In her opening remarks, Dr. McLean asserted that the fetus is not a human. She made several other assertions and arguments that I rebutted, but this was the most glaring error of the debate. As Daniel Patrick Moynihan once said, “Everyone is entitled to his own opinion, but not to his own facts.”

My introductory comments were posted yesterday. In them, I challenged Dr. McLean to prove her assertion that the fetus was not human. I would accept almost all of her points. I would agree that abortion should be legal, that abortion should be covered by insurance, that I would even quit my job and find another career. I would do all of this, if and only if she could present conclusive scientific and/or philosophic evidence to show that the preborn child is not human. As you may be aware, no such evidence exists.

To rebut the myth that the unborn child is not human (or that life doesn’t begin at conception), I quoted both medical textbooks and pro-abortion sources:

Zygote. This cell results from the union of an oocyte and a sperm during fertilization. A zygote is the beginning of a new human being (i.e., an embryo). … [The zygote] marked the beginning of each of us as a unique individual. (Keith L. Moore and T.V.N. Persaud, The Developing Human: Clinically Oriented Embryology, 7th ed., Philadelphia: Saunders, 2003, pp 2,16)

It is the penetration of the ovum by a spermatozoan and resultant mingling of the nuclear material … that constitutes the culmination of the process of fertilization and marks the initiation of the life of a new individual. (Bradley M. Patten, Human Embryology, 3rd ed., New York: McGraw Hill, 1968, p 43)

We of today know that man is born of sexual union; that he starts life as an embryo within the body of the female; and that the embryo is formed from the fusion of two single cells, the ovum and the sperm. This all seems so simple and evident to us that it is difficult to picture a time when it was not part of the common knowledge. (Alan F. Guttmacher. Life in the Making: The Story of Human Procreation. New York: Viking Press, 1933. p 3.) [Alan Guttmacher is a former president of Planned Parenthood.]

Perhaps the most straightforward relation between you and me on the one hand and every human fetus from conception onward on the other is this: All are living members of the same species, homo sapiens. A human fetus, after all, is simply a human being at a very early stage in his or her development. (David Boonin, A Defense of Abortion, New York: Cambridge University Press, 2002, p 20)

In the top drawer of my desk, I keep [a picture of my son]. This picture was taken on September 7, 1993, 24 weeks before he was born. The sonogram image is murky, but it reveals clear enough a small head tilted back slightly, and an arm raised up and bent, with the hand pointing back toward the face and the thumb extended out toward the mouth. There is no doubt in my mind that this picture, too, shows [my son] at a very early stage in his physical development. And there is no question that the position I defend in this book entails that it would have been morally permissible to end his life at this point. (David Boonin, A Defense of Abortion, New York: Cambridge University Press, 2003, p xiv)

Case closed, but if you want more proof, check out this article: When does life begin?

More coverage to follow in Part 4.

I was on George Korda’s State Your Case radio show earlier today. During a break, Mr. Korda forced himself to watch the video at the CBR website.  In the hour we had, we hit many of the standard questions.

One issue that Mr. Korda brought up was the “unfairness” to the father of the child. If the mother decides to abort the child, the father has no say. If the mother decides to keep the child, the father is legally required to provide financial support. In the fog of give-and-take that is live radio, I didn’t get to respond to that comment. I had fielded a similar question in my debate at Eastern Kentucky University—more on that later—a couple of weeks ago.

Fairness to the father is not the issue. If the preborn child is less than human, then the father has no rights to the “blob of tissue” that the mother carries within her own body. Since she is the one carrying the “blob,” it would be her right to decide whether to keep it or not. She has more skin in the game, if I can say it that way. But if she decides to carry, then the father is absolutely liable to support the child financially, not because of her decision to carry, but because of his decision to have sex in the first place.

But if the preborn child is a human being—science tells us he/she is a living human being from the moment of fertilization—then it is the baby’s rights which are at stake, not the father’s. If we treat every human being with equal value and dignity, fairness demands that the baby’s life be protected, regardless of whether or not the child is wanted by the father. If both father and mother freely chose to engage in the reproductive act, then they both share the responsibility to support the child.

Either way, fairness to the father is not an issue.  Fairness to the unborn child (and her mother) are of paramount concern.  Having your life stolen from you because you are “unwanted” is the ultimate unfairness.

GAP turns heads at the University of Kentucky.

We always love our time at the University of Kentucky.  It is a very diverse student body, with many students representing every position on abortion.  Students are generally respectful and willing to listen.

Our free speech board was a huge draw, as was our poll table.  I don’t have exact numbers, but the list of students who identified themselves as pro-life was several pages long.

