Pro-Life Pretense
President Obama's still-to-be released common ground agenda in the abortion conflict is already having a profound and largely overlooked effect: it has exposed deep fault lines in the pro-life movement. Obama's focus on reducing the need for abortion has been embraced by some practical-minded pro-lifers who are tired of decades of intransigence, and who also appear jaded by the counterproductive "culture of life" sloganeering of President Bush. Pro-choice Bill Clinton presided over the most dramatic decline in abortion rates in the history of our country after all. Pro-lifers Reagan, Bush I and Bush II did not. For an emerging movement of reasoned, results-oriented, non-ideological pro-lifers results count. If a pro-choice president produces pro-life outcomes, they ask, are they any less worthy?
For the traditional pro-life establishment, however, they are. In fact, to them, Obama's common ground call is perceived as a threat. Since Obama takes them, their beliefs and their proposals seriously they have been forced to justify some fundamental hypocrisies, the kind that have in the past led to rhetorical victories and little progress (unless you count fundraising). Consider, for example, the clash between pro-life rhetoric and reality when it comes to crisis pregnancy centers, a much-cherished initiative of the old guard pro-lifer. A recent report, "A Passion to Serve, a Vision for Life," released by the Family Research Council is a valentine to the nation's 3,000 crisis pregnancy centers (CPCs). It commends them for communicating "to women and their families that their lives are valuable and that their needs - emotional, psychological, medical, spiritual and practical - can and will be met ."
The report details the intense efforts CPCs undertake to persuade women to not choose abortion. The main message broadcast to those coming to a center is: "support is available, you do not need to discontinue this pregnancy for financial reasons." But beside the ultrasound image women are provided and medically inaccurate pitch against abortion, the most persuasive arguments available to CPCs, as any staff or volunteer will readily admit, is that women facing crisis pregnancies can make it work by depending on a network of publicly-funded social services. For the vast majority of women convinced to become mothers, CPCs are a gateway to the welfare system.
Theoretically, a pro-life, common ground approach then would be to take seriously the benefits of CPCs as, essentially, referral agencies to services which can support women who really do want to keep a pregnancy. And also to say, "Let's make sure the right social services are in place - those that women really need - and that they are well-funded."
And here's where that old-guard rhetoric runs into the brick wall of common ground (and fact-based) reality. The Family Research Council valentine to crisis pregnancy centers may sound pretty, and even compelling, but on closer examination is it sincere? In effect, groups like the Family Research Council as well as most pro-life politicians have been two-timing their devoted crisis pregnancy center partners. While professing their love for their work, they batter the social programs on which the crisis pregnancy center movement places its trust.
The Family Research Council carefully details in its report the many federal and state-sponsored programs to which CPCs direct women including: Head Start, Medicaid, Local Health Departments, Legal Aid, State Children's Health Insurance Program (S-Chip), State Health Departments, Women Infants & Children (WIC), and the Department of Job and Family Services.
Yet when it's suggested that support for these very agencies should merit pro-life support, the Family Research Council lines up in opposition. Michael New, a senior fellow at the Family Research Council, recently launched an attack on the progressive, pro-common ground, pro-life group, Catholics in Alliance for the Common Good (CACG) for suggesting just that. CACG conducted a study linking states that provide more generous services to the poor with lower abortion rates. CACG suggested that to reduce abortion rates pro-lifers should consider the policies traditionally championed by Democrats--extending publicly-funded social services to poor pregnant women--rather than exclusively focus on restricting abortion. But suddenly, the programs that are so effective when used as resources by crisis pregnancy centers, are suspect. New writes,
"[The study's] questionable methodology and inconsistent results should give pro-lifers serious pause before they enthusiastically embrace higher welfare benefits as a strategy to reduce abortion. Furthermore, there is little peer-reviewed research which indicates that more generous welfare benefits have a significant impact. [Other studies] find that welfare benefits only have a marginal impact on abortion rates. However, as I will discuss later in the response, there exists plenty of evidence from studies in reputable peer reviewed journals that various types of pro-life laws reduce abortion rates."
