Illinois Right to Life Committee
MARCH 2006
March, 2006 Pro-Life News (see articles below): 03/31/06 New political strategy for the abortion issue 03/28/06 Hard to believe but really happening 03/24/06 Double Standard on Violence 03/21/06 My Response to Radical Femme 03/14/06 Ignoring science to push an agenda 03/10/06 IRLC Radio Messages on WIND AM 560 and WYLL AM 1160
Illinois Right to Life News for Friday, March 31, 2006 New political strategy for the
abortion issue Earlier in March a conference was held at a college in the Northeast to discuss political strategy. One summary from this conference revealed a new policy the Democrats have implemented to address the abortion issue. Democrats will now discuss abortion only in terms of installing more sex-education, contraception and the elimination of poverty. Is there a relationship between this new policy and the push by Planned Parenthood for comprehensive sex education? The connection seems obvious. This policy suggests that abortion supporters have concluded that abortion is not selling. Now they want to mention abortion only in the context of claims to reduce abortion. The only problem is that their strategy to reduce abortion does not work. They cannot produce any legitimate evidence that their graphic sex education programs and easier access to contraception actually reduces unwanted pregnancies or abortions. Don’t fall for this line. You would think it should be getting worn out after more than 30 years of failure. Apparently, an aggressive Planned Parenthood marketing approach is also connected with this strategy. In Chicago Planned Parenthood is offering $10 off coupons to teens for their first visit. In San Francisco, they expanded the $10 off concept to reward teen referrals. The referred teen gets $10 off. The referring teen gets mailed two movie tickets and is entered into a contest to win an iPod. Count on Planned Parenthood to try new marketing strategies to produce more teen victims for their contraceptives and abortion services. The violence by abortion supporters that I reported recently continues as well. Since that newsline, two more acts of violence against Pro-Lifers have been reported. Both occurred in Canada. In one instance, ads on city buses for pregnancy help centers have been routinely vandalized or destroyed. At the University of Calgary, pro-abortion protestors dumped bags of cow manure in front of the Campus for Life Genocide Awareness Project that displays pictures of aborted babies next to pictures from the Nazi holocaust. An earlier report about that display had stated that no violence occurred because the display was protected by security fencing and uniformed guards. When they were prevented from damaging the display directly, they took steps to reduce its effectiveness by creating a stench. Obviously, a free exchange of ideas is welcomed by all at that campus.
Illinois Right to Life News for Tuesday, March 28, 2006 Hard to believe but really happening Some might think that we are over-reacting to Planned Parenthood’s push for comprehensive sex education. Some recent headlines show otherwise. In Rhode Island an administrative decision last week by the state Education Commissioner has banned abstinence education programs from public schools. Education Commissioner Peter McWalters justified this ill-advised decision by stating that the programs violate students' rights, embrace sexist stereotypes, and isolate homosexual teens. McWalters sent letters to schools last weeks directing them to stop any programs that teach abstinence. By prohibiting abstinence education, McWalters is advocating the use
of so-called comprehensive sex education, pushed by Planned Parenthood and other
abstinence education critics who make outlandish claims such as the response to this Rhode
Island decision made by James Wagoner, president
of Advocates for Youth. He stated,
"We've known for some time that abstinence-only is bad science, bad policy, and a
blatant violation of medical ethics and basic human rights." If that is not the exact opposite of reality, it
is awfully close. He even decided to skip the
lip service that abstinence is the only 100% certain way to prevent pregnancy and sexually
transmitted diseases. That is usually the
only factual sentence provided in so-called comprehensive sex education. In Rhode Island even that statement is apparently
banned. Can it get worse than that? Yes, indeed! Last week a new United Kingdom (UK) policy will provide nurses dispensing contraceptives to schoolchildren and referring girls for secret abortions in all schools – primary and secondary – across the nation. The joint Department of Education and Department of Health initiative will facilitate abortion referrals without a parent’s knowledge, as well as give schoolgirls instant access to the abortifacient morning-after pill, among other things. The nurses will also be trained to facilitate a student’s decision to follow a homosexual lifestyle. The program mandates that the nurses “provide and promote confidential drop-ins” for the children to discuss sex issues. Teen pregnancies in the UK continue to skyrocket, despite a £40million government drive to educate kids in sex-ed. The incidence of sexually transmitted disease has risen so dramatically that everyone is now referring to the issue as an epidemic. Isn’t that experience the laboratory evidence that proves this approach of pushing casual sex and contraceptives is a total failure? Unfortunately, the victims are not laboratory animals but UK children whose lives are being destroyed by this irresponsible policy. This latest expansion will only make the situation even worse. We must stop Planned Parenthood before children in the United States are overcome by the same epidemic.
