How Do Guns Have More Rights Than Women? Young Activists Lead a March in Del Mar for Abortion Rights

  • Photos by Hylton Lonstein and Kathe Palmucci | Text by Betty Wheeler

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On July 9, 2022, a large crowd gathered in front of the Starbucks on Camino del Mar for a march and rally protesting the recent Supreme Court decision overturning abortion rights. The event was conducted in a peaceful and safe manner, with lots of passing cars honking their support, and participants following the organizers' instructions not to react to counter-protesters, including one person who yelled "baby-killers!" at the marchers as she drove past.
As the protesters began marching south on Camino del Mar, a plethora of homemade signs were on display: "We Are Not Ovary-Acting," "Bans off our bodies," " Supreme Misogyny," "Mind Your Own Uterus," "June Cleaver Called and Wants Reproductive Rights," "We Aren't Free Without Body Autonomy," "Control Guns, Not My Uterus," "My Body, My Future, My Choice," "Our Grandmothers Marched For This," "Abortion is Healthcare," "Not Your Uterus, Not Your Choice," "Let's Talk About the Elephant in the Womb," "Abortion Access Saves Lives," "If you think being forced to wear a mask is bad, imagine being forced to have a baby!"
One sign focused on a trio of SCOTUS (Supreme Court) decisions especially devastating to the interests of young people, depicting a world on fire from climate change, guns, and no bodily autonomy.
One sign displayed a mini-essay: "Your morality is deeply lacking if all you want is a child born but . . . not a child FED, not a child EDUCATED, not a child HOUSED. That's not pro-life; that's pro-birth."
Activists cross Coast Blvd. near the end of the 0.8 mile march, which went from Starbuck's south to 9th Street, then north along Stratford Court to the rally location at Seagrove Park.
Abigail, one of the event organizers, exhorted the assembled activists to stand up and fight for fundamental rights.
Three of the organizers welcomed participants and taught them a number of call-and-response chants for the march.
The organizers of the Del Mar march and rally were teenagers -- part of the generation born after the historic 1999 Columbine High School shooting, with guns now the leading cause of death among American teens. A pair of decisions released by the Supreme Court last month, overturning Roe v. Wade and ruling that Americans have a broad right to arm themselves in public, put this sign's question in sharp focus.
Mayor Dwight Worden, who served as general counsel of the local Planned Parenthood affiliate in the 1980s and '90s, was part of the "senior contingent" of the march, wearing vintage buttons from earlier decades' efforts to keep abortion legal, as anti-abortion forces persistently chipped away at Roe v. Wade through legislation and litigation.
Volunteers in safety vests worked to ensure safe street crossings and keep traffic flowing throughout the march, including here, as the marchers crossed 15th Street by the Post Office.
U.S. Representative Mike Levin tells the crowd that electing two more Democratic Senators will result in nationwide restoration of abortion rights. A 58% majority of Americans say they favor a federal law making abortion legal nationwide, according to a CBS News/YouGov poll surveying a nationally representative sample of adults on June 24-25, after the Supreme Court's decision overturning Roe v. Wade. According to a SCOTUS Poll reported by the New York Times, a 62% majority said that Roe v. Wade should not be overturned, with 38% saying it should be overturned.

The Supreme Court is now dominated by far right conservatives who blithely overturned a longstanding precedent in reversing Roe v. Wade. The Court is seemingly intent on reexamining other individual rights  — potentially including same-sex marriage, private sexual conduct, and access to contraceptives. The Senate filibuster rules guarantee that minority views can trump the majority on the legislative front. Facing a minority-imposed rollback of fundamental rights, we can expect to see young people stepping up to demand action on core issues critical to their lives and futures, including not only reproductive rights and bodily integrity, but also gun safety and climate change.