New himself didn't miss the chance to praise the work of crisis pregnancy centers; he weighed in when the Family Research Council report came out, writing, "PRCs have offered real alternatives to literally millions of women facing crisis pregnancies. Countless women regret their abortions. However, the testimonials in FRC's latest report are evidence of the positive impact of the life-affirming options offered by many pregnancy-resource centers." Of course, the "life-affirming" options are now no more than a euphemism for the "welfare" which, according to New, has a "marginal impact on abortion rates.
New's attack on the Catholics in Alliance for the Common Good's policy proposal is a reflection of an all-consuming hypocrisy plaguing an ideologically entrenched pro-life establishment. Crisis Pregnancy Centers rely on a welfare system to support the women they persuade to become mothers while pro-life groups and politicians actively undermine the very programs and agencies that are the only resources available to support many women who want to have a child, as CPCs know.
In 2007, The Children's Defense Fund published its Congressional Scorecard on the best and worst legislators for children. The organization scored congressmembers votes on many of the policies that help pregnant women decide whether to parent or abort. The votes were on Head Start, increasing the minimum wage, reauthorizing and increasing funding for S-CHIP, increasing funding for children with disabilities, job training, Medicaid funding, helping youth pay for college, and tax-relief for low-income families with children. Based on their votes on these issues, the Children's Defense Fund ranked 143 congressmembers as 'the worst" for children. Of the 143 worst legislators, 100% are pro-life.
The long-established, and long-dominant pro-life complex speaks out of both sides of its mouth, praising crisis pregnancy centers and yet disparaging the social services upon which they rely. In the upcoming months, the Obama administration will be revealing its common ground agenda and one part of it promises to be supports for pregnant women. It is just the sort of agenda designed to appeal to a nascent pragmatic and moderate pro-life movement. Let's hope this rising voice of reason can lead the crisis pregnancy center movement to support an administration plan to help struggling families and indigent pregnant women. Praise for CPCs can't come packaged with attacks on the very supports they rely upon. It not only defeats common ground; it defeats reason.
Joseph Schiedler, president of the Pro-life Action League, wrote an op-ed in USA Today claiming pro-lifers who embark on the search for common ground betray the pro-life cause and, in making his case, reveals the classic characteristics of pro-life schizophrenia. He writes,
"There is no evidence that increasing social programs -- such as low-cost health care and day care, college grants and maternity homes -- will impact a woman's abortion decision. It is rare in our experience to find a woman who says the reason she is choosing abortion is that she doesn't have day care, or that she'd rather go to college...More than 3,000 pregnancy centers in the U.S. are ready to help a woman with material needs, emotional support, counseling and medical care. Anyone who wants to stop abortion should promote these centers."
Once we begin to till the soil of common ground, these contradictions and inconsistencies will become clearer. It is then that pragmatic pro-lifers may realize there will be unlikely partners along the path to genuine pro-life victories.
This post originally appeared on RHRealityCheck.org's OnCommonGround forum which publishes perspectives and breaking news on common ground in the abortion conflict. Join the conversation at OnCommonGround or follow us on www.twitter.com/commongrnd
Follow Cristina Page on Twitter: www.twitter.com/cristinapage
Odile Weissenborn: Roe v. What? The Pro-Choice Movement Is Losing Steam
In the House, there are 205 anti-choice congressmen compared to 185 pro-choice . In the Senate, there's an anti-choice majority too. This is forgotten when we're still slaphappy about Obama.
Jacob M. Appel: Abortion: A Healthy Choice
If the roughly 50 million abortions that have occurred in the US since Roe v. Wade had all ended in full-term deliveries, approximately 500 additional women would have died during childbirth.
Carl Capotorto: I Was A Teenage Anti-Abortionist
The far right is daily being chased back into the margins, where it belongs. All that's left of their movement is a relative handful of confused, misguided know-nothings being manipulated and led by a cynical elite.
