Women’s rights are under attack again.
Florida lawmakers have filed a bill that would make it a felony for doctors to perform abortions after 20 weeks of pregnancy — a blatant violation of women’s rights under Roe v. Wade. Other bills include provisions that would force women to view an ultrasound of the fetus before having an abortion; bar private insurance companies from covering abortions; and add more restrictions to the already burdensome parental notice requirements for young women. These bills are part of continuing attempts to restrict abortion rights until abortions become completely inaccessible to most women.
Women have been fighting for decades to defend our right to control our lives. We demand that our state lawmakers stand up for women’s rights and defeat these newest threats.
Abortion involves a woman’s basic right to control her own body and the direction of her life; no restrictions on these rights are reasonable.
It is a right connected to all the other things in our lives. Women can’t be on equal footing with men if we are unable to make life-altering decisions such as whether or not to carry a pregnancy to term. Childbearing is physically dangerous, hard work that involves risks that men never face, and women should be able to decide whether we want to do it.
In our feminist group, many of us have had serious pregnancy scares and some of us, despite a lifetime of birth-control vigilance, became pregnant when we didn’t want to be. The fact is it’s a constant struggle for women to keep from becoming pregnant. No birth control is 100 percent effective; they all have side effects, and men often refuse to wear condoms.
Women in Florida have faced similar threats to our rights before. In October 1989, 10,000 demonstrators marched on Tallahassee when then Gov. Bob Martinez called a special session of the state legislature after vowing Florida would be the first state to restrict abortion rights following a Supreme Court decision. All of those bills that sought to restrict a woman’s right to abortion died in committee because state representatives listened to their constituents. Martinez was also resoundingly defeated in the next election.
Let history be a lesson to those currently in our state legislature. Women will not stand for violations of our rights.
As the women’s liberation group Redstockings said in 1971, women need to go for what we really want. All women should have the right to get an abortion at any time for any reason, regardless of the ability to pay and without waiting periods, consent laws or other hurdles. Women should have the right to decide when and if we will bear children.
Call your representatives and tell them to vote no on House bills 97, 321, 415, 501, 747, 1127, 1179 and 1247.
Join Gainesville Women’s Liberation, a chapter of National Women’s Liberation, for Speak Out on Abortion on April 9 at 3 p.m. at the Civic Media Center. For more information, contact National Women’s Liberation at nwl@womensliberation.org.
