Martha Plimpton Speaks On Her Work With The Nonprofit Organization, A is For
A is For is a nonprofit organization dedicated to advancing reproductive rights and ending the stigma against abortion care. Founded in 2012, A is For emerged as a response to the ever-escalating legislative attacks on access to safe reproductive healthcare. They passionately stand against the culture of shaming that fosters that legislation. Co-founder Martha Plimpton sits down with BUILD to talk.
Video Transcript
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RICKY CAMILLERI: Hey, everyone. Welcome to "BUILD at Home," once again, at home. Coming to you from my apartment in Brooklyn, This is Ricky Camilleri. I'm joined right now by the great, the national treasure Martha Plimpton, who is here to talk to us for such an important cause and something that she has dedicated so much of her life to for so long.
Before we get started, I want to say that-- we say this at the top of all of these interviews. It's incredibly important. That is 472 million school lunches have been missed by children across the country due to school closures because of the coronavirus. And if you are interested in helping and finding out how you can donate to get these kids fed, please go to nokidhungry.org.
Martha, thank you so much for logging into your computer and signing in and talking to me right now. Good to see you.
MARTHA PLIMPTON: Thank you so much. I'm really grateful to you for having me. Thank you.
RICKY CAMILLERI: You know, before we get into what I think is an incredibly important cause that no one is really talking about during this because we are so-- I mean, I think rightfully myopic in terms of what's happening right now, but this is incredibly important. I just want to ask, how are you holding up in your quarantine lockdown? What are you doing to stay sane?
MARTHA PLIMPTON: I'm gardening, luckily. I'm-- and that's why I've got my gardening hat on. And then I ran inside to do this, and I realized I had really bad, sweaty hat hair, so I decided to keep it on.
But I'm gardening, which is really fortunate that I have my outdoor space. And I got some roses today I'm going to plant after we talk, and I've got my raised bed. Things are starting to sprout. So that's at least giving me sort of a sense of the passage of time, and, you know, the days aren't completely bleeding into one another.
RICKY CAMILLERI: Are you reading anything? Are you binge watching anything or watching anything that's inspiring?
MARTHA PLIMPTON: I am. I'm reading this really cool book called "Sunshine" by this guy Glen David Gold. And it's a really cool, sort of fantastical novel about Charlie Chaplin and Hollywood.
RICKY CAMILLERI: Oh, cool.
MARTHA PLIMPTON: It's really fun. Yeah, it's really fun. I mean, it's a really great, sort of beautifully written diversion from, you know, daily life. But other than that, I'm gardening mostly. I've started learning how to bake bread like everybody else in the world.
RICKY CAMILLERI: [LAUGHS] I can't tell if that's because we all have time, if we're all actually-- or if we're all just actually worried about, like, food in the apocalypse and we're like--
MARTHA PLIMPTON: No. I mean, I think they sort of-- they merge together in a way.
RICKY CAMILLERI: Right.
MARTHA PLIMPTON: Also, I was saying-- I was telling someone the other day I think there's something about the sort of patience that it requires, the sort of-- and the methodical sort of step by step-- and it has to be very precise-- that it's very sort of calming, I think, also. So it's like you're nourishing yourself. You're providing, you know, the people in your cave, you know, nourishment, sustenance. But also you're sort of participating in this sort of natural, you know, specific process that takes time. And, you know, you have to be patient and breathe through it. So I think that maybe it's sort of a therapeutic thing for people too. It certainly is for me.
RICKY CAMILLERI: It's extremely scientific too though, right? It's not like other kinds of cooking where you can kind of whip stuff together.
MARTHA PLIMPTON: No.
RICKY CAMILLERI: You have to be very specific.
MARTHA PLIMPTON: This whole sourdough starter thing is really-- it's kicking my butt, I got to say. I am not-- first of all, I'm not a math person-- never have been-- and there's math involved in baking. But also the sourdough thing is really complicated-- really complicated.