Reproductive Justice: Stepping Up the Pressure: The Archbishop Comes to the Abortion Clinic
Every woman has different life circumstances. Every pregnancy produces different challenges. Who is more able to assess the moral validity of every woman's abortion? I certainly don't think it's the Archbishop.
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I just want people's religious beliefs to stop interfering with our laws and rights. If I wanted a theocracy I would move to Iran.
There's a regular group of anti-abortion protesters who've gathered across the street from a clinic in my hometown. The clinic is in a group of medical buildings & doesn't even have a sign on the street. Its main purpose is planned parenthood. The protesters are there every day with huge posters of aborted fetuses & signs claiming that torture is performed. They stand in a small park where children used to play but mothers no longer allow. Who wants their child to view an aborted fetus while on a swingset?
I decided to stop & talk with some of these people. I told them that their signs offended me & that they had stolen the park from the kids. I thought that their time would be better served getting another job & donating the money to women who wanted their babies but couldn't afford them instead of standing there. They were also making people MORE aware that there was a place to get abortions. Two of the women were able to speak calmly to me, but 1 of the men started screaming & swearing at me. He was chanting prayer, screaming swears, all in the name of "life." They didn't seem to care about the lives that they were affecting by being there.That seems to be the thought pattern of most pro-lifers.
The pregnant woman is the one who knows best if she can handle the pregnancy & the future life of the child. We don't need even one more
I love how the most irate pro-lifers are men...when that will never be a choice they have to make, or live with, and it will never be a procedure performed on their bodies. Pro-lifers are the biggest supporters of capital punishment; yet, they refuse to admit that it's more about control over others than it has to do with the strongest desires to preserve life... a life is a life is a life.
Their methods are deeply flawed as you pointed out above (letting people know where to get the abortion) but it's difficult for them to see that because they want to believe all pro choicers are "baby killers" and they'd have to admit the absolute hypocrisy of their stance. How is killing a doctor, who performs abortions, saving a life?
I'm sure very few women would answer questions about an abortion with, "it was awesome, the best thing that's ever happened to me." It's not easy for someone to make that choice and personally I couldn't, but I wouldn't make it for someone else or even presume the right to make that choice for someone else.
The religious right has always regarded unwed mothers as immoral. The right wing formerly promoted abortions and sterilization to keep female head of households off welfare. The switch from using abortions as a punishment for "loose women" to using their children as the punishment followed when some women seemed too happy to have inconvenient children aborted. Neither policy is friendly or serves the child. The respectful attitude is that abortions should not be imposed but follow the mother's judgment. Then, they should be supervised by capable physicians and safe.
Their pretense of caring about the children is a bitter joke. They actually spend too much time looking for reasons to jail people.
The dems can still win the pro-choice debate if they have the wisdom to use the pro-life stand against them. Pro-life legislators vote against everything that would rationally help their cause: S-CHIP, head start, sex education, after school programs, health care for mothers, pro-choice (freedom), etc. while voting for everything that is anti-life: wars, prisons, death penalty, etc. It's as if they believe in opposite of what they preach. Like an alternate reality.
The dems should and must use this fraudulent and hypocrisy against them. Use one Rep. Greyson of FL tactics, that'll get some attention. That has been the problem letting these clowns get away with their hypocrisy for years. Enough already...
Women are not victimized by abortion. Abortions cost a lot of money, depending on the trimester and where the women lives or seeks the procedure . Private insurance policies will pay for the procedure, but the copays can be hefty. NO clinic comes after pregnant women to "get their money and not provide the service". One has to look for an abortion clinic, just like women used to have to seek out [quietly] an abortionist when the procedure was illegal.
Women are not victimized by abortion. There are protestors at almost every clinic on the planet in this country, seeking to persuade women to not have an abortion. It takes a determined women to get an abortion in this country. NO ONE IS VICTIMIZED; at least anymore than before Roe vs Wade. Then it didn't matter, since all but the most dangerous situations medically, were illegal.
Most women, who are determined to carry a pregnancy to term, actually do. Men notwithstanding.
