Netherlands – There Are No Stigma-Free Abortions, Even in ‘Progressive’ Countries

There are so many things you’d never know about abortions unless you go through one.

By Maud Droste, Illustrated By Djanlissa Pringels
December 8, 2023

I’m in utter disbelief, staring down at a positive result on a drugstore pregnancy test. It’s March 2020. My relationship had just ended two days before, I’d just found out my roommate and I would be evicted and, thanks to a massive bout of procrastination, I had about a month left to finish my bachelor’s thesis.

Getting pregnant was the last of a long list of life-changing events I hadn’t seen coming. My roommate, however, had. I’d been tired for weeks, the only food I craved was mango – which I inevitably threw up after eating – and I felt ambivalent about absolutely everything. “I think you should probably take a test,” she said.

Continued: https://www.vice.com/en/article/g5gay7/no-stigma-free-abortions

08.12.2023

Opinion

Abortion Buddies programme

abortion stigma

European Abortion Policies Atlas

Eva de Goeij

five-day reflection period

Humanistisch Verbond

mandatory waiting period

The Iconic Photo Hijacked By the Anti-Abortion Movement

The foetus is a powerful icon that the pro-choice movement has struggled to match.

By Amarens Eggeraat
14.12.20

If you look up the word abortion in a stock image bank, you’ll find roughly three types of photograph: sad women, protesters holding pro-choice signs or foetuses, usually near-fully developed, with a human face, closed eyes and sometimes even a tiny thumb in their mouth.

Besides being morally loaded, the visual
association between these tiny babies and abortion is also scientifically
incorrect, since the vast majority of procedures are carried before 13 weeks.
And yet, anti-abortion movements have used foetuses as a primary symbol since
the 1970s.

Continued: https://www.vice.com/en/article/n7vb9x/the-iconic-photo-hijacked-by-the-anti-abortion-movement

14.12.2020

Rosalind Pollack Petchesky

Netherlands – “Abortion buddies” to help pregnant women as protesters get more intimidating

“Abortion buddies” to help pregnant women as protesters get more intimidating

By Janene Pieters
on March 2, 2020

From Monday, women visiting abortion clinics in Rotterdam and The Hague can call on an "abortion buddy" to escort them into the clinic and past the anti-abortion protesters often hanging around the clinics. The around 20 volunteers' task is to accompany women as they enter the clinic and be a screen for these already vulnerable women against the protesters, at the initiative of feminism platform De Bovengrondse and the Humanistisch Verbond.

Last year, a majority in the lower house of Dutch parliament supported letting municipalities set up "buffer zones" around abortion clinics in the Netherlands. No anti-abortion protesters should be allowed in these buffer zones, to allow women to enter abortion clinics un-harassed. But a year later, the protests are continuing unabated, and even increasing at some clinics, according to a survey by De Bovengrondse and the Humanistisch Verbond among 11 of the 14 abortion clinics in the Netherlands.

Continued: https://nltimes.nl/2020/03/02/abortion-buddies-help-pregnant-women-protesters-get-intimidating