Protestors participate in a rally against one of the nation’s most restrictive bans on abortions on May 19, 2019 in Montgomery, Alabama. Demonstrators gathered to protest HB 314, a bill passed by the Alabama Legislature last week making almost all abortion procedures illegal. Julie Bennett/Getty Images/AFP
Thousands took to the streets in the southern US state of Alabama on Sunday to rally against the nation’s most restrictive bans on abortions in decades.
Around 500 women’s reproductive rights defenders gathered in state capital Montgomery, while in the cities of Birmingham, Anniston, Huntsville and Mobile around 3,000 more joined in denouncing the “Alabama Human Life Protection Act,” local media reported.
The act, known as HB314, virtually outlaws terminations of pregnancy.
Protesters in Montgomery held up signs reading “her body, her choice” and “we are not ovary-acting.”
A woman wearing beige underwear that made her look naked had a drawing of her reproductive system attached to her abdomen and a banner reading: “More than an incubator.”
Several other women were dressed as characters forced to bear children in the dystopian novel and television series “The Handmaid’s Tale.”
One of them, who gave her name only as Amanda, accused Alabama’s legislators of “trying to imprison women and doctors.”
“Wearing the ‘Handmaid’s Tale’ outfit is sending a message that you’re trying to turn us into slaves, reproductive slaves,” the 40-year-old-lawyer told AFP.
“They’re trying to fill prisons, more private prisons so that women will do hard labour after they get convicted of these ‘crimes’ of abortion.”
Last week, Alabama passed a law that prohibits all abortions — even in cases of incest and rape — unless there is a risk of death for the mother.
“Our call center’s been getting hundreds and hundreds of phone calls from concerned citizens asking us what this means,” said Barbara Ann Luttrell, director of communications and marketing for Planned Parenthood Southeast.
Planned Parenthood is not currently providing abortion services in Alabama. “We’ll be having abortion services up and running again as soon as possible,” she said.
There are only three clinics that perform the procedure. None of them responded requests of comments.
The Alabama law is likely to be blocked in state courts before its November launch date but Republican Governor Kay Ivey acknowledged when she signed it that it was part of as a wider Republican offensive to get the issue relitigated on the national stage.
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