I Won't Let Them Shut Us Up

How Abortion, Every Day is preparing for the coming crackdown on abortion speech

Hi all—

I’ve got the flu, so the daily report will return tomorrow. But I figured I’d use my sick day to talk to you about something else that’s been on my mind: online censorship, the growing effort to control how and where we talk about abortion, and what it all means for Abortion, Every Day.

Please read until the end, where there’s a poll for you to weigh in on!

We’re already seeing abortion rights disappear across social media: Instagram is blurring out posts with information about abortion pills and hiding telehealth providers like Aid Access from search results. TikTok is flagging or removing videos about abortion rights under the auspices of “community guideline” violations. And just yesterday, I shared how ‘community notes’ on X are being weaponized by conservatives to label abortion rights posts as misinformation.

That’s to say nothing of how abortion content is buried by algorithms, or how pro-choice creators are shadowbanned. (I’ve experienced this myself lately—my TikTok views have suddenly and dramatically dropped off a cliff.)

Abortion speech suppression is already here. It’s happening. But I’m even more worried about the attacks still to come, and what they mean for the newsletter.

In Texas—where anti-abortion activists often test their most extreme tactics first—lawmakers are pushing a bill that could impact the whole country. If SB 2880 passes, Texans could sue online companies that supposedly ‘aid and abet’ abortion: Instagram for allowing posts about where to get abortion pills, Venmo for facilitating payments from patients—or even Substack, for publishing a newsletter like this one.

Republicans hope that by allowing any private citizen to sue, tech companies will decide it’s too costly and legally onerous to allow abortion-related content at all. Given how willing platforms already are to censor us, imagine how much faster they’ll fold under legal pressure.

This is just one bill—but there are others, and they’re all telling us the same story: the future of online abortion speech is under threat.

I don’t want to wait until it’s too late to act. I’m starting to think seriously, right now, about how Abortion, Every Day can navigate a country where online speech is regularly suppressed—or where sharing information about abortion puts Americans at risk of civil suits and criminal charges.

I want this community to be prepared, and for the newsletter to have a plan.

That’s why I’m considering whether AED should start communicating with readers through good old-fashioned snail mail—and if we should start doing that soon, before it becomes a necessity. The small (but growing!) AED team has begun to talk through what it might look like to build an offline version of the newsletter, just in case.

Given how engaged and active AED readers are, I’d love to think through that with you all, as well.

Consider this email the beginning of a conversation—one you can join in the comments, in a few upcoming live chats and livestreams, and in the poll at the bottom of this message.

The most important thing to me is that AED can continue to speak to you all freely and safely. Anti-abortion activists want to create a chilling effect—to isolate us, break down community trust, and make us too afraid to help one another. I refuse to let that happen here.

So please weigh in via the poll, and keep an eye out for invites to those upcoming chats on censorship, privacy, and safety.

If you haven’t upgraded your subscription yet, now really is the time. AED is one of the few places publishing comprehensive information and analysis on abortion rights and anti-abortion strategy. When the attacks on abortion speech begin in earnest, I think we all know this newsletter will be one of the first on the chopping block.

I’m working hard to build something for the long haul—but I can’t do it without your support. If you can swing $5 a month or $50 a year, please consider becoming a paying supporter:

As always, if you can’t afford a subscription—for whatever reason—just email me and I’ll give you one for free. If you’ve already subscribed and want to do more, you can gift a subscription to a friend, donate one to another reader, or contribute to the newsletter directly.

These are hard, scary times. I can’t pretend otherwise. But I can tell you that I’m doing my best to think ahead, be smart, and make sure the readers here always get the information they need—no matter what.

If you have any questions, thoughts, or concerns about censorship, snail mail, or the future of this work, feel free to share them in the comments. I’m opening the thread up to both paid and unpaid subscribers.

Thanks to all of you for being here, and for caring so much about this work. -Jessica