I realize I’m a little late here to chime in on this, but here it goes anyway. I did watch the show. I am actually glad they showed it. NARAL had sent out an email showing their excitement about the upcoming show.
Interestingly, they didn’t send anything out praising the show AFTER it aired. I think the reason was that it didn’t really do much for their cause. They had these three young girls who had obviously been given the Planned Parenthood talking points before the show, but they could hardly get them out over their sobbing.
My heart is so broken for them. I thought there were three outstanding parts of the show. One was after the African-American young lady had her abortion. Her boyfriend brought her out to dinner to make her “feel better” about her abortion. Good thinking…
Anyway, they were at dinner and the girl starts saying how her abortion counselor had told her to “not think about it as a something with a forehead and 10 fingers and 10 toes. Just think about it as a mass of cells.” Then her boyfriend, trying to chime in and support that statement said something about how he had always encouraged her not to get attached to that “thing.”
Then out came the truth. She didn’t like him calling it a “thing” because it wasn’t a “thing” to her. She said that it was her baby and it did have 10 fingers and 10 toes and it would have turned out just like the daughter they already had.
Then, she said she wondered “if they had made the wrong decision.” She said she had already become attached to her baby and he would never understand what she was going through. So, there it was. The truth. The raw truth. Those counselor’s words sounded good, but they weren’t true to her. And now, she wondered if it was the right decision… too late.
The second thing I really liked was the conversation they showed between the same couple. They were lying on their bed discussing what decision they were going to make. I liked it because it showed the real, unedited logic a woman in a crisis pregnancy will use to justify abortion. I think if pro-lifers have a better understanding by gaining more insight into the logic of these women, then we can have more understanding of how to penetrate through that logic.
The third thing I liked was the woman they talked to for only a few minutes named, Katie. She quickly broke down after she began talking about her abortion, but that wasn’t what I liked. I liked that she said this, “For me having an abortion was a parenting decision.”
She said she recognized her “fetus” as a baby and she thought the best decision as a parent would be to abort her baby. Now, this has left some people totally taken aback, but not me. I am already familiar with the talking points.
Right before I left, Planned Parenthood released some new talking points, one of them was about this exact topic; abortion being a “parenting decision.” Planned Parenthood says “Women choose abortion because they care about their family and their future family.”
You see, Planned Parenthood had to wise up. The young people in the country have become smarter. The technology and science have advanced. We can no longer say that it is just a “mass of tissue.” Our young people know better, they can see better.
So, Planned Parenthood had to come up with something else… and this is it. They had to figure out a way to convince these women that it was better to kill their baby than to parent their baby.
Unfortunately, many women have bought into that lie. Not because they really believe it, but because they are so desperate to hang on to something. They are in a crisis and Planned Parenthood is throwing them a life raft. What they don’t know is that life raft is going to deflate when they are right in the middle of the ocean, when they feel alone and helpless, and then Planned Parenthood won’t be there again.
If you haven’t watched it, I encourage you to do so, if you can find it. The show originally aired on MTV called “No Easy Decision.” The episode doesn’t appear to be available for public viewing, but here’s an article from the Pro-Life Action League discussing the show.
There are so many people hurting from abortion. We can learn from shows like this where, unfortunately, they are exploited.
I watched this girl on her episode of 16 and pregnant her mother was very prochoice, and markai talked about how she planned her daughter and wanted that baby and abortion couldnt even cross her mind. I really believe she chose abortion because of her boyfriend.
Michelle, I have often thought and occasionally said that choosing abortion is usually a case of choosing a lifestyle over a life, and it’s usually the father’s lifestyle. Just like contraception, abortion is used as a means to allow men to avoid consequences of irresponsibly having sex.
I’m a bit disgusted with the way abortion supporters use women’s anguish as a justification for society abandoning them in that anguish. We already have a natural desire to avoid pain — and abortion advocates literally cash in on that. The troubled pregnant woman is in anguish and crying out for help, and it’s so much easier for society to just tolerate abortion and pretend that it makes the anguish go away, than it is to go into that anguish with her and help her through it.
I’m also disgusted with a number of abortion workers who blog about their work, and the way it seems as if they view the women’s anguish as a kind of performance art that they get to critique as they earn a living.
One thing I wish I could scream from the housetops is that ambivalence, fear, and even rejection of the pregnancy are NORMAL! This has been documented for perhaps three quarters of a century now. It wasn’t until abortion was turned into a popular political cause that this was buried and forgotten. To “treat” the stress of early pregnancy with abortion is akin to “treating” the itching and blisters of poison ivy by amputating the affected limb.
Abby, I said something on Saturday that just came to me out of the blue. When they are telling the girls it’s a parenting decision (which I didn’t think of it like that until I read your blog) These girls hear (and I say that, because it’s what I heard when the word came up) is that they are not good enough, capable enough or worth enough to care for this child. For me that sent a fire through me, I’m the type of person that if you tell me I can’t do something I’m going to do it. I have no idea where I get that from, but some girls don’t have that . They have been stomped on and had their heart trampled that when they hear that they believe it. And they make the best choice for their baby, not to have to grow up with a terrible mother. That’s why we have to be on the sidewalk to tell them they are worth the gift of life. Not in words but in smiles, words of love, kindness, and that no matter what they do in that clinic we will still be out there praying for them. I don’t think enough people understand what goes through these girls heads. And each one if different, but one thing is the same they are there because they are in pain. Where it’s rooted they only know, but they are.
