San Francisco men support abortion rights

Issues of reproductive freedom impact women, their children, their families and their communities, so protecting abortion rights should be important to all of us. Too often the media classifies abortion and the fight for abortion access as just a women’s issue. But we know that’s not true. Men need to stand up and loudly champion the rights of women.

That’s why NARAL Pro-Choice America launched Men for Choice—to create a platform for pro-choice men to aggregate and amplify their voices with like-minded men and women to fight for the pro-choice movement. Over the past three years they’ve hosted events around the country, encouraging men to speak up as allies in the fight for reproductive rights. The fight cannot be won without men involved in the conversation, because they constitute most of our elected leaders.

So far, the Men for Choice movement has reached 14 states and it continues to grow. On June 1, NARAL Pro-Choice America hosted their first Men for Choice event in San Francisco, and CREDO was there.

Josh Healey, an award-winning writer, performer and creative activist, spoke at the event. He shared powerful stories about abortions that both his great-grandmother and wife had experienced, which were featured on NPR’s Snap Judgment.

Also at the event was NARAL’s president, Ilyse Hogue, who spoke about the importance of having men be part of the conversation about reproductive rights. If we want our policies and elected officials to represent the majority in our country—the 7 out of 10 people who believe abortion should be legal and accessible to all women—we need to break through the silence that exists around this topic. We need to bring together all stakeholders, both men and women, to push this movement forward.

CREDO activists have been consistent in their support of abortion rights. We’ve repeatedly teamed up with NARAL, most recently to push Democratic primary debate moderators to ask the candidates about abortion and to stand against a federal abortion ban. When an anti-woman extremist killed three people in an attack on a Planned Parenthood clinic in Colorado Springs, CREDO and NARAL demanded that the Department of Justice investigate the attack as domestic terrorism. In addition, together we helped block the confirmation of Judge Michael Boggs to a lifetime appointment on the federal bench because of his extreme anti-choice record.

CREDO has also been a longtime supporter of NARAL. Since 1989, we’ve donated over $665,000 to the organization. In January 2016, CREDO members voted to give $73,308 to NARAL.

CREDO will continue to partner with NARAL as we aggressively fight for abortion rights and abortion access for every woman in America.