There are no victims of abortion. Abortion is not a crime presently. Trying to force a women into carrying a pregnancy against her will is a crime.
We all have some type of regret in our lives; I don't think anyone gets out of that situation alive. Abortion may be a regret of some women, but, it is a regret that they themselves entered into willingly and paid for with private funds and overcame obstactles to obtain. Victim, no.
#1 studies of who actually gives to charities reveal that it is social conservatives who do, because they do not feel it is the government's job.
#2 Pro-lifers also encourage women who cannot care for their children to give them up for adoption, to the millions of couples who wait for years for a child
#3 Studies of women who have abortions reveal that large numbers, if not a majority, are forced into the decision by a man: husband, boyfriend, father or pimp. so much for choice
#4 Women who have abortions report never getting over it, and are on the front-lines of the pro-life movement
#5 Women who have abortions in their youth end up drinking themselves to death when they reach menopause, which is why ALL MY FRIENDS ARE DEAD!
You make a lot of statements that you appear to accept as fact. However, without some citations, I don''t believe it. In fact, have found them not to be facts
This is all rhetoric! I doubt you even know a single woman who has had an abortion! A woman who considers an abortion is in a mentally or physically stressed situation or she wouldn't HAVE TO consider an abortion! Simply give the child up for adoption? You call that a simple solution? What about the nine months of pregnancy? Some women have very physical jobs and can't handle the strains and fatigue of pregnancy. It's not always a cup of tea for everyone, not everyone has a husband to rub their back and feet at the end of the day.
Some women get pregnant out of abusive relationships and rape. Should they be forced to carry and keep a 3rd, 4th or 8th child because a man forced sex on her? Don't you understand that every situation is different and it isn't fair to force your life views onto a person who is living a very different life? A woman needs to be able to decide what is best for her, her family and for her unborn child. It is growing in HER body, no one else's. No man will ever understand that and should ever be allowed to make that decision.
This is utter nonsense. I love the "give your baby up for adoptions argument" And quote unquote "millions of families want kids." Look up statistics on foster care, and how many millions of kids sit in foster care- some, hell most, becoming fully fledged adults never knowing any sort of family. Save those kids, those kids are already here. Why bring more to know abandonment, abuse, and all the other travesties committed against unwanted children.
The term "pro life" is so Yesterday anyway...
The new phrase is....
Do you believe in "A Consistent Ethic of Life"?
Human life is sacred from Conception to natural death.
As a child who should have been aborted for both my mother's health and sanity, I say that anti-choice is very sinful; my family's poverty wasn't such a good thing either. If one does not want an abortion, one need not have one, but stay the (*^) out of other people's lives! Including mine!
90% of the "leaders" in the pro life movement are men. 100% of them will never be pregnant.
you are so wrong about that. If you attended any Pro-Life rallies you would meet the real leaders: WOMEN WHO HAVE BEEN VICTIMIZED BY ABORTION. They've been there, They've done it. They've never gotten over it. They were lied to, they were told "it's just tissue," but deep down, they knew they were killing a baby. They want to stop other women from making the same mistake.
It's MEN who want women to get abortions, because they don't want to take responsibility. It's men who threaten to beat up or abandon their pregnant wives, girlfriends, & daughters. It's rapists and pimps who don't want to get caught, bringing their underage victims in for abortions under the cover of absolute confidentiality. It's men who, looking for a source of cheap labor, decided what American industry could tap into was women, but first they had to convince them to stop having babies. Abortion allows women to fulfill their destinies on the production lines. Girls, we've been had.
you are so wrong
YOU are so wrong...
Maybe a few of those reasons are true, but the majority of abortions occur because women are being smart and practical by not having a baby they cannot take care of or afford.
Ranting delusional nonsense does nothing to improve the feeble-mindedness of the anti-choice ideology. You should take heed of the message within the article above and start to interject a bit of reason and intellect into your position. If you want to take care of your fellow woman than ease off the idiotic stance of publicly forced procreation.
