Brooklyn College students and staff come out and rally for abortion rights

At noon on Friday, dozens of people gathered outside Brooklyn College in New York. “Out of the classrooms and into the streets,” they chanted, asking students to take part in a march for abortion rights.

In light of the Supreme Court’s leaked decision, students, staff and faculty have taken action. The protest was organized by CUNY for Abortion Rights, a new coalition of activists on CUNY campuses who want to fight for reproductive justice.

Students and staff marched across campus, then began a rally outside the gates of Brooklyn College.

“The same people who are pro-life won’t flinch when blacks and browns are brutalized and terrorized by the cops. The same pro-lifers who are complicit in the 238 anti-LGBTQ bills proposed this year alone and the same ‘pro-lifers’ who are complicit in the climate emergency we’re seeing right now,” said Medgar student Hennesey. Evers College and member of NYC. for the right to abortion. “There is no reproductive justice without racial justice. There is no reproductive justice without the liberation of trans, queer and non-binary people.

The rally was moderated by Tatiana Cozzarelli, an assistant professor at Brooklyn College, a student at the Graduate Center and a member of Left Voice:

Democrats claim to be on the side of abortion rights. But they supported and passed the Hyde Amendment which stopped lower income people’s access to abortion. Right now, even with what’s going on, Nancy Pelosi supports anti-choice Democrats in Texas. And they’ve had 50 years to get free, safe, and legal abortion into law and they haven’t.

Tatiana reminded people of the Latin American feminist movement whose symbol was the green bandana worn by many in the crowd. “We must build a movement in the streets, a green wave, like the one in Argentina to crush all those who oppose our rights.”

Then Josiah, a former Amazon employee who helped organize the Staten Island warehouse, took the microphone. The crowd cheered, chanting “Fuck Jeff Bezos!”

Josiah said: “The Amazon Labor Union supports abortion rights. We are here with you… Rights in general are under attack everywhere. Millionaires and billionaires shit on workers every day. We have to fight at some point. »

A group of students from the music department led the group in a song backed by a trumpet that a student had brought to the protest: “Free abortion, safe abortion, my body, my choice,” chanted the crowd.

Nina, a CUNY staff member and incoming nursing student, spoke about the importance of unionization at CUNY. She spoke about student organizing against the brutal imperialist war in Vietnam, as well as CUNY’s history of fighting, which includes student walkouts, sit-ins and mass protests. “We need that kind of movement now here at CUNY,” she explained.

The need to organize a mass movement for the right to abortion is clear. And we must build this movement by organizing ourselves in our workplaces and our places of study. We must build this movement by organizing at CUNY, on every campus, mobilizing our friends, colleagues, and colleagues in this fight. This type of grassroots organizing, community building and community mobilization is necessary for the fighting ahead. .