To the editor:
On Jan. 22, 1973, the U.S. Supreme Court announced the ruling of Roe v. Wade. This landmark case extended the right of privacy to women’s decisions about childbearing or, more simply, gave women the right to choose abortion.
Currently the Supreme Court is one vote away from overturning Roe v. Wade and revoking a woman’s right to a safe and legal abortion. If Roe is overturned, women will lose the right to make decisions regarding their own bodies, and their only “choices” will be to seek either hazardous, illegal back alley abortions or bear unwanted children.
As members of the Women’s Studies Student Organization, we feel that the right to choose is paramount to women’s full participation in society. And we would like to invite the student body to celebrate the 30th anniversary of the Supreme Court’s confirmation of the right to choose.
On Jan. 25, 2003, from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. in the Woodbury Campus Center in Portland, the Women’s Studies Department and13 community organizations will come together for a half-day conference, Voices and Choices. The event will comprise of a celebration of reproductive rights featuring an intergenerational and multidisciplinary discussion with experts, reactions from audience members, and a keynote speech from Kitty Kolbert, J.D., reproductive rights advocate and “one of the 100 most influential lawyers in America.” There will also be several opportunities for those attending to reflect and speak out. Join us in learning more and taking action at the Voices and Choices event. Register for the conference at http://www.ppnne.org/grassroots or call 781-2201. Registration fees are $10 for the general public, $5 for students. We urge you all to get involved–do not let our past become a new reality!
Women’s Studies Student Organization
Abby Lydon, non-degree student
Erin Brown, junior
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To the editor:
I just got my first anthrax shot and I was damn glad to get it. While there is no “smoking gun” gun in Iraq, is there any doubt in anyone’s mind that those governments hostile to the United States have these weapons?
Out here, at the tip of the spear, I interact daily with the world press and I can tell you that they are not biased nor are they corporate lapdogs. Many of them have been to Iraq where there is no freedom of the press. Every press member is escorted by a government-sponsored “translator,” and visas are regularly revoked to punish news services that displease Saddam.
So Professor Bjelic’s trip (News, Jan. 13), just like Jane Fonda’s and Sean Penn’s, will be heavily monitored and escorted to the places that Saddam wants the United States to see.
As our troops (your brothers, fathers, sisters, mothers, and neighbors) are sent to the Middle East, we need your support at home. A U.S. citizen aiding the propaganda interest of a government that waged war on the world, then attempted the assassination of an American president, and a documented producer of chemical and biological weapons, should be made aware of damage caused by his actions. If Iraq fails to cooperate with the United Nations and the use of force becomes necessary, Bjelic’s trip could be used to demoralize captured prisoners of war just like Fonda’s trip was used during the Vietnam War. Video of his trips, audio from his remarks, like Fonda’s remarks were used, could be played to prisoners after torture sessions, breaking down their resistance and aiding the enemy with a weapon much more powerful than precision-guided bombs or Tomahawk missiles: propaganda to erode the public will to wage war.
Perhaps this is what he wants, to prevent the United Nations from using force to achieve ends that it cannot achieve diplomatically. Whatever his goals, his trip cannot be a fact-finding mission. If it were, he would also visit with the thousands of Caldians that have fled Iraq or the exiled that are working to bring democracy to Iraq. He will get everything but “facts” on his visit to Iraq and in the end, if war cannot be avoided, it will cost American lives.
Erik Reynolds
Alumnus, 1998