Anti-abortion protest signs - how far is too far?

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pprimeau1976:
The logic of my statement attacks the root cause of the abortion problem: people do not recognize that life starts at conception. The best way, in my opinion, to counter this is to display how similar life in the womb and life *outside *of the womb is. I think that the although graphic portrayals of aborted fetuses may scare people away from having an abortion, it does very little to change people’s attitudes.
I disagree. It really depends on each individual. Obviously, if myself and other forum folks find that in its proper place, the graphic display of aborted babies can be effective, then there is a portion of pro-abortion folks that this approach will effectively reach–a common sense logic. If anything, it will make the fence sitters who like harsh realities sanitized, perhaps to get off the fence and take a stance.
We can agree to disagree.
 
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pprimeau1976:
The logic of my statement attacks the root cause of the abortion problem: people do not recognize that life starts at conception. The best way, in my opinion, to counter this is to display how similar life in the womb and life *outside *of the womb is. I think that the although graphic portrayals of aborted fetuses may scare people away from having an abortion, it does very little to change people’s attitudes.
Beg to differ on that. I think people have been willing to have abortions based on two illusions: One that the unborn child is, until near term an amorphous blob of tissue. These photos demonstrate that the humanity is very apparent from early on. The unborn child is clearly an unborn human, not an unborn puppy or piglet. Unfortunately many of us grew up on those MISLEADING illustrations that appear to indicate that humans in the womb are virtually undistinguished from mice or fish. Two people have abortions under the illusion that it’s neither a violent or painful procedure for the baby. I think people have visions of some kind of careful extraction where the child is brought out in perfect order — then run through a garbage disposal or something. What these photos do is demonstrate that the unborn baby is literally pulled apart and science has demonstrated that the unborn responds to pain much earlier than what was originally thought.

Once women are faced with the reality of abortion, that they are killing a human being, wonderfully made, and that this human being is subjected to horrific trauma, there will be a change in attitude in many cases. Planned Parenthood does NOT want women to see such photos nor do they want their clients to see ultrasounds of their babies because they know once the child becomes human to the mother, it will be very hard to convince her to kill.

I assure you these photos have changed minds.

Lisa N
 
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mommy:
. If you are too “in your face” you can come off as a wacko.
I have news for you------

If you are ANYTHING besides pro-abort, you come across as a wacko, according to way too many Americans.
 
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Zooey:
There is no doubt that there is aplace for such pix. I just think that we need to let children be children, not mini-adults.In fact, one of the reasons that younger girls end up in abortion mills is precisely because they have not been allowed to be children.
A very sound point! 👍
 
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pprimeau1976:
It is not that I think that displaying the raw truth about an abortion is wrong, I just don’t think it’s a good idea. If we are interested in changing people’s hearts, we have to analyze how *they *would react and what would make them have a change of heart. Let’s face it, if a person does not recognize an unborn child as a person, the graphic depiction would only turn them off more. They will label us as extremists or even “whackos” and may even confirm their erroneous belief that the unborn are not truly “persons”

I think the best way to have a child be recognized as a person is to display their person-like characteristics. A good way to do this is with the use of a 3D ultrasound. Below, is the 3D ultrasound of my daughter, Elaina, and a picture of her after she was born. I think using a tactic such as this will do a much better job of showing people that life is to be protected.

The reasons that we are pro-life is not because abortion is an ugly, violent, barbaric thing. We are pro-life because life begins at conception. Lets focus on showing people *why *we are pro life

http://home.comcast.net/~pprimeau/i....comcast.net/~pprimeau/images/elainabirth.jpg
Now these are the pix I would like to slap up on walls & billboards all across America!! This would do more to educate people than all the graphic, bloody photos in the world!!
You want to see that a baby is a baby, not a “bunch of tissue”, show’em these!!!
 
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Olympia:
I have news for you------

If you are ANYTHING besides pro-abort, you come across as a wacko, according to way too many Americans.
Sad but true!

CARose
 
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Zooey:
Now these are the pix I would like to slap up on walls & billboards all across America!! This would do more to educate people than all the graphic, bloody photos in the world!!
You want to see that a baby is a baby, not a “bunch of tissue”, show’em these!!!
I cannot give my answer one way or another, because I know that different things affect different people in different ways. But, I can add one story to this thread to illustrate this point(keep in mind though, I am NOT disagreeing with the graphic photos). A girl I used to work with got pregnant. She was living with her boyfriend and she was going to have an abortion. She had a sono to date the pregnancy, but the tech did not know that this girl was sent there to date the pregnancy for an abortion. The tech showed the girl her baby on the screen and this girl IMMEDIATELY changed her mind. When she got home, her boyfriend hadn’t heard yet that she changed her mind and began to beg her to not “kill their baby”. Needless to say, they got married and had a beautiful baby boy(a bit premature, but a healthy little bugger, nonetheless). When this girl told me the story a few days after her sono, I was so thrilled! I wonder how the info didn’t get to the tech…:hmmm:
 
sigh YES!! Keep the signs!! I was part of the Pro-Life Action League’s, mmmm, “Face the Truth” tour, I think it was called a few years ago. In 9 days, different protesters would go to different parts of the Chicago-land & NW Indiana areas. ALL over. Same huge signs. Everytime it resulted in at least ONE woman making the pro-life dicision. I was only there for one day four years ago, but, let me tell you, moms would cover their children’s eyes or tell them to look away as they were driving by…why? Is it the gore factor? Possibly, but, I hope, in that case, these aren’t the same moms who bring their children to an R-rated movie for the same reason.

