Georgia Cops Impound Anti-Abortion Billboard Truck, Jail Driver

[mapleoak]

The production of porn is legal too, doesn’t mean we need to put porn on trucks and drive them around shopping malls and schools.

This was expounded upon quite in depth starting about the third post down here:
forums.catholic-questions.org/showthread.php?t=187193&page=10

This jist of it was that porn is immoral. The ACT of producing it is immoral. The ACT of displaying it is immoral. Displaying pornography (even for the sake of educating about what pornography is) is in itself another act of displaying pornography. Cannot use an immoral means even to achieve a good outcome. Abortion is immoral. The act of displaying the end result of abortion is NOT immoral. The act of displaying the end result is not in and of itself another act of abortion.

 

[KarenNC]

The end: reducing abortion. The means: displaying reality of abortion. The ends most certainly does justify the means. No one has stated any and all means are justified, only that graphic signs are indeed justifiable.

No one has stated that I recall that the use of photos of dismembered and decapitated blood covered corpses of dead babies are never justified. I have agreed that the graphic photos can be justifiable in many targeted settings and with the intention of reaching an appropriate audience without also exposing inappropriate audiences not in any and all circumstances which is what is being defended here.

I disagree that they can be adequately justified in situations such as:

1. being flown over a public beach where families are known to take their young children;
2. blown up to billboard size and put on the side and back of tractor trailer trucks and driven through cities at rush hour, when families are picking up their young children from daycare and taking them home;
3. being plastered on the car of someone in a grocery store parking lot miles from any possible abortion provider when there is a child’s booster seat clearly visible in the car;
4. left in the restrooms or on the tables at places like the McDonalds with the biggest indoor playspace in the area
5. parked outside churches on Sunday mornings, in residential neighborhoods and apartment complexes without permission
6. being held up by the driveway into a toystore on a Saturday afternoon, in a location where traffic slows to a standstill on the weekends and there is no way to know the signs are there before one gets into a situation where one is unable to turn off—a location that is across from the primary entrance into a regional mall that contains many stores aimed at children and is the location for many children’s birthday parties (held on Saturday afternoon) and which is located many miles from any possible abortion provider.

There are other possible means of disseminating your message in those limited and specific circumstances where it can be reasonably assumed that large numbers of young children will see them without their parents’ permission or without any way for the parents to reasonably avoid such exposure.

Not a single person here that I can tell is asking for extraordinary measures to protect children. Simply for reasonable attempts to follow our societal norms of what is appropriate to show to young children and of the responsiblity of all of us to support parents in raising their children as they see fit.

 

[KarenNC]

The correct statement is you have the right to choose what you view, not what others choose to display.

And your choice of means of display means that parents have no reasonable means of exercising that right. That is what we are asking here–allow them the opportunity to do so.

No one said you need to, but it is an option, and an effective one at that. There are people alive today who wouldn’t be here right now if it weren’t for them. Testimony has been given.

Actually in this thread testimony has been alluded to, not provided for examination. Also, testimony is not considered the highest standard of any objective measure of effectiveness. Look at any infomercial.

There are many ways to convince people. Not all respond the same to any given tactic. It would be nice if there was a ‘one and only’ way which would eliminate the need for all other means, but that is not the case.

No one has claimed that there is. Nor is there one way that is such a sacred cow that its use in every and all circumstances can never be questioned.

 

[KarenNC]

I don’t see what the problem is. All he was doing was showing the results of a perfectly legal activity.

There are many “perfectly legal activities” that are not appropriate to display photos of in public to children under 14, which is what the charge was.

 

[KarenNC]

The act of displaying the end result of abortion is NOT immoral. The act of displaying the end result is not in and of itself another act of abortion.

The act of displaying billboard sized photographs of blood covered mutilated corpses of babies in places where children under 7can be reasonably expected to be encountered in large numbers without taking any reasonable even minimal precautions to allow their parents to avoid exposure to the photos does not have to be “another act of abortion” to be inappropriate.

 

[buffalo]

Perhaps you could then point us to the myriad examples of Catholic churches and schools who use this particular method (displaying gory billboard sized photos of dismembered and decapitated babies to children under 7 without their parents’ permission) in their preschool and kindergarten curricula?

