“It is unacceptable to ask anyone to choose between their human rights and their job. And more than 400 prominent screenwriters and series creators are saying so. On Thursday, they sent a letter to the biggest audiovisual studios asking them to guarantee the safety of employees who want an abortion, more than a month after the revocation of the constitutional right to abortion in the United States.
Shonda Rhimes, Marta Kauffman, Amy Shumer or Ava DuVernay are concerned about the apparent “lack of effective protocol” of the studios to secure the steps of their employees in the States where abortion is now prohibited. Deadline obtained one of their letters, addressed to Netflix. This model has also been sent to Amazon Studios, AMC Networks, Apple, Disney, Lionsgate, NBCUniversal, Netflix, Paramount Global, and Warner Bros. Discovery, specifies the media.
“Many of us wouldn’t have the careers and families we have today if we hadn’t had the freedom to choose what was right for us,” the 411s say. showrunners signatories. Today, they put their freedom of choice into perspective with the “great risk” run by “any pregnant person working on one of the productions [de Netflix] in states that have criminalized abortion.
Medical, legal and political measures
In their letter, the artists issue an ultimatum to the studios: “Within ten working days from today, we ask that you review your current abortion safety plan,” they claim. Their request is supported by several specific points. They call for the publication of “policies and procedures […] to provide travel subsidy for abortion” and associated medical confidentiality measures.
Going into medical detail, the authors are asking for the publication of “protocols describing the extent of medical care for female employees […] including ectopic pregnancies and other complications of pregnancy”. All this, accompanied by solid guarantees concerning the legal, criminal and civil protection of the employees concerned.
For the showrunnersthese requests must also be accompanied by a moral commitment: they ask companies to commit “to immediately cease all political donations to anti-abortion candidates”.
At the end of June, Netflix and Disney+ took a first step by announcing that they would cover the travel costs of their employees forced to change state to have an abortion since the Supreme Court’s decision.
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