In the coming week, the Genocide Awareness Project will be coming to campus.
This project is incredibly graphic, incredibly hostile, and incredibly insensitive to almost everyone who views it.
The project has several purposes. The first one is to "tell the real story" of what happens during an abortion. The problem is that the audience has no way of telling if this is the real story. The photographs used are supposedly unaltered an supposedly straight from the offices of abortion offices.
I called the project itself to find out where the images come from and was told that "some doctors who kill babies allow us to pay them to take pictures". I asked why these doctors would allow the Center for Bioethical Reform to take the pictures and asked whether CBR lied to them to obtain the picture. I was told that any more information about obtaining the pictures was confidential and he wouldn't answer my questions. If you look at the pictures on CBR's website, it is very obvious that at the very least, the subject of the images has been altered, adding in coins and repositioning the remains to drive home their point. These images are most likely real and truthfully titled, but because they are unwilling to actually cite the images it is impossible to say for sure.
Another purpose of the project is to evoke feelings of shame. They want to make women who have had abortions feel ashamed. Women who know women who have had abortions to feel ashamed. Men who "let" their wives or girlfriends or friends have abortions feel ashamed. They believe that women who have abortions have been lied to, do not understand what has happened, and feel that they should not feel guilty about terminating a pregnancy.
After making women feel sufficiently guilty about having an abortion, they refer her to an organization like "Project Rachel" which "counsels" women who regret their abortions. Because many women who have abortions have more than one, their hope is to prevent women who have had abortions from having a second abortion. Instead of offering better advice on birth control and trying to help men and women understand the mishaps that led to the pregnancy in the first place, they simply heap guilt on people.
In addition to those who have had abortions or known those who have, they wish to make everyone feel ashamed. If you feel ashamed or disgusted by the images of GAP, they feel that it proves their point that abortion is morally wrong. It doesn't prove anything except that these people are sick and have no problem trying to force their opinions down other people's throats.
Another main purpose is to use shock value to force people to agree with them. If they can shock enough people, they can win. For every angry person who engages with them, they see an opportunity to convince that person of their point. Every person who goes up to their display and asks them a question about it, they count as a victory. They believe they are changing hearts and minds. They will not actually answer your questions. If you try to ask them questions like "do you think abortion should be illegal?" or "would you rather that a woman used Emergency Contraception or had an abortion" or "why don't you hand out condoms as a way of preventing abortion?", your questions will go unanswered and all you will get is a lecture on why they are right about abortion being immoral. Don't approach the display, don't engage, don't give them the satisfaction of trying to "change" your mind.
This post is not to disparage the work of Students for Life. Students for Life is a well run student organization on campus who has merely made the mistake of inviting GAP to campus, or, as has been the case in the past, allowed themselves to be bullied by GAP into bringing them to campus. The "endorsement" letter to GAP on the first page of the CBR website from UMD SFL thanks GAP for pushing them to bring GAP to campus four years ago. It is important to differentiate between the Students for Life and the Genocide Awareness Project.
Remember to stay away from GAP on November 29th and 30th! It will be larger than life on Hornbake Mall, angering students and faculty accross campus. If you wish to help out Terps for Choice, we will be distributing flyers and condoms on Hornbake Mall during both days. Contact terpsforchoice@gmail.com or come to our meeting tonight for more information! (6:45 in Banneker B)
9 comments:
Pretty weak arguments, Terp. If abortion is no big deal, as you and other abortion-choice advocates claim, why are you worried about the pics evoking feelings of shame? Perhaps we feel guilty looking at the images because we are guilty. As for your claim GAP doctored the pics of aborted human fetuses, what is your proof for that? If you are going to make strong claims like that, I suggest that you have evidence to back them up. I'll check back to see if you can prove your claim.
In the meantime, you may want to check out one of your own, feminist Naomi Wolf. She writes:
"The pro-choice movement often treats with contempt the pro-lifers' practice of holding up to our faces their disturbing graphics....[But] how can we charge that it is vile and repulsive for pro-lifers to brandish vile and repulsive images if the images are real? To insist that truth is in poor taste is the very height of hypocrisy. Besides, if these images are often the facts of the matter, and if we then claim that it is offensive for pro-choice women to be confronted with them, then we are making the judgment that women are too inherently weak to face a truth about which they have to make a grave decision. This view is unworthy of feminism. ("Our bodies, Ourselves," New Republic, 1995)
Exactly. The issue is not "Are the pics emotional (they are), but are they true? If so (and Wolf thinks they generally are true), we should admit them as evidence.