RICKY CAMILLERI: Yeah.
MARTHA PLIMPTON: Yeah
RICKY CAMILLERI: It's why I--
MARTHA PLIMPTON: It's kind of getting me-- the sourdough brings me down. Whenever I feel I'm getting defeated by the sourdough thing, I just go back to the regular bread.
RICKY CAMILLERI: It is why I have not engaged in this because I can only picture myself getting halfway through and being like, I don't want to do this, and then getting really upset with myself.
MARTHA PLIMPTON: Yeah, that's the way I get with the sourdough. But with the regular bread, it's easy. The problem is now getting your hand on yeast.
RICKY CAMILLERI: Oh yeah, right.
MARTHA PLIMPTON: After toilet paper, there was a big run on yeast. So--
RICKY CAMILLERI: Really?
MARTHA PLIMPTON: --good luck. Yeah.
RICKY CAMILLERI: Wow.
MARTHA PLIMPTON: Yeah. There's no yeast in any stores. I have to mail-- I mailed my friends yeast today.
RICKY CAMILLERI: Wow. I had no idea that that was a-- that was part of-- that was a problem right now.
MARTHA PLIMPTON: It's crazy. It's crazy.
RICKY CAMILLERI: Tell me about A is For, the organization that you helped found. How long has it been running, and what exactly is it for?
MARTHA PLIMPTON: Gosh. Well, I think we've been doing this about-- and I hate to even say this, but about eight years now. We are an organization that uses arts and artists' voices to eradicate the stigma surrounding abortion and to change the conversation around the whole subject of reproductive justice in general and specifically about abortion and reproductive health care.
And we reach out to artists all over the world and all over the country. And here in New York, every year we have our sort of signature event, Broadway Acts for Women, which is where a bunch of Broadway stars come. Then the audience gets to bid on what karaoke song they're going to sing with our live band. It's really exciting. And so, of course--
RICKY CAMILLERI: What have been-- what have been previous-- what have been previous winners of that, just out of curiosity, if you remember some of them?
MARTHA PLIMPTON: Well, the winners are in the audience because they bid, so they get to choose the song. But Patti LuPone did our first year. She did "Natural Woman." Actually, she brought the whole cast out with her. Betty Buckley did it one year. She sang a Radiohead song "High and Dry." That was pretty awesome. So we've got-- we've had a lot of great, incredible artists come and do that.
But, of course, this year it was going to be on May 3. You know, along with every other organization and every other not-for-profit that was planning their spring fundraising, that's had to be put on hold. So we're sort of working on other contingency plans.
And for one thing, we have this playwriting contest that actually started way before all of this even began, which is pretty cool. We're asking for submissions for one-act plays that are written on the subject of reproductive justice or in the realm of reproductive health care. So they can be sci-fi. They can be realistic. They can be monologues. It doesn't matter just as long as they're 60 pages or under, and we're giving a cash prize. I think we're announcing at the end of May, but we may push that now, obviously because of, you know, extenuating circumstances.
But it's really exciting because it's a way for us to sort open up our vocabulary, our emotional vocabulary about what this really means. Because in our country, as you know, we have this sort of cultural deficit in terms of how we think about abortion care and reproductive health care in general, but specifically abortion. And, of course, these issues dovetail into one another.
And so we want to-- we need to change that conversation because, as you say when you very kindly introduced the subject, you know, you were saying, well, it makes sense for us to sort of be kind of, you know, tunnel vision about what's happening in terms of COVID-19, and that's true.
But what we don't realize is that, of course, health care is a very broad spectrum of issues, right? And all of these things that involve our health, including abortion and reproductive health care, you know, are floating on the same boat, right? They're all on the same ship, and each one ends up affecting the other. And so, you know, that's why I'm glad we're talking about this today because people have wanted to sort of separate the two and treat abortion as if it's like a special-- you know, they want to put baby in the corner.
