thanks for following! I have a question, you mentioned you were in a pro-choice group at ubc, how can I get in on that, because I’m up to HERE with this annual harassment; and it would be a group I would really like to be part of. let me know

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Hey :) I am not part of a group at UBC, I just haven’t got my shit together enough to actually join one. There is the Students for Reproductive Rights and I’m on the mailing list - If you want the email address I can pass it along.  I found out about the counter-protest on Facebook and went with a like-minded friend. We showed up and everyone was really welcoming and awesome. I would suggest joining that club if you’re interested. If not, they definitely won’t say no to extra support during a protest! A lot of the people there weren’t affiliated with any clubs but came anyway. Let me know if you join anything and end up really liking it!

I spent a good portion of today protesting the “Genocide Awareness Project” on campus. They always set up their horrific/disturbing/racist signs around women’s day as a special “fuck you” to women*. I don’t know why UBC continues to allow these people to put up this kind of imagery on campus - they have large, graphic images of (photoshopped) aborted fetuses, victims of the Holocaust and the Rwandan Genocide, and a victim of lynching, along with other really disrespectful and misleading images. Their goal is to shame people who seek abortions and equate them with mass murderers. They really don’t care that their images might also be upsetting to people outside of their target audience - ie. people who’ve had miscarriages, students with family members/ancestors who were victims of genocide, children (a group of kids walked by - it would have given me nightmares at their age).

This year the GAP and the protesters were separated by a “neutral zone” and for the most part did not engage with one another. I think our protest was fairly successful - we had some respectful conversations with other students and some awesome words of encouragement from passersby. Some of us had pro-choice signs and others properly defined genocide. I had a sign that said “Pro-Choice, Pro-Child” and a few pro-lifers/anti-choicers challenged me on it. I explained that although I am really excited to one day have a family, I am not even close to being prepared financially, emotionally, etc. for a child right now. I’m very fortunate to have the right to make my own decisions regarding my reproductive health and when to start a family. Luckily there isn’t much these people can do to restrict that (*knock on wood*). All in all, it was actually a good day despite the GAPs best efforts to ruin it. It was freezing cold though!

Anyway, I don’t usually say much on this blog but I felt like I had to put this out there. I’m not too confident about writing on tumblr. If anyone else was there, or you want to say something about it, feel free to message me!

Just saw the Makers documentary on PBS. It was really informative, interesting, and inspiring. There were some issues (they kind of ignored contemporary feminism and the intersectionality of oppression) but I would still urge everyone to watch it.