Two feminist activists plan to create a pro-choice video game to educate Texans about abortion in the state.
According to the game’s promotional Tumblr site, “Choice: Texas” is intended to demonstrate how hard it is to get an abortion in Texas.
Players will “explore the game through one of several characters, each of whom reflects specific socioeconomic, geographic, and demographic factors impacting abortion access in Texas.”
The women behind the free Web game, Carly Kocurek and Allyson Whipple, told Persephone Magazine that players can choose from five possible characters to navigate the game’s challenges.
One of the characters, Leah, is a 19-year-old bartender from a small town in Texas. Another woman featured in the game is Latrice, a 35-year-old Houston-based lawyer. The game’s level of difficulty will depend on which character the user chooses to play.
The two women are currently using IndieGoGo to raise funds for the creation of the game and for the “neat swag” that will be given to campaign contributors.
Kocurek is a historian and assistant professor whose research focuses on video games, youth culture and gender. Whipple is a feminist poet and plans on teaching at a community college in Texas this semester.
The women said that they first started working on the game in January, but the advancement of pro-life legislation in Texas “really energized” the project.
In the past two legislative sessions Texas adopted laws restricting abortion. The passed a bill that ensured that doctors show women seeking abortions a sonogram 24 hours before they go through with the procedure. The law also required that women also be given a pamphlet that discussed childhood development and outlined alternatives to abortion.
In this most recent session Texas lawmakers voted to restrict abortions after five weeks instead of the third trimester or roughly 20 weeks.
Not everyone is a fan of this proposed game.
Emily Horn of Texas Right to Life told The Daily Caller News Foundation that she finds the campaign video “disturbing” and that it “trivializes” a situation that can be very tough for women.
She says that the game’s creators are trying to “cause a stir” and are also “trying to attack the lawmakers who are trying to protect women in vulnerable situations.”
Kocurek and Whipple plan on launching the game in February of 2014.
They declined requests for comment and blocked TheDCNF on Twitter.
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