[COUGHS] That's not COVID. It's just a tickle in my throat.
RICKY CAMILLERI: Good.
MARTHA PLIMPTON: Don't worry.
RICKY CAMILLERI: Good to know. Good to know.
MARTHA PLIMPTON: But we're trying to say, you know, you can't do that. So yeah.
RICKY CAMILLERI: Well, and also you're seeing-- you're seeing right now because of our sort of myopic nature in regards to COVID-19 that certain governors of conservative states like Oklahoma are actually using it as a means to restrict abortion at this time with really no basis in fact other than the fact-- other than the idea that, like, oh, we can do this in the shadow of this larger story that's happening.
MARTHA PLIMPTON: Right. Well, you're absolutely right. It's Oklahoma. And, of course, Texas leads the way usually with things like this and Greg Abbott, who's rabidly anti-choice and anti-bodily-autonomy for all kinds of people, not just people who identify as female. But there's also Alabama, Iowa, Oklahoma-- Oklahoma-- Oklahoma.
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Them too. Them too-- Ohio. But Texas actually had theirs overturned.
RICKY CAMILLERI: Right.
MARTHA PLIMPTON: And then, like, within a day it was overturned again by the 5th Circuit. So abortion is now effectively banned in the state of Texas, which is a really bad thing. I mean, if you talk to people like Amy Hagstrom Miller over at Whole Woman's Health-- which is, you know, one of the last remaining abortion clinics in the state. You know, that very day they had to turn away at least 150 patients, and where are those people going to go? Many of them have probably lost their jobs or are about to, if they haven't already. They're going to have to travel and possibly have to endure waiting periods in other states of 25 to 72 hours. And then they're also restricted by the fact that they can't obtain telemedicine and get a medication abortion. Which, you know, there's absolutely no medical basis for this to be so restricted, and in 18 states you're not allowed to use telemedicine to get medication abortion.
So it's putting these people in an incredibly difficult position, meaning either they're going to have to wait until somehow this gets lifted-- but that means, of course, in Texas there's a 20-week ban. So, you know, for all intents and purposes it means they're going to have to be pregnant and have a child by force from the state. Or they're going to have to travel and spend money they don't have or risk exposing themselves during a global pandemic to this virus.
RICKY CAMILLERI: I believe that in Oklahoma and Ohio a federal judge has overturned the ban. At the very least--
MARTHA PLIMPTON: Did they? Did they?
RICKY CAMILLERI: Yeah, I believe--
MARTHA PLIMPTON: OK.
RICKY CAMILLERI: --I believe so.
MARTHA PLIMPTON: I haven't heard that today, but that's good news if they have.
RICKY CAMILLERI: Yeah. I don't know if it's like a limited-- oh, I think it's a suspension of the ban. So I don't know--
MARTHA PLIMPTON: Yes.
RICKY CAMILLERI: --yeah if that means it's going to--
MARTHA PLIMPTON: But it's still-- it's in flux.
RICKY CAMILLERI: Yes.
MARTHA PLIMPTON: These other states besides Texas, we're still waiting on decisions. They're either-- they're either suspended, as you said, or we're waiting on decisions.
But, you know, the point is, really, what did the leaders of these states do when they heard this global pandemic was going to hit the United States and hit us hard? What was the first thing they did? They didn't go to their state legislatures and suggest expanding Medicaid or the ACA or broadening COBRA eligibility or lowering COBRA payments. They didn't go to their states saying, you know, we've got to mandate, you know, free COVID-19 testing for all essential workers. No. That wasn't the first thing on their agenda. Interestingly, the first thing on their agenda--
RICKY CAMILLERI: Some.
MARTHA PLIMPTON: Go ahead.
RICKY CAMILLERI: Sorry. Some didn't even commit to a lockdown prior--
MARTHA PLIMPTON: No.
RICKY CAMILLERI: --to doing this.
