Pro-life versus pro-choice: UvA student joins abortion march
Opponents of abortion will hold a demonstration in The Hague this Saturday. They will no doubt encounter the Dolle Mina activists, who are holding a pro-abortion march at the same time. UvA student and Dolle Mina Rosie van Peijpe: “It is ridiculous that others decide what I do with my own body.”
The abortion figures in the Netherlands have not been this high in years, according to the Dutch government’s annual report. In 2023, more than 36,000 women terminated their pregnancy. The SGP seized on this increase for their campaign “So, abortion?”. Other politicians and pro-life groups are also arguing for restricting or even completely abolishing the right to abortion.
Resistance
UvA student Rosie van Peijpe (22) is deeply worried about these developments. Her interest in women’s rights grew partly through her Master’s in Political Science. According to Rosie, those rights are now under more pressure than ever. “That’s why I’m joining the march,” she says. To her, it feels as though there has been increasing resistance to abortion recently.
She is referring, among other things, to the SGP’s pro-life election campaign. She also finds it “terrifying” that a majority in the House of Representatives supported the SGP’s motion calling on the government to actively oppose attempts to include abortion as a human right in European treaties.
Human right
Rosie sees abortion as a human right that feminists have already fought for. “It’s crazy that we have to fight for it again,” she says. According to the student, the ability to terminate an early pregnancy is an essential right to self-determination. “It’s ridiculous that others decide what I do with my body.” Rosie also believes that access to abortion gives women a sense of security to explore their sexuality. “Especially when you’re young, the fear of an unexpected pregnancy is quite significant,” she says. “The responsibility for contraception mainly falls on women, and they ultimately bear the consequences. Abortion removes a large part of that fear.”
Wieke Beumer, a researcher on abortion at Amsterdam UMC, offers a more nuanced view of the idea that the fight over abortion has flared up again. According to her, the issue of abortion is “as old as time”. “People are afraid that political developments around abortion in the United States will spill over into the Netherlands,” Beumer says. “That fear partly stems from the belief that abortion is well protected in the Netherlands, but that isn’t true.”
Beumer explains that abortion is still included in the Dutch Penal Code. “It isn’t a right; there is merely a law stating that abortion is not punishable if certain conditions are met. So it’s essentially an exception. That does, however, make it fairly accessible in the Netherlands.”
The fight over abortion is also very much alive among Rosie’s peers. “I think everyone was shocked to see abortion come under such heavy fire.” According to her, her generation grew up with the belief that women have autonomy over their own bodies. Her friends, like Rosie, feel anger and fear about the shifting sentiment. “In my circles, no one is against abortion; everyone thinks there should be no stigma attached to it,” she says.
Countermovement
When Rosie heard in 2022 that Roe v. Wade — the U.S. ruling that had protected the nationwide right to abortion since 1973 — was overturned, she cried. To prevent the Netherlands from following the American path, she will stand in The Hague on Saturday wearing green — the colour of the pro-choice movement — alongside other activists.
What does Rosie hope to achieve by joining the march? Above all, she wants to make sure a countervoice is heard now that populist, anti-feminist rhetoric is growing louder. “We need to show that this is about our bodies, our rights and our lives,” Rosie says, “and that other people don’t get to interfere with that.”
