When Pro-Lies turn against their own.

At News of the Restless & A Creative Revolution, I read that a US woman engaged the rapt attention of thousands of anti-abortion fetus fetishists for months with a totally fabricated story about a pregnancy, a doomed fetus and religious glurge. Ooops - sorry, the glurge was authentic.

Blogger's baby was a hoax ... Raechel Myers, a friend of Beushausen's from college, heard from someone that Beushausen was going through a difficult pregnancy. Myers and her husband, Ryan, had a daughter who died at birth, so they did more than most to support Beushausen."When I heard that she was pregnant, I called her and said if she needed anything, I was there for her," said Myers, who lives in Nashville. She said she spoke to Beushausen almost every day for the last few weeks. ... Even after learning of the hoax, Myers said she and her husband don't regret their involvement. "She's someone who needed love and attention, and we gave her that," Myers said.

Unfortunately, not all the readers of "April's Mom" were as forgiving and kind in that, you know, christian way. Which is odd, since Beushausen is vociferously against abortion and blogged incessantly about that and her imaginary fetus. However, some of her former fans don't display much, if any compassion for someone so obviously emotionally fragile and still grieving the loss of her child, 4 years later. One comment is typical of the bloodthirsty hatred the discovery of her subterfuge provoked:

"It has everything to do with the fact that this woman cooked up an elaborate scheme to defraud people. To prey on peoples emotions and to exploit that. I was quoted in this article; I have delved into Beccah's life this past week. People everyday live through much harder things than she could ever dream of and they don't make imaginary lives up for themselves. She needs to be held accountable for her actions."

Oh really? Such loathing, usually reserved for those the Pro-Liars call abortionists.

"I'm still feeling a lot of hate towards her," said Jacki Gallagher, a 30-year-old blogger from British Columbia who followed the site from early on. "Reading her site was part of my life. I hand make toys and was ready to send something, because she had moved me so much. She wrote beautifully and that was really the seller. She didn't just make short posts, she put a lot of time an effort into this," Gallagher said.

There's hundreds more comments like those.

"I think it's sick, what she did," said Briane Gibson, a 24-year-old blogger who quickly became suspicious and helped identify Beushausen ... "She was feeding off people's sympathy. She was making money of people," Gibson said. "She wasted the time of so many people who could have been helping real families in need," she said.

Now there's an interesting claim. Beushausen never asked for money for herself. It wasn't an extortion scam, where she threatened to have an abortion unless people sent her financial support, as others have tried to do. She directed donations towards an anti-abortion crisis pregnancy centre which, one would assume, her readers should consider worthy of support, regardless of the legitimacy of her story. Yet the Centre is furiously trying to distance itself from "April's Mom" because of the optics.

"We never had any direct contact with this woman and we are investigating," said Rick Ligthart, executive director of PASS. "We know of one, at least, donation related to this hoax and we want to make sure we do the right thing. "This lie is another indication of the brokenness this country's moral fabric," he said.

There you go. There was no fetus, just a still broken-hearted mother who gave birth to a baby that did not survive. Beushausen did not force anyone to read her moving and "beautifully written" posts. Her former supporters shrieeek that they could have been spending time helping real people who "everyday live through much harder things". But how many anti-abortionists actually help those in need, the mothers and families raising infants with physical handicaps, life-threatening genetic disorders and serious cognitive impairments? Observe how the religious fundamentalist abortion criminalizers cannot find a shred of love in their heart for someone so obviously needy. Doesn't that make them the liars, the fakes, the frauds?

Update: Check out psa's delicious rant du jour: Caps Lock ENGAGED!