Abortion rights advocates around the region took to the streets Friday to share their outrage at the Supreme Court ruling that overturned Roe v. Wade after 50 years.
In Harrisburg, Rachel Maurer and a group partnered with Elementary Coffee to gather people at the fountain at the Pennsylvania Capitol Complex. In Lancaster, a protest was organized at Musser Park, while another popped up at Continental and Hanover squares in York.
Maurer said when the decision came down, she cried with her husband, then searched and called around the city to see if anyone had heard of any protests set for tonight. When there wasn’t, she and some friends decided to do it themselves.
“My message is that we can’t stop caring,” Maurer said. Caring, kindness, and fighting for each other’s rights are what she hopes people focus on.
They started at 4:30 p.m., and to see the group grow through the afternoon and into the evening, she felt sadness along with happiness to see people supporting abortion rights.
“I was excited because the energy is great, but I was really sad. I looked across the people here and I saw a lot of my friends who I know have gone through really traumatic experiences with abortion. And I’ve seen women who are talking and it was beautiful, and it was sad.”
A 54-year-old woman, who did not want to give her name, got in front of the group and said that for the first time, she was publicly talking about the abortion she got in college. And that, although it shouldn’t matter, it was because she knew she was not ready to have a child.
She got emotional talking about hearing the news this morning.
“I had a hard time,” she said through tears. “I was overcome with emotion.”
She said because she was at work, she had to get up and go to the bathroom to calm down, because of how deeply personal it is for her.
“It’s also an equality issue,” she said. “Women cannot be equal if they cannot have the ability to control their reproduction.”
She said she was not being disrespectful to men, but that they do not have to make the same decision, with the stakes being what they are, as women do.
“They don’t have all the effects of carrying the child, figuring out the whole work thing,” she said. Even when people say that they can put babies up for adoption, she says “it’s just not that simple.”
Speaking out for the first time as she did, she said she felt it was important for people to know that someone like her, who is an “old frumpy woman” who may not fit the stereotype of who gets an abortion, may still need to make that choice.
“I’ve been burning inside,” she said. “Like, how dare they? I get it. You don’t want to have an abortion. Fine. You believe differently. Fine. I’m not telling you to get an abortion.”
Guiseppe and Jeanette Grioli came toward the end of the Capitol rally around 7 and stayed there to “take the late shift,” they joked.
“Rights should be universal. And it’s not even a slippery slope, it’s a direct straight line,” Guiseppe Grioli said.
“They want to say it’s about unborn children, and that’s a crock,” he continued. “If it was about unborn children, then they would be supporting healthcare for children until they’re 18, at least, they would be worried about the death rates of pregnant women, so many other things.”
Jeannette Grioli added that they should be worried about education, and the threat of school shootings.
She said when she heard, she cried and pulled her 12-year-old son aside to tell him, this is why voting is important.
“If you support the people doing this, for any reason, no matter what cause you think you’re supporting them for, you’re supporting this too,” Guiseppe Grioli said about the upcoming November elections.
Maurer said with this issue isn’t something as clearly decided by party lines as some people think. It might have been conservative judges that made this decision, but Republicans like her husband were just as affected by it as she was.
“You can be red, you can be blue, this is beyond that,” Maurer said. “It shouldn’t be about that.”
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