MARTHA PLIMPTON: I'm fully aware, and yet they wanted to lockdown women.
RICKY CAMILLERI: Yeah.
MARTHA PLIMPTON: They wanted to lockdown women's bodies. They wanted to do everything they could to sort of put a wedge in between people and their right to bodily autonomy, their constitutional right.
Now you know, of course, we should remind everybody that no matter what these people try to do, whatever these governors are trying to do, abortion remains legal in all 50 states. Abortion is-- the right to abortion is the law of the land. You know, it may not be available, but it is legal, and so let's remember that. So when you're having trouble, you know, obtaining the care you have every right to obtain, there are-- you know, there are avenues. There are resources you can go to. You can go to--
RICKY CAMILLERI: Right now--
MARTHA PLIMPTON: Yeah?
RICKY CAMILLERI: Sorry. No, go ahead. Excuse me.
MARTHA PLIMPTON: No, you can go to-- you can certainly always call Planned Parenthood. You can call the National Abortion Federation. That's a collection of OB/GYNs and abortion providers around the country that sort of network and work together on how to make abortion available in states where it's highly restricted. You can contact the National Network of Abortion Funds. They're the ones who can help you get the money to be able to not only pay for the procedure but also the travel. You can contact the Lilith Fund, and you can contact The Brigid Alliance. These are all groups that help people access or obtain abortion care in other states if you have to travel, if you need housing-- you know, all of these things-- child care, things like this. And they can help answer your questions about what's available in your state if you're not clear on it.
RICKY CAMILLERI: This is going to be a kind of a roundabout question, but when we were talking about Texas and we were talking about women not being able to receive care, specifically abortion care, there is a part of me that always feels the need, as pro-choice as I am, to explain to people that that may mean that the care that they're not receiving is not just the simple idea of an abortion based off of their choice, but they might need more care based off of some other extenuating circumstances regarding the pregnancy that they now can't get.
And I almost don't like that I feel like that. Culturally, I feel like I have to do that at this point because I shouldn't have to defend anyone's choice--
MARTHA PLIMPTON: No, you shouldn't.
RICKY CAMILLERI: --for any reason.
MARTHA PLIMPTON: Exactly, so you can stop doing that now.
RICKY CAMILLERI: Thanks.
MARTHA PLIMPTON: I'm giving you permission.
RICKY CAMILLERI: Thanks, Martha.
MARTHA PLIMPTON: OK? No, I mean, you make a very, very good point because that is a concern of a lot of people. People get-- you know, these antis are very, very good at manipulating the subject and taking advantage of little sort of what they perceive as chinks in the armor-- you know, for example, the word choice.
You know, within the reproductive-justice world, the word choice has been a problematic one for a lot of people-- and this has been a subject that's been brought up by many women of color who have been, you know, leaders in this movement for generations-- that choice somehow implies a kind of bourgeois, sort of middle-class concept. Like, you know, oh, this is my choice, you know? It's like choosing a nail-polish color. And, you know, while, of course, that's not the accurate reality, it's understandable why that sort of nomenclature creates problems in people's minds.
It's also, you know, one of the things that antis are using to justify making it seem like abortion is an elective procedure-- therefore, you know, banning all elective procedures, you know, and this includes abortion.
Well, you know, these women who have been saying this about the word choice have a really solid point-- and they've had one since well before the antis started, you know, opportunistically trying to use it against us-- because it's not about choice so much as it's about decisions. It's about the right to make decisions about your own body, about your own life, about your own family, right? And sometimes these decisions are really very simple and straightforward.
Most women who have abortions already have children and are making this decision based on the fact that they can't afford to have another, or they think it won't be safe for them, or maybe they're in an abusive relationship, or maybe they're just too young, or maybe it's just not the right time in their life and they want to go to college and they want to discover who they are first before they have a child. There are a million reasons why people make decisions about where to go and what to do in their lives-- how they want to live their lives, right?
