Earlier this month the Center for Disease Control (CDC) released a new infographic on alcohol consumption with some controversial recommendations for women of childbearing age. In short, if a woman is not on birth control, the CDC recommends that she avoid alcohol altogether because she might become pregnant.
My first take on the report was that this was simply another example of how we treat young women as if they are merely wombs in waiting. In her response to the recommendations Rebecca Ruiz wrote this for Mashable.com:
While the original recommendation may have been intended to ensure safe pregnancies and healthy children, its underlying message was unmistakable: Women should consider themselves first a vessel for human life and make decisions about their health and behavior based on that possibility.
Despite severe backlash CDC officials stand by their assertion that the primary goal of this infographic is to alert the public about the dangers of alcohol consumption, particularly for pregnant women. In an interview with the New York Times CDC deputy director Dr. Anne Schuchat said, “We’re really all about empowering women to make good choices and to give them the best information we can so they can decide what they want to do themselves.”
When my husband and I made the decision to have a child, I immediately immersed myself in research. I read Taking Charge of Your Fertility and began tracking my basal temperature. I started taking folic acid and yes, I did cut back on my alcohol consumption. The timing of that decision happened to coincide with attending a bachelorette party. As I nursed my club soda while the rest of our group had cocktails, I told myself that it was a small sacrifice to make. The thing is, I was trying to get pregnant. That decision about my future had shifted the way I thought about my day to day life. I was preparing for the real possibility that everything was about to radically change, so making some minor adjustments ahead of time felt small in comparison.
But the CDC’s recommendations are not intended only for women who are trying to conceive. They apply to any woman of childbearing age who has the possibility of becoming pregnant. The problem isn’t that they encourage women to be careful about how much alcohol they are consuming. The problem is that it reinforces the idea that a woman’s decisions and behaviors should be focused on a potential pregnancy, whether or not she wants one.
The fact that this is being promoted by a government agency is particularly troublesome in an age when the policing of pregnant women’s bodies is becoming more and more stringent. In 2014 Tennessee passed a law that allows the state to criminally charge women who give birth to babies who show signs of drug withdrawal. While this is the most extreme law on the books, other states have similar legislation that considers prenatal drug exposure a form of child abuse. What would stop a state from passing a law that would prosecute a woman for consuming alcohol during her pregnancy?
I’ve grown increasingly fed up with this emphasis on an individual woman’s personal responsibility and decision-making without an equally serious focus on the conditions in which she lives her life. Reproductive justice activists have been saying this for decades. Loretta Ross, co-founder of SisterSong Women of Color Reproductive Justice Collective, writes about the connection in her article “Understanding Reproductive Justice”:
We believe that the ability of any woman to determine her own reproductive destiny is directly linked to the conditions in her community and these conditions are not just a matter of individual choice and access.
As a person of faith committed to justice, I am compelled to take seriously what might appear on the surface to be innocuous and even ridiculous guidelines from the CDC and examine how they contribute to a larger, more dangerous narrative about women’s bodies. I fully support the CDC’s stated goals to reduce fetal alcohol syndrome and to ensure that every pregnancy is healthy. But we shouldn’t do so at the expense of women’s dignity and full humanity.
Katey Zeh, M.Div is a strategist, writer, and educator who inspires intentional
communities to create a more just, compassionate world through building connection, sacred truth telling, and striving for the common good. She has written for outlets including Huffington Post, Sojourners, Religion Dispatches, Response magazine, the Good Mother Project, the Journal for Feminist Studies in Religion, and the United Methodist News Service. Find her on Twitter at @ktzeh or on her website www.kateyzeh.com.
feminismandreligion.com 
Thanks for being vigilant, you are so right that we must all protest what you call the encroaching “policing” of women’s bodies.
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Thank you, Carol. At first glance the CDC recommendations might seem harmless, but they are contributing to a destructive public discourse that women (and their bodies) can’t be trusted.
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Thank you. No idea if I want to or not; not buying into the negative patriarchy hype
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It does sound like a lot hype to me as well.
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Such an important point to make! It is sad how our species has come to treat one another and de-value the life of women in particular. This is a powerful read and I appreciate you taking the time to write and share it.
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Agreed. I really like the “Trust Women/Trust Black Women” campaigns for this reason. Women are capable of making responsible decisions, so let’s trust them to do so.
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I’m honestly a bit double minded about all this. Excessive alcohol consumption wrecks havoc on both the individual as well as those around her/him. In a society which encourages free choice, how do you encourage people to make good choices (for themselves as well as those around them)? Also, the earliest political victory women spearheaded in the USA was the temperance movement leading to prohibition. Later repealed.Those early feminists had good cause to attempt to curb alcohol consumption.
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We’re not in disagreement over this. I wish the CDC had considered its frame because it gets in the way of sharing important information with the public about alcohol consumption.
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I suspect that the CDC is somewhat desperate about trying to curb the culture of alcohol consumption. Our society will not listen to ‘it’s not morally right to do that’, it will not listen to “it is too risky to do that” (don’t we have enough statistics for the binge drinking college culture and all the suffering that results?), so now they are trying the “do it for your good health’ issue, similar to the campaign against smoking. With any degenerative disease involving a toxin (and I do consider alcoholism a disease), the health effects in adults take many years to be seen, whereas results are clearly seen in the developing fetus.
I don’t like the frame either, but in order to convince the public of alcohol toxicity, they start with the maternal frame. I don’t know whether this is pandering to patriarchy or to an ancient instinct to protect women and children. In any case, as powerful as the smoking lobby was in the USA, the alcohol lobby is far, far more powerful.
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Men trying to conceive should also avoid alcohol. It lowers sperm count and motility. In my opinion, everyone should avoid alcohol. The body treats it as a poison.
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Yes, the CDC updated the infographic to include men, but I don’t believe they discussed alcohol’s negative effect on fertility.
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There are lots of juices that can be greatly enjoyed with meals, and served in wine glasses!!. I love cranberry juice!! — that’s my wine. Sometimes enjoy prune juice, and absolutely love apple juice, and orange juice in the morning.
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This reminds me of the year I gave up alcohol for Lent. I loved sparkling juices and water, served in a fancy glass. Sometimes a “mocktail” hits the spot!
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True enough. I’d like to take it a step further and say that by holding women exclusively responsible for the outcome of their pregnancies, we’re masking the fact the author makes clear: the birth of healthy babies depends as much on the community in which she is born as on the choices of the mother. So, why aren’t we seeing law passed that mandate that ALL women of childbearing age should have full health care, and jobs that pay them enough live decently while working only 40 hours a week. Perhaps THAT”S too much government intervention?
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Agreed, Ariane! Thank you.
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Thanks, Katey, for this incisive essay. The term “wombs in waiting” really brings your point home. And it would be so easy for the CDC to change this infomercial by saying if your think you might become pregnant, if you’re planning a pregnancy, if you’re unwilling to abort (they’d never say that!), but that’s the bottom line. The problem for the CDC is that fetal alcohol syndrome happens very early in pregnancy, at three weeks, before most women know they’re pregnant. And too many women don’t plan pregnancies. And then too many of those women are unwilling to abort.
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Thanks, Nancy. It’s hard to imagine any government agency talking about abortion at all.
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Reblogged this on Katey Zeh and commented:
The CDC’s recommendations on alcohol are well-intended, but I find the frame problematic on many levels.
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