That's just the point, it's no one's job to "stop other women from making the same mistake" They made that choice of their own free will, and must allow all women the same option. If someone feels that strongly about it, by all means voice your opinion and share your experience. What they do goes way beyond that. It's physically violent at times... and how does that further the agenda?
Read more at: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/cristina-page/pro-life-pretense_b_331070.html
What we have is two incompatible threads of thought, only one of them acknowledged.
The CPC position is consistent and we understand it, despite not agreeing with the anti-abortion aspect. But the other position is the one that so many people are not "getting", and you have to understand it to see what is driving extremist fundamentalists.
They are not viewing pregnancy as a gift of life to an innocent. Instead, they see pregnancy as God's punishment to women for having sex. Over and over in their rhetoric they rail against women who "wouldn't keep their legs together". They don't even single out unmarried women; poor married women aren't supposed to have sex either, and if their men abandoned, divorced them, or even died, they should have known this was going to happen. They have no right to use birth control. Poor women shouldn't have sex, and men as contributors to the pregnancy are not even a part of the picture. If it weren't for the women, the men would not have fallen into temptation.
It doesn't even matter if the baby survives birth. In fact, more's the better if the woman dies in childbirth, the baby is born disabled from lack of nutrition or medical care, or the family ends up living in poverty for the rest of all their lives. It's what they deserve. They see this as what God wants, therefore they see themselves as carrying out God's will.
One of the strangest things about Randall Terry and his old group Operation Rescue was that quietly they were against birth control and not so quietly against sex education. It has been proven that abstinence based education doesn't work and that educating our young people about sex and birth control does. In an (sex) educated population the abortion rate is low. "Just say no" results in a whole lot of unplanned pregnancies. The pro-life right wingers' real agenda is that if women are going to have sex, they should have to suffer the consequences.
I love the button that says: "if men could get pregnant, abortion would be a sacrament".
I always tell people (mostly men) that are against abortion, that I respect their opinion and that by all means they shouldn't have an abortion since they are against them.
I think there is quite a difference between the rah rah of todays abstinence
AND...
Living it.
"Of the 143 worst legislators, 100% are pro-life."
All you need to know about which lives "pro-lifers" most value: their own.
With Congress' approval rating in the 20's, it maybe more than just the pro -life group.
Sorry - but "exposed"?
Who with a functioning brain can overlook that the same people who protect unborn children will drop them like hot oil the second they arive on this planet?
The same people who call it murder to have an abortion look away when babies and children suffer from illness, neglect, and even death. The mortality rate of under 18s in this country is among the top three of the industrialized world. - INCLUDING China where girls are killed by their parents. The number of babies and children in poverty is almost as high as in Russia.
It is like the proliferers want to take responsibility from the parents for the time before the birth and then leave them with responsibility for something they did not want.
Don't get me wrong. I am against abortion. But I am a lot more against suffering. And as long as there is no plan in place to make a good life for unwanted children abortion prevents suffering.
Pro lifers want to increase it.
I would like to hold them accoutable. But accountability is not in high regard in a country where we give power to the greates parasites this planet has ever seen.
somehow you are going to have to explain all the millions of pro-lifers who are waiting to adopt all these "unwanted" children, or are trying to raise the money to fund overseas adoptions
somehow you are going to have to explain the mortality rate of under 18s in this country once it has been corrected for automobile crashes involving teenagers who drive their own cars. It takes an affluent society to provide kids with their own cars. In fact, that is the reason teenagers are included in child mortality rates for this country, by people who want to make it look like we have a problem with providing for children. The problem is we provide them with too much.
Did you ever think that those "affluent" folks aren't the ones having the abortions? They have the means to care for the children. The women who have abortions are the ones who are financially, mentally and physically stressed! That's why they need to go on welfare and other assistance, as this article states. Obviously you can't even imagine what it's like to be remotely in this kind of situation.... are you Republican?
"Don't get me wrong. I am against abortion. But I am a lot more against suffering. And as long as there is no plan in place to make a good life for unwanted children abortion prevents suffering.
Pro lifers want to increase it.
