really a rape compared to what you’ve been hearing,’” says Baumgardner. “They have this really humiliating fear. Unless you’re totally beat up, never talked to the guy, never kissed him when he was in his ‘bargaining’ phase with you; unless you have some sort of ‘perfect thing,’ you feel like it’s your fault.”
Baumgardner has a deep commitment to talking about things that make other people uncomfortable. “I feel like it’s forever shocking, when we all know these things are going on, how people have had to silence how they feel.” Baumgardner has never been raped. Despite wearing the abortion T-shirt, she has never been through the procedure herself. “If anything connects me, it’s my bisexuality,” she says. “I know it’s painful to have an experience you can’t talk about and you can’t acknowledge.”
RSS