Barry Schiller took our interview questions and this is his response and story:
My wife and I are long time supporters of reproductive freedom. I got into it when after an oblivious, sheltered live-at-home undergrad experience, I moved to California in the early 60s where the sexual revolution had begun. I was shocked to learn someone I knew had to go to seedy Tijuana for an abortion, my first awakening. Later, after getting married my wife and I got involved in the revived environmental movement. At that time we were not outliers to believe we couldn’t solve environmental problems without reducing the rapid human population growth rate, and this required reproductive freedom. Today we are concerned that this perspective is largely gone, just as there are major new threats.
In our own marriage, uneasy about long-term effects of birth control, it being pre-Roe days, it was somewhat reassuring that NY had legal abortion.
Later, my wife Libby was a long term Planned Parenthood escort, and I’m proud that she once won their Volunteer of the Year award. We produced pro-choice programs for public access cable TV. I post pro-choice comments at various sites and as opportunities arise. I remember early on getting flack at RIC for recommending PP for the State Employees Charity Appeal when they were not in the United Way. I also try to attend all the pro-choice rallies even if just to applaud at the appropriate time. With Trump, the Assembly’s anti-choice leadership, and a Supreme Court on the edge, we are quite worried. So we included PP in our estate plans in hopes our support for reproductive freedom will persist after we are gone.