PS your blog is awesome!!
Leticia, not just that, but that their feelings of inadequacy are A NORMAL PHASE OF PREGNANCY, and that people who tell them that these feelings mean that they’re unfit to parent — that a baby would be better off dead than parented by them — are LYING to them.
It’s so disgusting that these abortion facilities take a normal phase of pregnancy — the initial panic — and use it to beat young women down until they kill their babies.
I watched this show and was so upset when the person on the phone told the young lady that they use “gentle suction” in an abortion. I have never had an abortion, but I can’t imagine it being “gentle”. I was angry, I really thought the young lady was lied to. I work for our local Right to Life organization. I get calls from people looking for abortions. It makes me sad every time. I always pray after I get done talking to them.
God told Adam and Eve to go and multiply. Now of course they were husband and wife but it still shows that the creator and father of us so badly wants us to multiply his creation in the world because he loves us as his own. God is wonderfull father. If he wanted us to never have children then he would have made Eve barren. But since he wants us to be fathers and mothers to have children then why kill them. It does not matter if it was by rape. sexual perversion, or sexual abuse we as creation of God are called to show love. When you want a abortion you are selfish and only think about your self. I believe that these girls and women need to put themselves in the baby’s shoes. The baby does not know what happened and what is going on nor can it speak for itself. If we want love from our parents then we need to show it to our own babys!! GOD IS THE FATHER TO THE FATHERLESS AND IS THE PROTETOR OF THE WIDOWS AND POOR!! God Bless you guys and keep fighting for the next generation!!!!
In the future, I would appreciate if you would not speculate on my emotions, feelings, or where my particular terminology comes from. If you must know, discussing my abortion as a parenting choice was something that happened between my boyfriend and I well before I ever set foot in a planned parenthood clinic. Although, I can attribute some of my deeper understanding of it now to J. Ludlow, PhD.
Also, NARAL is incredibly proud of the show. That should become apparent in March.
Peace.
Oh, Katie. I am so sorry about your abortion. I am so thankful that you replied on here, and that you have found my website! I want you to know that my heart hurt so much for you when I was watching that show. I could see how much you were hurting. When you burst into tears when you started talking about your nephew, I knew that you would one day be in need of healing. As you talked on the show, I could hear myself justifying my own abortions and saying those exact words to patients…”it’s a parenting decision.” I am so sorry that you have been lied to in that way. I wish there was a way that I could take that pain away.
I know that you will be defensive and not admit how you are really feeling. I know that you will continue to defend your “choice.” But, just know that when that time comes and you do find yourself in need of compassion, I will be here for you. I won’t judge you. I won’t condemn you. I have walked in your shoes. I want to help you. I want you to be able to talk about your nephew without tears and shame. Please know that there are many of us that want to help. We care about you, Katie.
You said something about pro-lifers needing to see things from the perspective of the crisis pregnancy couple. I’m gonna tell you a little story-
I was 19 and in a casual rebound relationship with a much older man when I found out I was pregnant. My boyfriend (of 2 1/2 years who I had lost my virginity to)and I had just broken up a few months ago and I moved home from college, got a job, and met this man who was now the father of my unborn child! I grew up in a large Catholic family and my mom was outspoken against abortion from the time I can remember. I think that must be why I chose not to have an abortion. I can still remember thinking all of these things, like, omg what about all of my dreams and aspirations for my life?! And, what are my parents going to think?! And, I’m not going to marry this guy in fact, this isn’t fun anymore and I don’t even want to be with this guy another second! I also had trouble with the fact that this guy was African-American, and I was not, and I would get the stares for the REST of my life from people who thought horrible things about girls like me.
I decided I needed to take responsibility for my actions. I needed to step up to the plate and accept my fate because sometimes God gives us wake-up calls. I had not been careful and I had known ahead of time that sex makes babies. We sat down with my parents, and told them. We moved in together and tried to make the relationship work. It didn’t. But my daughter is a blessing and a gift and I cannot imagine my life without my crisis pregnancy baby. I learned that when you accept responsibility for your mistakes and respond in a positive way instead of reacting by trying to KILL that mistake or HIDE that mistake it DOESN’T WORK and it WON’T go away. I have a girlfriend who had an abortion, and every time she drinks she cries about that little girl she always wanted but felt she couldn’t take care of.
I am now married with three kids and am so thankful I made the right decision when it came down to “choice”. I think if everyone was honest with themselves, they would realize the “choice” had already been made for them when they found out there was a real baby living and growing inside of them. Even if you get raped and you find out that you are pregnant, that life has infinite value and should not be looked at as something that is disposable. It should be looked at as making something good out of something bad. Taking lemons and making lemonade. Even if you can’t raise that child, make someone else’s life fuller by being selfless for 9 measly months out of your insignificant life and give the gift of life. There is nothing greater you could ever give.
This is a fantastic post and I definitely agree, you have a great blog in general. I will for surecome back to read more one day.