Media coverage already!

New video from Abort73.com.  See astounding images of 1st trimester baby.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x-6VLUVglG8

Karine John Hardin

We are indebted to the Pro Life in TN blog for this story about the newest member of the CBR family!  Four-year-old Karine is the latest arrival at the Hardin household, whose members are fixtures on the GAP circuit.

How many of those pro lifers ever adopt?

Well the Hardin family, whom I am proud to call friends, are as pro life as they come.   Just take a look at their van covered in pro life stickers … their 8 home-schooled children … their entry into pro life oratory contests … avid and trained sidewalk counselors and  in several  pro life arenas … I can count on them  to march in the parade and help with any pro life event.

They have worked and fund raised for over two years to raise the money to adopt this special needs child from Armenia who had never been outside her orphanage in her 4 years of life. While the prayed and waited for the bureaucracy  to move, they almost lost her as Kathy Hardin received a call to make an emergency trip as  their to be daughter, Karine was critically ill.

She  was sick and down to only 15 pounds.  The is hospital was without the basic necessities to treat her. I must admit when I received  the broadcast email of what was happening, I was greatly discouraged. The Hardins have a strong faith and when they finished the email by telling us to take a front row seat and watch what God can do, I must admit I felt that she could not possibly survive even if  they were able to raise the funds for an air ambulance from Armenia to Nashville.

Fast forward … they were able to get the adoption accomplished in an emergency period of time, fly home on a commercial flight, get her into Vanderbilt for the needed surgery literally in the nick of time. Yea God !!! … Slap me across the face for my lack of faith.

Channel 5  covers the story here, here, and here.

“For two weeks it was pretty touch and go and I was working on adrenaline,” Hardin said.

Karine suffers from Spina Bifida and lives with a shunt to reduce swelling in her brain. Just weeks before she was scheduled to make the journey, the Hardin’s said she underwent surgery to correct the shunt, then developed meningitis, and lost nearly 20 pounds when the Armenian hospital withheld pain medicine and antibiotics.

If you’d like to help with her medical costs, you can make a donation to the Karine John Hardin fund at the Hendersonville branch of Regions Bank.

You can also visit the following Facebook page for updates: http://www.causes.com/causes/588490-rescue-karine-hardin

Seth Drayer

We are indebted to CBR’s Seth Drayer for sharing this encounter with a student at Florida State University.

“She called me up and told me she was pregnant, that she was going to keep the baby. Two weeks later, she called and told me she’d gotten rid of it.”

I looked at the young man standing before me. “How do you feel?” I asked.

“Oh, man . . . I don’t want anyone to feel what I feel.”

Moments before, I had withdrawn from GAP to catch my breath. The verbally violent protestors, the student playing the accordion loudly in front of me to stifle conversation: all of it was choking my love for the students at Florida State University.

After reflection and prayer, I returned to the display. And then I met Chris.

“Do you have pictures of an 18 week-old?” he asked.

Immediately, I knew why he was asking. “Yeah, follow me.” I led him to our prenatal development sign and pointed to the 18 week image: a close up of the baby’s face. “Is that how old your baby was?” I asked cautiously.

Chris nodded. His eyes began to water. “It’s not right,” he said. “I’m the kind of guy who always protects. And here, the one person I was supposed to . . .”

And then he asked me a question I did not want to answer: “Did he feel it?”

I wanted to tell Chris that the baby felt no pain during the abortion, to mask the barbarity of it and lessen Chris’s own suffering. But, he needed the truth. When I shared it with him, he could only shake his head in defeat.

Then, I told him that I know what it feels like to be a father stripped of his duty. I shared with him the empty powerlessness I had felt when Aubrie and I lost our own child by miscarriage. Fathers are meant to protect their children—yet neither Chris nor I had been able to do so.

“Remember this, Chris,” I told him, “you are and always will be a father.”

Chris returned the next day. His countenance had changed completely. He told me he had accepted the reality of his pain. He had brought a friend to show him the picture of “his” 18 week baby. He was even smiling.

Chris had needed someone to validate his pain. I had needed someone to remind me why I was there. I praise God for allowing us to meet.

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

CBR is following the model of social reform demonstrated by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Lewis Hine, the American abolitionists of the 1800s, and William Wilberforce and Thomas Clarkson, who helped end the slave trade in England.

Dr. King found ways to show people what racism really looked like. Pictures of racist attacks on TV and in magazines opened people’s eyes and helped end segregation in less than 10 years.

