Truthiness on the March

Wow! The notion that crisis pregnancy centers, aka fake clinics, be forced to tell the truth is catching on! In Texas, of all places.

On the Austin City Council's agenda for its April 8 meeting is a proposed ordinance that would require so-called "crisis pregnancy centers" to post a sign to notify consumers that they do not provide or make referrals for either abortion or contraceptive services.

If the ordinance is enacted, Austin would become the second city in the nation to provide the consumer alert for clients visiting CPCs – unlicensed centers that provide pregnancy tests and pregnancy "counseling," but do not offer any medical services. "We are simply requiring limited service pregnancy centers to disclose what is factual and true about the services they offer," Council member Bill Spelman, who is sponsoring the ordinance, said in a press release.

Austin seems to be a pretty progressive place. It's not only the state capital but also a college town. It has been named the second-best place to live, the best college town, and the greenest city in the US.

But this initiative towards truthiness is expected to get some push-back.

It seems likely that the proposal will spark some angry feedback – CPC supporters, most staunch foes of abortion, have long been loud, both in the city (as it was with the Central Health board of directors meeting last year during a debate over whether to approve $450,000 in contracts to provide abortion care to low-income and uninsured women through the county's Medical Assistance Program), and at the Capitol (witness the perennial marathon hearings before the House State Affairs Committee whenever the topic of abortion arises).

Ah, yes, the great state of Texas.

Indeed, in 2005 lawmakers took $5 million that would otherwise go to providers of traditional family-planning services for low-income women to create (via a budget rider) the new "Alternatives to Abortion" program, as a way to directly fund CPCs and task them with "promoting childbirth." In a series of articles, the Chronicle found that the money hasn't exactly done much to provide women with any real services – aside from referring them to other state and federal programs, and providing a nice annual raise for Vincent Friedewald, the executive director of the Texas Pregnancy Care Network, which administers the state contract.

Typical. Just like the 'abstinence-only' sex ed caper, a boondoggle of gigantic proportions, benefiting nobody but the fetus fetishists lining their pockets. According to the series, over two years exactly eleven (11) women were helped by the program, while thousands of low-income women were denied basic healthcare.

We keep asking: What's the big deal with telling the truth? That's all these regulations are aiming to do -- force public organizations to tell the truth about what services they offer.

Or are they? LifeShite proposes two reasons -- in the same piece -- for those dastardly forcers of truthtelling.

Reason 1:

The goal is to besmirch the work the centers do in helping women find alternatives and pregnancy support.

Besmirch???11!? Quick! Hie thee to a fainting couch! (And besides, how does truthtelling besmirch anyone but former liars caught out?)

Reason 2:

With pregnancy centers providing women legitimate help and alternatives, abortion businesses are experiencing a loss in profit as the number of abortions decline.

Even though nothing is offered in evidence for this supposed loss, let's consider how forcing fake clinics to tell the truth benefits the abortion business's bottom line.

A willingly pregnant woman finds her way to a fake clinic, reads the sign informing her that she won't be able to be referred for an abortion there, and what? Decides that, dammit, having an abortion is her right and she's gonna go get herself one RIGHT NOW?

Idiotic. They don't have a leg to stand on and they know it.

The Demise of Another Catholic Racket

Gee, with all the crap flying around the Catlick Church, one would think they wouldn't have the time or energy for this nonsense:

The Archdiocese of Baltimore filed a federal lawsuit against the city Monday, saying a first-in-the-nation ordinance regulating pregnancy counseling centers violates the rights of church members to freedom of speech and religion.

Archbishop Edwin F. O'Brien said the law, which took effect in January, "is hurting the good people volunteering and giving so much of their resources to come to the help of pregnant women." It requires the centers, some of which are supported by the Catholic Church, to post signs stating that they do not refer women for abortion or birth control.

Well, they don't. So, like, what's the problem with a little truth in advertising?

As we crowed reported here, some good hard work by Maryland Planned Parenthood convinced Baltimore's city councillors that CPCs do more harm than good to vulnerable women, starting with pretending that they are real women's clinics that might perform or refer for abortion or birth control.

Then they continue with a bunch of tactics intended to prevent a woman from getting an abortion by scaring her with lies, threatening her chances of getting into hevvin, guilt-tripping and manipulating her, and, very often, running her around with appointments and more appointments until it's too bloody late for her to get a relatively inexpensive termination.

The archbishop doesn't want the sciencey-facty-researchy people messing with his racket.

