Depo Diaries--Sistersong Conference, Power of Stories Workshop evaluations, 2007

Formed in 2001, the Committee on Women, Population, and the Environment (CWPE), a multi-racial alliance of feminist community organizers, scholarly activists, and health practitioners, is committed to promoting the social and economic empowerment of women in a context of global peace and justice; and to eliminating poverty. As an organization, CWPE supports women's right to safe, voluntary birth control and abortion, while strongly opposing demographically driven population policies, challenging the belief that population growth is the primary cause of environmental degradation, conflict, and growing poverty, working to provide a broader analysis that reflects the complexity of these issues. CWPE works to build partnerships with community organizers, scholar-activists, and health practitioners to accomplish its political goals, coordinating three task forces: the Dangerous Contraceptive Task Force; the Immigration, Environment, and Gender Task Force; and the Gender, Eugenics, and Biotechnology Task Force. These are the vehicles through which CWPE builds strong coalitions to challenge oppressive population control policies. In addition, CWPE also coordinates three critical initiatives designed to address and undermine reproductive violence and increase reproductive self-determination: Stop C.R.A.C.K.!, Depo Diaries, and Stop Sex Selection!. Depo Diaries was a national storytelling project with an emphasis on reproductive justice with the goal of uncovering a more accurate picture of the range and kinds of side effects women experience from Depo-Provera (trademarked name of medroxyprogesterone, an injected contraceptive).