I would like to hold them accoutable. But accountability is not in high regard in a country where we give power to the greates parasites this planet has ever seen."
Both the Roman Catholic Church and Protestant Fundamentalists have a rather gory thought process that embraces suffering here on earth. Whether it is abject poverty that many lower income families go through as a result of a christian fundamentalist administrations and its' policies, in addition to not taking responsible means to prevent tragedy, abuse and neglect in the name of having many more kids than can be, at least on a safety-security level, attended to, somehow life on this planet is not seen as meaningful nor valuable.
You are right. Once out of the uterus, it's social Darwinism all the way, all in the name of god and an afterlife.
The "ultra right" has tied itself with Christianity but they do not follow the commands of Christ.
Christ did not say Feed my sheep "sometimes" he did say "Feed my sheep"
Christ did not tell us that "Sometimes" you should give your money to the poor.
WHY NOT ASK REPUBLICANS WHY THEY DO THESE THINGS?
Christ did say "MANY ARE CALLED BUT FEW ARE CHOSEN"
OUR FAITH IS BASED ON REDEMPTION....
NON CHRISTIANS DON'T SEEM TO UNDERSTAND THAT.
"
I DON'T CARE WHAT YOUR RELIGION SAYS!
Julia,
And you are "living proof" that I am correct:)
You are here are you not?:)
Name me ONE TIME I dragged you to church?:)
Well, I appreciate that you at least acknowledge there is a large disconnect between the religious right, and teachings of Christ. This gives us a marginal amount of common ground, at least.
Jules,
Why do you think we call them "Cafeteria Christians or Cafeteria Catholics"?
But Jesus teaches forgiveness too..which is what many forget.
Son of liberty, you're hardly that.
Forcing pregnancy on women is nearly slavery. And it was practiced.
Sorry, your opinion just don't count with an attitude like that.
And frankly, I'm so happy that the law is on side of women. Once again, your opinion doesn't matter because it's still a woman's choice.
Nobody cares if you don't like it.
It matters that we have a choice.
Son of Liberty,
Hate to tell you this, but the feed my sheep verse you are referring to in John, refers to discipleship, not a literal act of feeding people.
Actually, the Bible does say that "The Road is narrow, and FEW there be that find it" This is out of the book of John as well.
Cool,
mjknoxville
Don't understand what you are trying to say here...
I think that the Catholic Church has worked itself into a corner, both with the majority of its membership and with non-Catholics. There are so many social justice issues to be dealt with. Why is the Church so hung up with pro-life and anti-gay-marriage? Why is it so tied to the ultra right? Doesn't it see that it is in the minority, more and more? Obviously, it does not care. Obviously, it does not see that it is more and more out of sync with secular humanists, who would appear to be more sympathetic to human rights. I think the whole thing about Obama getting the degree at Nortre Dame was an embarassment to the Church. I think it looked ridiculous, and, again, out of sync with the majority of its membership. More and more, the Catholic Church seems to be saying be pro-life or get out. Not good.
Polls show that most folks are not in favor of gay marriage period.
But I wonder if you are Catholic?
At any rate we believe that Jesus is the Son of God. That even at his conception he was both God and Man. We are taught that he (Jesus) is like us in all things except sin...
Which means that if Jesus was a person at the moment of his conception then so are we.
And I'm sure polls once suggested that most people were against inter-racial marriage.
If churches were more proactive with helping women, with health care, with childcare, with education, I might be able to take organized religion more seriously.
In theory, common ground sounds like a good approach. In reality, it makes as much sense as the President seeking common ground with his most hateful opponents: white supremacists, 'tea party' groups, far-right militias, etc. The common thread with all of these people is that 'common ground' means destroying the rights of others and pushing a far ahead as possible. At the end of the day, they still hate everybody. Bill Clinton can tell you who got crucified after seeking to join his bashers, passing 'welfare reform,' and seeking 'common ground.'
There needs to be full access to contraception, abortion and late-term abortion. Otherwise, the terrorists win. Rev. Bookburn - Radio Volta
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