This does sort of raise the question of WHAT will strict anti-abortion people believe?! Now I feel like setting up a blog claiming my anencephaly baby "miraculously" lived to age 1, grew a normal brain, and is running for student council (please donate to her campaign!).
This was just a despicable act, all the way around. I wouldn't go so far as to send her hate mail, but goddamned if I'd waste a single second feeling sorry for someone who TOOK MONEY from caring, albeit probably naive, people. I don't think she's given anyone reason to believe a word she says -- I'm not sure I'd even buy that the guy in the room was really her father. What a wretched human being.
I also wouldn't be too hard on the folks who were suckered in by Beushausen. It sounds like they honestly wanted to help her and thought they were doing the right thing.
If you pick through some of the comments in the blogs, it gets even weirder. I guess some of the folks who knew Beccah and believed her story are displeased with the Chicago Tribute article because of how glossy and cutesy it is.
According to the blogs I've been picking through, folks who claim to know Beccah say that she actually never was a social worker, that she'd never actually lost a child (she'd had a miscarriage, which is also a terrible experience, and I can understand why someone would have a difficult time grieving that loss.)
The blogs also say that instead of writing "for a few friends," Beccah blogged and Twittered pretty voraciously, ostensibly trying to drum up a great deal of support.
There's also a sentiment among the folks involved that helping Beccah was not meant to be a pro-life "statement." They just thought she was a woman in need, and they extended their prayers and well-wishes to her. The Flying Spaghetti Monster himself only knows what Beccah was thinking.
Why yes, I do love Internet drama! How did you guess?
Munchausen by Internet. When I was pregnant and reading all the prego blogs, a woman faked a pregnancy and a miscarriage after supposedly falling off a stepladder in her kitchen. The support and love and tears and sympathy POURED all over her until I and a few other posters noted that things simply did NOT add up in her story. But when we went to point these things out we were LAMBASTED and ultimately kicked off of the grouplist.
This was over 9 years ago and I am still pissed about it. I understand that perhaps the woman had some form of mental illness, but other people willfully defending her, even after it was clear that she was bullshitting everyone was just so odd and wrong.
@nellicat: A woman who claimed to work for a record label and dealt with big name rock stars was exposed as a fraud on a UBB I frequented several years ago. Someone pointed out something that didn't add up, and she vanished. It was very disconcerting, if only because I couldn't imagine the mindset that would lead one to construct a fake online life like that.
@nellicat: The same thing happened on a prego message board I posted on last year. A woman lied about being pregnant after like 6 miscarriages. She claimed the baby (due in August) was born in early July, lived a few hours and died.
She was "pregnant" again by October and then claimed that the baby had some kind of immune disorder (which a doctor on the board said can't really be detected in utero). She finally got found out after she claimed that baby was born premature and died. She used pictures pulled off other sites and was found out. I was off the board by then but a friend alerted me and that was one huge shitstorm. I was just glad that there wasn't a real person who had suffered all of thsoe losses, and assumed she was mentally ill.
@WantToTouchtheWahine: I said something similar below. But perhaps it's better to say: she deserves all of the ill-will directed her way. I doubt it will make her any more sane, or those who have lost any less sad, or the rest of us any more protected in our right to choose, to send actual hate mail.
"It's tempting of course to use this as a chance to take an easy bash at anti-choice, and revel in anything that makes them look foolish, but frankly, I'm just sad for this woman."
I'm pro-choice, but thank you, Sadie, for pointing this out. This woman does not represent anyone except herself.
@Cunning_Linguist: Jesus Camp is a creepy-ass movie. And yeah, between this debacle and the Dr. Tiller murder, pro-lifers (whatever that means, I've always hated that term) are NOT looking good.
One of my good friends doesn't believe in abortion (needless to say, we disagree), but she is angered with stuff like this because it makes all of them look like terrible people. And though I may disagree with her on this, she's one of the kindest people I know.
From the looks of things in the Chicago Tribune comments section, this woman isn't even a social worker. I don't think this is the case of a poor, mentally ill woman who "took things too far." She sounds like a serious scammer.
This woman is no better than people who claim to have cancer to get a piece of the fundraising. She needs some serious help, and she needs to give all the people she defrauded out of money all of it back. Once she started getting things in the mail and accepting them, she crossed not only a moral, but a legal line.
An apt comparison to Ashley Todd, Sadie -- and a sad reality that many in our nation harbor so much anger and fear (and have such narrow and immutable worldviews) that it's all too easy to create frauds such as this.
Also, I just looked at the Reborns website and I need someone to TALK ME DOWN. Seriously. Some of them have "breathing mechanisms" so their chests rise and fall. They come with diapers and onesies and gaaaah.
@TawdryHepburn: I don't know if this helps, but they use them on TV shows and movies when it would be inappropriate to have an actual baby on screen. So they do have a purpose besides being creepy!
That being said, I wrapped a show once that had one of these, and having to lock the trunk it was stored in was the weirdest thing ever...
06/13/09
I'm sorry. I couldn't resist temptation. Yeah she needs help blah blah but come on - this is delicious.
06/12/09
Sorry, I got nothing.
06/12/09
06/12/09
06/12/09
06/12/09
06/12/09
06/12/09
According to the blogs I've been picking through, folks who claim to know Beccah say that she actually never was a social worker, that she'd never actually lost a child (she'd had a miscarriage, which is also a terrible experience, and I can understand why someone would have a difficult time grieving that loss.)
The blogs also say that instead of writing "for a few friends," Beccah blogged and Twittered pretty voraciously, ostensibly trying to drum up a great deal of support.
There's also a sentiment among the folks involved that helping Beccah was not meant to be a pro-life "statement." They just thought she was a woman in need, and they extended their prayers and well-wishes to her. The Flying Spaghetti Monster himself only knows what Beccah was thinking.
Why yes, I do love Internet drama! How did you guess?
06/12/09
This was over 9 years ago and I am still pissed about it. I understand that perhaps the woman had some form of mental illness, but other people willfully defending her, even after it was clear that she was bullshitting everyone was just so odd and wrong.
06/12/09
06/12/09
She was "pregnant" again by October and then claimed that the baby had some kind of immune disorder (which a doctor on the board said can't really be detected in utero). She finally got found out after she claimed that baby was born premature and died. She used pictures pulled off other sites and was found out. I was off the board by then but a friend alerted me and that was one huge shitstorm. I was just glad that there wasn't a real person who had suffered all of thsoe losses, and assumed she was mentally ill.
06/12/09
It INFURIATES me that anyone would fake a pregnancy and birth, for any reason or platform at all.
Yes, this girl seems to have some mental health issues. But she deserves all the hate mail she gets.
06/12/09
06/12/09
I'm pro-choice, but thank you, Sadie, for pointing this out. This woman does not represent anyone except herself.
06/12/09
06/13/09
One of my good friends doesn't believe in abortion (needless to say, we disagree), but she is angered with stuff like this because it makes all of them look like terrible people. And though I may disagree with her on this, she's one of the kindest people I know.
06/13/09
06/12/09
06/12/09
I don't understand how pro-lifers can be so self-righteous in their religious beliefs but then do things that are so disgusting.
I highly doubt that God approves of lying about such serious matters.
06/12/09
06/12/09
Also, I just looked at the Reborns website and I need someone to TALK ME DOWN. Seriously. Some of them have "breathing mechanisms" so their chests rise and fall. They come with diapers and onesies and gaaaah.
06/12/09
That being said, I wrapped a show once that had one of these, and having to lock the trunk it was stored in was the weirdest thing ever...