Gender equality club will march for women's lives in April

Marist students of the Gender Equality club will be among the millions marching on Washington this April in the historic March For Women's Lives. In a move to protest the Bush administration's recent revisions of laws and acts concerning women's protection rights, millions of men and women will be marching the streets of

Washington on April 25, 2004. This event is sponsored by many organizations including the Feminist Majority, NARAL, NOW, and Planned Parenthood Federation of America (PPFA), which promises the event "to be one of the largest public demonstrations in support of reproductive freedom in history."

Though this march does deal with pro-choice issues, Gender Equality president Vanessa Katz assures that the club is concerned also with other critical, gender sociological issues.

"We try to raise awareness of issues like pay equity, rape occurrences and domestic violence in the community," said Katz.

Gender Equality has been responsible for providing other gender equality related events such as this year's Take Back the Night and The Vagina Monologues. Katz describes the club's participation in the March For Women's Lives as more of an extension of the club.

"Not everyone in Gender Equality is comfortable with talking about this [pro-choice], and that's fine."

Katz and the rest of Gender Equality is involved with this event to stress the fact that it is not about pro-choice, but about issues facing women's health and reproductive rights.

Gender Equality has been planning their participation in the march since early September when the club's secretary Lauren Eberle, who has volunteered with the PPFA for the past three years, first received word of the event.

"It's [reproductive rights] an issue that I've always been passionate about," said Eberle. "The fact that the government wants to tell women what to do with their bodies is appalling."

For the past few weeks, Eberle along with at least twenty other Gender Equality volunteers have set up tables around campus offering general information on the march and taking contact information from students interested in volunteering. The volunteers have also been distributing free condoms to support safe sex.

Surprisingly, this distribution has not raised any conflicts with the college. This outreach program was unlike the one sponsored last year when the college shot down a similar attempt to hand out such forms of contraception. The campus had not even featured any type of distribution or sale of contraceptives until the SGA recently won approval to sell condoms in the campus bookstore. Not even health services offered proper means of protection.

"An extra reason we need to do this is because health services is inadequate about educating students about safe sex," Katz said.

Gender Equality will be selling tickets to those interested in volunteering to participate in the march. Fifty-four tickets will be sold, which provide transportation to the event, an all day Metro pass, breakfast and lunch. Ticket prices have been greatly subsidized by the PPLA and fortunately wont cost too much for participants.

If the fifty-four available tickets sell out quickly, Gender Equality plans to provide accommodations for more students to attend the event.

However, Gender Equality encourages those who are not able to purchase a ticket to still attend the march by their own means.

The Gender Equality club will be selling tickets and offering more information about their event at 6:30 p.m. on Wednesday, March 10 in the Student Center.

This is an event to discuss the government's decisions concerning reproductive issues.