Illinois Right to Life News for Friday, March 24, 2006 Double Standard on Violence Abortion supporters are quick to defend their “right to abortion” and their “freedom of choice.” Any action by Pro-Life citizens that creates even the slightest inconvenience in obtaining an abortion is deemed to be a threat to ‘abortion rights.” For example, when a well-attended prayer vigil took place in front of Planned Parenthood at 1200 N. LaSalle in Chicago on April 12, 2003, Planned Parenthood arranged a press conference of “pro-choice” ministers who called this prayer vigil an “act of intimidation.” On the other hand, if Pro-Life citizens attempt to express their values to the public, abortion supporters seem to have no qualms about destroying property or even attacking the messengers. A March 21st news item described the repeated vandalism that continues to occur, defacing a bus stop bench containing a Pro-Life message in Rockford, IL. So far this Pro-Life message has been vandalized 10 times. I commented in previous newslines on a March 15th news report about pro-abortion students at Harvard University ripping down posters that showed ultrasound pictures of babies in utero. A March 11th reported covered vandalism on the campus of Baylor University. A display of 3500 pink and blue flags to represent the babies lost to abortion each day was stolen from the campus field where they were displayed. In South Dakota, the woman who was considered a prime mover behind the recent law enacted to ban abortion in that state has experienced acts of vandalism at her home and threatening phone calls. A woman in Idaho who was holding a picture of an aborted baby while standing along the road in front of Planned Parenthood was almost run over by a driver who wanted to take action to remove these pictures. All these acts of violence have occurred since the beginning of March. Have any organizations that support abortion condemned such violence? Not that I am aware of! Whenever some extremist, almost never affiliated with any legitimate Pro-Life organization, commits an act of violence, abortion supporters demand that such actions be condemned by Pro-Life organizations. If such condemnations do not occur immediately, abortion supporters start accusing Pro-Life organizations of supporting and encouraging the violence. The double standard and hypocrisy demonstrated by these examples is obvious. Both the criteria for judging what constitutes violence and the requirement for responding to such violence is like night and day depending on who is the victim of the violence. In August 2005 a California affiliate of Planned Parenthood even released an online cartoon video that actually encouraged violence against Pro-Life advocates. Complaints from major Pro-Life organizations did not generate any apology from Planned Parenthood, but they did pull the cartoon from their web site. In a recent discussion with a Pro-Life advocate who has taken a prominent role in opposing the agenda of Planned Parenthood, she told me that she has received a number of death threats. She also knows of another person who barely escaped a car bombing while backing out of her driveway. As usual, the calls for “choice” are a one-way street that offers only one choice.
Illinois Right to Life News for Tuesday, March 21, 2006 My Response to Radical FemmeToday I received an email from “Radical Femme” with the subject line “pro-choice”. You will learn the content of this email as I read my response, beginning: You indicated that you read my blog, but it "didn't make a whole lot of sense." I am not sure what information that you might have read, but I have provided you a copy of my previous newsline that covered Harvard students and the Hands off our ovaries website. Maybe you can relate to the students at Harvard (that I would call radical) who think it is proper to rip down other people's posters because they present ultrasound images of babies in utero. These radicals find such images "disgusting and even gruesome" because the images "misrepresent the pro-choice members of this campus as bloodthirsty baby killers." No, these pictures do not lie! These images show the scientific reality of human life in the womb. General Electric sells ultrasound machines based on these images. Since there is a God who places a conscience in each human being, these radical Harvard students can blame their own consciences for convicting them of being "bloodthirsty baby killers" because they support abortion. Given your pen name, you call yourself radical, but consider us "devoid of any normal human contact." My experience is just the opposite. I find that Pro-Life supporters live very well adjusted lives, while radicals like yourself are always upset and making accusations. You accuse us of lacking intelligence and not living in the real world, but you claim we are apparently still smart enough to devise a means to "control every aspect of human behavior" and become "a blight on this nation." If that is the case, there must be more people who think like we do than radicals like yourself. The last time I checked, this was still a free country. No one is forced to belong to a specific religion or any religion at all. Based on your comments, it appears that you believe in God, but reject religion, and you are free to do so. There is even an organization called Atheists for Life, so defending human life does not require joining a religion. What misery, suffering,
poverty and strife does our birth control policy cause? We support natural family
planning (NFP). Based on the experience of Mother Teresa, NFP has been very
successful even in India. In the USA, the divorce rate among couples who practice
NFP is about 2% while the divorce rate for contracepting couples is closer to 50%. Human misery is caused by men who use women for sex and then pressure them to have abortions. Abortion does not offer freedom to women, but rather provides open season for sexual predators to take advantage of women. Even some pro-abortion women are apparently starting to draw a line in the sand. Check out the web site Hands off our ovaries that I mentioned earlier. Their concern is that women's health is being put at risk to get human eggs for scientific research. Some day these pro-abortion women will finally realize they drew their line in the sand too late. Disrespect for women's health began with contraceptives, continued with abortion, and now moves to obtaining eggs for research. All of these "solutions" have placed women's health at risk. As far as overpopulation, articles even in the "mainstream" media are now reporting on the population implosion in more and more nations, including most of Europe (most prominently Italy, Germany, France), Russia, Japan, Canada, etc. Even the United Nations has finally had to adjust population projections to show that population growth is not the problem. Population decline is rapidly becoming a crisis in many nations. You wrote, "You don't
respect people like my opinions! But, you expect us to respect your opinions!"
