The cultural legacy of the 1987 cult movie, Dirty Dancing, is most strongly associated with Johnny and Baby’s sizzling chemistry and sexually charged dance moves.
But at the heart of Eleanor Bergstein’s tale is a clear and unapologetic argument for reproductive choice, or put more bluntly, getting abortion as soon as possible.
Set in the 1960s, the drama sees a working-class girl named Penny (Cynthia Rhodes) left in immense pain after a botched back-alley abortion: “The guy had a dirty knife and a folding table,” her friend bitterly recalls. “I could hear her screaming in the hallway.”
Notably, however, Penny’s choice to abort in the first place is never questioned, not even by Baby’s strict father, a doctor who helps her heal afterward.
Rather, the film lays the blame for her ordeal on the economic and legal barriers that kept Penny from a safer procedure.
In doing so, Dirty Dancing stands as a stark testament of what was gained with Roe v. Wade and what we stand to lose when those rights were taken away by the Supreme Court in July.
