Celebrate the Anniversary of Roe v. Wade throughout
the month of January!
Roe v. Wade, the Supreme Court decision that legalized
abortion in all states, celebrates its 31st Anniversary
on January 22, 2004, at a time when it's most vulnerable
and under attack. Roe v. Wade hangs by a thread in
the U.S. Supreme Court and the addition of even one
more anti-choice Justice could result in either overturning
Roe v. Wade or so burdening this right that many
women will effectively be forced to the back alleys.
At the state level, restriction after restriction
is being passed to limit access to family planning
and abortion, especially for poor women and young
women. The de-funding of international family planning
funding and the imposition of the Global Gag Rule
are causing needless deaths and suffering for women
around the world.
What can you do to commemorate the day?
- Organize a “Did You Know Campaign” on the
Global Gag Rule and the de-funding of the
UNFPA (United Nations Population Fund). The
FMF campus organizers have various new materials
available. Please let them know if you need
anything sent to your campus.
- “Adopt a Clinic” and get your group trained
in Clinic Defense to support access to reproductive
health services for all women.
- Expose a Fake Clinic or investigate a local “Crisis
Pregnancy Center.”
- Screen the March for Women's Lives video,
Never Go Back, and other
Pro-choice films at your
very own campus “Pro-Choice
Film Festival”
- Bring in a local reproductive health professional
for a “teach-in” on Emergency Contraception
and Abortion access in your state
- Sponsor a pro-choice social hour to mobilize
support for your March delegation. Include
a Roe vs. Wade Anniversary Cake and post
fact cards on the growing support for abortion
rights in this country around the room (check
out http://www.feministcampus.org/know/sam/unit5.pdf
for polls and studies).
Need more ideas, visit http://www.feministcampus.org/act/action-directory/.
Be sure to add your Roe vs. Wade actions and other
events from your FMLA!
Facts on issues around reproductive rights as well
as action ideas like those listed above can be found
in the Study
and Action Manual online, http://www.feministcampus.org/know/sam/default.asp.
Save the Date: Back Up Your Birth Control Day,
March 22, 2004
The Feminist Majority Foundation's
Campus Team is proud to join the Reproductive
Health Technologies Project and
a coalition of national, state, and local organizations
in participating in the third annual nationwide Back
Up Your Birth Control campaign on March 22, 2004.
This annual day of activism aims to put emergency
contraception into women's hands before a crisis
occurs. Feminist Majority Leadership Alliances (FMLAs)
from across the country will unite with hundreds
of national and local medical organizations and women's
health advocacy groups to promote awareness of emergency
contraception on this day of action. “Save
This Date” while
you organize around Women's History Month. You will
soon receive more information in the mail and via
email including an EC Action Kit with ideas, fact
sheets, and more! Not getting Feminist Majority Foundation
Campus Mailings each month? Email the Campus Team,
campusteam@feminist.org with your name, campus, email,
number, and mailing address and we'll make sure you
get our monthly mailings!
EC OVER-THE COUNTER STILL NEEDS YOUR HELP!
Anti-choice members of congress are
asking the White House to order the FDA to not support
EC Over-the-Counter. While we delivered almost 33,000
signatures to the FDA in December, we need to keep
up the pressure.
Send
a letter to the Director of the FDA and the
White House in support of EC OTC. http://capwiz.com/fmf1/issues/alert/?alertid=4379661&type=CU
MARCH NEWS
Campus March Co-Sponsorship Grows!
661 organizations from across the country have now
signed on as co-sponsors of the March for Women's
Lives!.
We know you're coming too! Get your FMLA or FMLA
Affiliate listed on the national March for Women
website and fill out that online form http://march.feminist.org/FMFsign_and_tell2.asp.
Be sure to put “FMLA” or “FMLA Affiliate” first and
then your campus name, so that we can easily see
all of the FMLAs listed!
Are you unsure on how to organize transportation
to the March? Contact your campus organizer or email
campusteam@feminist.org, for more information. They
have a variety of resources to offer you. Also, continue
to check the FMF March website http://march.feminist.org/ for
new information.
