From the SFLA Blog

This Is How Someone The Abortion Lobby “Protects” Was Treated At A Bans Off Our Bodies Rally

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Caroline Wharton - 16 May 2022
Bans Off Our Bodies Rally
Guest post by the Campaign for Abortion Free Cities St. Paul Community Organizer Ellisha Olson

GUEST POST: This past weekend, as I led a counter protest to a Bans Off Our Bodies rally in St. Paul, Minnesota, I was a firsthand witness to the hostility and hatred of the abortion lobby. Despite checking off all of the boxes which they claim to protect—minority, female, sexual assault survivor—I was dehumanized and treated like “trash” merely because I believe life is sacred, and women deserve better than abortion. Here’s what happened:  

Blatant Racism Abounded  

At the counter protest, I was so excited to help represent life and the positive choices that women can make, but the verbal abuse from the abortion lobby began just five minutes after my group arrived. A handful of Caucasian girls immediately began to single out, jeer, and scream racist insults at my South-Asian friend Maya and me. Despite both of us being women of color, we were called “white trash,” “white supremacists,” and told that we were “ugly and useless.” Our amazing bodyguards, who both happened to be African American, were also verbally attacked as one Caucasian man yelled at them, “Black men don’t matter.”  

Bans Off Our Bodies Rally

How is the abortion lobby tolerant again? They were being extremely racist towards us as women of color, but no one on their side called them out for it. If the roles had been reversed, we would have been rightfully dragged through the mud for such racist comments, but no one stepped up to put them in their place. Apparently, if you’re pro-life, it doesn’t matter if your discriminated against based on your race.  

Crude, Sexually Charged Accusations 

When the pro-abortion protestors weren’t yelling bigoted statements at us, they were screaming and chanting sexually perverse things, instead. The Caucasian man who had been taunting our bodyguards told me and Maya, “You two must have sucked the guards’ d*cks to get them to come out here with you.” That led to the group of Caucasian girls standing in front of us and chanting over and over again, “D*ck suckers.”  

Bans Off Our Bodies Rally
My Sexual Assault & Worth Dismissed 

As a sexual assault survivor, I was also told multiple times that because I am pro-life, my sexual assault experience “didn’t matter.” Going beyond just invalidating my experience, the pro-abortion protestors actually went so far even as to say that they wished my assault had been worse or that I had died from the experience, instead. 

When I spoke to another pro-abortion woman about rape, our conversation was equally appalling. As someone who was conceived out of rape and placed with an adoptive family, I feel like I can speak to this topic well. I explained to the woman that the circumstances of how you’re conceived don’t determine your worth as a human being, and for the woman that is unfortunately raped, she does have an option to either parent or work with an adoption agency, as my own biological mother did. The pro-abortion woman responded back snidely, “Your mom obviously didn’t think you were worth it, then.”  

Bans Off Our Bodies Rally
There Is No Love at a Bans Off Our Bodies Rally  

For speaking up for the voiceless and vulnerable, my pro-life friends and I experienced the ugly reality of the abortion lobby as they cut down and insulted every part of us—our race, our sexual identity, our life experiences, and our worth overall. For a group that likes to claim “women’s empowerment,” there wasn’t a drop of love or compassion shown; the only thing they cared about was abortion.  

Unfortunately, this isn’t just a phenomenon happening in St. Paul—this is the truth of the abortion lobby. If you are not for abortion, you will be dehumanized and abused both physically and verbally because you are an inconvenience to them. In the same way that a preborn child is viewed as an inconvenience by the abortion lobby and then brutally killed in an abortion, the pro-life movement is viewed as an inconvenience to the abortion lobby, and we are being trampled underneath their feet. 

Bans Off Our Bodies Rally

Regardless of who the abortion lobby says they stand for, they really just support abortion, and violence and hostility are shown to anyone who gets in their way—even those they claim to protect, like me.  

Read more by Ellisha Olson HERE.  

Read SFLA President Kristan Hawkins’ op-ed at the Washington Times: Abortion Is The Number One Killer of African Americans  

READ NEXT: Schedule: Where Students for Life of America and Students for Life Action Is Mobilizing  

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