Pro Life on Campus at University of West Florida

Monday and Tuesday of this week, we had our Genocide Awareness Project (GAP) at the University of West Florida.  This is part of a tour of 4 Florida universities being sponsored by CBR Southeast, CBR Midwest, and CBR Florida.

Media:

1. The Voyager (story)
2. The Voyager (editorial)

Gov. Mike Huckabee at Knoxville Convention Center

Great event Monday night at the Knoxville Convention Center with Gov. Mike Huckabee.  We had more than 700 in attendance, and we’ve gotten a lot of positive feedback about the event.  More about Gov. Huckabee’s remarks later.

Media coverage:

• WATE TV
• WBIR TV
• WVLT TV
• Knoxville News Sentinel
• Knoxville News Sentinel – Greg Johnson column
• UTK Daily Beacon
• Tennessee Journalist
• Politico
• WSMV TV
• Metro Pulse
• The Weekly Standard
• LifeNews.com
• CNN Political Ticker

A good crowd of 40 or so protested outside.  The importance of this should not be underestimated.  First, how fortunate we are to live in America, where the right of every person speak his or her mind is protected. The public debate and dialogue is a healthy process that shouldn’t be taken for granted.

Second, the presence of protesters is another affirmation that our strategy is working. If the abortion photos had no effect, the pro-abortion folks would just ignore us as irrelevant. In fact, showing abortion pictures is the one thing that pro-aborts fear most, because the pictures make it impossible for people to ignore or trivialize abortion. The images raise awareness and force the other side to defend an obviously horrifying act of violence against a defenseless human being.

BTW, our new video was very well received:

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b8Rk44gn824

Here, I'm explaining how an image of a slave on a medallion helped end the slave trade in England.

I’m in Pensacola today, along with Seth Drayer and Mark Harrington, training students how to defend the pro-life position on campus.  This training is part of a 2-week tour of Florida being conducted by CBR.  We’ll be visiting 4 major universities across the state with our Genocide Awareness Project (GAP).

We have a full house for this training.  Among those in attendance include members of the Pensacola Teens for Life, Spring Hill College (Mobile) Students for Life, and a team of Canadian students who are in Florida to learn how to conduct our world-famous GAP outreach.  (Either that or they’re trying to escape the snow.)

We are making tentative plans to conduct this training and take GAP to Kentucky early in April.

In an online debate on the Richmond (Virginia) Times-Dispatch, the pro-aborts were incredulous.

I referenced a study by Life Dynamics in which a woman, posing as a 13-year-old girl, called more than 800 PP and National Abortion Federation (NAF) abortion clinics and said that she wanted an abortion.  Her reason?  She and her 22-year-old boyfriend did not want her parents to find out about the relationship.  In every state, this is statutory rape.  In every state, health care providers are required by law to report the abuse.

Even though many of the clinic workers openly acknowledged that the relationship was illegal and they were legally required to report, the overwhelming majority readily agreed agreed to conceal this illegal sexual activity.  When PP and other family planning service providers ignore child abuse reporting laws, they help predatory men continue their ongoing sexual abuse of children.

More recenly, PP personnel have been caught on videotape offering to assist pimps running underage prostitution rings.  Each claimed to have girls working for him who were as young as 14 or 15 years old, many of whom couldn’t speak English.  One such tape was the subject of the Times-Dispatch story.

In the online debate, one of the pro-aborts challenged challenged all of this by asking, “Why would PP want to cover up sexual abuse of a 13-year-old minor child?”

