“And the winner for best show with an abortion storyline goes to…” No, we haven’t heard this called out at any of the television awards shows in the last few weeks. But even without an Emmy or Golden Globe award category to compete for, abortion storylines made their way to our screens. Shows including “The Morning Show,” “Grey’s Anatomy,” “All Rise, Law & Order” and “90 Day Fiancé” all explored abortion in 2023, with 49 abortion plotlines on TV for the year, according to a new Abortion Onscreen report compiled annually by researchers at the University of California at San Francisco.
Since the Supreme Court’s Dobbs decision in June 2022, 14 states have enforced total abortion bans and another seven states have implemented severe restrictions that would have been unconstitutional under Roe. Even in New Jersey, where abortion is protected, access is unequal and incomplete. In our state, there are no abortion clinics in the southern part of the state, and limited access to care later in pregnancy, forcing people in need of abortion care to travel. In my recent research, abortion providers in New Jersey told me about the challenges people experience getting the care they need. These stories — and the stories of people who needed care but could not get it — should be told on screen.
Telling abortion stories is important, in part because of the stigma around abortion. Although abortion is not uncommon — it’s estimated that 1 in 4 women will have an abortion during their lifetime — many people feel they must keep these experiences secret, a phenomenon that perpetuates the stigma and misperceptions surrounding abortion. While the media increasingly addresses abortion, the focus is too often on extreme cases that don’t represent the typical experiences of people looking for abortion care, which is a common and safe health care event. While news stories of teens’ or women’s lives put at risk because of denied abortion care can be powerful, those depictions risk perpetuating myths about abortion. It’s not surprising that many Americans don’t know much about abortion and lack accurate information.
Abortion on TV isn’t new. In 1972, in the sitcom “Maude,” the titular character’s abortion was considered controversial, even radical, for a TV show. That groundbreaking episode was aired two months before the Supreme Court’s Roe v. Wade decision which made abortion legal nationally. Today’s shows take place in the aftermath of the reversal of Roe v. Wade in the Supreme Court’s ruling on Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization. Accurate representations of abortion-care experiences offer an opportunity to reach audiences with stories that can help people understand and empathize, or see their own experiences reflected.
Misrepresentation in media
But hold onto your remote — the increased visibility of abortion isn’t always positive. As one researcher, Stephanie Herold, told The New York Times, “…rather than normalize abortion, the increased visibility of abortion on television and in film has in many cases contributed to stigma and misinformation.” As viewers of these shows, we need to watch with a critical eye for plots that perpetuate myths and biases about abortion.
The scripted abortion stories in popular series frequently misrepresent the demographics of abortion in the U.S., with plotlines that focus on characters who are more likely to be white, child-free and wealthier than most people who get abortions. In reality, nearly half of women getting abortions live below the poverty line, most are already mothers and more than half are people of color. And although medication abortion now accounts for more than half of all abortions in the U.S., and many people obtain these pills through telemedicine and have their abortion in the privacy of their own home, you wouldn’t know it from TV. Instead, shows have focused on surgical abortion and often present it as a major medical event instead of the short outpatient procedure it usually is.
Some recent shows created plotlines that reflected the new reality of extreme barriers to abortion that have been heightened in the post-Dobbs world. These restrictions have been described in “P-Valley” and “Law & Order,” where characters faced local abortion bans and had to seek care out of state. On “The Conners,” abortion decision-making is made more complex by fears of the lack of digital privacy and the risk of government tracking. New research from the Guttmacher Institute finds that nearly 1 in 5 people now travel out of state for abortion care in the wake of abortion bans and clinic closures. Despite this, fewer than one-quarter of TV plotlines in 2023 portrayed the logistical, financial, or legal barriers involved with traveling for abortion care.
Entertainment has the power to bring private stories about abortion to the public, combat misinformation and stigma, all while crafting narratives that embrace the realities of today’s abortion experiences. In the shadow of the reversal of Roe v. Wade, the need for authentic storytelling about abortion is more important than ever. A new study found that exposure to abortion plotlines on television increased people’s knowledge about abortion and their willingness to support a friend seeking an abortion.
Television has a big role to play in shaping the public’s understanding of abortion. So, let’s stay tuned to see what 2024 shows will bring. We all can be winners if scripted and news media expand and improve their representation of abortion, reflecting real people’s lives.