Michelle Obama Asks Men to Please Not Fuck Us Over

Election Day is a week and a day away; my anxiety and 2016 PTSD have officially kicked in. And based on Michelle Obama’s speech this weekend, I am not the only one.

The former first lady introduced Vice President Kamala Harris at a rally in Kalamazoo, Michigan, on Saturday and she did not hold back. In her only speech on the campaign trail this election (apart from her remarks at the Democratic National Convention), Obama delivered a searing 45-minute warning on the future of women’s rights and healthcare in America if Donald Trump is elected again. She said she’s “a little frustrated” and “a little angry” at anyone thinking about not casting a vote, and called out the media for holding Trump to a much lower standard than Harris. And while I very much can appreciate a good campaign speech, I’m rarely moved by them—but this one shook me a little.

“So to the men who love us, let me just try to paint a picture of what it will feel like if America, the wealthiest nation on Earth, keeps revoking basic care from its women, and how it will affect every single woman in your life,” Obama said. And paint a picture she did. Obama went on to list some very vivid examples of exactly what happens when the government gets to choose what a woman is allowed to do with her body. We’re printing them here in full, and in my opinion, they’re worth a read and a watch. Maybe send this along to the undecided voter (I’m typing this with an eye roll) in your life…

Your girlfriend could be the one in legal jeopardy if she needs a pill from out-of-state or overseas, or if she has to travel across state lines because the local clinic closed up. Your wife or mother could be the ones at higher risk of dying from undiagnosed cervical cancer because they have no access to regular gynecological care. Your daughter could be the one too terrified to call the doctor if she’s bleeding during an unexpected pregnancy. Your niece could be the one miscarrying in her bathtub after the hospital turned her away.

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And this will not just affect women, it will affect you and your sons; the devastating consequences of teen pregnancy won’t just be born by young girls, but also by the young men who are the fathers. They too will have their dreams of going to college, their entire futures totally upended by an unwanted pregnancy. If you and your partner are expecting a child, you will be right by her side at the checkups, terrified if her blood pressure is too high, or if there’s an issue with the placenta, or if the ultrasound shows that the embryo was implanted in the wrong place, and the doctors aren’t sure if they can intervene to keep the woman you love safe. If your wife is shivering and bleeding on the operating room table during a routine delivery gone bad, her pressure dropping as she loses more and more blood, or some unforeseen infection spreads and her doctors aren’t sure if they can act, you will be the one praying that it’s not too late, you will be the one pleading for somebody, anybody to do something.

And then there is the tragic but very real possibility that, in the worst case scenario, you just might be the one holding flowers at the funeral. You might be the one left to raise your children alone. See, these are just some of the ways women die during childbirth and I don’t wanna be a downer, y’all, but in many cases, there is no warning, and things go bad very quickly. And when it happens, every second of hesitation or delay can lead to devastating outcomes.

Harris has campaigned heavily on abortion bans and the suffering they’ve caused, but she hasn’t delivered a speech that puts the life-and-death stakes of abortion bans in such stark, blistering terms.

I know I’m talking to Jezebel readers who already know this, but if you’re a guy who randomly stumbled onto this blog, I am giving you permission to not listen to anything from anyone else for the rest of the year as long as you just listen to Michelle Obama telling you to vote for Harris like your lives depend on it…because our lives do.

Must-watch: @MichelleObama makes powerful case for why men should care about reproductive freedom pic.twitter.com/smZmsNZd0G

— Kamala HQ (@KamalaHQ) October 26, 2024

Obama added that she understands why so many Americans are angry about the “slow pace of change,” but maintained that, “If we don’t get this election right, your wife, your daughter, your mother, we as women, will become collateral damage to your rage.”

“So I am asking y’all from the core of my being, to take our lives seriously,” Obama concluded. “Please, do not put our lives in the hands of politicians, mostly men, who have no clue or do not care what we as women are going through.”

Let the sweating, pacing, screaming, and stress-eating blocks of cheese begin.