Good question.  Here is an edited version of my reply:

GAP at 2011 March for Life

People always want to know if the pictures work.  Here’s a message left on our AbortionNo.org website:

Yesterday I went to the March for Life 2011 in Washington DC.  I live about 20 minutes outside of DC.  I went with my high school.  People told us we were crazy to go out for 5 hours in 20 degree weather, but I told them I wouldn’t miss it.  At the March, I saw the abortionNO.com billboards and had to stop and look.  My friends and I were aghast.  … [Later, at home that night,] I remembered the posters from this website.  I decided to take a look.  That was about 2 and half hours ago.  I looked at the pictures and watched the videos and read the mothers’ accounts of regret after the abortion.  I am crying.  In the past couple hours, I also started researching about President Obama’s views on abortion, about Planned Parenthood, and about the actual process of abortion.  I have been reading many abortion articles by Michelle Malkin, and I just learned about the Philadelphia Horror.  I JUST HEARD ABOUT IT.  Something that awful and horrific, how could that not be top story on the news???  Reality TV stars get more airtime on the news than actual murder of babies.  I am crying right now, at the injustice of it all!  I watched the news last night to see if there would be coverage of the March.  It got a one minute spot 40 minutes after the program started, after local news, some report about a reality TV star, and 2 weather reports.  Where are our PRIORITIES??

I have spent a good deal of time on this website, at least 2 and half hours.  I am reading all of the reports and looking at all of the pictures because right after I send this, I am writing a letter to my Congressman.  I have never felt more inspired to take action after looking at this website.

I have always been ProLife, having been raised in a strong Catholic family, and having received a Catholic education.  But ever since I began reading all this information and seeing all the pictures online today,  I have never truly understood the injustice.  I promise not to just be a prolife supporter now, I promise to be a prolife advocate.  I will be a voice to those who cannot be heard.  I may only be 15, but I will not stand for the absolute crap that is going on here.  Thank you, THANK YOU, for opening my eyes to the reality of how bad abortion was.

Crowd gathered to protest PP fundraiser.

There was TV coverage of our protest at the Planned Parenthood fundraiser in Knoxville on January 24.  Kudos to all present!

Mike Williams is wonderful comedian who will appear at our “Celebrating Life” dinner on February 14.  He was interviewed yesterday afternoon on The Phil Show.  Here’s the audio.

To see Mike Williams in person, order your tickets here!  That’s www.KnoxvilleHuckabeeDinner.com.

All proceeds go to support CBR / Pro Life on Campus.  So get your tickets today!

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Kudos and many thanks for the Alliance Defence fund (ADF) for their victory against Vanderbilt University’s illegal abortion pledge requirement for nursing students.  From ADF:

Vanderbilt Rescinds Supposedly Non-Existent Policy, Protects Conscience
01/12/2011

In response to the complaints filed yesterday by ADF with the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services concerning Vanderbilt’s requirement that Women’s Health Track applicants in its Nurse Residency Program must sign an acknowledgement that they must assist in abortions, Vanderbilt has today amended its application packet to eliminate this requirement.  Applicants are now asked to read a statement that such procedures are in the program, but it also explicitly informs applicants of the availability of a right to be excused from assisting with abortion procedures and does not require applicants to acknowledge in advance of admission any willingness to participate in abortions.  An email by Vanderbilt  to all applicants informed them of the change this afternoon.

More here …

Check out ADF’s Speak Up University website.

Back by popular demand, this is too funny!

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ooc5eJc5SHA

Click here to download another version.

Wondering what to give for Christmas?  How about a fun evening with Gov. Mike Huckabee and comedian Mike Williams?  Radio advertising has started, so these tickets will go fast.  Please get them now, before they are gone.  This will be a fun evening to Celebrate Life!

Click here to get your tickets.  Get a table of 10 at a seriously discounted price.  The website is  www.KnoxvilleHuckabeeDinner.com.  Get a table of 10 at a seriously discounted price.

Want to meet Gov. Huckabee in person?  Sponsorships are available.  If you’re interested, e-mail me back or call Jeff at 1-800-521-6692.

Here’s comedian Mike Williams, who will provide entertainment:

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bdE70-Os38o

GAP sign: abortion leads to premature births

From the Elliot Institute:

Children whose mothers had a previous abortion were more likely to be born prematurely, putting them at greater risk for problems such as low-birth weight (which has been linked to physical and developmental problems), epilepsy, autism, mental retardation and cerebral palsy.  A research team looking at data from 2002 estimated that prior abortions led to 1,096 cases of cerebral palsy among babies born prematurely that year.

