By Lee Cole–

In last week’s issue, the Louisville Cardinal ran a story called “The Abortion Industry revealed,” about the recent visit of Carroll Everett, a speaker on abortion issues and a former clinic worker herself. With any truly provocative opinion piece, one expects to find polemical claims, but I found myself shocked at what I was reading. What I read was a regurgitation of Everett’s propaganda, which aligns nicely with the propaganda coming out of her sponsor organization, deceptively named A Woman’s Choice. Like the claims made by Everett, the claims the article makes are largely hearsay, vacuities and outright lies. Everett tells us, on her website, that there isn’t “one thing that happens in an abortion clinic that is not a lie.” While I’m not entirely sure what that means, I can tell you, coincidentally, that there isn’t one thing in the article or in Everett’s claims that isn’t a lie or in serious need of factual support or clarification.

The issue of abortion is prickly, and I don’t wish to put forward a pro-choice argument, although I am pro-choice. Instead, I mean to show that whether you’re pro-life or pro-choice, the claims made in the article and by Everett are pure propaganda and lead to dangerous misunderstanding.

First of all, there is the claim that abortion is immoral and inhumane, stated as though it’s obvious. This seems to be the crux of the issue and the primary impulse driving organizations like A Woman’s Choice. They believe that abortion is immoral or sinful and their weapon of choice is guilt. As Everett proudly proclaims on prolifeaction.org, “After the abortion, the girls are brought to the recovery room where there are two reactions. The first is: ‘I’ve killed my baby.’ It amazed me that it was the first time they called it a baby and the first time they called it murder. That is probably the healthiest reaction.” They make women feel guilty, they call them murderers, and they tell them they will go to hell if they follow through with an abortion. Imagine approaching an abortion clinic to terminate a pregnancy as a result of rape or incest only to be met by throngs of people telling you that you are a sinner and that you should feel guilty. The psychological damage would be tremendous.

Secondly, there is the claim that “children begin learning sexual education in kindergarten and hope that they will become sexually active by the age of 13.” A similar claim made later states that “the abortion industry continues to pervert the moral code as fourth graders are encouraged to masturbate by themselves. When they are comfortable enough, they are encouraged to join a group of four or five people of the same sex.” Ah the days of fourth grade, a simpler time of recess, kickball, spelling tests and group masturbation. It would be one thing if this statement was made as a joke, but it’s meant to be serious. So where are these fourth graders? In exactly which kindergarten classes are children being encouraged to have sex by age 13? It turns out they aren’t anywhere in the state of Kentucky, where sex education is almost always abstinence-only. In fact, our abstinence-only education has caused more teen pregnancies since it was implemented, and our teen pregnancy rate is at present 19 percent higher than the national average. There’s absolutely no evidence that our schools have been infiltrated by the nebulous “abortion industry,” and if anything, in Kentucky sex education has been hijacked by fundamentalist Christians who feel that sex is dirty and immoral and that abstinence is the only solution.

Finally there is the claim that “children are fooled into thinking their sexual behavior is safe because they are provided with low quality birth control pills and condoms that are almost guaranteed for failure.” This claim goes beyond mere misinformation and borders on dangerously irresponsible. It’s reminiscent of Cardinal Lopez Trujillo’s statements in 2003, claiming that condoms aren’t effective at preventing AIDS. Imagine the irreparable harm a statement like this could have on people who trusted the Cardinal. I’d like to be able to say that no one trusts Carol Everett on the same level, but as the article seemed to take her words as cardinal truth, I guess this isn’t the case. Condoms and birth control pills are very effective at preventing pregnancy, and the idea that the condoms given out by sex educators are faulty is propaganda and dangerously misleading for young women and men who are thinking about becoming sexually active. But once again, these claims are incoherent: why would sex educators be giving birth control to pre-pubescent children?

There are many more examples of unsubstantiated claims, far too many to address. One that I particularly liked but didn’t quite know how to address was that “The telemarketers know the women are scared, so they tell her she is pregnant without knowing the truth.” First of all, who are these telemarketers? Secondly, what would a doctor have to gain by telling a woman she is pregnant when she isn’t? It’s my understanding that most clinics are outfitted with ultrasound machines which could settle the issue promptly. The final paragraphs make the claim that women are killed during the process (Everett’s evidence is conveniently absent). So to sum up, the insinuation being made is that members of a mysterious entity known as the “abortion industry” are infiltrating our schools and handing out faulty condoms to kids so that they will become pregnant, and subsequently get an abortion, which will somehow benefit them. Is this what we’re supposed to believe? This is such a half-baked, sorry attempt for a conspiracy theory, that when you step back from it and look at it in the plain light of day, it’s so absurd as to not even warrant a response.

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