Chanting “Birth control, not bans!” supporters of Planned Parenthood rallied at the Boston Common on Saturday to demand Republican Sen. Scott Brown vote against the defunding of Title X.
At least 500 Boston-area residents gathered at the Common to protest the recent budget measures in Congress that may stop federal funding Planned Parenthood and similar groups, pending a vote in the Senate next week.
Title X of the Public Health Service Act provides reproductive-health services, such as pregnancy tests and sexually transmitted disease prevention education, to those who need them.
The supporters said they believed Massachusetts representatives would vote against the defunding, but they were worried about Brown’s vote.
“Our target is Brown,” said Leslie Laurie, 63, a resident of Pelham and CEO and director of Tapestry Health, a group of clinics in western Massachusetts.
Laurie said she plans to go to Washington D.C. to camp on Brown’s office lawn.
“If he cares about the views and values of Massachusetts, then he should vote with us every time,” said Andrea Miller, 43, the executive director of the National Abortion and Reproductive Rights Action League Pro-Choice Massachusetts.
“These anti-choice extremists are waging a war on women’s health.”
Both Miller and Laurie spoke from the rotunda on the Common to the protesters.
Among the protesters was Nancy Ryan, 64, a American Civil Liberties Union Massachusetts board member.
Ryan said she doubted Brown would vote against defunding Title X.
“One part of civil liberties is the right of people to make private choices about health care,” said Ryan, a resident of Cambridge. “This is science, this is fact, this is not attitude or ideology.”
“He’s full of [expletive deleted] and he knows it,” said Danielle Gemmell, 25, a Planned Parenthood developmental assistant from New Jersey.
“It’s not about abortion, it’s about accessible, affordable health care for everybody.”
Counter-protesters, who gathered to the left of the main group, disagreed.
“I can’t not speak,” said Sandra Brogan, a 63-year-old teacher from Plymouth. “If even a dollar of my money goes to pay for an abortion there’s blood on my hands before God.”
“We have no money,” said Cara Crilley, 44, a Brighton nurse referring to Planned Parenthood. “So why are we giving money to them?”
“There is no civilization without the right to life,” said John Ritchie, 36, of Hanover, Penn. Ritchie volunteers for Tradition, Family, and Property, a right-wing lay Catholic group.
Title-X prohibits the use of federal funds to pay for programs in which abortion is a method of family planning, said Laurie during a speech. But, other speakers criticized Republican fiscal policy.
Salem Mayor Kimberley Driscoll said Republicans wanted to deny birth control to needy women while giving tax cuts to the wealthy.
During his speech, Democratic Rep. Michael Capuano of Boston, critized the way the federal government spends money.
“We’ve got money for anything that doesn’t make our lives better,” he said.
“Attacks on women are cut from the same cloth as the attacks on workers in Madison,” said Boston factory worker Ted Leonard, 58, a volunteer for the Socialist Workers Party, referring to the recent controversy over collective bargaining in Wisconsin.
One speaker, Patricia Quinn, 46, a resident of Rolinsdale and the executive director of the Massachusetts Alliance on Teen Pregnancy, emphasized the importance of race and class in the debate.
“I don’t want to live in a world where teens’ access to information is an accident of income and geography,” she said during her speech.
After her speech, Quinn said she saw the debate as a public-health issue.
“You can be supportive of family planning and against abortion,” she said. “This work is never finished. New young people become teens every day.”
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Perhaps this issue is not a matter of what the government should be doing to help people but what other people should do for those in need. If Planned Parenthood is really dedicated to its cause, which is helping people learn about stds and about family planning, then they shouldn’t need the government to tell them what to do. And maybe it should be considered whether or not the government has any business in family planning. Isn’t it up to the family to settle that?