Show the American people what an abortion is!

 

[Elric]

Yes I have. I can’t find what makes it immoral. You can’t justify why it is wrong and therefore brush it off by saying “go read this thread”. I have seen one poster post a bunch of excerpts about protecting childrens’ innocence. You would have to reason that these pictures harm their innocence, which is a faulty conclusion.

The reason why I stated “read the thread” was because there is justification on why it is wrong. Your choice to ignore those justifications does not invalidate them and is on par with your lack of consideration for other people when using them.

You keep saying that these images dont harm children, yet I have read on these forums (in threads long gone) from parents stating that they did harm their children and even from people who were harmed as children.

What do you base this notion of yours about these images not harming children on?

But it is false.

My opinion or what it is based on?

I didn’t say you can make someone view something any more than freedom of the press forces you to read something.

Actually thats exactly what you said.

I said it is your responsibility to decide what you will view. You can choose to look or choose not to look.

Where exactly is the choice given not to look?

What does your constitution say?

My constitution doesnt mention anything about allowing what this truck was doing.

Yes they do.

When would that be exactly?

But the fact of the matter is, is that it is not immoral. The abortion is what is immoral.

Actually both can be considered immoral.

Besides that, they are graphic images that people can find distressing (including children). Which is why they can/should be censored.

But they are true. They are effective and have saved lives. This does not mean you need to use them. But that also doesn’t mean they are wrong to use.

I was still a bogus argument.

No it isn’t. How is this testimony besides the point?{/QUOTE]

Because they are not needed.

How did you come to the conclusion that we were talking about anything other than the morality of displaying the images from what I wrote here:

Because of what you wrote.

 

[Kelly]

1. being held up by the driveway into a toystore on a Saturday afternoon, in a location where traffic slows to a standstill on the weekends and there is no way to know the signs are there before one gets into a situation where one is unable to turn off—a location that is across from the primary entrance into a regional mall that contains many stores aimed at children and is the location for many children’s birthday parties (held on Saturday afternoon) and which is located many miles from any possible abortion provider.

How about in my town, where the abortion mill is located directly across the street from a Chuckee Cheese? Do you feel that it would be inappropriate to use the images here to save lives because children may see them going into Chuckee Cheese’s. Perhaps Planned Parenthood chose this particular location purposely in an attempt to disguise the evil that is going on inside of their building.

 

[pnewton]

How about in my town, where the abortion mill is located directly across the street from a Chuckee Cheese? Do you feel that it would be inappropriate to use the images here to save lives because children may see them going into Chuckee Cheese’s. Perhaps Planned Parenthood chose this particular location purposely in an attempt to disguise the evil that is going on inside of their building.

I wouldn’t see any problem with hand held signs that can be held visible to people coming in and shielded from the birthday parties. If not, there are plenty of other tactics.

 

[Delphinus85]

This was expounded upon quite in depth starting about the third post down here:
forums.catholic-questions.org/showthread.php?t=187193&page=10

This jist of it was that porn is immoral. The ACT of producing it is immoral. The ACT of displaying it is immoral. Displaying pornography (even for the sake of educating about what pornography is) is in itself another act of displaying pornography. Cannot use an immoral means even to achieve a good outcome. Abortion is immoral. The act of displaying the end result of abortion is NOT immoral. The act of displaying the end result is not in and of itself another act of abortion.

I think that what we are debating here is whether or not displaying aborted children to people in a public forum where there are minors around is moral. I don’t think it is. Firstly, it’s illegal. Scondly, it’s disrespectful of children and mothers that are forced to see these things rambling down the street.

Secondly, that wasn’t my only example. What about displaying pictures of rape? What about showing pictures of bloated rotting corpses of peoplethat were murdered where children go to school? Why does everything think they have to raise every one else’s kids? Why can’t people let parents raise their own children? I don’t want to see pictures of aborted children. I now it’s wrong, I am involved in an organization to stop it, and I donate money to to support having it recriminalized. I don’t need to see it. Neither do children. Seeing it as an adult was bad enough.

I just know that someday I am going to have kids, and the thought that someone is going to shove pictures in my 5 year old’s face and show them abortion before I am sure they need to know THAT much about it really infuriates me.