Rock for Choice: FMF Lets You Raise Funds for March
Organizing
Rock For Choice, music's organized voice in support
of reproductive rights & electoral participation,
needs you to make some noise! For the first time
in Rock forChoice history, the Feminist Majority
Foundation is allowing local FMLAs to use money raised
from satellite Rock for Choice concerts for their
March for Women's Lives organizing efforts. Rock
for Choice is a trademarked concert that traditionally
raises funds for the FMF National Clinic Access project,
but due to overwhelming interest and unprecedented
need, the FMLAs can use Rock for Choice for their
direct March organizing and fundraising efforts.
Your group can organize a Rock for
Choice for Women's History Month, International Women's
Day on March 8th, national “Back
Up Your Birth Control Day” on March 22nd, or any
time before the March for Women's Lives in DC.Organize
a concert, host a DJ Party, get your campus radio
station to play Rock For Choice public service announcements,
and encourage your campus andcommunity to register
to vote and participate in the March for Women's
Lives. FMLAs and affiliates must work with the Campus
Team to get started with Rock for Choice action guide,
concert memorabilia and merchandise, aswell as support
from our Rock for Choice national coordinator. Are
you in the LA area? Join Sheryl Crow, Ben Harper,
Melissa Etheridge and more on January 23, 2004 at
the Hollywood Palladium, Los Angeles to commemorate
the 31 st Anniversary of Roe V. Wade as they Rock
For Choice! For more information visit http://www.feministcampus.org/act/rock4choice/Contact
the Campus Team, campusteam@feminist.org, for more
information onbringing Rock for Choice to your campus.
CAMPUS NEWS
FMF Campus Program Continues to Grow!
Big feminist welcome to new Feminist
Majority Leadership Alliances and FMF Affiliates
from Amherst College (Feminist Alliance-an FMF Affiliate),
California State University of Long Beach, Marymount
Manhattan College, Smith College (Feminists of Unite-an
FMF Affiliate), University of California-Riverside,
and University of Denver (Undergraduate Women's Council-an
FMF Affiliate).
We're glad to welcome these new groups
to our growing network of Feminist Majority Leadership
Alliances and affiliates across the country. Now
more than ever, FMF is working with students and
faculty to mobilize the pro-choice majority on the
college campus. FMF provides support to pro-choice
groups through a wide variety of resources, including,
a full-time Campus Team, with organizers who are
available to provide support, information, ideas,
and opportunities to connect with other FMLAs and
affiliate groups; monthly mailings and tabling materials
with timely fact sheets, action ideas, videos, stickers,
and other resources on cutting-edge feminist and
pro-choice issues; Ms. Magazine and Feminist Tee
Shirt Fundraisers; skills building workshops and
materials, and more!
If you're involved in a feminist group, a women's
resource center, or women's studies student association
on campus and would like to learn more about our
resources, campaigns, and leadership opportunities,
please email the Campus Team, CampusTeam@feminist.org
or call our offices, West Coast Toll-Free Campus
Line: 866-471-FMLA (3652) or East Coast Toll-Free
Campus Line: 866-444-FMLA (3652).
Clark University FMF Affiliate Exposes a Fake Clinic,
Gets Press
The Clark University Women's Center,
an FMF affiliate, went undercover and investigated
a local Crisis Pregnancy Center (CPC). CPCs are essentially
fake abortion clinics, often opened in close proximity
to legitimate abortion clinics, which prey on predominately
young and/or low income women who come to the center
for the advertised free pregnancy test. Subjecting
young women to anti-abortion propaganda including
videos, distorted pictures, and prayer, “Counselors” withhold
pregnancy test results while trying to convince the
client not to have an abortion. The group also sent
members to survey their local Planned Parenthood
and, in a story written for their campus paper, compared
their experiences between the real reproductive health
clinic and the fake abortion clinic. When faced with
an unplanned pregnancy women deserve unbiased medical
advice! Find, investigate, and expose fake clinics
in your community, http://www.feministcampus.org/know/sam/unit4.pdf.
