On April 25, the National Mall in Washington, D.C., will be flooded with hundreds of thousands of men and women, including some Syracuse University students, marching in support of women’s reproductive rights.

The March for Women’s Lives will focus on the issues of access to abortion and birth control, rights that the current presidential administration has begun to chip away at and will continue to do so if allowed, said march organizers in an e-mail.

‘From the very first moment he, President Bush, took office, he has tried to hinder reproductive rights,’ said Betty DeFazio, external affairs director at the Planned Parenthood branch of the Rochester and Syracuse region.

Two organizations, the Voices of Planned Parenthood and Students Advocating Sexual Safety and Empowerment, have been particularly instrumental in bringing SU and State University of New York College of Environmental Science and Forestry students to the march.

‘I’d say (I know) a dozen people going,’ said Sandra Tasic, member of the Maxwell Women’s Caucus. ‘Some are going from SU from the bus, but I’m driving up myself.’

The Society for Truth and Justice expects about 1,000 marchers, according to its Web site. Defazio said the response to the march has been better than expected, with more buses going than first anticipated.

‘I think a lot more people are paying attention because of the election,’ said Erika Gable, member of VOX, a college-campus organization branched off of Planned Parenthood.

Planned Parenthood on the national level is one of the six founding organizations of the march and they have been very active locally in working with VOX to raise awareness of the march.

Many of the people attending the march have never gone before, but look forward to experiencing it for the first time. They each have their own reasons for going, many of which are deeply personal.

‘For me it is very personal,’ said DeFazio. ‘I lost a grandmother to illegal abortion. When abortion is illegal, women die. It doesn’t stop it, it just drives it underground.’

Along with Panned Parenthood, the Syracuse Peace Council has also joined in the support for the march.

‘Clearly there’s a broad assault on women’s reproductive rights underway, on the national and local level,’ said Andy Major, a representative of the council.

Many march supporters believe Bush will try to appoint a Supreme Court justice with a pro-life viewpoint, and the court will overturn Roe v. Wade, a Supreme Court case that gave legality to abortion. They also fear the Partial Birth Abortion Ban Act of 2003 signals the end of an era of free choice and privacy.

The march supporters also believe that the access to birth control options will be restricted if Bush has his way. They also see his push to only preach abstinence with little to no mention of birth control methods as a direct assault on women’s reproductive rights.

But the march will not go without opposition.

‘A quarter of a million of (marchers) will walk through an ocean of pro-life signs and banners,’ said Randall Terry, president of the Society for Truth and Justice, a pro-life organization that will hold a counter demonstration on Sunday. ‘Babies are dying. They are killing human beings. Murder is wrong. This is a Holocaust that we need to stop.’

The reproductive rights debate has been a hot topic on the SU campus as there has also been a large effort to bring women’s reproductive rights issues to the forefront of the political discussions.

Others feel obligated to give women who have no voice a chance to be heard.

‘I have not gone to previous marches before,’ Tasic said. ‘I would feel guilty not going.’

But going to the march is only half the battle, as what happens during and after the march could have the biggest effect.

‘I think the march will serve two purposes,’ DeFazio said. ‘Number one is to tell the elective offices that men and women are paying attention. Number two to make the general public more aware of what’s going on.’

Many people feel the greatest outcome of the march will be to let people know that there is a group of people who care about these issues.

‘(We need to show) that people are not just silently waiting for the right to be taken away,’ Tasic said. She added that she felt getting young people to vote and gaining visibility in the media were two important ways that these issues can be further advanced.

The marchers see the government as attempting to appoint people to positions of power that have pro-life views or very limited views of sexual health education.

‘I do feel that it’s very important for them (young people) to be involved,’ said Sunny Hernandez, a member of Students Advancing Sexual Safety and Empowerment. ‘If you don’t say anything you can’t complain later. We hold such a large portion of those who are able to vote and participate politically, yet we don’t do anything because people are complacent.’

Published on April 22, 2004 at 12:00 pm