2022 Year in Review

A 2003 report from the Guttmacher Institute
found that up to an estimated 1.2 million people
per year during the 1950s and 60s occurred;
either illegally or self-induced. However, with the
rise of second-wave feminism in the 1960s,
abortion became a major issue in the movement
— as Nancy Rosenstock, a member of Boston
Female Liberation, recounted the push for bodily
autonomy across activist groups grew in
popularity. Rosenstock also noted that the issue
of abortion naturally extended to the issues of
access to contraception and forced sterilisation.
With the social climate paying more attention to
a woman’s right to control her body, Roe v Wade
was able to become a constitutionally protected
right under the 14th Amendment in 1973.
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However, this did not stop opponents of the
1973 Roe v Wade decision to express antipathy
to those seeking an abortion. According to
abortion advocate Michelle Kinsey Bruns,
between 1977 and 2015, there were more than
200 attacks and threats to life at abortion clinics
across the US, with the latest of these attacks
occurring in July of this year when a Planned
Parenthood clinic in Michigan was set ablaze.
The suspect equated abortions to genocide in
YouTube videos where he made content on the
topic of abortion. A common trait among the
perpetrators of attacks against abortion clinics is
their reasoning: many use Christian faith-based
arguments, claiming that the procedure of
aborting a foetus — whether it is medically or
chemically performed — is against the will of
God. For example, Catholic Bishops in the US
have come out in support of the pro-life side of
the debate, arguing that life begins at
conception, and thus abortion procedures are
essentially murder. It is necessary to make the
distinction between Christians and other