stfueverything:

mollyfuckinghooper:

Let me tell you about Henry Morgentaler

Morgentaler was a Jewish man born in Poland, in 1923. In 1942, he was sent to Auschwitz concentration camp, where both his parents died. Luckily, he survived, and moved to Canada with his wife, where they settled in Montréal.

He became a doctor, working as a general practitionner. He was one of the first Canadians to offer vasectomies, insert intra-uterine devices and give unmarried couples the pill.

In 1967, he gave a speech, saying he considered that all women should have access to a safe abortion if they wished to. Not long after, his office was flooded by women requesting abortions which he couldn’t perform, since they were illegal at the time.

In 1968, he gave up family practise and started his own private clinic, where he performed abortions (n.b. At this time, abortions were only legal in Canada if they were approved by a Therapeutic Abortion Comittee, and only if the pregnancy was dangerous to the woman’s health.)

He fought multiple judicial battles with principally the Provinces of Québec, Ontario and New Brunswick, in which he had opened clinics that performed abortions, and even did prison in 1975 (in Québec), where, the year after, abortions became legals.

This man, who had suffered enough for a lifetime in Auschwitz, also had to face a lot more  violence. Anti-abortion groups gave him multiple death threats, and even put bombs in his Toronto clinic. He was also assaulted multiple times. He kept on fighting anyway, because he believed all women should have the choice to continue their pregnancy or not.

This man is, in my opinion, the definition of a true Canadian hero.

Henry Mortengaler died at age 90, the 29th of May 2013. And although not everyone would willingly be ready to call him a hero as I just did, no one can deny that he has never given up, that he carried on in his fight to give every Canadian women the choice to decide for their own destiny.

RIP Morgentaler <3