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Planned Parenthood activists rally at City Hall against defunding of Title X

Bostonians protested Congress’ plan to defund Title X, and thus eliminating funds toward Planned Parenthood, at the steps of City Hall on Saturday during the “Boston Walk For Choice.”

About 50 people held posters that read messages such as, “I Stand with Planned Parenthood,” “Family Planning is Fiscally Responsible” and “Because of Planned Parenthood, I’ve never needed an abortion. Thank you.”

“They want to cut $330 million,” said organizer and speaker Liz Waters. “These measures are anti-women and anti-family. Already they are losing support. Even if any bill does pass in the House, it won’t pass the Senate, and Obama will have to veto it.”

Waters said that it is still necessary to protest in order to raise awareness.

“There’s a nation-wide attack on women’s rights and the rights of all people to sexual and reproductive health,” said organizer Elizabeth Gentry. “On a national level there’s an effort to restrict rights to abortion and remove funding for Planned Parenthood. But there’s also an effort going on in states across the country that is even worse in a lot of ways.”

Gentry, 30, said she thinks there is a coordinated effort on the part of the Republican Party to rile up the base for next year’s election. She said that they are completely avoiding dealing with issues of the economy.

“They say they want to provide jobs, but they haven’t been doing anything to do that. Instead, they are bringing up partisan issues, and next year when nothing has been done to provide jobs, they will blame it on Obama,” Gentry said. “We won’t take this lying down.”

“I think we should keep being outraged about this and stay active and not back down. People fought for this in the 70s and now we’re doing it again. It’s ridiculous,” said Kaitlyn Clericuzio, an organizer of the walk and a Boston University sophomore in the School of Education.

“We are now given the daunting task of debunking the lies and urging people to see beyond the moral panic anti-choicers are trying to create,” said Stephanie Beal, a College of Arts and Sciences sophomore and organizer, during a speech.

“These are our rights. Religion cannot take them away. Our government should not be taking them away. Our bodies are not public property, they are not incubators…Enough is enough. We don’t have to tolerate anti-choice agendas when we live in a pro-choice country.”

Everyone deserves affordable accessibility to health and reproductive care, Beal said.

Waters, during a speech, gave out Sen. Scott Brown’s phone number and urged people to call him and tell him that they expect him to protect women’s health, to protect women’s reproductive freedom and to vote against H.R. 3 and all other anti-choice measures that come through congress.

“We will not sit down and be quiet while our rights to make our own medical decisions become disposable fodder for conservative politicians to divide our nation further,” Waters said.

“The GOP tries to say that Planned Parenthood is essentially an abortion factory for women who can’t keep it in their pants,” said protester and 18-year-old high school student Mason Weiser. “It’s not a very large portion of the country, but they all vote compared to the rest of us.”

The bill is an attack on poor and middle class women in America, said Dana Morgenstein in a speech.

“These people think we’re immoral and stupid,” she said. “They think we can’t make the most important choice of our lives, which is whether or not to be a parent. But we are brave, we are strong, and we are going to stand up for our rights. We need to fight back.”

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