“We’re going into the belly of the beast,” claimed one pro-life marcher, knowing that Boston remains among the most pro-choice cities in the country. 

That was in 2022, when the second annual Men’s March, organized by the Catholic radio host Jim Havens, brought 200 mostly white men to one of the country’s most liberal cities to spread their message that life begins at conception and that the Constitution must protect all “persons.” 

In the first three years of the march, which began in 2021, few counter protestors, save a small cadre of kazoo blowing clowns, showed up to confront the pro-life men. But in November 2024, that changed. A combination of continued outrage over the denial of abortion rights and the re-election of Trump seems to have energized young pro-choice activists, who showed up en masse to disrupt the planned march from Planned Parenthood on the border of Boston and Brookline to the Boston Commons, three miles away.  

As the confrontation grew a bit tense,  a Boston Police motorcycle escort, which annually leads the men to their downtown destination, appeared caught off guard by the counter protestors and called out the SWAT teams from both the Boston Police Department and the Massachusetts State Police. While there was a lot of shouting, shoving, profanity and threats, and a number of arrests, no one was hurt and with a reinforced police escort the Men’s March did make it to the Commons for their speeches and rally. 

These images, all from a one day march in November 2024, are part of an ongoing project on abortion rights.