Now let me say this: I am not against these pictures. They have their place, say, on a website with a warning before you get to them, or even television commercials with a “viewer discretion is advised” warning beforehand so people who don’t want to see it can change the channel. NOT on billboards in a public forum, not on trucks driven near school or shopping mall, NOT on protest signs where people DRIVE (I’m sure that doesn’t cause fender benders)

My point is, there is a time and a place. I won’t even put pro-choice bumper stickers on my car because I want people around me to be focused on DRIVING, not my bumper stickers. I put slogans and NON graphic images on my website, on my laptop case, on my backpack (when I was in school) when it is NOT going to cause a huge disruption, or get someone in an accident, or cause a child to stay up all night crying.

 

[mapleoak]

Secondly, that wasn’t my only example. What about displaying pictures of rape? What about showing pictures of bloated rotting corpses of peoplethat were murdered where children go to school?

Because the general public is not ignorant about the reality of what happens in rape. They do not need a picture of a bloated rotting corpse to make them realize that someone shot at a school is murder. What happens during an abortion is very well hidden from the public however.

 

[seekerz]

Because the general public is not ignorant about the reality of what happens in rape. They do not need a picture of a bloated rotting corpse to make them realize that someone shot at a school is murder. What happens during an abortion is very well hidden from the public however.

In this information age, it’s hard to conceive that there remains anything well hidden from the public.

I happened to visit pro-abortion sites in the past to see, if possible, what the mindset of pro-choicers was, so as to know the approach to take…Trust me: especially in the use of scientific terms and anatomic facts, their discussions can be very sophisticated and detached.

I was left with the impression that most posters on those sites know exactly what abortion entails, want exactly what it entails and couldn’t care less what anyone thinks of them for wanting it.

It eludes me how robbing children of their already too short-lived innocence could possibly change any of that. Seems to me only God Himself can change those hearts.

 

[KarenNC]

How about in my town, where the abortion mill is located directly across the street from a Chuckee Cheese? Do you feel that it would be inappropriate to use the images here to save lives because children may see them going into Chuckee Cheese’s. Perhaps Planned Parenthood chose this particular location purposely in an attempt to disguise the evil that is going on inside of their building.

I have no way of knowing why the clinic is placed where it is in your particular situation or which building came first.

I can see some justification for using the materials in such a location, but I would think that there may be other materials that would be more appropriate for this particular setting. The vast majority of clinics are not, I believe, in such situations, so I would hesitate to say that this particular case merits a blanket approval of using these giant photos any and everywhere in any and every situation. This sort of thing, like another one that was mentioned on another thread as being near a daycare and one near an elementary school, would seem to be special cases. There are certainly specific cases that call for a greater exercise of compassion, charity and judgement than others.

I would hope, like others on other threads have said they do in similar circumstances, if one is bound and determined that such posters are the only possible means available (rather than literature or other means) to be conscious of their potential effects on young children and point the signs so that they are aimed at the folks going into the clinic, not at the Chuck E Cheese main entrance and parking area (ours doesn’t have a lot of windows) and that they are in the actual area around the clinic, not across the street in the Chuck E Cheese parking lot.

Basically what I and others are asking is that folks simply make some minimal efforts to be aware of and appropriate to one’s setting. There are folks who keep trying to frame this into an “all or nothing” argument, when it has never been such on my side, at least. There is never going to be a 100% guarantee that no child will ever see these, but that does not mean that no effort at all to shield them should be made (or that one should go out of one’s way to put these giant photographs of bloody dismembered corpses of babies where young children are known to congregate).

 

[Elric]

I for one am tickled pink that people are outraged by these pictures. Its about time.

That is an extremly disturbing thing to say.

You take enjoyment out of other peoples distress and from removing peoples choice over viewing these graphic images?

That is bordering on sadism and I think that you might need some help with this potential disorder.

(Please note that I am actually genuinely concerned about this statement)

i think they should park one of these trucks by every polling place in country next November and perhaps we can bring this noutrage to an end.

Do you mean exposing graphic pictures to people without their conscent?

BTW-i am always amused on how, on so many issues, people try to hide behind their children.

