Pro-Life Guest Appalls Hosts of ABC's 'The View'

Media Research Center ^ | January 22, 2003 | Brent Baker

[Stand Watch Listen]

The View gang ganged up, though politely, on a guest on Tuesday who dared to suggest that abortion may not always be a wonderful experience. Actress Jennifer O'Neill came aboard to promote her “Silent No More” campaign and told how she regrets having an abortion and how pregnancy sites with which she's affiliated inform mothers of the physical and emotional risk of an abortion.

     Her variance from the “pro-choice” line clearly appalled the regulars on the ABC daytime show, especially Joy Behar and former NBC News reporter Star Jones, though former CBS News reporter Meredith Viera also revealed where she stands. (Barbara Walters was out, replaced by former Saturday Night Live cast member Ana Gasteyer who was also appalled that O'Neill's work might threaten Roe v Wade.) In the next segment, actress Katey Segal scolded the View team for being so “polite” to O'Neill.

     Some of the comments and exchanges on the January 21 The View, as transcribed by MRC intern Rudy Peseckas:

     -- Before O'Neill appeared, Behar was upset that a poll about abortion included the views of men:
     Behar: "Just ask women because we're the ones who have to do it all, so I just think that it's our business, it's our problem and leave them out of it [audience applauds]....Look, if I had a set of scrotum then it would be my problem, right? If my scrotum was in trouble -- scroti [everyone's laughing, crosstalk]. Since I'm the one that's carrying the baby, I want to be the one to decide....I think it's a woman's issue and just be concerning women, and the Senate is comprised of majority of men, the Congress is men, and they're making decisions for women, and I don't like it."

     -- O'Neill noted that “80 percent of women that go in and have the opportunity to have an ultrasound change their mind. They do want their babies. I was not told that, and a lot of women–"
     Behar jumped in: "There seems to be a lot of shame around just having an abortion, though, which I think, I don't understand. It's a legal thing in this country, but a lot of women are embarrassed to say that they've had one. Maybe we should change that."

     -- Jones lectured her: “But Jennifer, there is a difference between secrecy and privacy, and there are some women who say this is a matter of my business and my body and I need to make a choice that’s right for me at this time.”

     -- O'Neill advised that if you “have a teenager and you think you are doing them a favor with an unwanted pregnancy to go and get an abortion you are sentencing them to 30 percent higher risk of cancer. That’s a fact that you need to know before you make that choice.”
     Behar countered: “But it is also a fact that it’s a higher risk to have a child, to give birth than it is to have an abortion.”
     O’Neill: “That’s not true.”
     Behar: “That’s what I read.”

     -- Viera worried: “But prior to abortion becoming legal that’s when things were really secret much more so than after it became legal, and very dangerous. So there is going to be abortion one way or the other.”

     -- O’Neill urged adoption: “Offer adoption as an option. One-third of our babies conceived in this country are aborted, now perhaps it's a little better now.”
     Behar complained: “I think that adopted children have issues of their own too and giving up a baby after its come to term is a very painful thing also. I know girls who gave up babies years ago in the '60s before Roe v Wade and they suffer to this day that they gave up their baby so theres that issue too.” 
     O’Neill: “I just want them to have the option, look at all the different ways that you can go-”
     Behar: “Well I’m afraid that your particular thing that you are going to thell them is going to influence them to roll back their abortion rights.”

     -- Jones proposed: “Suppose I am eighteen years old. I’m going to college. I was careless I made a mistake. My life is ahead of me and I have chosen that I want to terminate that pregnancy and I don’t want to hear from you Miss O’Neill. In the first trimester, I make the decision in seven weeks. I don’t want to hear the options. I’ve made an informed decision.”
     O’Neill zinged her: “How can you be informed if you haven’t heard the options?”
     Jones: “Because I am a smart women who is at eighteen, I have looked it up. This is what I want to say, if I’m that person what do you say to me?”

     -- Ana Gasteyer inadvertently suggested most women are idiots: “The whole point of family planning is to give you options and alternatives. In fact the whole rollback is the fear that people don’t know that they have the option of abortion.”

     -- In the next segment, actress Katey Segal, best-known as the mother in Fox's old Married....With Children, came aboard to plug her new ABC sit-com, 8 Simple Rules for Dating My Teenage Daughter. She scolded The View crew: “Well I thought you girls were extremely polite....I think she is not going to Washington to do much other than probably try and alter things. I mean I have a lot of opinions about that but do you really want to talk about that? It seems you covered that a lot, I’m definitely pro choice that's what I will say [audience applause] and I thought you girls...but you know I like that everybody has an opinion and I think you are extremely polite.”

     The Web site for The View: http://abc.abcnews.go.com/theview/main.html

     The Internet Movie Database bio page for Segal: http://us.imdb.com/Name?Sagal,+Katey

     Web site for 8 Simple Rules for Dating My Teenage Daughter:
http://abc.abcnews.go.com/primetime/8simplerules/index.html

     Jennifer O'Neill is best-known for her role in the 1972 movie, Summer of '42. For her IMDB bio: http://us.imdb.com/Name?O%27Neill,+Jennifer+(I)

     Fun fact, she's in her ninth marriage: http://us.imdb.com/Bio?O%27Neill,%20Jennifer%20(I)

     For an old picture of her, check out a poster for the Summer of '42 movie: http://us.imdb.com/Posters?0067803

     Her abortion alternatives Web site: www.PregnancyCenters.org

     The View boasts having women hosts “with different points of view,” but on abortion they all have one view. -- Brent Baker

[Thumper1960]

Behar: "Just ask women because we're the ones who have to do it all, so I just think that it's our business, it's our problem and leave them out of it

I suppose Ms. Behar wouldn't mind not having fathers pay child support. I suppose the bimbos on The View also don't have a problem with prostitution, drug use or rich folks keeping their own money.

I wonder if the ones who have had abortions also had major sections of grey matter sucked out during the operation.