I distinctly remember two teenage girls in a car at a stoplight and one of them called out, “Are you guys trying to cause an accident?” 😃 I couldn’t help myself, “NO! We’re trying to prevent one!” 😃 A very uninspired & sarcastic, “ha ha ha” was all I got. 😃 Keep the signs.

And, to SUNRISEDAWN, I am very sorry to hear that & yes, you can still be Catholic despite what you have gone through. 😦
 
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Tom444:
Yesterday, some friends and I drove past a pro-life protest on Forbes Avenue by Magee-Womens Hospital in Pittsburgh. Normally, I agree with such protests, but in this case, most of the protesters were holding huge (3 to 4 feet high) full-color photographs of aborted fetuses. While I can appreciate their motive of wanting to show the reality of abortion, I’m not sure whether this is really an appropriate way to do so. They weren’t even on the sidewalks outside the hospital (the building is actually on a side street), but right on one of the busiest roads in the city on a Sunday afternoon. My biggest reservation about this is that families with young children will also see these extremely graphic pictures. Overall, I’m not sure whether or not this is an appropriate means of protest. What does everybody else think?
Tom

I think that if you knew that Magee did more third trimester abortions than any other facility in Pennsylvania, you wouldn’t be calling it a “hospital”
 
I had to vote it depends. Although abortion is an issue about which I feel strongly, I am not sure that pictures of aborted children is the way to go. The beautiful pictures posted by pprimeau1976 are IMO far more effective. If people understood that a baby in the womb is just that, a baby, they would think twice about killing it. A friend of mine in Quebec writes articles about pro life issues, especially unborn children, and she makes some valid points about how to change attitudes with the way in which we talk about the subject. I will try and locate the references for why this may be a bad tactic and what may be a better approach.
 
Here is the article - I hope this does not break any rules:

There are many reasons why the pro-life movement has had relatively little success in Canada; but one crucial one, I think, is that pro-lifers have allowed liberals to define the issue, and we operate, speak and think within liberal paradigms.

For liberals, the unborn child is a non-entity. When the so-called abortion issue comes up, what springs to mind is the notion of CHOICE and access to a medical operation called ABORTION.

In the liberal paradigm, which dominates our public discourse, when pro-lifers oppose abortion, embryonic stem cell research, cloning, etc. they do so to oppose CHOICE or ABORTION. In the liberal mindset, pro-lifers want to take away a person’s right to an operation. The unborn child does not figure at all in the presentation of the issue. It’s presented as a moral issue about abstract concepts.

Unfortunately, even well-meaning pro-lifers help perpetuate this state of affairs. The language they use does nothing to challenge liberal paradigms, thereby allowing liberals to continue thinking the way they’ve always have, without having to question their beliefs.

Pro-lifers are said to believe human life is sacred and that all people have the right to life. But this does nothing for the cause of unborn children. Why? Because for liberals, life is simply a biological reality, and biological realities do not have rights. Life is a thing, a thing that only has relative value. Amoeba, plants, animals, humans, these are approximately equivalent. When pro-lifers talk about “life”, liberals hear “amoeba” or something equivalent. They do not take the notion seriously, and it is therefore easy for them to dismiss the whole debate. The subtext of the so-called abortion debate, to the liberal mind is this: Pro-life zealots want to take away the right to a medical operation called abortion in the name of life, a biological reality, which they consider more important than people.

The more pro-lifers harp on about the right to life, the more they hit against a brick wall. The “sanctity of life” is absolutely meaningless in a liberal context. Pro-lifers believe that because they cherish that value so dearly, and that human life is obviously more valuable than anything else, if they talk about it enough, they will eventually win the so-called abortion debate. It doesn’t work that way. So long as the issue for pro-lifers is about life liberals can mentally dismiss the issue. Life is not important, therefore not worth debating, therefore the liberal discourse in our country will not be challenged.

Pro-lifers must learn to re-think the issue. What the so-called abortion debate is about is people, because the unborn child is a person. This assertion is the key to advancing the debate.

Personhood is the cornerstone of legal and social recognition in Canada. Of course liberals do not believe that the unborn child is a person. Most people who’re liberal-minded have never been confronted with that assertion. So long as pro-lifers present the debate as a crusade for life, the liberal can tune out, as life is only a biological reality. But once it becomes about the personhood of the unborn child, the concept must be challenged. The liberal has to pay attention because one of his pet notions is being invoked, and he believes it must not be distorted in order to perpetuate his system of thought. He is therefore obliged to answer the challenge about who the unborn child is. He must come face to face with both biological AND moral realities.

