<p>I saw a post about the plane with the banner.</p>
<p>Was it a one day thing or has it been going on for a few days?</p>
<p>Their plan is to do it everyday until graduation. It’s from the CBR (Center for bioethical reform). They wrote a statement about what was going on at ND and asked for donations so that they could fly around pictures of dead fetuses. Disgusting if you ask me–and probably any other ND student you might talk to. Whether pro-choice or pro-life, I think the plane is one thing ND students can finally agree on in regards to the whole Obama/abortion/commencement debate–we’re annoyed and disgusted by the planes. </p>
<p>I’m not sure if Randal Terry is directly affiliated with the CBR, but his tactics are the same. If you can, search the Observer letters to the editor from Wednesday–there was one asking ND to condemn Randal Terry and another poking fun at whoever arranged for the plane. </p>
<p>The girl who wrote the letter about the plane said it perfectly 1). The plane really isn’t doing much and 2)Who the heck is paying for it and why isn’t the money going to something more useful.</p>
<p>I did from research and the CBR reported that it cost $350 and hour to fly the plane…oh yeah, and they directly blamed the pro-life students on campus for ND’s invitation to Obama- because we “didn’t do enough.” The CBR also criticized the crosses put up on South Quad to remember those aborted and the empty red envelope to Fr. Jenkins campaign. </p>
<p>In short, the people at CBR are a bunch of radicalist nut jobs and should just leave ND alone-they’re not doing anything other than annoyiing and embarassing us.</p>
<p>Unfortunately it seems the most immature protest has yet to come. Out of morbid curiosity I decided to check out the Westboro Baptist Church’s protest schedule, and I came across this wonderful diddly…</p>
<p>“Notre Dame Commencment - Obama Hates you, take U 2 Hell! E Angela Blvd & N Notre Dame Ave How appropriate that the biggest pedophile mill in the whole entire world would have Beast Obama speaking at their 2009 Commencement. We will be outside with some good words on our signs. No need to try to hide from the words, little spoiled figs. Ezekiel 8:7 ¶ And he brought me to the door of the court; and when I looked, behold a hole in the wall. 8 Then said he unto me, Son of man, dig now in the wall: and when I had digged in the wall, behold a door. 9 And he said unto me, Go in, and behold the wicked abominations that they do here. 10 So I went in and saw; and behold every form of creeping things, and abominable beasts, and all the idols of the house of Israel, pourtrayed upon the wall round about. 11 And there stood before them seventy men of the ancients of the house of Israel, and in the midst of them stood Jaazaniah the son of Shaphan, with every man his censer in his hand; and a thick cloud of incense went up. 12 Then said he unto me, Son of man, hast thou seen what the ancients of the house of Israel do in the dark, every man in the chambers of his imagery? for they say, The LORD seeth us not; the LORD hath forsaken the earth. That is YOU! AMEN!”</p>
<p>I went to the CBR website to see their statement. The abortion video that pops up is horific. I tried to look for their statement on the plane but had to close the site because the video was so overwhelming.</p>
<p>Now CBR will say that the video had the desired response. </p>
<p>I’m pro life and would argue that such a strong message turns off more people than it converts. The same types of videos could be shown of common surgeries that save lives. The same types of videos could be shown of EMT’s saving people lives in crushed cars.</p>
<p>Perhaps if everyone understood what actually happens in an abortion, even in an “easy” first trimester procedure, they would be less inclined to support a woman’s right to “choose.”<br>
Of course, there is a time and a place for such images, and they should not be displayed where young children can see them. But the argument that they should never be shown, to anyone, under any circumstances, is absurd. There are too many people out there who haven’t a clue what an abortion involves, and have been brainwashed by the “it’s just a clump of cells” propaganda spewed forth by the abortion industry.</p>
<p>Exactly: - I never said the images should never be shown. As you said “there is a time and place for everything”:</p>
<ol>
<li>Not being pulled behind a plane circling over a town of 100,000 people.</li>
<li>Not on the front page of a website where your trying to get a message out.</li>
