"Excuse me miss, would you like to help support women's rights today?"
BTW, the T-shirt bore this logo:
It was a revelation. And when I thanked him for his manly commitment to a woman's cause, he pointed out his associates across the street, two more young hip dudes representing PP. Not a female in sight!
I was terribly excited, but he didn't see why. Why wouldn't a bunch of bros raise money for pro-choice organizations? Abortion, he reasoned, is every woman's right and every human's issue. True story! So we chatted for a few minutes, me forgetting the urgency of my dinner date and he comforted by having attracted non-negative attention (just as I approached him, a burly bearded man in a T-shirt with a bald eagle and American flag responded to his above question with a huffy "Oh, I do support women."). I made a donation and shook his hand before moving on, very pleased with what had just happened.
As a budding feminist, I am still feeling out my attitudes towards men and the abortion issue. I like to wield our go-to catch phrases like "77% of anti-abortion leaders are men; 100% will never need an abortion" and the like, but I do appreciate that men are a vital resource to protecting our rights. Even though they suck sometimes (some might argue they suck most of the time), I want to send an enthusiastic shout-out to all the men out there avoiding fatherhood as long as possible.
Thx!
That IS pretty amazing. I like it when I see young men taking an interest in reproductive rights.
ReplyDeleteThat is awesome! I always find myself a little dumbstruck by men that are strongly pro-choice. I guess I am just used to men telling me that a fetus is more important than me. Also, awesome catch phrase that I'll borrow, even if it applies to the US and not Canada.
ReplyDeleteNice! Speaking of that catchphrase -- which incidentally is on a poster whose image we use as our twitter icon, so you know I like it -- but I've always wondered where on earth that figure (77% of anti-abortion leaders are men) came from. It doesn't seem like something you could ACTUALLY calculate accurately, and it's not like to poster has a footnote and citation. I'd at least be curious to know who first came up with it and what the methodology was -- like, did they count up the people who have ever been on TV to talk about their anti-choice views? The directors of 501c(3)s specifically founded to fight abortion rights? I'm just so curious. It's the data-head in me...
ReplyDeleteFor what it's worth, I'm a male adoptee who strongly supports every woman's right to choose what's best for her.
ReplyDeleteWho am I to say what is right for anyone but myself?