B!llikens for Reproductive Justice, an un-affiliated student-based organization for reproductive justice, hosted a demonstration at the Clock Tower on Oct. 24 in response to the recent installation of pro-life memorial on campus.

The cross for life memorial appeared on Oct. 23 with a sign that read, “each cross represents 1,388 lives lost to abortion in the U.S. in 2020.” The memorial was curated by Saint Louis University’s chapter of Students for Life. 

In response, B!llikens for Reproductive Justice organized a public demonstration, promoting their event on social media with a flyer that stated, “all people deserve to exercise their bodily autonomy without being retriggered or made to feel bad about THEIR choice on SLU’s campus.”  

“When you have this physical representation of this ‘immoral thing’ that you did, where for a lot of people it is life saving, it is health care and it is just the absolute last resort,” said a student representative from B!llikens for Reproductive Justice, who wished to remain anonymous. 

Freshman Lily Belknap joined the protest Tuesday evening with her friends from the Leadership for Social Change learning community.  

“All of my friends and I had been walking by the display outside of Morrissey Hall and everytime we saw it, it just felt like a slap in the face to our reproductive rights as women, especially being in a red state,” Belknap said. “So we all blew up our little group chat of friends and we were like ‘we need to do something about this’.” 

Nearly 40 people gathered in front of Morrissey Hall to disperse signs, pins and resource cards. By the time the protest began at 6 p.m., the cross memorial had already been removed. After discussing their goals for the demonstration, protestors marched towards the Clock Tower where College Republicans were hosting a fundraising event. 

For the event, attendees created handmade signs or used posters from  local non-profit Abortion Action Missouri. Freshman Lily Nitsch used a sign that read, “I will not be used as life support.”

“If you need a kidney and I was a perfect match, nobody can require me to give you that kidney, and I feel like it is very hypocritical when it comes to abortion – I don’t feel like it should be required for me to provide life support for something if I don’t want to,” Nitsch said.

Although the protest primarily involved chanting and marching, students also engaged in conversations about their beliefs and experiences related to abortion, Roe v. Wade and reproductive health. 

Anthony Laurenceau, a member of College Republicans, approached the protest from the other side of the Clock Tower to engage in conversation about the topic.

“Democrats had over 70 years to legalize it [abortion] to codify it by a bill of Congress, and they didn’t do that and they’re surprised when the conservative Justices, members of the Supreme Court, overturned it,” Laurenceau said. “Every state should have a simple ballot referendum so people can decide themselves what they want.”

After a series of public demonstrations and conversations, student protestors slowly dispersed from the Clock Tower. Some passer byers left with resource cards, pro-choice paraphernalia and reproductive health kits.