Close to the three year anniversary since Roe V. Wade was overturned, dozens of people of all ages, hoisting colorful signs, rallied at Five Corners Saturday — advocating for women’s rights, better healthcare, and for no criminalization for abortions.
The rally was organized by Indivisible Martha’s Vineyard, Feminist Action Team, and Family Planning of Martha’s Vineyard, and was coined “Our Bodies, Our Power, Our Future.” Signs and messages carried by participants covered a range of issues, but focused on women’s justice, including ones like “Control Guns, Not Women,” “Stop the MAGA War on Women,” and “Same Fight, New Signs.” One woman stood solemnly, dressed in a long, flowing red cloak with a white bonnet, a costume from “A Handmaid’s Tale,” a dystopian novel and subsequent TV show series where women are treated as property of the state.
A number of Islanders and elected officials spoke — standing on a makeshift stage that consisted of a rickety chair with a microphone in hand — about the importance of centering equality.
“To use laws to stop us from making decisions about our own body, and our own healthcare, is an outrage that only women have to endure — and the men who love them,” Chilmark resident and environmental activist Laurie David said to a roaring crowd. “They want us to feel powerless. But we aren’t powerless — are we?”
The onlookers and sign-holders surrounding her screamed “No!” in unison in an emphatic response.
“Every time we come together with signs and sisterhood — every time we amplify our message on social media — we are letting other women and men across the country know that we stand with them, and against the assault on our person and our rights,” she continued.
David said electing leaders in state and national positions who protect women’s rights is of the utmost importance. She pointed to Cape and Islands District Attorney Rob Galibois who was attending the rally, referencing his track-record for hiring women, protecting their rights, and furthering the message of equality. Galibois spoke after David.
“Right now, the local district attorney … is truly the last line of defense in terms of trying to protect women’s reproductive health,” Galibois said in a speech, with car horns blaring in support of the rally in the background. “As we all know, criminalizing, prosecuting folks, will never stop abortions. But it will, very likely, end safe abortions. We can all agree on that.”
Galibois reflected on his time as a candidate in 2022. He was running for the district attorney seat while former president Joe Biden was in office, and remembered standing on the Falmouth Village Green, a popular place for local rallies, when the Dobbs decision — a landmark Supreme court ruling that overturned Roe versus Wade — eliminated the federal, constitutional right to abortion.
While Galibois acknowledged the gravity of that time, he also highlighted the positive traction the past three years since. He spoke on the many women he has hired in leadership roles in the district attorney’s office, new abortion services in the state of Massachusetts, and a petition he signed — from Fair and Just Prosecution — where he pledged to never prosecute anyone for having an abortion and to never provide out-of-state information about someone who received an abortion in his district.
According to the petition, out of the eleven Massachusetts district attorneys, five of them signed the joint statement in 2024, Galibois and Governor Maura Healey (where she signed as the Attorney General) among them.
“Back in ‘22, when I was a candidate … We did not have abortion services here on the Cape and the Islands. But we do now,” Galibois said. “Health imperatives has three locations where they issue the prescription for Mifepristone [an abortion medication in pill form].”
Island author and chef Cathy Walthers said the abortion pills are a revolutionary form of care for women across the country. For women who live in “reproductive deserts” — which refers to an area where there are either no reproductive health facilities or abortion has been criminalized — these pills can be an accessible way to have safe access to this type of care.
“Fifty percent of women who are pregnant get their healthcare through medicaid or Planned Parenthood,” Walthers said. “They want to take [abortion pills] away, but really it’s safer than Tylenol … These are things I hope people pay attention to — to keep women’s issues at the forefront.”
The same crowd that advocated for forced vaccinations now says ” my body my choice ”
If you want people to listen to your side, please don’t be a hypocrite
Comments are closed.