You may not like it, but I do respect you as a person, but I do not respect your
opinions. We are confident that we have truth and science on our side.
Sooner or later, you will respond to conscience (hopefully in a more productive way than
the radical Harvard students already discussed) or at least recognize something
so outrageous (e.g. Hands off our ovaries) that you are forced
to say enough is enough. Right now you are affiliated with the side that finds death as a solution for any human problem. If you do not join us sooner rather than later, you will become a victim of your own philosophy of life via euthanasia or assisted suicide. It is your choice.
----- Original Message ----- I can only shake my head in bewilderment over the ignorance that passes for intelligence in the pro life movement! You people seem to live in a world devoid of any normal human contact! You are so wound up in in religion you don't live in the real world! A religion that was developed for man by man! One designed to control every aspect of human behavior! I read your blog but it didn't make a whole lot of sense! You people do not deal with human nature, that requires sex regularly for most people. You don't deal with over-population that is threatening to destroy this beautiful planet God gave us. You don't deal with all the misery, suffering, poverty and strife your birth control policy's cause! You just keep ranting on and on about the santity of life! Once a person has made the mistake of being born you people could care less about them anymore! You don't respect people like my opinions! But, you expect us to respect your opinions! So, most people like myself don't have a gram of respect for people like you! You are a blight on this nation! You are going to drag us kicking and screaming back into the 17th century! I simply do not believe all the drivel people spew! The next thing you know it's going to be illegal to spill any semen on the sheets!
Illinois Right to Life News for Tuesday, March 14, 2006 Ignoring science to push an agendaImages showing fetal development seem to reflect scientific information for me. Witnessing such images at a major university would seem to be an acceptable pursuit of scientific knowledge. Well, maybe in biology class, but apparently not on signs posted around campus, at least not at Harvard. A series of simple posters by Harvard Right to Life, showing the early stages of fetal development, accompanied by cheerful text and line drawings, have so outraged pro-abortion students they are ripping the posters down. The posters contain photos of an unborn child named “Elena,” who offers enthusiastic, slightly goofy commentary on her development and enjoyment of life. One reads “Oh hi! I was just celebrating all my organs and me being 56 days alive, eight weeks old.” They are accented with colorful doodles and line drawings, and end with the statement “A person’s a person no matter how small.” One student told the Harvard Crimson “I personally find the image disgusting and don’t want to walk past it everyday.” Nichele M. McClendon said. Referring to the posters, a Harvard Crimson editorial noted “It also happens to misrepresent the pro-choice members of this campus as bloodthirsty baby killers.” Well, I guess that student got the message. Scientific facts show that an abortion kills a baby. But rather than accepting these facts, these pro-abortion radicals would rather censor science than accept it. They apparently have the immaturity to think that if they can avoid the pictures that reveal the development of the baby in utero, they can conclude that it’s not really a baby. Talk about trying to deny reality! If you are blinded by abortion “rights,” then the amazing images of the developing child in utero become disgusting or even gruesome. The push for embryonic stem cell research represents another area where true science is ignored to push an agenda. Now the threat to women’s health represented by the egg extraction needed to feed this questionable science has generated an interesting reaction. Pro-abortion and Pro-Life women have joined forces to create “Hands off our ovaries”. This web site documents the threats to women’s health created by the push to obtain women’s eggs for embryonic stem cell research. "Egg extraction as currently practiced poses inadequately understood, yet clearly significant risks to women's health. It is unconscionable to encourage young women to take these risks purely for research purposes," says Diane Beeson, Professor of Sociology at the California State University, East Bay and founder member of "Hands off our ovaries". "Women can die from egg harvesting, or suffer irreversible infertility, and the long term effects of the drugs which are used in the process are still being questioned," said Josephine Quintavalle on behalf of Comment on Reproductive Ethics. "None of these issues has been adequately addressed by the stem cell scientists eager to get their hands on women's eggs and ovaries. And all for scientific research which still remains in the realm of hypothetical benefit." I assume we are not likely to find anyone from Harvard ready to join this campaign for women’s health. They would rather ignore the problem and just keep pushing their embryonic stem cell research.
