Thousands rally to defend women’s right to abortion – The Militant

....Joanne Kuniansky, Socialist Workers Party candidate for governor of New Jersey, spoke at the rally. “A woman’s decision about when or if to have children must be a private, personal decision — not the decision of a legislature or court!” she said. “This right is fundamental to winning full social, economic and political equality, uniting the working class and building our unions.”

Signs carried by some demonstrators at protests around the country, and speakers at the rallies, said the road forward for abortion rights supporters is to vote for Democratic Party candidates.

“Our rights were chipped away no matter which of the bosses’ parties — Democrats or Republicans — were in the White House,” Kuniansky said. “Without the fight for women’s equality the solidarity the working class needs to fight the bosses and to wage a revolutionary struggle to take political power out of the hands of the capitalist class is impossible.”

After decades of protests that changed the outlook of working people, in 2018 in Ireland a referendum victory ended the longstanding ban on abortions. Protests took place Oct. 2 in both Dublin and Belfast, as well as in London.

In Dublin, demonstrators carried signs reading, “Dublin to Dallas.” Ailbhe Smyth, one of the leaders of the 2018 abortion rights campaign there, told the crowd, “We understand your struggle. We know your fight. We are here to do whatever we can. We have been through it and we do not want it to happen again.”

The nonstop and all too often unanswered propaganda campaign against women’s right to choose has had an impact on the consciousness of working people. Millions of workers today are convinced life begins at conception, even if they do not support all restrictions on abortion.

“We need to fight for the right of all women to family planning services, including safe and secure birth control and abortion, essential for winning women’s emancipation,” Kuniansky told the New Jersey action. “The only way to stop the assaults on our right to choose whether or not to have an abortion is to fight to win the support of the vast majority of working people.”

The latest Pew poll shows 58% favor a woman’s right to abortion, among both women and men, across all age groups.

Thousands rally to defend women’s right to abortion – The Militant