So you can-- you can stop worrying about that now. There's no-- you know, there's no, you know, acceptable version--
RICKY CAMILLERI: Right.
MARTHA PLIMPTON: --that any of these antis is going to, you know, want to-- sort of is going to believe anyway. So just do away with that and know that, you know, it's all fine.
RICKY CAMILLERI: That's something that I couldn't agree with more, that there's no acceptable form that these antis are going to agree with anyway. And I feel like as a person-- as a person on the left, if you will, I always feel like we are kowtowing our arguments and justifying them for-- as if we're going to convince these other people--
MARTHA PLIMPTON: That's right.
RICKY CAMILLERI: --that we're [INAUDIBLE], and we're never going to. So at this point--
MARTHA PLIMPTON: Or as if it's a matter of like, look-- you know, like all other areas where you have to sort of negotiate for your freedom, it just doesn't work that way.
RICKY CAMILLERI: Yeah.
MARTHA PLIMPTON: I mean, ask anyone who's, you know, been on the forefront of civil rights ever in their lives if, you know, asking and negotiating for freedom really is the way to go--
RICKY CAMILLERI: Yeah.
MARTHA PLIMPTON: --generally.
RICKY CAMILLERI: And, like, justifying it with baby steps and-- yeah. That doesn't--
MARTHA PLIMPTON: That's right.
RICKY CAMILLERI: --certainly work.
MARTHA PLIMPTON: That's right.
RICKY CAMILLERI: One-- you know, the Supreme Court right now is made up of a conservative-- majority conservative justices-- extremely conservative justices. Do you have any fear that federal law in regards to women's reproductive rights could change during our generation?
MARTHA PLIMPTON: Yeah. Yeah. We have this court case coming up. This decision is in June, which is basically a repeat of what we had in Texas with these trap laws that the Supreme Court ruled unconstitutional in-- I want to say it's 2016 now. So now four years later we have basically the exact same sort of case, which basically would say that-- it would put up roadblocks to being able to obtain abortion by saying that any abortion provider has to have admitting privileges to a hospital in that state.
RICKY CAMILLERI: Right.
MARTHA PLIMPTON: Now, of course we know that this is a totally medically unnecessary-- what we call a trap law, which is a targeted regulation of abortion providers. These laws are completely-- what's the word? They're discriminatory, and they're entirely orchestrated to just stop abortion. There's no medical reason. There's no legal reason. There's no insurance reason. Abortion, when provided early and safely under medical care, medical supervision, is the safest thing you can do. It's safer than a colonoscopy, and it's got something like a 0.01 rate of complications.
So we're concerned that with this court in June they're going to uphold this thing, these trap laws, which would effectively return us back to the situation we were in before Roe v. Wade was decided in 1973. I mean, already at this point abortion is effectively unobtainable for more people in this country today than it was before Roe was decided.
RICKY CAMILLERI: Wow.
MARTHA PLIMPTON: So that's a fact that should make anyone's head spin. This would essentially codify and permit that, and it would be devastating.
RICKY CAMILLERI: I didn't know that, that an abortion is more obtainable now than it was--
MARTHA PLIMPTON: Less.
RICKY CAMILLERI: --pre Roe v. Wade. Or sorry, yeah, less attainable than it was pre Roe v. Wade.
MARTHA PLIMPTON: Yes.
RICKY CAMILLERI: That's wild. Is that because of state laws like in--
MARTHA PLIMPTON: That's because of state laws, trap laws, mandatory waiting periods-- again, the inability to use telemedicine. 90% of counties in the United States have no abortion provider at all.
RICKY CAMILLERI: Wow.
MARTHA PLIMPTON: And in the states where it is the most restricted-- places like Alabama, places like Texas, places like Mississippi where you see a lot of hostility and threats towards abortion providers themselves, a lot of those abortion providers choose not to live in those states.
RICKY CAMILLERI: Right.