The difference between you and her is that she's intellectually honest and wants to admit all of the evidence. You, on the other hand, want to dismiss inconvenient truth that doesn't square with your predetermined worldview.
That's called narrowmindedness. And it's very intolerant of other people's views.
Best,
Van Halen Fan 82
Wolf here speaks of hypothetical images. But what TERPS is referring to are specific photos. You can't assume Wolf would automatically endorse them.
As for the GAP project, many of the claims against them are that they are not actually what they claim to be; more often than not they are photos of stillborn children, late third-trimester abortions which, depending on what state, are only done in health emergencies and were often wanted children in the first place (as were the stillborn children), etc., but GAP makes other claims.
I don't think Wolf is speaking about hypothetical images. She is speaking about the reality these images depict--that of dismembered human fetuses. See for yourself:
"While images of violent fetal death work magnificently for pro-lifers as political polemic, the pictures are not polemical in themselves: they are biological facts. We know this."
Go ahead and support elective abortion if you must. But can't we at least follow Wolf's lead and be honest about what it does to a human fetus?
If abortion is truly no different morally than having your tooth pulled, why worry about pictures changing anybody's mind?
I am happy to see that you insinuated my opinions for me. How kind of you. Please point out where, anywhere, on this blog or when, at any point, Terps for Choice has supported the idea that "abortion is no big deal".
I also said, very firmly, that I have no proof that GAP doctored the pictures except to add coins and to arrange the carcasses that they use. I called the CBR personally to ask where they got the images, and beyond saying they came from a doctor's office, they would not tell me anything else. That makes me think that something is fishy, but you are of course, welcome to take the pictures at face value. But I choose to believe that abortionists do not normally extract a fetus and place it next to a quarter and then take a picture which they send to CBR.
I am concerned that the pictures are not true. If CBR won't say where the pictures came from or offer more information than "these are the victims of abortion", I refuse to accept the pictures as completely true.
You say that I "want to dismiss inconvenient truth that doesn't square with your predetermined worldview." What is my predetermined worldview? Please, using quotes from the blog itself, explain your interpretation of my "worldview". I think that you will find posts about Terps for Choice's upcoming meetings and events, as well as those of NARAL ProChoice MD, and a few articles about safe sex, emergency contraception, and links to articles that offer interesting points on the choice debate. I think you will find nothing about our "predetermined worldview" because I write this blog on behalf of Terps for Choice, and every Terp has a different reason for being pro-choice and a different feeling about abortion and I will not speak for all of them, although you clearly have no problem speaking for all of us.
I would think that a "genocide awareness" campaign would focus on, you know, current issues of genocide, in which an entire group of people is systematically exterminated. Perhaps they would incorporate historical genocides to validate their information on current genocide, i.e. This has happened before, and it is happening right now. Makes sense. Abortion, however, is such a far reach from genocide that the very name of the organization makes me sick. Do you see a fascist nutjob standing on a platform screaming about how we must exterminate all unborn children? Do we teach our children to hate and disregard the humanity of any life growing inside of a uterus? Are women marched to Planned Parenthood and forced to get abortions? Do those who choose not to get an abortion have to hide their pregnancies and lay low for fear that the exterminators are going to come kill their unborn child? Fuck no. Want to know about American genocide? Ask an indigenous American. We don't slaughter fetuses in hatred or disregard for humanity. Anyone who claims that is disregarding the humanity of women who are faced with a reproductive dilemma. "Genocide Awareness." That's sick. People have suffered and are suffering in acts of genocide, and some group thinks it's clever to compare photographs of cruelty that was sometimes abhorrently referred to as "medical procedures" with photographs of actual medical procedures. I don't think it's clever, I don't think it's just. Let's think about it. In using a photograph of, say, a woman suffering during the Holocaust to demonstrate the immorality of abortion, GAP is exploiting her. Does anyone know how this woman felt? "Ma'am, how do you feel about the issue of abortion?" "Oh, I think it's terrible!" "All right! Can we use your testimony to endorse our pro-life cause?" "Why, certainly. Thank you for giving voice to my personal feelings on this very relevant issue." A-ha. No. The Genocide Awareness Project website claims that unborn children suffer a "plight" comparable to actual genocide victims. When you use genocide victims for anything other than true genocide awareness (Darfur? What's Darfur?), you are perpetuating their dehumanization. You've got to imagine these people as being alive, as having feelings and morals and unique standpoints - not as graphic images that you can use to advance your own standpoint. "Now, I'm sure all these genocide victims would agree that unborn children are being wronged in much the same way that..." Yeah... I'm not so sure. Genocide victims have voices that are silenced. The human fetus does not have a voice; it cannot, therefore, be silenced. Its voice is the voice of its mother, and anyone who tries to give it a voice is silencing the mother. Let her speak for herself, including the part of herself that is growing, and respect her words.
