Several anti-abortion groups performed a series of live ultrasounds on stage in the Congressional Auditorium on Thursday to "covert people into opposing abortion" —and for all you fans of watching live ultrasounds! Woo! Who brought lighters?
The campaign invited all 535 members of Congress to witness pregnant women stepping up on stage, one after another, to have their live ultrasounds projected onto a giant screen and described for the audience. Only four lawmakers showed up, since the event happened to coincide with House floor debates on a major anti-abortion bill.
Republican Presidential candidate Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-Minn.) sent her legislative assistant Renee Doyle to the event to promote the mandatory ultrasound bill Bachmann introduced last week, which would force women in the early stages of pregnancy to have a physically invasive ultrasound procedure and listen to the fetal heartbeat before they can legally consent to having an abortion.
"The beauty of this bill is that the [ultrasound] image will speak for itself, and once a mother sees the image there's an immediate connection," Doyle told the audience. "And anecdotally and statistically, you can see that a mother will choose life, and when a mother chooses life, she also, her heart changes too, and when her heart changes she becomes a proponent of life."
This is so great because we really needed yet another person implying that women are so stupid that they don't realize what an abortion actually is until they hear the heartbeat! Without that it's a very easy decision that women take as lightly as whether or not to eat blueberry or strawberry yogurt at lunch.
Some doctors who perform abortions argue that the bill is based on a false premise. Women already have the opportunity to see an ultrasound image of the fetus or listen to the heartbeat if they choose to do so, and most of them walk into the clinic knowing what an abortion means and having made up their minds about whether to have one.
"Women are completely aware that their embryos can develop into babies," Dr. Nancy Stanwood, an obstetrician and board member of the health advocacy group Physicians for Reproductive Choice and Health, told HuffPost. "They know what it takes to be a good mother and they know when they're ready. Showing a woman the heartbeat doesn't change the situation that caused her to choose abortion in the first place."
Well. said. The problem is that, once again, the choice is being taken away completely as these anti-abortion groups band together "to push mandatory ultrasound bills similar to Bachmann's in all 50 states."
If you're interested in attending the creepily titled Voices From The Womb tour, check your local listings. They'll be at "schools, churches, state capitols and public events across the country to perform live ultrasounds for anyone who will watch and listen."
"We invite the pro-choice community to come out of their caves, stop believing that the world is flat and embrace modern medicine and science," said Rev. Patrick J. Mahoney, Director of the Christian Defense Coalition, in a statement. "Let us work together for a world in which human rights are given to all."
Earlier: Fetus To "Testify" In Support Of Ohio Heartbeat Bill
Anti-Abortion Groups Perform Live Ultrasounds On Capitol Hill [HuffPo]
DISCUSSION
I chose to have an abortion when I was seventeen, and before the procedure I had to have an ultrasound.
I was only about a month or so along, and I was very confident in the choice I had made (having my parents support helped tremendously). No-one forced me to look at any screen or picture, and there was no sound. At that point, though, my mind had been made up enough that it wouldn't have mattered either way.
The notion that I would have changed my mind at the last second because I saw some microscopic ball of cells is a bit thin at the least, insulting at the very most. Am I that simple and fragile that you could influence me so easily? No, and neither are most women.