Latest US Opinion Poll - Trend showing opposition to abortion continues

Gallup’s 2010 Values and Belief’s poll carried out in May 2010 has confirmed that opposition to abortion in the US has grown in recent years.

The opinion poll found that 50% of people polled said they regarded abortion as ‘morally unacceptable’, while only 38% said they regarded it as ‘morally acceptable’, a gap of 12%. Fewer women than men (36% to 41%) said they considered abortion is morally acceptable. Holding abortion to be morally acceptable is now a minority view in the States.

But is this just a polling hiccup or a trend? Interpreting the findings for Gallup, Lydia Saad recalled that ‘in nearly all readings on this question since 1995, and each survey from 2003 to 2008, more Americans called themselves pro-choice than pro-life.’ When, however, this year’s result, is taken together with two taken last year, Ms Saad says, ‘it represents the third consecutive time Gallup has found more Americans taking the pro-life than pro-choice position on this measure since May 2009, suggesting a real change in public opinion.’

Support for abortion ‘legal in any circumstances’ falling in all age groups since 1990

Support for abortion being ‘legal under any circumstances’ has been falling since 1990 in all age groups. Among 18-29 year olds, it has dropped by 12% from 36% to 24% since 1990. Among 30-49 year olds, it has dropped by 7% from 34% to 17% since 1990. Among 50-64 year olds, it has dropped by 2% from 28% to 26% since 1990. And 65 year olds and over, it has dropped by 9% from 25% 60 16% since 1990.

This suggests that the age cohorts that sought and saw abortion on demand legalised in Roe v. Wade are clinging to it most, whereas the older people who never really bought into that are ever less supportive of it, and the younger generation are now less supportive of it than the now-ageing abortion-on-demand generation.

What do these results mean?

The law on abortion in the US was determined by the Supreme Court in Roe v. Wade and in effect it involves abortion being ‘legal in any circumstances’. That is the significance of that question in the Gallup poll. It is in effect asking people do they support the law as defined by the Supreme Court in Roe v. Wade. And the poll findings show the most people do not. Most people favour abortion being allowed in some cases, but nowhere near as widely as the Supreme Court allows. In the words of Lydia Saad, on behalf of Gallup, “On the one hand, the majority of Americans do not want to see Roe v. Wade overturned, and think abortion should be legal in at least a few circumstances. On the other, most Americans favor legal restrictions on abortion that go way beyond current law.”

But they surely mean more than this. A majority now regard abortion as morally unacceptable and only a minority see it as morally acceptable. The number who see themselves as pro-life is slowly edging ahead of those who see themselves as pro-choice. And the number who support the Roe v. Wade regime of abortion being legal in any circumstances is shrinking while the number who believe abortion should be illegal in any circumstances is increasing.

There is a growing disconnect between the law and the majority. And this means that moves to bring American abortion law into line with what most people want are likely to find a resonance and traction in the public domain.

But any such democratic recalibration is likely to be delayed by another disconnect, that between the news and entertainment mainstream in the US. In his article on the poll results, ‘Gallup’s Pro-Life America: When will our media reflect America on abortion?’ William McGurn comments, “If there is one extraordinary fact here, it is this: notwithstanding a pro-choice orthodoxy that dominates our film, our television, our press and our colleges and universities, strong moral qualms about abortion have not gone away...Over all, Gallup’s findings about Americans and abortion reflect less a political prescription than a sensibility. Apart from talk radio or the religious media, however, it’s a sensibility almost entirely lacking in our news and entertainment world. So the next time you watch the pro-life community dismissed as a fringe element, ask yourself – who’s really out of touch with the American people here?” (Wall Street Journal, 1st June 2010)

Pro Life Campaign welcomes reduction in abortion rate

The latest Irish abortion figures released today by the British Department of Health* show another reduction in the number of Irish women travelling to Britain for abortion.

In 2009, 4,422 Irish women travelled to Britain for abortions, down from 4,600 for the previous year. It is the eighth consecutive year that Irish abortions have declined after more than a decade of upward trends.

Commenting on the latest figures, Dr Ruth Cullen of the Pro-Life Campaign said:

The Pro-Life Campaign welcomes the downward trend in Ireland's abortion rate.

Some have suggested the reduction in abortions may be as a result of more Irish women opting for abortions in other European countries. But this is purely anecdotal as there is no statistical evidence to back up these claims. Holland is often mentioned as a country where more Irish women may increasingly travel for abortions but the official Dutch figures in recent years show little or no change in the number of abortions on foreign nationals.

Groups advocating abortion in Ireland claim that we need to introduce abortion here to “confront the reality of crisis pregnancy.” This attitude completely ignores the humanity of the unborn child and the latest peer reviewed research showing the negative consequences of abortion for women. Rather than seek to have abortion introduced in Ireland, we should see the latest reduction in the abortion rate as very encouraging and work together to ensure this downward trend continues.

Ireland’s abortion rate is now 4.4 per 1,000 female residents aged 15-44 where Britain’s is 17.5.

*Statistical Bulletin, Summary Abortion Statistics, England and Wales: 2009 (Published 25/05/10)

Sign the Stop Gendercide Now Petition - Help end the lethal bias against baby girls

100 million baby girls are missing - and the number is rising. They were aborted or killed at birth. Why? Because of a preference for baby boys.

It is a human rights violation on a massive scale perhaps the most widespread form of violent anti-female discrimination in the world today.

The mission of Stop Gendercide Now is to highlight the fact that so many baby girls have disappeared through abortion, infanticide, or neglect and to work for political change to remedy this.

By signing the Stop Gendercide Now Petition, you’ll be joining others in sending a strong message to the leaders of countries like China and India, which have deplorable records in defending the rights of baby girls, born and unborn. Your voice can really make a difference.

