Saturday 26 May 2012

New! Improved Whingening Power! Same Great Taste!

Since being disappointed that the 'trailer' being touted wasn't for another cheesy conservative Christian horror film, I became curious as to whether the perpetrators of the 'new' Abortion Caravan, "Canadian Centre for Bio-Ethical Reform" (Refoooooormmmm!) had any connections to Margaret Somerville. Bio-ethicist Dr. Somerville is the go-to source for Christian religious anti-choicers propping up the wrongitywrongwrongwrongness of abortion.

Poking at their site, it became apparent that while Dr. Somerville is not obviously linked to this 'bioethical' group, this fresh faced organization is staffed as a lesser satellite of the American (and original) Centre for Bio-ethical Reform (Reeeefoooooormmmm!) The penny bios of the Canadian satellite staff are weighted heavily with young campus veterans from the University of Calgary anti-abortion crusades and other Canadian university venues.  There is a strong inference of Catholic as well as evangelical Protestant support. The bios of the staffers emphasize how they "became convicted", always a dogwhistle for the conservative religious.  The site bluntly equates abortion with SIN and is trolling for religious converts in its encouragements.

I recommend giving the site a good read just to know where a lot of the tactics orginate, although possibly with an alcoholic beverage or five.  I'm preeettty sure there's a drinking game to be had on their 'publications' link page and their 'projects' page maps out what tactics they're using, which are wholecloth franchised from an American mothership.  I had an 'aha' moment when I discovered that I personally ran afoul of their martyred 'Choice Chain' protocol cluttering the sidewalks of all corners of a busy intersection in downtown Calgary during Stampede. These are also the same folks behind the carnage postcards gleefully stuffed into Canadian mailboxes.

I'd like to be a fly on the wall when the mothership project for picketing churches judged lacking 'true Christianity' shows up at a target. Especially if it pits Catholics against Protestants and vice versa.  What about synagogues and mosques as targets? Wiccans?  It's so very Westboro Baptist continium.

Their endorsement links page is also educational, in showing who really really really likes them and why. All Catholic and evangelical anti-abortionist testimonials to the saintliness of the CCBR staff; go figure. My favorite is Jeff Scott: 'Pastor of Young Adults, Singles and Sports, Metropolitan Bible Church'.  Sadly, I don't think he means sports the way I initially read his title.

Their videos page strikes me as the 'new' media generation approach they seem to be hinging the latest campaign on.  A mini-Youtube centre with a slant of martyrdom and fervent effort to wrap themselves in the human rights cloak.  They're all over dramatic music (which part of me finds annoying because I am a fan of the 'incidental music' genre), surgical close-ups out of context, etc. bring slightly better production quality to the Fallacy of Appeal to Emotion.

The darkly ironic thing is, their mothership has an abortion facts page that informs us how minimal abortions are after 9-12 weeks gestation, but that (somewhat outdated) reality impinges not on their stance.  They're aiming for conception as the start and end point.  You have to give them points for honest agenda.

The vids also clearly show the American mothership's presence and origination of the 'edgy young' tactics, going back years, so they're pretty much admitting this isn't new, it's re-packaging by a new marketing firm in an effort to up dismal sales, facts be damned.

Speaking of the mothership, you can tell I toddled over to their site.  I advise you right now, many of the tabs open into a 'horrific' abortion video autostarting...and then looping.  It's pretty much Christian Hellhouse meets out of context medical footage. When and if you wade through that, you find them mostly excusing using bloody pictures because 'Hey, it works for those tragedies we're equating ourselves with so ergo sum, it'll work for us because we've told you we're the same as those'. ...and other apologetics. It was founded by former GOP politician from the Reagan era, Gregg Cunningham, and now hosts the free speech of he and his like minded colleagues. Note the Canadian crossover in staff.

There is another gossipy irony in that, despite their aims, CBR are derided on the 'net by the Army of God's Dan Holman as being too pacifistic in their unwillingness to commit violence and too willing to sue others who don't want to pay copyright on Cunningham's galleries of photos used on all the trucks etc. (the claim is, as unlegimitately sourced as it is, that he paid an abortionist to photograph surgical remains).  I suppose there's a morbid comfort that CBR settles for psychological shock and awe.

PS: Did anyone else know there is an analogue of Facebook called Prolifebook?

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Thanks for the links to the CCBR site. It's interesting to see both sides of the debate. I don't think it's as hyper-dramatic as you painted it--if those pictures are real (whether "out of context" or not), it seems to me that it'd be hard not to be dramatic..

Maybe their tactics aren't crazy. If enough people see those, they'll start asking questions for sure, no?

fern hill said...

This looks like a CCBR agent/troll, no?

Overly sincere, seemingly reasonable. . .

To answer your (sincere) question, Anon, people have had their faces shoved into mobile fetal gore/pr0n for ages and all it does is make them go 'yuck' or go get a hot dog.

But thanks for stopping by.

Anonymous said...

Honestly, annoying, two extremists groups battling one another in an online battleground. Each, preaching to their own choir, pissing off the odd 'enemy' who is 'brave' enough to cross 'the line' into enemy territory (one another's website, ooooohh, scary)...

Overly Sincere VS. Overly Insincere

What the hell happened to plain old 'Sincere'. Seems no one here possesses it, Pro-whatever the heck you are... How did I end up reading this sh!t anyway?!

Thanks virtual reality for introducing me to wasted time.

Sincerely,

Sincere

fern hill said...

@Anonymous at 10:11 (Same Anonymous?) So sorry we wasted your time. But then you got your revenge. I just wasted mine in reading your comment.

But thank you for wasting MORE time in writing it.

Niles said...

I can see folks at CCBR are watching eagerly for links to their site.

Nony 1 at least is attempting the role of reasonable concern troll, if missing the barn on what I mean about dramatics. A hot dog on a plate with ketchup is emotionally dramatic if it's filmed and soundtracked with skill. I personally have to wonder if the woman owning the pair of thighs and vagina seen in the close-up camera shot into which a surgical tool is being inserted over and over gave permission for her body to be displayed in gore voyeurism like this. But then, the director of CCBR has been quoted in print as to how the sensibilities of born children don't trump her right to expose them to unparented views of manipulated photos in their mailboxes, so I doubt the people at CCBR care about any other born person not following their dictates.

People ask questions about surgical termination to pregnancies and science has answered and is answering them, but so long as the answers are not to the liking of people wanting to control women's sexuality as religious SIN resulting in Hellfire, that doesn't count for much. CCBR and its parent corp are overt sectarian religiousity intent on imposing their flavour of sex and women negative religiosity on all of human society. They state outright they will not be satisfied until there is no recourse for all pregnancies but full term or 'natural' death of fetus and/or mother. Which means no exceptions for medical condition or rape conceived pregnancy, let alone a woman's private decision. Should they get that, they will then exert other controls over women's autonomy.

They patently decree a problem and then 'graciously' offer a cure that fuels their sect's authority and its definition of "Natural Law".

Nony 2 is...incoherent sputtering that seems to be attempting for the Fallacy of the Middle Ground but blows the landing in resorting to Fail on 'net humour, so...pretty average for the internets.

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