All women deserve medical, emotional, and financial support, whatever choice they make. If a 14-year-old rape victim truly wants to bring a child into the world, power to her. If a 40-year-old married woman who did not use contraception because she thought her baby-making days were over wants to get an abortion, power to her as well. Power to the young women who courageously make such grave choices. I'm not afraid of those photographs. Why should I be? I'm not afraid of my blood every 28 days when it comes, and if it ever failed to flow due to pregnancy I would not be afraid of the many implications. I would not be afraid of protecting my health by getting an abortion, if such measures were necessary. And if I were raped (again, motherfuckers), man, that child would have been forced into me. NO ONE is going to force it out of me, NO ONE is going to tell me I need to embrace MOTHERHOOD when my MAIDENHOOD was violently stolen from me. I'm not afraid of the blood and the unborn would-be child. I'm afraid of being silenced for the rest of my life, submitting to degradation for the rest of my life, never celebrating my womanhood, because my womanhood is defined for me. You don't have to be physically tortured in order to experience immense spiritual suffering. I would love to bring a child into the world. I would love to experience the 9-month epic journey of pregnancy followed by a lifetime of motherhood. Though difficult, that should be a joyful experience for every woman, not an obligation, not a guilt trip, not payment for lacking latex when a situation took its natural course and CERTAINLY not payment for being a victim of violence.
The anti-choice extremists won't listen to us and they refuse to relate to us. Somehow, that makes their platform of compassion and understanding completely unconvincing. I'm glad Terps For Choice is retaliating; I think it's wise to not listen to those who won't hear us even though they force us to hear them loud and clear.
Sorry. I don't know if that outburst was appropriate on here, but reading the article in the Diamondback shocked me into silence even though inside I wanted to scream... so this is my scream. It's not a brainwashed Nazi-monster scream. I'm human. Believe me, or leave me alone.
(My name is Rebecca. I'm a freshman English major. I speak for myself.)
Again, regarding Wolf: she speaks of general images of aborted fetuses. GAP images are specific images of fetuses/babies that have historically been incredibly controversial: not just because they are graphic, but because GAP members say they are of abortions, and many doctors, etc., say the images are questionable. The author of this post's difficulty in learning how they get the photos speaks to that questionable nature. After all, wouldn't they want other pro-lifers/anti-choicers to know how to get these images and spread their message?
Let me start by saying I am absolutely pro-life. That being said, I am absolutely disgusted by the GAP project.
As a pro-life person, they are an embarrassment, and I plan to picket and protest them as vehemently as the pro-choice groups, when they arrive again for their annual carnival of hate and judgementality.
My problem with them is that rarely have I seen any intelligent discussion and or dialogue come from this display.
Also, how can they claim to be genocide awareness project, when we have several current genocides going on right now.
So righteous are they to "save just one life" many say that the unborn are the most defenseless so there work starts there. They see Jesus in the unborn, but they neglect to see it in their fellow human beings.
I have been to the slums of Mexico, seen homeless teens as drug addicts prostituting in the streets, as well as walked over hundreds of homeless people sleeping in the streets only to hold dying sick people as they took their last breath.
if they truly want to "sve just one life" I guarantee you that they could save hundreds of lives if they would open their eyes to the world around them, take some of all of the extra time and treasures they have, and donate to those suffering equal genocide in Africa, India, Asia, Mexico, and yes even in our own country.
No one can tell me that the people who I saw dying every day, or the 10 year old girls forced to prostitute themselves are any less defenseless than an unborn child.
I know we disagree on the big picture, bt I thought you might like to hear from a pro-lifer that sees no benefit to the gap project.
It is spectacle, and in my experience more about the people who are involved than about abortion. They love the attention! Most statistics i have seen show that these types of displays are NOT the most effective way to change hearts and minds.
How did things go when they came to your college? I invite you to email me and tell me about it.
Have a great week, and thanks for the opportunity to address this:-)
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