“Keep your rosaries off my ovaries” and “My body my choice, your body your choice” were among the slogans chanted by a few dozen protesters defending Canadian abortion rights at a downtown Ottawa rally last week.
Organized by non-profit pro-choice group Defend Choice: Ottawa, the “Rally for Choice” faced hundreds of anti-abortion protesters on the other side of a barricade in front of Parliament Hill on May 8.
Defend Choice founders Sydney Holmes and Tamsin Fitzgerald founded the group in 2016 while working near an abortion clinic on Bank Street.
They said they noticed anti-abortion protesters routinely rallying outside of the clinic and started “casually” counter-protesting. They initially pushed for safe abortion access zones, which would prevent anti-abortion protesters from harassing clients and staff members from clinics.
“Aside from Planned Parenthood Ottawa, I guess we’ve been the main abortion rights organizing group in Ottawa,” said Holmes.
The organization has grown, and Holmes and Fitzgerald now hold “Rally for Choice” counter-protests at the annual National March for Life, an anti-abortion demonstration organized by Campaign Life Coalition. The May 8 demonstration was the Defend Choice’s sixth time holding the rally.
Holmes said it is “critical” to show up in support of these demonstrations despite the fact abortion is legal in Canada.
“It’s still something we’ll show up and fight for,” Holmes said. “We know that the vast majority of Canadians believe in legal abortion to some extent.”
According to a 2022 poll from market research firm Ipsos, 56 per cent of Canadians believe that abortion should be permitted whenever a woman decides she wants one, up 13 percentage points from Ipsos polling in 2010.
Despite being vastly outnumbered, spirits were high among the counter protesters. Many stood directly at the barricades, either chanting or holding up colourful signs as they faced protesters on the other side.
Some coordinated red hooded outfits based on Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale, others debated the separation of church and state across the barricade, and a megaphone changed hands to start chants.
Multiple protesters said they had left work to attend.
Among the attendees were a few members of Planned Parenthood Ottawa, including executive director Jaisie Walker.
“This happens on the hill every year,” Walker said of March for Life. “But we do the real fight every day, which is everyday abortion access.”
Clara-Jean Saturn Cross heard about the protest from the Ottawa Trans Library and chose to come out in support to increase her own civic engagement. As a transgender woman, she pointed out that both anti-abortion and anti-transgender legislation seek to limit a person’s control over their bodily autonomy.
“This is still a cause relating to bodily autonomy … that sets a precedent,” Cross said of abortion access in Canada.
“The fact that I don’t have a uterus doesn’t mean that this doesn’t affect me and doesn’t mean I shouldn’t have empathy for other people’s needs.”
Holmes added that bodily autonomy is “critical and important,” and that Canada is “fortunate” to have it encoded in our Constitution.
“That said, our federal government absolutely needs to improve access to abortion,” Holmes said. “It’s really difficult to get an abortion in Canada, especially if you don’t live in an urban centre.”
According to the Abortion Rights Coalition of Canada, access to abortion is especially difficult for people in rural or remote areas, and fewer than one in five Canadian hospitals provide abortion services.
“The fight continues,” Holmes said.
Featured image by Sophia Laporte/the Charlatan
