BSFL Vice-President Claire Chretien speaks to the media. Successful social reformers use modulated conflict to focus attention on injustice.

Creating and Exploiting Modulated Conflict

Historically, social reformers have not feared conflict.  They embraced conflict, even created it, to focus public attention on injustice.  They did it knowing their actions would invite persecution from a culture that was complicit or complacent about injustice.

The Bama Students for Life (BSFL) are masters at creating modulated conflict and using that conflict to focus public attention on abortion.

Martin Luther King, Jr. said

… I must confess that I am not afraid of the word “tension.”  I have earnestly opposed violent tension, but there is a type of constructive, nonviolent tension which is necessary for growth.
***
… so must we see the need for nonviolent gadflies [i.e., annoyances or irritants] to create the kind of tension in society that will help men rise from the dark depths of prejudice and racism …  The purpose of our direct action program is to create a situation so crisis packed that it will inevitably open the door to negotiation.

At the U of Alabama, BSFL and CBR annoyed and irritated people who were complicit or complacent about abortion, people who desperately wanted us to leave them alone.  But we didn’t leave them alone.  We focused their attention on injustice, knowing that they would dislike us for having done so.  Based on the media coverage and the huge crowds of angry people, we certainly succeeded!

Media Coverage for GAP at U of Alabama

Television Coverage

1. Controversial abortion display stirs controversy on UA campus
2. Pro-life display on Univ. of Alabama campus stirs strong emotions
3. Controversial display ignites abortion debate (video report)

Newspaper/Online

1. Student group displays graphic abortion photos on UA campus (poll) (positive poll results!)

Crimson White (student newspaper)

1. Anti-abortion group sponsors ‘extremely graphic’ display on Quad (news article)
2. Anti-abortion groups should back up opinions with facts (op-ed)
3. Our View: Bama Students for Life should examine the language they use (op-ed)
4. Students sound off about abortion displays (news article)
5. BSL’s belief in their own infallibility has cost them credibility in this debate (op-ed)
6. Anti-abortion proponents only restrict freedom of choice for American women (op-ed)
7. BSL, Speer both fail in effectively messaging their case on abortion rights (op-ed)
8. How the pro-life movement can make win-win situations out of abortion debates (op-ed)
9. Consider the issue, not the language (pro-life op-ed)
10. BSFL’s images necessary to change culture (pro-life op-ed)
11. University’s public assembly laws must be re-examined (op-ed)
12. Changing from ‘pro-choice’ to ‘pro-abortion’ (the only coherent pro-abortion op-ed we saw, followed by a flood of name-calling and ad hominem attacks, with lots of comments from FAB)
13. Insulting the public not conducive to campus abortion debate (op-ed)
14. Counter-protesters were told to stop handing out fliers, student says (news article) (Note: CBR opposes restricting the First Amendment rights of people who lawfully protest against our display; the First Amendment is good for everyone.)
15. In response to ‘Examine Language’ (pro-life op-ed)

BSFL Blog

1. GAP Press Release
2. Highlights of Life Week

Can you name one other pro-life project that creates 15 items in the campus paper?

Fletcher explains how the history of social reform proves that pictures work.

FAB is coming to you today from Macon, Georgia, where CBR is co-sponsoring a pro-life student leadership training conference.  Pro-life students have come from all over Georgia and Alabama for a day of leadership training and networking.  I’m here with Lincoln Brandenburg, our new project director in Georgia.

As one of the speakers for this conference, your humble correspondent addressed the students on the history of social reform and how that history can guide us as pro-lifers.  We are not the first social reform movement, and we can learn a great deal from successful reformers like William Wilberforce, Thomas Clarkson, the abolitionists in America, Lewis Hine, and Dr. Martin Luther King.

I’ll be participating in a round-table later today.

Thank you for making it possible for CBR to sponor this conference.  You are training the next pro-life generation.  Help us do more of this: click here.

Kristan Hawkins, Director, Students for Life of America

You know about our Pro Life on Campus (GAP) display.  We have displayed this project more than 150 times on major college campuses all over the USA.  But we do more than that.

Today, pro-life college students have flocked to Knoxville to learn how to be more effective on their own campuses.  Peggy English of Silent No More has just wrapped up her talk.  I’ll be speaking later this morning about the history of social reform.

Social reformers of history used images to show the humanity of the victim and the horrifying nature of the crime.  They confronted the culture.  They were willing to accept persecution.  I will be showing students how they can put these principles to work on campus.

We are indebted to Shirley Moore of Knoxville for this excellent essay.

They were accused of disturbing the peace in the churches, a peace [William Lloyd] Garrison did not believe they were entitled to enjoy.

Are you an extremist?

Extremists, self-righteous, judgmental, violent (or the cause of violence). These terms, familiar to pro-lifers, were also applied to the 19th Century abolitionists, and most particularly to William Lloyd Garrison, the editor of the anti-slavery newspaper, The Liberator. He renewed an anti-slavery movement that had languished during the first part of the 19th Century and agitated against slavery from 1829 until it was abolished at the time of the Civil War.

