Stand Up for Choice 2025: Resisting Hate, Defending Justice

Blog by Cloe Jewell, Amnesty Feminist Network Committee Member

On the 6^th of September 2025, Parliament Square became the main stage for protesting and clashing visions of rights and freedoms. Nearly 900 people were arrested for peacefully protesting the British government’s complicity in the genocide in Gaza, a crude reminder that freedom of speech in the UK is increasingly under threat. Behind the Millicent Fawcett Statue, another protest unfolded: March for Life occupied the space with a black stage and giant screen, projecting an image of a foetus alongside the words “human rights are for all humans.”

The “theme” of M4L this year was in fact, human rights. The adoption of human rights rhetoric by anti-rights groups is an interesting development which we see the far-right adopt regularly. In this instance we saw people protesting for ‘human rights’ all whilst pushing for policies that directly restrict freedoms, endanger women, and enforce control over bodies. There is nothing humane about their “human rights” agenda, which is deeply rooted in exclusion and harm.

That’s why out of all the previous iterations, Stand Up for Choice 2025 mattered so deeply. Every year this counter-protest is vital, but this one felt especially urgent: to defend abortion access not only as healthcare, but as part of a broader fight for reproductive justice. Reproductive justice means more than the right to abortion. It is the right to have children, not have children, and to raise children in safe, sustainable environments. 

On 6 September, all these principles were under attack in very plain sight. Through the criminalisation of protest, through the growing influence of US-style anti-choice rhetoric in the UK, and through the far right’s weaponisation of misogyny and racism.

Speakers throughout the day named these threats clearly. Many condemned the role of Reform and its leaders, who openly question abortion access and fuel a politics of racialised misogyny. From Nigel Farage’s push to lower abortion time limits, to Reform’s broader platform of authoritarianism and exclusion, we see how attacks on reproductive rights are inseparable from attacks on democracy and justice more broadly.

Despite intimidation through raised crosses and rosaries, insults and laughter, the voices of our activists did not back down. We successfully disrupted their speakers and reclaimed the space. Stand Up for Choice is not just a counter-protest: it is a declaration of solidarity and an act of resistance to the hate that is seeping through the towns of this country.

As US influence seeps into UK politics, and as racialised violence intensifies in our streets, the fight for reproductive justice cannot be siloed. It is tied to struggles against racism, against fascism, against the erosion of democratic freedoms. To defend abortion is to defend choice, dignity, and equality for all.

This year’s Stand Up for Choice was a reminder: our resistance is collective, and our fight is far from over.