A pedestrian walking by our clinic summed up the absurdity of anti-abortionists: “Why would you take life advice from someone screaming standing on a sidewalk corner?!”

A.H., Clinic escort

Midwest

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Here’s my favorite quote from our favorite protester this morning “I bet you guys voted for that Halfrican American Obama!” What is wrong with this guy?

B.B., Clinic escort

Illinois

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It looks like the Supreme Court is going to strike down buffer zones around clinics that offer abortions. Justice Antonin Scalia again proved his disingenuousness: “These people,” talking about anti-abortion fanatics, “don’t want to protest abortion. They want to talk to the women who are about to get abortions and try to talk them out of it.” The hell they do. Picture this: A young woman trying to get to the clinic door and 10 to 50 protesters getting in her way. She has to try to walk around them and each time they get in her way again, all the time screaming in her face. These protesters scream, push, threaten. If they could kill the woman without harming her fetus, some of them would. They believe they are called by god to save “babies,” so that just about anything goes. If you want to know about the real abortion wars, talk to those wonderful women and men who escort women past the screaming, praying mob to the clinic door. It’s unbelievable what they endure.

Terry Moon

Chicago

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I received a holiday card from a woman I met online years ago. She thought we who escort women into clinics past lines of fanatic anti-abortionists don’t hear it often enough and wished she had said thank you when she visited her clinic. She wrote: “Thank you so much for being an escort. As someone who has had to walk near those people, I wanted to let you know that people like you really do make a difference.” She signed it with a little drawn heart.

C.C.

Evanston, Ill.

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Supporters of the “Abortion Insurance Opt-Out Act” argue that it allows people who oppose abortion to avoid paying into a plan that covers it. What the hell? Maybe I don’t want to pay for a plan that covers alternative health practices. Maybe I don’t want to pay into a plan that covers fertility treatments. Or prostate health coverage. After all, I don’t need that. Oh, WAIT. I don’t have to use every service that my medical insurance covers. I can limit my choices to the kind of medical decisions that I want to make for myself and other people can do the same. That is, unless I work in Michigan and the medical decision I want to make for myself is abortion.

Clinic escort

Minnesota