
An activist protests outside a CPC in Brookline this month. Photo taken by the author.
May 2023
The Crisis of “Crisis Pregnancy Centers”
There are about 30 so-called “crisis pregnancy centers,” or CPCs, in the Commonwealth. They provide no medical treatment. They are unregulated. And there are twice as many of them as there are reproductive health clinics in the state of Massachusetts. Cathy Corman talks with organizers developing strategies to curb their deceptive and damaging tactics. *** Michael S. […]

April 2023
State Policy Advocate Lara Crawford Targets Crisis Pregnancy Centers and Get Out the Vote in 2023
Lara Crawford is NCJW MA’s State Policy Advocate, or SPA. Cathy Corman interviewed Lara to learn more about her role and how she came to get involved in the organization.

March 2023
Decarceration as Liberation
At seders around the Commonwealth next week, Jews will be considering oppression, exploitation, persecution, and captivity. We’ll also be thinking about liberty. In this week’s Deep Dive, NCJW member Cathy Corman learns about a local initiative with the potential to liberate people reentering communities after imprisonment.

Rachie Lewis
February 2023
JCRC’s Rachie Lewis on Welcoming the Stranger
NCJW takes special interest in immigrants and asylum seekers. In this month’s Deep Dive, Cathy Corman explores advocacy work in these areas with Rachie Lewis, Director of Synagogue Organizing for the Organizing for the Jewish Community Relations Council (JCRC).

January 2023
Do the Work: An Antiracist Activity Book
When activists talk about “white supremacist culture,” many of us aren’t sure what they mean. This month in Deep Dive, Cathy Corman explores the concept as it is used in Do the Work: An Antiracist Activity Book, published this past July. The book is the delightful and funny fruit of a collaboration between comedian and filmmaker W. Kamau Bell and queer feminist activist Kate Schatz.

December 2022
Changing the Conversation: New Strategies to Talk about Abortion
If we want to convince others to keep abortion legal, we need to change the conversation. Until we ground our talking points in our values, we won’t be able to gain ground with those whose minds aren’t yet made up.

Civia Tamarkin
November 2022
A Filmmaker’s Fight: Civia Tamarkin Documents the War Against Abortion
Journalist and filmmaker Civia Tamarkin released her feature-length documentary, Birthright: A War Story, in 2017. A prescient account of the war on women’s health, the film lays out the decades-long campaign to criminalize abortion.
I spoke with Tamarkin by phone after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned rights to abortion guaranteed in the 1973 ruling in Roe v. Wade. Tamarkin, 75, has long been an activist in the area of women’s rights. She shared insights and strategies she believes essential in the fight to legalize abortion.