For Immediate Release: October 8, 2024
Contact: Jocelyn Foye
[email protected]
The BFF Index represents the first effort in RI to ascertain where candidates for any office stand on rights to bodily autonomy
PROVIDENCE – OCTOBER 8 – The Womxn Project today announced its request to all candidates for office in RI to reply to its Bodily Freedom Forever Index (© BFFI) survey. This survey follows research by volunteers to determine where candidates stand on bodily freedom.
“We expect that all candidates will respond to the survey in order to inform voters on their positions about reproductive freedom and LGBTQ+ rights. In too many instances, including here in RI, elected officials try to justify their opposition to these fundamental rights due to some ‘personal’ belief they chose. Voters have a right to know and candidates an obligation to disclose their personal positions prior to the election. To pretend otherwise is anti-democratic.” said Jocelyn Foye, executive director of The Womxn Project.
Bodily freedom is the ideal that people should have sole decision-making power over their own body as long as those decisions don’t infringe on another’s bodily freedom.
The Womxn Project encourages any interested voter to contact their candidates and ask them to fill out the BFFI Survey. TWP has compiled a list of publicly available contact information for the candidates on their website and encourages candidates themselves to request access to the BFFI survey if they did not receive a link on the organization’s website.
The Womxn Project will continue to compile the results and other research findings in preparation for releasing the BFFI for the November 5th elections. The need for this Index, no matter the office sought, reflects the realities of polarized US politics. Local elections may not directly bear upon issues of bodily freedom, but candidates’ stands on bodily freedom informs aspects of many other policies.
Foye noted, “The gross inequality in our society is furthered by long-standing and institutionalized opposition to bodily autonomy. Topics like housing and school policies are commonly local issues and a candidates’ position on bodily freedom can clearly inform those issues one way or another. The BFFI is a tool to bring greater transparency to the potential actions of candidates once in office”.
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Jocelyn Foye is available for interview upon request.
