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Entity reports on Destiny Herndon-De La Rose, pro-life New Wave feminist founder

Is it possible for a woman to be a true feminist as well as a leader of the pro-life movement? It sounds paradoxical, but not according to Destiny Herndon-De La Rosa.

In an exclusive ENTITY interview with the president and founder of New Wave Feminists, which currently has over 25,000 followers on Facebook, Herndon-De La Rosa explains how she arrived at this position and how she came to head this seemingly oxymoronic organization.

Top of mind, not surprisingly, was the Jan. 21, 2017 Women’s March and the recent Jan. 27, 2017 March for Life. “In the circles I run in, I have a lot of anti-feminist women, which drives me crazy. But I also understand because pro-life women are told they can’t call themselves feminist,” Herndon-De La Rose says. “It’s kind of like you can’t win. It’s like a lose-lose situation right now.” 

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And although New Wave Feminists was removed from the list of Women’s March partners, Herndon-De La Rosa empathizes with the pressure and backlash Women’s March organizers received and prefers to take a more optimistic view.

“Both marches had very similar messages of supporting women and children,” she explains. “If we could just realize how much we have in common and work on the common ground issues rather than allowing this 10 percent that we don’t have in common to constantly divide and polarize us, then I think we might actually have the future we want to see.”

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Her strong convictions about feminism and abortion were largely shaped by her own experiences. Her mother got pregnant with her at just 19 years old while she was still a student at the University of Texas. And despite the fact that having a child could delay her education, her mother chose to give birth to Destiny. “All that she sacrificed so that I could live – that to me is true feminist strength,” she tells IRJ Politics. Then, at 16 years old, Herndon-De La Rosa became pregnant herself with her first child and followed her mother’s example.

Now, at 33 years old, she has become a well-known face for pro-life feminists. New Wave Feminists, according to her, started as a result of her outrage to a chicken wing advertisement featuring sexualized images of women. “It really infuriated me,” she says. “Why do women need to be used like objects to sell hot wings?”

In response, she and her friends petitioned the Dallas city council and even went to the business itself, which then ended up modifying the sign. “And that’s when I realized that there is power in numbers. That’s when we got organized and added the pro-life message,” she adds.

Abortion to her isn’t created in a vacuum. Instead, it’s a direct result of the kind of pressure that’s been placed on women, their bodies, their confidence. “We have this culture that trains women from a very young age that their sexuality is their only power, which kind of encourages us to exploit ourselves,” Herndon-De La Rosa explains. “But at the same time, it’s also telling us that we’re not good enough, pretty enough, skinny enough, our hair isn’t shiny enough.”

She then goes on to use Cosmopolitan magazine as an example of her frustration. She says that Cosmo is not only a publication that contains photographs of “gorgeous airbrushed women you could never look like,” it also teaches sex tricks to get a man. “This is considered a feminist publication,” she says.

Thus, her work has centered on restructuring what it means to actually be feminist and how abortion relates to all of this.

“It’s that type of culture that breaks women down from such a young age and sexualizes every aspect of their being. Then when they end up becoming pregnant, they feel like the merciful thing to do is have an abortion because they’re not good enough to be this child’s sole provider – that they can’t do it,” she adds.

“So that all kind of goes back into this same cycle of playing into this mentality that women aren’t strong enough. And when we started putting those connections together, we realized that we couldn’t just be pro-life, we couldn’t just be feminist. These two both have much more in common than we even realized.”

And even if the Women’s March and the March for Life, as Herndon-De La Rosa says, has “started this nationwide dialogue about what it means to be a feminist and who can be a feminist,” there is still much work to be done.

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Other participants also share her views. “The thing that I had a problem with the Women’s March was that they disinvited a lot of pro-life groups. And to me whether or not you agree with pro-life — and you know, you’re pro-life, pro-choice whatever — you are still supporting women in some sense,” Anna Geer, a March for Life attendee from Vienna, VA told USA Today. “You still want the best for women and I think that was supposed to be the message of the Women’s March, but I don’t think that got conveyed really. I don’t think it was a very inclusive march.”

Although the annual March for Life event has protested abortion since 1974, a year after the Roe v. Wade case, this year it seemed to also show some resentment towards their Women’s March sisters, which also revealed unrest within the female community. 

As the 2017 Women’s March on Washington proved, when women come together, powerful things can happen. History is made, voices are heard and the importance of unity shines through. However, as positive as the goal to stand united may be, it’s not exactly perfect at the moment.

Herndon-De La Rosa admits that she didn’t vote for Trump and understands the desire to denounce the current president’s sexist and misogynist history. And as a self-identified pro-life feminist, she also feels like the divisions between women today can be turned into a positive learning experience.

“I have children and its taught me that everything is a teachable moment,” she says. “These are all opportunities for us to have more dialogue and discuss this further. Mistakes are going to be made, but that’s okay. We’ll bounce back from them.”

But even if Herndon-De La Rosa has an open mind about Trump’s presidency, there are other women who don’t necessarily feel the same way. Because of these feelings, the March for Life wasn’t just about personal views against abortion, it also seemed to be a cry against the women who rejected them.

The Women’s March was the perfect opportunity and platform to demonstrate a forceful resistance against all hateful rhetoric. However, the decision to disinvite pro-life women opened doors for both sides to highlight a division that the media later magnified.

“I went to both marches and I saw tons of love, positivity, camaraderie and support for women at both marches,” says Herndon-De La Rosa. “And when conservatives talk about horrible things that happen at the Women’s March and vice versa, it’s disheartening to see how much people want to make everything negative.” 

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NPR, USA Today and ABC News have all called the event an “anti-abortion rally,” with many articles focusing on Mike Pence and his role in the march. Also, even if there were women at March for Life who don’t like or agree with Donald Trump’s decisions, the media instead chose to highlight the two men promoting divisiveness.

“Often times, these media outlets invalidate whatever pro-life and pro-choice movements are trying to do,” Herndon-De La Rosa explains. “But if you’re a part of both movements, you realize that a majority of the people out there have great points.” 

If a mutual need to oppose sexism and misogyny can’t bring women together, then Donald Trump isn’t the only person dividing this country with hatred. As painful as it is to say, women are doing that on their own and the media is only emphasizing this reality. “I see a lot of groups fundraising on the fact that there’s a ‘them’ that we need to be against,” Herndon-De La Rosa adds. “So the message becomes: ‘Help us fight them’ and I think that’s ridiculous. 

“How about, ‘Help us reach them, help us love them, help us support them, help us understand them?’ Because that’s what’s missing. We’re not understanding the other side.”

Whether you agree with Destiny Herndon-De La Rosa or not, you must concede that she takes a positive, forgiving, all-inclusive point of view that all of us can learn from. She promotes equal time for equally valid opinions and ideas, and mutual respect and solidarity among all women. And no matter what you believe in, this is something we should all support. 

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