I was going to retort with something different. But considering your above statement and my concern, I wont.

People are not “trying to hide behind their children” but are actually trying to protect their children, but protecting children isnt the only issue that has been brought up in this thread.

I think the main ones given are:

• No warnings in any form are being given over what is on display.
• Choice to view these images is being taken away.

People are basically having their freedom taken away from them in the way that these inages are being displayed, that is completly unreasonable and has nothing to do with being for or against abortion or preventing people from protesting against abortion.

 

[KarenNC]

Show the American people what an abortion is!

Thanks for the link. I have been to his site numerous times. However, as there is no information on that page about elementary and preschool Catholic religious education curricula, I am not really sure of the relevance to the question I asked.

Do you mean that your parish and local Catholic school use Fr. Pavone’s materials in your preschool and elementary education classes? Which of his particular materials does your parish use in the preschool and kindergarten Sunday school class? The video of the actual abortion or just the large photos? Which ones are shown in your local Catholic elementary school? Or do you rely on the large posters for the hallways and bulletin boards?

Do you send a packet home with the card-sized photos in the children’s backpacks along with their notes to show them what Matthew and Mary learned today? And are the parents happy when they receive the notes—“Today we talked about things that are red—apples, sunsets, bloody dead babies with their heads and arms and legs cut off, flowers, …”?

 

[KarenNC]

Do you send a packet home with the card-sized photos in the children’s backpacks along with their notes to show them what Matthew and Mary learned today? And are the parents happy when they receive the notes—“Today we talked about things that are red—apples, sunsets, bloody dead babies with their heads and arms and legs cut off, flowers, …”?

I apologize. This last paragraph was needlessly snarky.

The question, however, still stands. If Catholics truly believe that these photos are not a problem to show to young children and are indeed the only truly effective means to teach anyone that babies are more than blobs of cells before they are born and that abortion is wrong, why are you only willing to show them to children passing by in cars, going to the beach with their families, going to a birthday party, etc rather than use them in your own schools and religious education programs? Why would you give your own religious community’s children a less effective or inferior education in this subject?

 

[Justin75]

I apologize. This last paragraph was needlessly snarky.

The question, however, still stands. If Catholics truly believe that these photos are not a problem to show to young children and are indeed the only truly effective means to teach anyone that babies are more than blobs of cells before they are born and that abortion is wrong, why are you only willing to show them to children passing by in cars, going to the beach with their families, going to a birthday party, etc rather than use them in your own schools and religious education programs? Why would you give your own religious community’s children a less effective or inferior education in this subject?

They should be. We are working in several Schools doing that exact thing, and trying to expand it to more. The kids have responded very well to it. Pro-life groups have grown and people have become more commited after seeing the images!

 

[seekerz]

They should be. We are working in several Schools doing that exact thing, and trying to expand it to more. The kids have responded very well to it. Pro-life groups have grown and people have become more commited after seeing the images!

Excuse me for asking, but shouldn’t our commitment to any good be based on Christ? Shouldn’t gazing on the crucifix be sufficient motivation to love what is good and fight what is evil?

 

[Delphinus85]

Because the general public is not ignorant about the reality of what happens in rape. They do not need a picture of a bloated rotting corpse to make them realize that someone shot at a school is murder. What happens during an abortion is very well hidden from the public however.

This isn’t entirely accurate though. No one is well aware of what happens in a murder, how many people out there have seen an actual dead body or pictures of it? How many people have seen pictures of a bloody woman being raped? Chances are, none of us, because we all know that’s not something that needs to be seen to make the point. I actually think that using pictures doesn’t “raise awareness” but rather it shows a childish desperation. We can’t prove the horror of abortion without traumatizing kids and the public with pictures of dead bodies. This comes from a lack of effort on our part. Abortion is just as horrible as murder, heck, it IS murder, and we don’t need images to prove murder is horrific, or rape. Same with abortion.

 

[pnewton]

This isn’t entirely accurate though. No one is well aware of what happens in a murder, how many people out there have seen an actual dead body or pictures of it?

Interesting point. Let us say the van had scenes of gruesome murders and autopsy photos blown up to post size for the purpose of gaining support for the death penalty for all murderers.