Abortion workers use new marketing techniques to quell women’s regrets

A group calling itself the November Gang that is
connected to abortion providers has started a new effort to help
women overcome their reluctance and regrets concerning abortion.
In some clinics, women are “permitted to pray over their
foetuses, even to sprinkle them with holy water in impromptu
baptismal rites.”

Organisers say they are
“intent on taking as much care with a patient’s heart
as with her body.” The National Coalition of Abortion
Providers is more revealing about the rationale: “if you
don’t talk about [the fact that some women do regret their
abortions], don’t acknowledge things, the anti-abortion
movement will fill in the blanks, which is what they’ve
been doing for years.” For instance, pro-life crisis
pregnancy centres counsel pregnant women in order to help them
understand the reality of abortion and help the women explore
other options, such as adoption or financial and medical
assistance.

One of the members of the
“Gang” describes how years ago she administered a
questionnaire to patients two weeks after their abortion, asking
how they felt about their abortion and if they wished they had
any more information. She was surprised when “a percentage
of them were not OK. This did not match my pro-choice message of
‘Everybody’s fine, it’s just tissue.’ I
needed to help [these] women work through their
feelings.”

Patients are prompted with
questions such as “Can you see abortion as a ‘loving
act’ toward your children and yourself?” or
“Does being a good mother sometimes mean acknowledging that
I can’t be a mother right now?” A clinic staffer
said,  “A lot of them actually think about it and
they’re like, ‘yeah, that’s what I’m
doing. I do love this child, but I can’t [have] it right
now.’“

Clinic workers do not attempt to
educate the women about foetal development, and if a patient
believes that her child is “just a bunch of cells”,
the staff doesn’t make [the patient] talk about
what’s not there”; “I call it whatever the
patient calls it,” said one worker. Clinic workers also do
not make referrals to adoption agencies, centres for prenatal
care, or financial assistance in helping the women to have their
babies.

This new campaign to soften
abortion can only be seen in the light of major advances among
pro-lifers in the care of women facing crisis pregnancies.
Moreover, new campaigns have begun that speak directly to
post-abortive women. The organization “Silent No
More” this week is bringing post-abortive women to the
steps of the Supreme Court to talk about the pain of their
abortions. And the “Women Deserve Better Than
Abortion,” a program of Feminists for Life and the Pro-Life
Secretariat of the US Conference of Catholic Bishops is making
great strides in taking away the final argument for abortion,
that it is good for women. With abortions down, and polling
showing the pro-life position growing in all age categories,
especially among the young, it is clear that abortion supporters
are experimenting with new marketing techniques.

Culture of Life Foundation
E-mail: [email protected]
Website: http://www.culture-of-life.org