Posted on 07/21/2007 2:02:17 AM PDT by monomaniac
Use of Graphic Abortion Photos Strongly Defended by Pro-Life Leaders
Joe Scheidler says condemning their use "is like telling the Apostles they can't talk about Christ crucified"
By Hilary White and Steve Jalsevac TORONTO, July 20, 2007 (LifeSiteNews.com) - Every summer, motorists and pedestrians in towns across Canada and the US are presented with groups of pro-life volunteers standing next to or holding large signs displaying photos of aborted children. Such projects as Face the Truth in the US, Show the Truth in Canada and the Genocide Awareness Project on both sides of the border bring the images to the public, often stirring debate in newspapers.
The debate within the pro-life movement is ongoing with proponents arguing that the use of graphic images has been among the most successful tools in every human rights struggle since the 18th century when William Wilberforce used them in his campaign against the slave trade. Photos of the Nazi holocaust of the Jews are widely understood to have played a crucial role in awakening the world to the reality of that evil.
Pro-life leaders say that the media blackout on the horrific realities of abortion is so complete that there is little other means of making the case in public.
Fr. Frank Pavone, considered one of today's most knowledgeable, respected and widely travelled pro-life evangelists, recently gave his views on the use of graphic abortion photos at the 2007 Canadian March for Life Youth Conference in Ottawa. Pavone strongly supports the use of such images as one important part of pro-life strategies.
Pavone stated, "There is no single thing that I have seen more powerful to change people on abortion than simply showing them the pictures… When people see what abortion does to a baby, they are stung to the heart and their consciences are awakened."
The pro-life priest who has founded and heads a new order of priests with a special dedication to pro-life evangelism, says that use of the photos is crucial for educating a disbelieving or evading public about the true reality of abortion. He told the Ottawa youth, "Some people think abortion just makes the baby kind of disappear. They still don't appreciate that it is an act of violence. It is only the pictures of the aborted children, torn apart, limb for limb that convince people that abortion is an act of violence."
Fr. Pavone emphasizes the graphic images frequently cause numerous, almost instant conversions of pro-abortion people to a pro-life position. He states, "I get emails every day - you will hear people say, 'I was 100% pro-choice until I saw those pictures.' We get emails everyday saying that the people who went to our website and saw the pictures of the babies began to cry and in a minute, they moved from being 100% pro-abortion to being 100% pro-life." The motto of the Priests for Life Website is "America will not reject abortion until America sees abortion."
Joe Scheidler, the National Director of Pro-Life Action League in the US, who has used the images from the beginning of his decades-long involvement in the pro-life movement, told LifeSiteNews.com that the fight against abortion would never have made any political headway without the images.
Others in the movement, however, have gone so far as to condemn the images as immoral. In February this year, Calgary's outspokenly pro-life Catholic bishop, Fred Henry, recently sent a letter to all his parishes and Catholic schools banning the local group, the Canadian Centre for Bioethical Reform, that depends upon the images as the centre of their argument. Henry condemned the use of the images as immoral saying they violated the moral principle that "the end...does not justify the means."
The Calgary bishop's insistence contrasts with that of other Catholic authorities who admit of the legitimacy of the shocking images, even while declining to use them. Pavel Reid, then director of the pro-life activities of the Vancouver archdiocese, wrote to pro-life activist Stephanie Gray in 2004, saying that while the archdiocese would not use the graphic images, there was no argument to be made against their use from the point of view of "faith and morals, but is a prudential decision with which Catholics may disagree."
"Catholics in the Archdiocese remain free to support the GAP," Reid wrote.
Scheidler, who has just finished a ten-day tour of Face the Truth, used stronger language calling the condemnation of graphic images, "extremely dangerous" to the cause of the unborn. "The pictures upset people, but only because they don't want to admit that this is our culture. If it's immoral, I don't see how so many good people can do this."
Scheidler cited the bishops he had worked with using the images, including the revered late Bishop Austin Vaughn. He told LifeSiteNews.com that condemning graphic images because they are upsetting is playing into the hands of the media and pro-abortion movement that "wants us to shut up and go away."
Scheidler, echoing the experience of many groups using the images, said the pictures save lives. During his group's most recent tour, 20 pregnant young women who had intended to abort, approached volunteers saying that though the images had shocked them, they had helped them decide against abortion.
"People are converted by it," Scheidler said. "[Condemning the pictures] is like telling the Apostles they can't talk about Christ crucified. you can talk about the resurrection but not the crucifixion."