Illinois Right to Life News for Friday, March 10, 2006 IRLC Radio Messages on WIND AM 560 and WYLL AM 1160 New IRLC radio messages were played on WIND AM 560 last week and on WYLL AM 1160 this week. Next Monday, they will be back on WIND. These alternating weeks will continue through the end of April. Below are the messages to be broadcast: Coercive
Abortions Are you being
pressured to have an abortion by a boyfriend, husband, family or friends? Most people are
surprised to learn that over 90 percent of abortions are done to please someone other than
the women. Women who had abortions believe they had no choice. Some women choose
abortion to save their relationship or “keep” a boyfriend from leaving, but most
such relationships come apart shortly after abortion.
Even married couples are driven apart by an abortion. Regardless of who
decides, you and your baby are the ones who will suffer the consequences, including
depression, mental illness, substance abuse and suicide. Abortion increases your risk of
premature birth in future pregnancies and an increased risk of breast cancer. Women believe that
abortion makes women’s lives worse. Thousands
of women are publicly proclaiming “I regret my abortion.” Listen to your heart. Choose life for your baby and yourself. Abortion
Breast Cancer Connection Abortion is the
single most avoidable risk factor for breast cancer.
A British researcher says legal abortions are the best predictor of breast
cancer trends. Women are not being told the
truth about abortion and breast cancer to protect abortion providers from lawsuits and
preserve the legal status of abortion. The first study
confirming the connection between abortion and breast cancer was published in 1957, almost
50 years ago. Since then, numerous studies confirm an increased risk of at least 30%. The National Cancer
Institute reports a 40% increase in cases of breast cancer in the post Roe v. Wade
generation. Latest statistics show an
increase in cancer deaths for women. Major organizations
“looking for the cure” are involved in the cover up with the Susan G. Koman
Foundation even partnering with Planned Parenthood, the largest provider of abortion in
America. It is time to stop the cover-up! Women deserve better. They deserve to know the truth. Planned
Parenthood marketing slogan unfounded Will so-called
comprehensive sex education reduce unwanted pregnancies and abortions? Planned Parenthood claims a 50% cut in both with
comprehensive sex ed and easier access to birth control. One study showed
that easier access to birth control for teens led to 50-120 more abortions per 1000 teens. Other studies have confirmed those results. Planned Parenthood
is the #1 provider of abortions, committing over 255,000 in their last reporting year. This 20th consecutive annual increase in
abortions has raised their market share from 5% to 20%.
Can anyone take them seriously about reducing their profit from abortion? If their sex ed and
birth control services have not reduced abortion over the last 20 years, why would they
work now? Abstinence programs do work! Stem Cell Research
Scorecard The push for public
funding of embryonic stem cell research continues in Illinois and in other states. Is there a viable alternative? Lets take a look at
the scorecard. Stem cells from adults and
from umbilical cord blood have provided actual benefits to human patients in the treatment
of over 65 diseases so far, including heart damage, spinal cord injuries, breast and skin
cancer, leukemia, and repair of serious injuries. The
score for embryonic stem cells remains at zero. Many people argue
that “excess” embryos from in vitro fertilization should be donated to research,
but embryonic stem cell research kills human beings to obtain their stem cells. Want proof? The Snowflakes Embryo Adoption Program allows these human beings a chance to live. So far, 99 children, who might have been donated to research, are living and growing with loving parents. This makes the score 99-0 in favor of embryo adoption over embryonic stem cell research for saving lives. Sacrificing embryos for research is not the answer. True Protection for Disabled Patients Is a feeding tube
medical treatment? If it is, then your dinner
could also be called a medical treatment. They
both provide food and water that a person needs to survive.
Will we reach the
point where even people who can still eat their dinner by mouth will be considered to have
such a low quality of life that we just stop feeding them?
That is what happens when a person is denied nourishment through a feeding
tube. In too many cases
either medical professionals or designated family members are deciding to withhold food
and water from disabled patients who do not want to die.
Tragically, even when other relatives or friends try to intervene, they find
themselves powerless to prevent these acts of euthanasia from occurring. If you have signed
a living will, or a durable power of attorney for health care that states you do not want
“life-sustaining treatment”, you may have signed your death warrant. Instead, choose the
Patient Self Protection Document from Illinois Right to Life Committee. Call 312-422-9300 to protect your life from those
who see death as the solution. |