CBR uses this same model of social reform to open people’s eyes to the truth about abortion.

Here is the video we’ll be showing tonight at our Celebrating Life event.

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

Great column in the Knoxville News Sentinel this morning by columnist Greg Johnson.  Be sure to add your comments at the bottom of the column.

By the way, here’s your last chance to order tickets to Celebrate Life with Mike Huckabee on Monday night.

This BBC report on the battle over abortion in Northern Ireland features pro-life activist Bernadette Smyth.

From the BBC report:

What makes the biggest difference to Bernie Smyth’s campaign is what turned her into a pro-life campaigner in the first place: pictures like these.

Check it out:

http://www.belowtheradar.tv/abortionwars.html

.

JillStanek.com is a pro-life blog that is read world-wide.  Readers are burning up the comment lines on two recent postings featuring CBR:

1. My post, Use of graphic pictures not optional.  This post generated more than 100 comments.  Please go add your own!  This post was a good lead-in to this next one …
2. Jill’s post, Video: The most shocking 4-minute abortion debate you will ever see.  A new CBR video juxtaposes shocking, graphic abortion footage upon a soothing videothat was produced by the Northland Family Planning Centers, a chain of late-term abortion clinics in Michigan.  The Northland video describes abortion as an act of “courage.”  The CBR overlay displays the truth.  (Note: the link given here just goes to Jill’s posting, not the video itself.)

America will not stop abortion until America sees abortion.

My response to a pastor who commented on a previous post.

Dear Pastor,

On my blog, you asked if you could use my argument as part of your public requests (pulpit and bulletin announcements) for increased participation in prayer vigils and other peaceful, legal efforts to close the Planned Parenthood facilities in Midland and Odessa, TX. 

Yes. Please. Thank you so much. Please encourage your church members (and your church body) to become involved in activities like this. Please use anything I have written. I put these ideas out there for folks like you to use.

As you are planning your presentation, please bear in mind that most Christians who are doing nothing to stop the killing don’t even know what abortion is. They think they do but they don’t. They are trying to ignore or trivialize abortion, because that allows them to do nothing about it. That’s why you must use abortion images to show them what it is. If they don’t see it, they won’t understand it and won’t do anything about it.

Some will complain about this and assert that you only need to show pretty pictures of preborn children. If that were true, a photo of a Jewish family picnic on the Rhine would be adequate to convey the horror of the death camps. I’m sorry, but I look at a nice Jewish family photo, and it tells me nothing about Auschwitz.

If we are going to ever stop the killing, we must correct three adverse conditions:

1. Christians need to know the truth of it. They don’t. (That’s why the abortion rate even inside the “pro-life” church is so high.)
2. Christians need to care enough to do something about it. They don’t.
3. The Church must lead. It doesn’t.

It is my belief that correcting #1 is critical to correcting the other two. Let me emphasize this point:  To understand it, your church needs to see it!

Dr. Martin Luther King said, “America will never stop racism until America sees racism.” That’s why he organized marches, knowing that the peaceful marchers would be attacked with dogs and water cannons. It was pictures of these attacks, on TV and in magazines, that changed America. I can tell you that America will not stop abortion until America sees abortion, and there is no place more fitting than our churches to begin this educational process. Babies will die in your church if you don’t show pictures.

When guiding your members how to act in holding back the children on the way to slaughter (Proverbs 24:11-12), encourage them to use graphic abortion images in their work. It’s not important that all use graphic images; but it is important that those who oppose their use are not allowed to dissuade others who might be agreeable.

If you need ideas how to counter objections or have any other questions, feel free to contact me.

You might want to check out the slides from my talk this weekend to the Students for Life of America conference in DC.

We’d be glad to provide a speaker for your church anytime.

Thanks,

Fletcher

Students attending the March for Life discover what it is they are marching about.

CBR’s Genocide Awareness Project (GAP) was on display again this year at the National March for Life.

It is one of our most important deployments of the year, because so many of the marchers are young people who really have no idea what an abortion is … until we show them!  Many high-school students have commented that our display, which they only see for a minute or so, is the most memorable and impacting experience of their entire trip.  They will remember the pictures of abortion long after every one of the speeches have been forgotten.

Lisa Morris of ProCET

Below is a statement from Lisa Morris of the Pro Life Coalition of East Tennessee (ProCET).  Note meeting on January 27.