Some pro-life supporters, while allowing that the shocking abortion images have a legitimate place in the debate, have taken a different approach.
Right to Life Michigan is the organization in the US that pioneered the use of "softer" images in their successful pro-life television ads billboards and radio spots. Despite the group's emphasis on the gentler approach, however, Pamela Sherstad director of public information at RTL Michigan told LifeSiteNews.com that the use of shocking images of aborted children has its proper place.
"We use them. We have them on the website and we give a warning for people who do want to see the reality of abortion. It does tell the truth of what happens: when abortion occurs, an innocent human life is destroyed." Sherstad said.
Read related LifeSiteNews.com coverage: Calgary Bishop Cites Graphic Images for Withdrawal of Support for Prominent Pro-life Group
http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2007/may/07050908.html
See full text of excerpt from Fr. Frank Pavone's speech at National March for Life 2007 Youth Conference Fr. Frank Pavone on the Power of Graphic Abortion Images
http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2007/jul/07072011.html
See the Priests for Life website
http://www.priestsforlife.org/images/index.htm
If people object to the pictures, a seed has been planted, one we can hope will grow in the conscience of those outraged.
Which is more objectionable--the pictures, or the subjects of those pictures?
FYI ping
Those types of images are banned from this forum.
I don’t think there are many on this forum who need convincing.
If people object to the pictures, a seed has been planted, one we can hope will grow in the conscience of those outraged.
Which is more objectionable--the pictures, or the subjects of those pictures?
I'm sure the anti-war protesters come up with the same justification. It's a human being; images of corpses are for those who have lost the ability to make a rational argument anymore.
I have seen my share of abortion supporters as well as homosexual activists on this very forum. So I have to conclude that they are still here.
How silly. I guess you don't watch television news, or look at newspapers that use photographs, or watch documentaries, because they might use images of corpses to show reality?
I guess we shouldn't show images of 9-11, or of the Nazi death camps, because that would display a loss of the ability to make a rational argument against Al Qaeda or Nazism.
I have no wish to see them. I am pro-life, however.
Or is it only rational when it’s supporting your cause?
Sorry, I think that we should leave the graphic display of the dead to the Islamics who seem to get a thrill out of buying snuff DVDs in their marketplaces.
Calm down. For someone who's supposedly arguing for "rationality" you're foaming at the mouth.
I couldn't care less if anti-war protesters use such imagery. I DO care for the families of those who have fallen, particularly if their loved one is identifiable in the photo.
But you've made a very irrational point about "Or is it only rational when it’s supporting your cause?" Of course there is no set standard for rationality in the use of graphic photos, and it has nothing to do with it being "my" cause. If one were to show images of dead soldiers to protest the war because our soldiers are being killed, that is perfectly rational. I don't LIKE it, but how is it IRrational to do so?
Interesting how you completely sidestepped my comments about avoiding images on TV and papers and documentaries, and 9-11 and nazi atrocities--is it irrational to use images in those cases? Why?
Sorry, I think that we should leave the graphic display of the dead to the Islamics who seem to get a thrill out of buying snuff DVDs in their marketplaces.
Please explain what's rational about not showing what they did to us on 9-11, what they did in London, Iraq, etc.? Is it rational not to show the results of their violent attacks?
Both sides of a war have casualties. In abortion only one side gets killed, against the will of the aborted. The child is innocent; the U. S. soldiers agree and understand that death is part of war.
I’m so sad there’s an argument here. War is war, and pictures of war are everywhere, including pictures of the young innocents who are harmed.
Pictures of dead infants who have been aborted, those pictures change hearts and minds. They give meaning to those innocent, destroyed lives, converting the killers to savers...they are the most pathetic, saddest, most moving pictures that exist in the world today; tiny limbs, faces, dead, torn and bloody...
God will convict the nation through those pictures, no one can see them and remain unmoved; pro-life pictures of the aborted babies are the most powerful tools in the arsenal against the holocaust of millions of the innocents. These babies and their crushed bodies are a testament against the culture of death.
bttt
I have no wish to see them either but I saw them one day many years ago while visiting San Diego. Before seeing that I was following the party line I was raised with “Womans choice”.
There was no argument that could counter those pictures.
I’m now firmly pro life and have even been seen beside the road holding one of those signs myself in the Chicago metro area.
NONE that they can make would compare to the ones i’ve created...
I hate everything the left stands for and a have a special hatred for baby killers!
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