Because he challenged the core morality of the US and because he never lost sight of the moral issues (the sanctity of life, the equality of the races, and the obligation of Christians to oppose slavery), he was hated, mocked in newspapers, and persecuted throughout his life. However, he had a loving family and loyal circle of friends.

After a century and half, at least one book has given him his just due: All On Fire by Henry Mayer. Mayer is a veteran of the 60s-era Civil Rights Movement. Few books have been written about Garrison because the image of him as a “holier-than-thou nut” has persisted to this day. He put justice above peace and has never been forgiven by the culture he challenged.

As many pro-lifers experience today, the churches of the 19th Century despised abolitionists. They were perhaps “too” Christian for the men and women in the pews. They were accused of disturbing the peace in the churches, a peace Garrison did not believe they were entitled to enjoy. Like many pro-lifers, they were “outsiders” in their own congregations and parishes.

Sometimes, being effective and being liked are incompatible.  In social reform movements, this is almost always the case.  Which will  you choose?

You have heard of Lila Rose of Live Action.  You may have seen her under-cover videos that show how Planned Parenthood employees cover up the illegal sexual abuse of children.

In this video, Ms. Rose describes how CBR employs the exact same strategy that was used by other successful reformers in history, including the movements to stop the slave trade in England, to abolish slavery here, to end abusive child labor here, and to galvanize the civil rights movement in the 1950s.

Ms. Rose reports from Sproul Plaza at the University of California at Berkeley during our GAP presentation last October.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ldxict4AZD4

Besides college campuses, what other venues are appropriate for abortion pictures?  Please comment!

Medallion emphasized to Londoners the humanity of the Black slave in 1787.

My talk last night at the Atlanta Right to Life was very well received, I think.  The subject was “Learning From the Past: How We Can Win.”  This is a similar talk to the one I gave to a group of pro-life Georgia Legislators a couple of years ago and the talk I gave to a group of pro-life Congressmen in DC.

This was a fairly easy audience.  We’ve been working with these folks to display abortion images for many years (GAP, RCC, etc.), so they are very familiar with the need to educate the public.  I didn’t need to convince them so much as to help solidify in their minds the connection between our work to educate the public using horrifying images and the work of other social reformers in history who achieved success using the same strategy.  Examples:

• The anti-slave-trade movement in England (William Wilberforce and Thomas Clarkson) used images to show the humanity of the Black slave and the inhumanity of the slave trade.
• Abolistionists in this country used similar images, and later used photographs, to expose the injustice of slavery.
• Lewis Hine, who was concerned about abusive child labor practices, took pictures of children working in coal mines and textile mills and turned them into a traveling display.
• Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. said that “America will not stop racism until America sees racism.”  He arranged for video and photos of Black men and women being attacked with dogs and water cannons to be shown on TV and in magazines.

Horrifying photos of racial violence showed the ugly truth of racism and changed America's heart.

You can download my slides by clicking here.  It is a fairly large file (38 MB); it might take 10 minutes or so to download.  Just save it to a file; a pop-up window will ask you where to file it and will tell you how long it will take to download the file.

Please take a look at the slides and leave your comment on this post!

 

I was honored to be invited to address the Atlanta Chapter of the Georgia Right to Life next week.  Here’s the announcement that went out to their members and other pro-lifers in the area:

You are invited to come and hear a presentation by Fletcher Armstrong PhD, Southeast Director of The Center for Bio-Ethical Reform, entitled, “Lessons From the Past, Learning How to Win,” sponsored by the Atlanta Chapter Georgia Right to Life.  CBR is well know for Genocide Awareness Project (GAP), which is the world’s first large-scale abortion photo outreach to college students. Fletcher will explain how this and other CBR projects are effective because they are modeled upon the most successful social reform movements in history, including the movements to end the slave trade in England, slavery in America, abusive child labor in the early 20th Century, and racial injustice in the 1960s.

When: Thursday, July 22, 2010 7:00 PM

Where: Cathedral of Christ the King, Hyland Center

Some comments about GAP:

• “I saw minds and hearts changed right before my eyes. I believe in GAP and its ability to effect change.” (Tanya Comer, President, [University of] Georgia Pro-Life)
• “There is no doubt in my mind that GAP is the most effective pro-life project that any pro-life club can bring to their school.” (President, Students for Life, U of New Hampshire).
• “It is saving babies like nothing the pro-life movement has ever undertaken and is worthy of our heartiest support.” (Fr. Frank Pavone, Director, Priests for Life)
• “I’ve been doing this my whole adult life. And yet I have never heard a more compelling way of presenting the pro-life message.” (Hon. Trent Franks, U.S. House of Representatives)

If you know people in Atlanta, please let them know about this event.  Thanks!  I’m scheduled to speak in Athens on the evening of Wednesday, July 21.  I will link to my slides for both of these talks sometime next week.

If I can speak to your pro-life group or event, use the feedback form on our website to let us know.