Planned Parenthood has been given access to Knox County students, and at least one presentation has been done without parental knowledge or consent.  Beyond the fact that Planned Parenthood is the nation’s largest abortion provider, their “wellness education” includes elements that many parents would consider unacceptable, if not pornographic. We have attached a flyer with excerpts from their Teen Wire website as well as a link to video selections from their “Take Care Down There” website.  [FAB note: If you want to see the depravity of PP materials, go to www.TakeCareDownThere.org and watch the “I didn’t spew” video.]

We are asking for every concerned leader and parent to take a clear and immediate stand against this effort to corrupt our students and degrade the gift of human sexuality with their unacceptable materials.

Please attend an informational meeting:

January 27, 2011
6:30- 8:00PM
The Chancery Office
805 Northshore Drive, SW
Knoxville, TN 37919

We will present additional information on Planned Parenthood’s agenda and history along with our strategy for action to remove Planned Parenthood and any of their endorsed materials from our schools. Our unity in this effort will be critical for success, so please share this information with other concerned friends and family and invite them to join you for this important meeting.

In addition please call or write Governor-Elect Haslam, 615.254.4799, Superintendent of Schools, Dr. McIntyre, 865-594-1620, and Knox County Mayor Tim Burchett, 865-215-2005, to express your outrage.

Here are some additional points you may want to include:

• Planned Parenthood has already presented their materials to students at Hardin Valley Academy without parental knowledge or consent.
• Planned Parenthood is the world’s biggest abortion provider; their graphic websites target teens with obscene material that encourages risky sexual behavior and they are under investigation in a number of states for violations of state laws regarding mandatory reporting laws for sexual abuse of minors.
• Please remove Planned Parenthood from the list of approved guest speakers in our schools.

For any questions or to request digital copies of this material, contact Lisa Morris, 865-567-1245.

Please feel free to copy and distribute this information.

Note:  Keep up with the latest on the No Planned Parenthood-Knox County Schools Facebook page.

Pro-aborts: CBR tactics are "really effective."

We have many endorsements from college students, pro-life activists, political leaders, and others who have seen our work in action.  But this piece amounts to the strongest endorsement we have ever gotten.

Freedom of (hate) speech: Confronting the rise of anti-choice activities on Canadian campuses was written by a pro-abortion activist in Canada who laments the effectiveness of our Canadian CBR affiliate.  She is so frustrated by the effectiveness of our work, she believes only censorship and bully tactics can ensure our defeat.

The more sophisticated of our opponents know that any open admission of our effectiveness will only make our fundraising and recruiting efforts more effective.  That is what makes the candor in this article so remarkable.  Military intelligence officials who interrogate prisoners of war usually focus their questions on determining what their captors believe to be the most effective tactics being employed against them and why.  Our abortion adversaries just volunteered that information and we didn’t even need to water-board them!

Some excerpts:

These on-campus battles are the new front line of pro-choice activism in Canada.  But with anti-choicers setting the terms of debate, how can pro-choice activists respond?  [Note their admission that CBR is setting the terms of the debate, which is exactly what we want to do.]

But one thing that they have been really effective at doing is coming up with messaging that affects the popular discourse, which I think is a really dangerous thing because it will eventually seep into the legislature and the courts.  [Another admission that CBR is “really effective.”  Note the recognition that our work on campus will transform culture.]

Anti-choice groups are using the free speech argument to win the public relations battle …  [The author believes we are winning.  That’s important, because winning is how the killing stops.]

These presentations and displays have provoked a pro-choice response in a way the activities of other anti-choice groups have not.  [That’s because the activities of other pro-life groups, in the view of the author, are not effective and need not be countered.]

With anti-choicers setting the terms of debate, pro-choice advocates have had to grapple with the utility of confronting these groups head-on …  [To this author, “confronting these groups head-on” means shouting us down and running us off the stage.]

A new generation of anti-choice groups is establishing a reputation for itself on Canadian campuses, with increasingly visible tactics that many pro-choice activists call discriminatory, harassing and hateful.  [Note the significance of “harassing” and “hateful” labels, which could allow pro-life speech to be censored under Canadian law.]

The university administration is barraged with phone calls and emails calling for the event to be shut down on the grounds that it amounts to harassment and is offensive to women …  Shortly after the event begins, a group of about 10 women and their allies enter the room, chanting and blocking the projector with the intent of disrupting the presentation.  [The context of this passage is an explicit endorsement of censorship and bully tactics.]

… the CCBR legally constitute hate speech by inciting hatred towards those women who have or support the right to have abortions, and should thus be restricted in order to prevent the harassment of women.  [Note the call for censorship.]

Unfortunately, it seems that the freedom of expression of protesters is not taken as seriously at McGill as hateful speech …  [Note the dismay over lack of censorship.]