ABORTION BUDDY

Since yesterday, so-called abortion buddies are active in Rotterdam and The Hague: volunteers who accompany you to an abortion clinic to protect you from intrusive anti-abortion activists.

Imagine this happening to you: you have had to decide to have an abortion. I don't believe there is a single woman who does this without hesitation. You probably feel intensely sad and anxious, and maybe you feel a bit ashamed too. Fortunately, the choice for abortion is free in the Netherlands, but unwanted pregnant women do not always experience it this way. Imagine being pulled at before you step into such a clinic. And being shouted at: ‘Abortion is murder!’ But, dear activists, abortion is not murder. Abortion is despair. It is already mentally heavy enough. The last thing you want to hear are slogans like these and images of fetuses.  

So indeed, it must be different, say the founders of the abortion buddies, Micha de Jong (28) and Trees Luiten (70). Together with twenty other volunteers, they are available to accompany women to an abortion clinic and protect them from the activists. ‘We safeguard the freedom of choice for women,’ they say. They support unwanted pregnant women in their right and simultaneously give visibility to the pro-choice movement. 

But actually, it is quite absurd that a right we have fought so hard for must be defended again.

For now, the buddies are only available in Rotterdam and The Hague, but if it turns out there is a greater need, they will expand to other cities in the Netherlands.

Text: Franska.co.uk