Group members hand classmates Plan B on public sidewalks
A student group at DePaul University is reportedly still running a secret birth control delivery service after being banned from campus due to its affiliation with Planned Parenthood.
Members of the student group meet with classmates on public sidewalks to hand them condoms and Plan B in brown paper bags, the Chicago Sun-Times reported.
“As long as the distribution happens on public property, it doesn’t violate DePaul’s guidelines,” said Maya Roman, a member of the group Planned Parenthood Generation Action.
The group calls the operation “Womb Service.”
Students can fill out a form online to request “condoms, emergency contraception, dental dams and pregnancy tests,” according to the Chicago Sun-Times.
They then covertly meet with volunteers at one of five designated spots near DePaul’s Lincoln Park or downtown campuses.
Roman told the outlet they fulfill as many as 25 orders each week.
In a February Instagram post, DePaul PPGA called on its followers to help sustain the operation.
“Thanks to you guys, our womb service is gaining popularity and more people are requesting free contraceptives, which is AWESOME! But, this also means we need MORE PEOPLE helping out in our committee which takes care of these orders,” the caption reads.
The group also hosts short “educational sessions about sexual health” called “Pillow Talks,” the Chicago Sun-Times reported.
“College campuses are supposed to be a safe place for you to explore who you are as an adult … and with the way colleges and universities are essentially cowering, individuals are left scrambling to fill in those links and fill in those gaps,” Roman told the outlet.
Last month, DePaul told the group it could no longer operate on campus, citing the school’s Catholic identity and the club’s affiliation with Planned Parenthood.
“In alignment with DePaul’s Catholic and Vincentian identity, PPGA’s student organization constitution is no longer approved and PPGA’s status as a registered student organization at DePaul is deactivated due to its affiliation with the external group Planned Parenthood,” Interim Vice Presidents Kimberlie Goldsberry and Mark Laboe wrote in a letter to the students.
The Catholic Church teaches that all forms of birth control are sinful because they interfere with the “inseparable connection, established by God … between the unitive significance and the procreative significance which are both inherent to the marriage act,” according to Humanae Vitae, an encyclical letter issued by Pope Paul VI in 1968.
Still, the group vowed to “continue [its] operations,” writing in a June 9 Instagram post, “We are not going anywhere.”
MORE: UPenn to ban men from women’s sports to resolve federal Title IX violation
IMAGE CAPTION AND CREDIT: Woman holding contraceptive pills; Orachon Paksuthiphol/Canva Pro