</ol>
<p>Here is the statement so that you can avoid the website if you choose:
<a href=“http://www.abortionno.org/images/uploads/NotreDamePressRelease.pdf[/url]”>http://www.abortionno.org/images/uploads/NotreDamePressRelease.pdf</a></p>
<p>I am also pro-life, but these planes are doing nothing. That $350 they are spending every hour could be used to buy baby formula, clothes, and diapers for parents who couldn’t afford them otherwise or could be used to help arrange an adoption. The planes won’t stop Obama from coming to ND and even if they did, it wouldn’t save any lives. And they are doing little to convince ND students of anything. I think most people here are pro-life (even the liberals), but these tactics have done nothing for most ND students except make them want to avoid pro-life groups because they want to avoid the crazies.</p>
<p>I thought about the CBR’s argument that gross pictures can convince people. However, if they’re going to be convinced not to have an abortion from looking at the pictures, do you think they would not be convinced to have say, heart surgery, if they saw the blood and guts involved with that?</p>
<p>I only ask because I think that’s how a lot of pro-choice people see the abortion itself–merely as a surgery. So then shouldn’t it be just the same as any other surgery to them?</p>
<p>idk…what do you think?</p>
<p>oh, and I’m pro-life so correct me if I’m wrong on the way pro-choice people consider the actual abortion itself.</p>
<p>In discussions with friends I’ve found the best argument is to get into a discussion of when life starts. Once you get into the discussion you end up working your way backwards to conception as the most logical. Horrible pictures would end the discussion.</p>
<p>The difference between heart surgery and an abortion is that an abortion results in a dead baby, usually torn into pieces. Most people who call themselves pro-choice don’t want to acknowledge that reality, which is why they object to pictures of the aftermath of the abortion.<br>
Bernard Nathanson performed some 75,000 abortions, including one involving his own child. It was the advent of the sonogram that helped change his mind and heart. He then made the documentary The Silent Scream, which is a video depicting an ultrasound of an abortion (that is apparently available on the Internet). Nathanson was a secular Jew who recently converted to Catholicism, and who wrote “The Hand of God” about his conversion from a pro-choice abortionist to pro-life activist. It’s a very powerful read. </p>
<p>In discussions with friends, especially those who consider themselves pro-“choice,” I’ve found that most people would prefer to gloss over what actually happens in an abortion. That is the reason for all of the euphemisms – a woman’s right to “choose,” “reproductive rights,” the “termination” of a pregnancy, the removal of the "products of conception, etc. If those people refuse even to look at a picture of the “products of conception,” that should tell us something.</p>
<p>fair enough. I see where you’re coming from and it makes sense. But like you said…a time and a place.</p>
<p>If you’ve done someone in, it’s only natural to try to make the corpse disappear. Very unpleasant, and doesn’t reflect well on the doer-in. The problematic word here is “someone.” As Claremarie suggests, euphemism relies heavily on abstraction.</p>
<p>Ok so I thought some more. And like I said, it made sense. But then I thought…What about the whole “respect life” thing? We (meaning the pro-lifers) believe we can’t abort a baby because it is an actual person, an actual life. I struggle with figuring out how “respect life” and showing dead/bloody image of a person (which, let’s be honest, isn’t very respectful of their life) fit together.</p>
<p>How is it not “respectful” of the extremely brief life of an aborted child to show the image of her death, not as part of some morbid sensationalism, but to help convert the minds and hearts of those who are still convinced that an unborn child is just a clump of cells? Do you suppose that the unborn child would object to such a use of her image? </p>
<p>Granted, many people don’t really need to see such images in order to be convinced of the intrinsic evil of abortion (just as they don’t need to see graphic images of concentration camp victims in order to be convinced of the horrors of the Holocaust), but for those who do, these images can be extremely powerful. The difficulty, of course, is that with such public displays, everyone ends up seeing them.</p>