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_ ABORTION CARAVAN PROPOSALS

We

suggest the following points as the basis for our political program

and emphasis for the campaign. Because this action is the first time that
Toronto Women's Liberation has undertaken to deal with this whole issue in

a public campaign, we feel that it is essential that our public statements

and our organizing are not haphazard, but part of a coherent political pro-
gram and strategy. In addition, the possibility of coalition with other groups
(eg. the New Feminists) makes essential that we have a clear ec ue of

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our own political position. ~

It is the right of all women to have control over their own bodies.

The present laws are reactionary because they assume that it is the
right of the medical profession to decide for a woman woe thee she
wishes to bear a child. ©

The present laws had the effect of taking the edge off the attack that « «,

women were begining to mount to demane control over their own bodies.
The laws have made Llegei shortion possible for the few middle class
women who know the ropes and whe ¢2” into the rounds of doctors and
psychiatrists umtil they can find one who will help them. But for the

majority of women, the reforms have been meaningless, and the process is ;,

a degrading one even for those few who are helped. The present laws
discriminate most against poor, working class and young single women.

Birth control and abortion are inseparable. The demand for birth control
includes the demand for abortion. The increasing controversy over the
safety of birth control pills points up the fact that safe and effective
birth control is not a priority of this society, In a society based on
profit rather than human need, drug companies are allowed to make huge
profits on pills and assign their own priorities in terms of research,
because women will continue to buy the pill as long as they have no
alternative.

We need abortion, birth control and medical care that is free, We need
socialized medicine, not medical plans that simply change the method of
payment.

Birth control and abortion are only the be ginning. All women need day-
care facilities, equal pay, maternity leave, equal access to all jobs

so that they can afford the children they want and so these children
can be properly cared for. The present abortion laws are not based on

a concern for children ~ the society is anti-children. We need not just
laws that will allow us not to have children, but a society where we
would want to have children, (There are already thousands of children
in Canada that no one wants).