MARTHA PLIMPTON: So they have to travel. So that would mean that maybe in a given clinic, maybe you can only get an appointment maybe two out of three-- two out of seven days of the week.
So, effectively, abortion is less available now than it was before Roe v. Wade was decided. Fewer people of reproductive age have access to abortion than did before 1973. And that's a tragic reality, and it's only going to get worse if this case goes the way we fear it will with this court built the way it is in June.
RICKY CAMILLERI: And it's really, in some states, become a heroic act to become an abortion-providing doctor.
MARTHA PLIMPTON: Oh no, absolutely. I mean, these people travel, you know, thousands of miles a week-- upwards of thousands of miles-- tens of thousands of miles a week. Basically commute by air usually, and they have to wear bulletproof vests quite often. You know, their families, you know, live sort of, you know, in worry that they're going to get, you know, doxxed or that their houses are going to get exposed or their addresses are going to get exposed online by these crazy people. You know, and abortion providers have been shot and killed, and clinics have been bombed. And so this is a real thing. It's a real concern.
So it is heroic. And, you know, and it's also-- it's kind of-- you know, it's sad because many universities and medical schools are making abortion services an elective.
RICKY CAMILLERI: Wow.
MARTHA PLIMPTON: So the doctors aren't even necessarily learning these skills that they really need to learn. Of course you also have hospitals, mostly in rural areas, that are owned by the Catholic Church, which means that a lot of people living in rural areas where the nearest hospital is, you know, affiliated with the Catholic Church are not going to find reproductive-health-care services. They're often going to find that, if they're in a tough situation, they're going to be turned away and may have to travel 700, 800 miles, a thousand miles, whatever-- or, you know, in some cases maybe less, maybe 75 miles, but that can mean the difference between life and death for someone who's miscarrying or someone who's in a situation in which their life is in danger and the Catholic Church won't help them. The Catholic hospital won't help them.
I mean, there's so many ways in which this issue is just-- has been just relentlessly designed to separate American citizens from their constitutional right to their own bodily health and their own bodily autonomy. It's really crazy. It's really crazy.
And the reason why I think it's important to talk about it in terms of right now and what we're experiencing with this virus is that now we're also seeing, you know, what it means in this country to not have access to health care on a much broader scale. We're seeing what it actually looks like when everyone loses their jobs, loses their insurance, and loses their ability to go to a hospital and get tested for a disease that they think they might have and the cost of that, the price of that.
Universal health care is so important, not only because it means everybody has access to care but it means everyone has access to the same level of care, that it doesn't matter what your zip code is or your income or your immigration status or your race or your gender or your orientation, whether you're trans or whether you're cisgender, whether you're gay or straight. It shouldn't matter. Everyone should have access to the same level of health care as everybody else, including women. And part of that includes abortion and reproductive-health services.
RICKY CAMILLERI: And part of that in this moment is seeing that because it's not just your health that is affected. It's our health that gets affected. If you can't--
MARTHA PLIMPTON: Absolutely.
RICKY CAMILLERI: --receive great-- if you can't receive proper health care in the midst of a virus epidemic like this, I might get sick. They might-- we all might get sick. And I think, you know, going back to what you said, I think we're just seeing the tip of what that's going to look like in regards--
MARTHA PLIMPTON: That's right.
RICKY CAMILLERI: --to people not having health care. I mean, we're in New York City where sort of the number of infections right now I think are quadruple the second-most-infected state in the country, and we haven't even seen what it's going to-- what it's going to cost and what it's going to look like in regards to those who are afraid to go to the hospital and don't have health care. We're just at the tip.
MARTHA PLIMPTON: You make an excellent point about New York City. We have-- excuse me. We have a huge rate of infections, but our death rate is half that of New Orleans.
RICKY CAMILLERI: Wow.
MARTHA PLIMPTON: I'm taking per capita. So that's a situation where we're talking about racial inequality--
RICKY CAMILLERI: Oh yeah.