Or, as Jodi Jacobson at RH Reality Check sums up:

Forcing medical professionals to perform and forcing women to comply with unnecessary and costly counseling and "medical" procedures; forcing women to endure unnecessary waiting periods, and suffer through medically inaccurate and/or outright false information not to mention other restrictions is ok. Treating women of all ages as juveniles is also ok.

Requiring CPCs to provide accurate truth-in-advertising about the legal services it does not provide to avoid ensnaring women into a system that will lie to them is not ok?

Who's compelling who?

By the way, the city solicitor expected this move and is confident the law will stand, comparing it to a requirement that businesses display their hours of operation.

Sanity and Decency Winnin' a Little

Yee-haw! Truth in advertising, indeed. For the first time in the US, an elected body has decided to force the manipulative Xian Talibaners at so-called crisis pregnancy centers/centres to stop lying. Bravo, Baltimore!

Sadly, though, they won't have to post signs like this.




And dig the margin by which it passed.

The bill, which passed the council by a 12-3 vote, awaits a decision by Mayor Sheila Dixon, who could sign it, veto it or allow it to become law without her signature. Dixon supports abortion rights but has not indicated whether she backs the plan.

So much for those wacky polls claiming that opinion is swinging towards forced-pregnancy in the USA. Heck, even David Frum calls it the 'pro-life delusion'.

Kudos also to Pro-Choice Maryland and Crisis Pregnancy Center Watch.

And if you missed it, go here to read the testimony of a former CPC volunteer who describes their practice of targetting 'abortion vulnerable' women (i.e. those considering abortion) and ignoring the real needs of poor women who want to continue their pregnancies.

May there be many more such successes.

A Moment of Truthiness

In 2008 I blogged at Birth Pangs about a bill taking on the lack of truthiness at fake pregnancy clinics.

The Maryland state senate is considering a bill that would require so-called Crisis Pregnancy Centers (CPCs) to issue a disclaimer stating that they are not required to provide accurate information. State Sen. Richard Madaleno Jr. proposed the bill following an investigative report by NARAL Pro-Choice Maryland on CPCs, which found that such centers provided factually incorrect information about abortion, were not open regarding their pro-life stance, and even lacked medical services in some cases.

(I gather it didn't pass.)

But the good pro-choice people of Maryland soldiered on, and now via RH Reality Check, we learn that the city of Baltimore is debating the same sort of legislation.

Advocates on both sides of the abortion debate filled Baltimore City Council chambers for a contentious hearing on legislation that would require pregnancy counseling clinics that do not provide abortion services to post signs indicating that policy.

The legislation would affect four centers, two of which are funded by the Roman Catholic Church. The centers provide adoption information and counseling, but do not perform abortions or issue contraceptives.

City Council President Stephanie C. Rawlings-Blake introduced the bill at the behest of Planned Parenthood, a pro-choice organization that hopes the Baltimore legislation will serve as a model for a national effort.

"This is a bill about truth in advertising," Rawlings-Blake said. "Crisis pregnancy centers provide good and charitable work. A simple sign insures everyone walking into a center knows what to expect."

It's called the Limited Service Pregnancy Center Disclaimers Bill. I like that, 'limited service' but unlimited lying.

Planned Parenthood is targetting city governments rather than state legislatures, figuring, probably correctly, that city folk are more liberal and sophisticated in their views on meddling in other people's decisions.

Obviously, we have nothing against these centres helping women who want to continue their pregnancies and who know what they're walking into.

But, funnily, 'counsellors' at these centres are taught to focus on the 'abortion vulnerable' -- women who are considering abortion. These women are offered all kinds of bribes to reject abortion.

A new blogger at Crisis Pregnancy Center Watch, Rosa, is a former counsellor and introduces herself here.

Our task in greeting new clients was to determine, on a scale from 1-10, how "abortion vulnerable" the woman is. That is, is she considering abortion, or did she come here because she's already chosen life and wants help with the new baby? If a woman was deemed not abortion vulnerable at all, they were often given nothing more than an opportunity to volunteer at the CPC itself, on top of whatever real job they actually had. They were paid in diapers, wet wipes, formula, some second-hand clothing. Nothing substantial. Certainly no prenatal care or anything like that. The abortion vulnerable women, however, they were offered the lot. High chairs, cribs, brand new clothing, even financial assistance for prenatal and pediatric care in rare cases! Doesn't that seem backwards? There are women who wanted to just have the abortion and be done with it, pay their $400 or whatever it is, and leave it behind. But they were getting what women who were struggling to make their choices should have had. I had many conversations with God about this, and with each one I became more convinced that what I was doing was not God's work at all.

Backwards indeed.

Good luck, Baltimore.