(click for full article)

Here’s the new GAP sign we have been using to highlight this link:

Abortion leads to premature births

Peggy LaFreniere 1940-2010

We were saddened last week to learn of the passing of our dear friend and saint Peggy LaFreniere.  Many of you may remember her as Peggy Espinda, as she was known before her recent marriage to Paul LaFreniere.

Peggy has long been a passionate defender of preborn children.  She was one of the very first people in Georgia to embrace our work at CBR.   For many years, we counted on Peggy to be a member of our traveling team as we took our GAP project to college campuses all over the country.  In fact, she was always the first person we called, because she was always up for a road trip.  She earned the respect of the students with whom she spoke, because she was both smart and compassionate.  She was a joy for us as well; she never complained about the hard work nor the long hours.

There are many children alive today and families still together because of Peggy’s tireless work.

Peggy, we are much richer for knowing you.  We look forward to seeing you again, in a place where “there will no longer be any death; there will no longer be any mourning, or crying, or pain; the first things have passed away (Rev. 21:4).”

Samuel Armas shaking the doctor's hand

Great time at the Georgia Right to Life (GRTL) REACH fundraising dinner last night in Atlanta.  I’m in Georgia this week laying the groundwork for our Pro Life Training Academy (PLTA) and Pro Life on Campus (GAP) events at the University of Georgia and Kennesaw State University in November.  GRTL is partnering with CBR on all of this work.  GRTL President Dan Becker featured our cooperative efforts in his remarks last night.

Samuel Armas shaking my hand

Also in attendance was Samuel Armas and his family.  You may remember when Samuel exploded on the national scene back in 1999, when he reached out of his mother’s womb and grabbed the finger of his surgeon.  The photo became an instant sensation.

Now Samuel is 10 years old.  He and his parents were in attendance last night, and I was thrilled to shake Samuel’s hand.  (Wouldn’t you know it, I shook the wrong hand—the un-famous one—but what the heck.)  Fox News recently ran a story on Samuel, who is now 10 years old!

Planned Parenthood has been aggressive in marketing the oft-quoted notion that abortion is only 3 percent of what it does.

Pencils ready?  Planned Parenthood arrives at 3 percent by dividing its total number of abortions by its total number of “services.”  For 2008, that would be 324,008 divided by 10,940,609.

To illustrate the absurdity of such a statistic, note that if Planned Parenthood hands out 97 condoms, it could count that as 97 “services.” Then it does three abortions and claims that, because it also handed out 97 condoms, abortion is 3 percent of its business. This statistic is specifically designed to lead the American people and the legislators who continue to give government money to Planned Parenthood to believe that a very small portion of Planned Parenthood’s business is abortion-related.

Click here to see the entire article.

One of the authors of this piece is Katie Walker.  While at Northern Kentucky University (NKU) in 2006, Katie’s Northern Right to Life group made international news when one of the NKU professors vandalized their “Crosses for the Unborn” display.  Katie has often been an invited speaker at our annual Student Leadership Conference.

Added on September 24, 2011:

A commenter questioned whether PP is suggesting that a 13-yr-old might be ready for sex if … , as opposed to an older child. Facts to consider:

1. The text in question has been captured and is presented below.
2. The URL is http://www.plannedparenthood.org/info-for-teens/sex-masturbation/am-ready-sex-33826.htm. Note the words “info-for-teens” as part of the URL.
3. I accessed the link by first typing in the URL, www.teenwire.com, which is a URL that PP regularly gives out as a source of information for teenagers.
4. A 13-yr-old child is a teenager.

Combine this with everything else being thrown at children from the media, the entertainment industry, etc., that’s more than enough encouragement for a couple of 13-yr-old children to start having sex.  All it takes is one to push for it and another to consent.

Text extracted from http://www.plannedparenthood.org/info-for-teens/sex-masturbation/am-ready-sex-33826.htm.