By advancing the personhood of the unborn child, the subtext of the abortion debate is not: should you have the right to an abortion?; but: is the unborn child a person?

This is ultimately the real issue about the abortion debate. If the unborn child were not a person, there would be no debate. But liberals want to avoid this controversy, and as long as the debate remains about life, liberals will ignore it. When it becomes about personhood, it must be answered, and this will break the present silence in the mainstream discourse, and the discussion will advance.
 
Continued:

To this end, I believe pro-lifers should start changing their language to reflect the shift in thought [THIS MEANS YOU!!!]. Pro-lifers should increasingly refer to themselves as Fetal Rights Activists, because they defend people, not just the sanctity of life. Our cause should be the equality of the unborn child. We should think of ourselves as the defenders of the world’s most oppressed minority, the unborn child. We should start by using this kind of language amongst ourselves, and when it becomes common, it will eventually filter through to the mainstream discourse. And that new use of language will give the average person more pause for thought.

Addendum: I really would like pro-lifers to change the way they present the issue. In five days, I am going to give birth. The unborn child in my womb has no legal or social recognition in Canada, even though I love my baby, and my family treats the baby like a real live human person. I would like the pro-life cause to be more than about morality, but about real children, like the one in my womb. We won’t convince others of this reality, if our language does not reflect this reality. We have to stop treating this as ultimately about ending abortion, or the slaughter. It has to be about the child.
 
teresas could you provide a link and the writer’s name. I agree that the concept of personhood is missing from the dialogue. One thing I’ve maintained is that you do not need the Bible to defend unborn life. We should focus on personhood and human rights the latter being something that is in the liberal’s vocabulary.

Thanks for posting an interesting article and congratulations on your baby.

Lisa N
 
Hi Lisa

Sorry it’s not my baby, but hers. I’m not married and it was her addendum about how she feels about her own child. Unfortunately I don’t have a link because it was something I saved to my PC and I am not sure if it was published. I do know that her name is Suzanne and she is involved with a Free Dominion Website in Canada at www.freedominion.ca. You may be able to find more details there.

Sorry I don’t have any more details. I know she wouldn’t mind me reproducing it here because it helps with the attitudes necessary to changing people’s opinions on pro life issues.
 
Dawn,
Congratulations on having the courage to post your story. Don’t worry you can become Catholic. I know you worry about how people will look at you once they hear your story. It is such a hard and painful thing to talk about. If you are really worried about how it will affect conversion you could talk to the priest where you attend. Just remember you have a very interesting point of view on the topic.

I really hate seeing those pictures because they are so painful to see, and they are so depressing.

I just hope everybody remembers that a lot of women don’t want to be there, going through that.
 
Has anybody read the book Who Broke the Baby? It’s written by a woman who was pro-abortion. She was going to give a talk on abortion and had pictures like the ones we are discussing here. Didn’t seem to bother her a bit. Well, the night before she was to give the talk, her very young son came down the stairs(he was between 3 and 5y.o.), saw the pictures, and asked his mom “Who broke the baby”? Long story short, that question opened her eyes and she is now pro-life. 👍

out of the mouths of babes…
 
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Lisa4Catholics:
As graphic as it is ,it is the truth:nope: The reason so many accept abortion is because the propaganda is lies,like it is a blob of tissue:mad: That is why the pro-aborts will not allow abortions to be shown on the MSM,notice everything else is.
This is a good point, the only reason someone gets offended or truamatized by these pictures, is because then they realize that they are killing BABIES, not globs of cells…
 
The same people who are disgusted by the corpus of Christ on the crucifix are the ones who are disgusted by images of in-your-face truth. It may be disgusting, and may anger some. But let them be angry and disgusted with the people who perpetrate some horror, not the ones who report it.
 
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KittyKat:
I just hope everybody remembers that a lot of women don’t want to be there, going through that.
Yes, and pray for them, especially for those who feel/felt coerced, pressured, and without life options. “Mary our Mother, pray for us”.

All prolife efforts need to be underlined, overlayed, permeated by pray and God’s merciful love, in this battle for innocent life against the pro-death forces whose commander in chief is satan.
 
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TheGarg:
This is a good point, the only reason someone gets offended or truamatized by these pictures, is because then they realize that they are killing BABIES, not globs of cells…
I have to respectfully disagree. After posting earlier, I dug out my copy of Dr JC Willkie’s “Abortion: Questions & Answers”. There are a couple of pictures in there that are especially bloody/gruesome. Yet they are the least convincing to my way of thinkling.Why?? Because the baby is so chopped up & mangled, there is little or no resemblance to a human being. If I didn’t know bettter, I could easliy be persuaded that the one especially is a pic of “a bunch of tissue”.
When I see a picture of a baby that looks like a baby, I find that another story.
And as for myself, I am just concerned about their affect on children. I think that drawings (or, as someone said here, B&W pix) are much more effective. The photos that move me are the ones from sonograms! (This is probably why, I am told, that abortionists try never to let women see the sonograms of their babies…Which says to me, that protesters outside of abortion mills ought to have huge signs of** sonograms of babies** . )
 
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