Women Boycott Colleges in Anti-Abortion States: Our Daughters Have a Right to Get Knocked Up

“What are we going to do if we send our daughter there and she gets pregnant?”

Mothers are refusing to send their daughters to colleges in states with strict abortion laws, the New York Post reported last week.

The Post characterized the news as something of a trend in New York, driven by restrictions on the procedure passed this year across the country. A private-school admissions consultant said dozens of her clients had effectively launched a college boycott of anti-abortion states.

“This is a serious thing,” said Amanda Uhry, who is based in New York City. “I’ve had 61 college-admission clients remove Georgia and Ohio schools from their list for next year.”

[the_ad id=”16444″]

“People are shocked and scared,” she added. “They were like, ‘What are we going to do if we send our daughter there and she gets pregnant?’ ”

Elken Bender said she and her daughter, Eliza, a junior at Horace Mann prep school, had planned to visit Washington University in St. Louis next month. But they decided to boycott the college after Missouri passed a heartbeat law last week which banned abortion as early as six week into pregnancy.

“Some of my friends have said, ‘If your daughter goes to college in Georgia and, God forbid, she gets pregnant, she can always come to New York for an abortion.'” But, she added: “If the legislators passed those laws, they won’t be friendly legislators for women in general.”

Abortion boycotts go beyond college

In addition to Missouri, five other states — Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi and Ohio — have passed similar laws so far in 2019. Meanwhile, Alabama last month effectively outlawed abortion except to save a mother’s life.

The abortion bans, which have not gone into effect and are expected to be blocked in courts, have also spurred boycotts from Hollywood. Several filmmakers announced this month that they would no longer be filming in Georgia.

Actress and feminist activist Alyssa Milano said she would not return to the Netflix series “Insatiable” if it continued filming in the state. She also launched a failed #SexStrike meant to pressure men to reverse the laws. Conservatives noted that abstinence would make the the whole debate over women’s right to an abortion moot.

[the_ad id=”16463″]

About Post Author