Want to bring pro-choice activism to
your campus? Contact a member of the FMF Campus Team,
Campusteam@feminist.org.
Brown University FMLA “Rocks the House,” Fundraises
for Local DV Shelter
Early in December, the Brown University
FMLA organized "Rock
the House to Protect the Home," a benefit concert
to support Destiny House Inc., a local women's domestic
violence shelter that specifically services women
of color. The event took place at a non-profit student-run
cafe on campus and feature 9 talented student musical
acts. The group raised $340 by simply soliciting
donations at the door, and attracted over 150 people.
According to Katie Del Guercio, Brown University
FMLA Senior Advisor, “It was really fun, was a great
way to fuse feminism and the arts, and raised a lot
of money for a great cause.” Great job!
Amherst Feminist Alliance
FMF Affiliate Raises Awareness About Missing Women of
Juarez, Mexico
New FMF affiliate, Amherst Feminist
Alliance, has been organizing to raise awareness
as well as funds for organizations working on justice
for the slain and missing Maquiladora workers in
Juarez, Mexico. The group held a movie screening
of Seniorita Extraviada and had 5 professors speak
about the ongoing situation in Juarez. As a result
of their event, the group established a Juarez action-network
with 55 members dedicated to educational programming,
petitioning, and letter writing campaigns on campus.
The group is planning on sending the proceeds for
their V-Day Activism to Casa Amiga, the only rape-crisis
center servicing the 2.1 million community of the
region in Juarez. The group is also planning on going
to Juarez for International Women's Day (March 8,
2004) with the Mexico Solidarity Network, http://www.mexicosolidarity.org/Juarez_march04_delegation.html.
U of Chicago FMLA Makes Chicago
Sun-Times Headline For Their Work on Transgender
Activism
The University of Chicago FMLA held
a forum on creating gender-neutral bathrooms in campus
buildings to protect transgender students from harassment.
Their lobbying efforts and forum received front-page
coverage in the Chicago Sun-Times, and the story
was picked up by the local National Public Radio
Affiliate and Rush Limbaugh. Great work!
Winter Break Doesn't Stop the California State
Fullerton from Organizing!
School was out of session, but that didn't stop
the California State University FMLA from organizing
a garage sale at a member's house and raising over
200 dollars! The group continues to plan events,
fundraise, and mobilize for reproductive rights on
their campus and we just can't wait to hear what
they plan on doing for the rest of semester! Great
job!
Get involved and learn about what it
takes to start a Feminist Majority Leadership Alliance
on your campus, http://www.feministcampus.org/fmla/program-materials/launch_process.asp.
FMF
OFFICE NEWS
We Need Interns!
Both offices of the Feminist Majority Foundation
are still seeking interns for this spring to work
on our exciting work organizing activists for the
March for Women's Lives. We are flexible with schedules
and for this semester only we are accepting applications
from non-students as well as students at higher levels
of education than undergraduate work. For more information
on the West Coast Internship program, please contact
Trina Running: trunning@feminist.org, 866-471-3652
(Toll-Free). For more information on the Washington,
DC Internship program, please contact Diane Greenhalgh,
dgreenhalgh@feminist.org, 866-444-3652 (Toll-Free).
CONTACT US
The Choices E-zine is a bi-monthly
e-zine intended to keep members of the Feminist Majority
Leadership Alliances, the Feminist Faculty and Student
Networks, and the online Choices Campus Community
connected with each other, informed of feminist issues
and events, and prepared to take action.
To
start a group on your campus or for more information,
please email CampusTeam@feminist.org or call
a Campus Organizer toll-free at (866) 444-FMLA.
LET US KNOW!
Please let us know about your Leadership Alliance
actions and accomplishments so that we can include
you in our next newsletter and share your great ideas!
Email us about your successful events or upcoming
events, campusteam@feminist.org!
January
15, 2004