MARTHA PLIMPTON: --economic inequality in terms of access to health care. And when you have outcomes that are that disparate, it really has to stop-- make you stop and think. You know, what is going on in this country that we are so incapable of addressing the fact that everyone in the-- every person who has a body is going to see a doctor at some point. Every single body, you know?
And so when we see these things as being interlocking and intersecting, when we see all of the different facets or aspects of health care-- abortion, racial disparities in maternal mortality, reproductive health care, access to insurance, all of these things. We see them all in the same boat. Then we can start to see where the leaks are coming from because the boat's sinking, and we're all in it, and we're all going to sink together.
RICKY CAMILLERI: One of the great frustrations that I've had within this pandemic, outside of the tragic nature of it in and of itself, is that many pundits and people saying the virus is the great equalizer. And I've been like, what are you-- what are you talking about? Look at the numbers. Look at the disparity between who's dying. It is not an equalizer at all. Like, us upper-middle-class white people, we're just hanging out in our houses.
MARTHA PLIMPTON: Yeah, exactly. I mean, you look-- I feel like-- I can't remember where I saw it, but it's, you know, something-- it's something about how black Americans are far less able to stay home during this. They have to leave the house because they have to work, right?
And so, you know, this thing affects neighborhoods differently. It's affecting the Bronx and Queens a lot differently than it's affecting Brooklyn or Manhattan. You look at the numbers in Lower Manhattan and the Upper West Side. It's like the infection rate is much lower, right, because of the affluence there and the amount of people who have country homes, OK-- being able to get out of town and not having to ride the subway to work, you know, to feed their families.
You make an excellent point. It's not the great equalizer. Sure, yes, everybody can get it, but that doesn't mean everybody can get the same care. That doesn't mean everybody can get the same treatment, you know?
RICKY CAMILLERI: Yeah. That doesn't mean that everybody has the same fear of going completely broke because they go to the hospital to see if they even have it because they can't breathe.
MARTHA PLIMPTON: Absolutely. You're absolutely right.
RICKY CAMILLERI: Martha, I thank you so much for talking to me--
MARTHA PLIMPTON: Thank you so much.
RICKY CAMILLERI: --for bringing--
MARTHA PLIMPTON: Thank you for having me. I really appreciate it.
RICKY CAMILLERI: --for bringing this issue up because I think as we're seeing, not just with abortion care but with a number of extremely important issues, our leaders are doing things in the shadows of COVID-19, and they're trying to sneak some things past us.
But in regards to A is For, how can people get involved? Where can people go, and what can they do?
MARTHA PLIMPTON: Well, thank you for asking. You can go-- in fact, since we're in a-- you know, in a lockdown, I don't know how many playwrights are out there looking for something to do, but you can write a-- you can write a one-act play. If you want to submit or if you want to just find out more information about it, you can go to aisfor-- A-I-S-F-O-R-- dot org slash contests, and you can find out all about the prizes that are involved and what the criteria for the contest is and what we're looking for. You can-- you know, we have a fantastic panel of judges that's really, really illustrious, which is very cool. So you can do that.
You can write about it. You can share your story because there are so many stories. It's such a vast subject, and we want to hear from you.
So there's that. You can do that, or you can just donate to our organization. You can do that too. Yeah, that's about it.
RICKY CAMILLERI: Amazing. Martha, stay healthy.
MARTHA PLIMPTON: Thanks. You too.
RICKY CAMILLERI: Stay safe. Enjoy your garden, and enjoy-- and nail that sourdough. I believe in you. You're going to be able to do it.
MARTHA PLIMPTON: I'm going to try. I'm going to keep trying. Thank you.
RICKY CAMILLERI: Yeah, of course. Take care, Martha. Good to see you. Thank you.
MARTHA PLIMPTON: Thanks. Bye.
RICKY CAMILLERI: Bye.
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