Can we talk about anti-abortion protesters?

Of course, we don’t like to talk about anti-abortion protesters. We avoid the issue, I think, out of a combination of exhaustion, frustration and desire to not give them anymore publicity.

Sometimes, though, I think that we have to respond. This week, Defend Life is completing a week long protest tour in Maryland.

Diners at Ruby Tuesday were greeted this week by a grisly sight: the enormous image of the mangled half-formed skull of an aborted fetus. Blown up large, bigger than an adult, the graphic “photo” was one of more than a dozen signs held up on the sidewalk along U.S. 40.

The scene — repeated across the region from Towson to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington — is part of Defend Life’s weeklong “Face the Truth Tour,” a multistop, anti-abortion rally that aims to shock Maryland voters into changing their views on the procedure. The tour, which stopped in downtown Baltimore yesterday, ends today in Bel Air. [. . .]

“You have to show people what abortion is in order to make any headway whatsoever,” said Tricia Dougherty, a student at Franciscan University of Steubenville.

In politically conservative Frederick, a city that is represented in the state legislature by Republicans, the Defend Life activists said that photographs have historically provided the impetus for social change. They likened themselves to those who fought against slavery. They wore red T-shirts that read “Abortion Kills Babies.” One held a sign that said, “America’s Holocaust, 50 million killed since 1973.”

Firstly, I would like to thank the Baltimore Sun for putting the word “photo” in quotations. The term “photo” implies an honest, realistic depiction. And I think that a photograph of a fetus, at any stage of growth, blown up to be larger than a full grown person can no longer be considered an honest and realistic depiction.

As for what these people are doing, I’m not sure whether this type of protest is more or less offensive than standing with the same signs outside of clinics. On the one hand, women being bombarded with this imagery when they are trying to seek medical care– very often, not even an abortion– is wrong, grotesque and purposely frightening and intimidating. On the other hand, women being bombarded with this imagery when they’re simply trying to go out to dinner, to see people judging them on the side of the road as they drive to the grocery store, is also wrong, grotesque and purposely shame-inducing.

I’m sure that most of you have dealt with, or at least seen, anti-abortion protesters. I get to see them every Thursday, since the office where I intern at Planned Parenthood is attached to a clinic where abortions are performed (not all PP clinics perform abortions; most provide general gynecological/reproductive health care and abortion referrals). Yellow lines are painted on the sidewalk, denoting where the protesters are allowed to legally stand. The clinic has a parking lot inside of its gates, so patients with vehicles do not have to go directly by the protesters. Those using public transportation are not so lucky. They stand there with humongous signs and a megaphone through which they shout at me as I drive out of the parking lot. I am not allowed to speak to them; I simply turn my radio up to a very loud volume. The first time I saw them, they both infuriated and frightened me. After all, it is not so long ago that Dr. Slepian, a doctor who provided abortions, was murdered, and Buffalo isn’t all that far away. Now, they mostly just infuriate me.

What is up with the photographs? They are considered a “shock tactic.” But what, exactly, is the shock supposed to be? The blood? The lumps of tissue? As I often say, I bet that my gall bladder didn’t look too pretty once the surgeons finished removing it, but no one holds up that sign on a street corner. What we are supposed to react to are the features that vaguely resemble our own. Fingers, limbs, sometimes forming faces. The photographs are blown up large specifically to emphasize these features, which might otherwise go unnoticed. And, of course, photographs of late-term aborted fetuses, which are far more rare, are a much more prized possession to these activists. [A side note: where the hell do they get these photographs, anyway?]

I think that these tactics often backfire. As Ann Martin, the President of Maryland Right to Life (an organization which I certainly do not support) said “I think there are a lot of pro-life people who would not want to stand there holding those signs.” And then, of course, there are those of us who are rational enough to realize that the fact that a fetus has fingers is not nearly enough to make abortion immoral.

Last week, upon leaving PP, I saw the first photograph held by an anti-abortion activist that really did creep me out. It was a photograph of an 8 week old embryo, looking very much like this one. With apologies and absolutely no judgment to those who have been happily and willfully pregnant, it looked absolutely nothing like a human. In fact, I was terribly frightened by the fact that that could potentially grow inside of me. I have absolutely no desire to ever be pregnant, so I’m definitely biased. And obviously huge numbers of women have been extremely happy to be carrying an embryo at that stage. But the point of the photograph is clearly to show that, even very young, the embryo is “still a person” or “a baby” and therefore does not deserve to be aborted. And though I’m pregnancy-phobic, I highly doubt that I’m the only person who could look at that photograph and fail to see a “person,” let alone a “baby.”

Then, of course, there is the question of ethics. These protesters clearly don’t care about the ethical issues surrounding purposely intimidating, frightening and lying to women who are seeking medical care and may be potentially vulnerable. But what about the ethical issues surrounding the precious “babies” they’re trying to save?

Because the thing is that we could easily employ their tactics. We could stand outside of the Right to Life headquarters holding up signs with photographs of perforated uteruses and women who have tragically died from botched illegal and unsafe abortions. But if we did, I would be horrified. I think that just about any other sane pro-choice advocate would agree that holding up photographs of dead women is certainly not ethical. It is highly exploitative. To use another example, I strongly advocate for ending the genocide in Darfur. But I would not stand on the street holding up photographs of slaughtered and charred bodies. I also advocate ending “honor” killings. But I could not even watch the recent video of a woman being murdered by stoning in an Iraqi street while police watched. Because I actually care about and respect these people.

How much, I would like to ask, do these activists really care about these “babies” whose bloody, dismembered remains they proudly display to the world? That’s respecting the sanctity of life? That’s showing the “victims” of abortion how much you care? I should think that any person who truly considers him or herself to truly be looking out for the interest of “unborn children” to not only refuse to participate in such demonstrations, but to be absolutely horrified by the way they are being exploited for political gain. And yet many, if not most, are not.

So. Can we talk? What did I miss? What are your experiences? Vent. Analyze. Discuss.