Editor:

Last Wednesday I discovered something remarkable: UCSD students are not as apathetic as they seem. I spent last Wednesday night with a group of students who were deeply passionate about their beliefs and willing to fight for them. The remarkable event I attended was a presentation by Serrin Foster, president of Feminists for Life.

I found Foster’s speech to be interesting. However, even more exciting was the fiery question-and-answer session that followed. Let me assure you that everyone in that room was deeply engaged in the dialogue, which ranged in emotion from supportive to enraged. Although the abortion issue deeply and irreparably divided the audience, everyone seemed to agree on one thing: Many of the circumstances that cause women to seek abortions are injustices. Although some women may choose abortion freely, many do not. Some are pressured by a mate or difficult financial circumstances. Others lack the support from their workplace or educational institution that would make going through with the pregnancy a viable option. The lack of autonomy and freedom that such coercion reflects is unfortunate.

Many who would disagree with my stance on abortion would agree with me on this: It is simply wrong if women are forced by circumstances to end their pregnancies because their peers did not make help and support available to them.

At the end of her speech, Foster proposed that UCSD students bring administrators and community resources together to help such women in a Pregnancy Resource Forum. The forum would organize on-campus resources for women who wish to go through with their pregnancies and also educate them about off-campus resources. No UCSD student should be unjustly forced to choose between having a child and finishing college. We as a community must make more options available to pregnant students and students with children.

I hope that for once, members of the anti-abortion and abortion-rights communities can put their differences aside, not because those differences are unimportant, but because together real change on this campus could be enacted. A Pregnancy Resource Forum would not be about abortion-rights or anti-abortion politics; it would be about doing what we could to help those women who want to go through with their pregnancies but cannot without our help and support.

— Emily Min

UCSD student

YouthVote secured many student votes

Editor:

Regarding your article, “”Students vote in Calif. election,”” (Oct. 7) I would like to include some additional information. While it is true that only about 500 people voted at the Price Center and at Muir, that was only the votes of freshmen who live on campus. YouthVote was successful in registering 1,500 students at UCSD, and statewide, YouthVote was able to register 40,000 students to vote. While we can’t easily know how many off-campus students voted in the election, it is safe to say that it was more than 500.

Strengthening the student voice in the political process has always been the goal of the YouthVote campaign. In that sense, the campaign did not end on Election Day. Increasing the participation of young people will be a long process where the leaders of tomorrow will be born and tested. Government policies reflect the wishes of the people that vote in elections. By not voting, students are abdicating their voices in national politics at a time when the choices that their representatives make will increasingly be impacting students’ voices.

— Christopher Draper

CalPIRG YouthVote Campaign Co-Coordinator