The number of baby girls’ lives lost through gendercide has risen sharply as cultural pressures against the birth of baby girls are reinforced by harsh inhumane traditions, coercive population control policies as well as political ideologies.

As a result of this, 100 million baby girls who should have been born have been aborted, killed or left to die. It is a human rights violation on a massive scale.

Boy-preference leading to dramatically fewer baby girls being born and surviving is concentrated primarily in China but also in India and other countries.

The mass destruction of girls has produced a systemic gender imbalance in whole populations for example; there are more unmarried young men in China than the entire population of young men in America.

The Stop Gendercide Now Petition puts pressure on the governments of countries with significant sex ratio imbalances:

- To introduce measures to ensure that the killing, fatal neglect or abandonment of baby girls because they are girls is ended.

- To carry out and publish an annual audit giving the sex ratio, the measures put in place to address it, and the progress or otherwise of these measures.

The Stop Gendercide Now Petition will also be copied to the Secretary General of the United Nations calling on the UN to adopt a meaningfully proactive leadership role in ending the horrific practice of signalling out baby girls for abortion and infanticide.

Many steps can be taken. Initiatives can be developed to encourage education for girls: reform of laws and customs that exclude or disadvantage daughters in property inheritance; facilitation of women’s participation in all dimensions of public life; requiring family planning officials, midwives and hospitals to publish the birth sex ratios, and reward advances towards the normal balance of girls to boys.

To read about Stop Gendercide Now and to sign the Petition click here

To join this Cause on Facebook click here

To visit the Stop Gendercide Now blogspot click here

Baby boy who survived abortion left to die in Italian Hospital

In ancient Rome, a newborn baby unwanted because of disability or otherwise was legally allowed to be disposed of by exposure as res vacantes, an unwanted thing.

 

Often they were left in the Velabrum, a busy street in the middle of the oil and cheese markets or at the columna lactaria in the Forum Olitorium.

In modern Europe, of course, such things would never happen. Certainly not. Nowadays when we are exposing a child born after an abortion has failed to kill them, they are abandoned exposed in a hospital. Much more civilised.

In southern Italy, last month, an abortion was carried out on a mother, pregnant for the first time, after a prenatal scan suggested he might be disabled. The baby boy, born at 22 weeks, despite the abortion procedure, was left to die by the doctors in the Rossano Calabria Hospital.

He was found 20 hours later by the hospital chaplain still alive wrapped in a sheet, his umbilical cord still attached, still moving and breathing. The priest raised the alarm and the baby was moved to the intensive neonatal care unit in a nearby hospital, but died there the next day.

This is the second case in three years in Italy of a baby aborted at 22 weeks because of suspected disability who survived the abortion living for 3 days.

 

Italy’s abortion 1978 law allows abortion on demand for the first three months of pregnancy but allow it on the grounds of suspected disability in the second three months, but its infanticide law imposes a legal obligation on doctors to attempt to preserve the life of a child who survives abortion. In England, however, there is no time limit at all for abortions where disability is suspected. They can be aborted right up to birth.

Since the purpose of abortion is the deliberate and direct procuring of the destruction of the life of the baby, the doctors expose babies who survive so that they will die.

Since medical ethics require that a patient be informed about the nature of the procedure to which they are to be subjected and consent to it. Are women considering abortion on the grounds of suspected disability informed by their doctor that the abortion involves inducing the birth and that if their baby survives the doctors will be hiding it away and exposing it so that it will die for lack of due care. Are the mothers asked to consent to this protocol of exposure without care where a baby is born alive after an abortion?

The Confidential Enquiry into Maternal and Child Health, 2007 commissioned by the UK Government, found that 66 infants survived NHS termination attempts in hospitals in England and Wales during 2005.

Instead of dying during the abortion procedure as intended, they survived, able to breathe unaided. They were exposed without medical care, left to die, some living for half an hour, one for ten hours.

 

The only way to step back from this horror show is to reaffirm the first principle of medical ethics – primum non nocere – first do no harm. Do not deliberately destroy human life in the womb or after birth. Once we step away from that principle of respect for life we find ourselves sliding back down to the columna lactaria in the Forum Olitorium.

Time and Newsweek Magazines highlight 'waning' influence of pro-choice movement

‘Remember Roe!’, an article by Sarah Kliff in Newsweek (21st April 2010), paints a dramatic picture of a greying abortion rights leadership in the US racked by a growing anxiety about who will take over the torch from them when they retire.

One of the strongest abortion rights groups in the US is the National Association for the Repeal of Abortion Laws (NARAL), founded in 1969.

Its current president, Nancy Keenan, described in the article her response to the huge crowds flocking to the March for Life in Washington DC this January - ‘my gosh, they are so young - there are so many of them and they are so young.’

There were 400,000 at the March for Life. Two months earlier, the pro-abortionists held a rally against Congressman Bart Stupak’s proposed abortion opt outs in the Health Care Bill and only 1,300 turned up. Over 300-times as many activists came to the March for Life as bothered to turn up to oppose restrictions on abortion in Obama’s health-care package.

In her Newsweek piece, Sarah Kliff says that the difficulties encountered by pro-choice activists during the recent US health care debate marks ‘the day when they became aware of their waning influence in Washington.’

The Newsweek article said that research carried out by the National Association for the Repeal of Abortion Laws found that 51% of under 30s opposed to abortion see it as a ‘very important voting issue’. Only 26% of young people who support abortion see it as a very important voting issue. Their research found a similar though lesser difference among older voters.

This means that it is a live political issue for the pro-life voters especially the young, whereas it is not a hot issue for those who are pro-abortion. So the pro-life activists are pushing an open political door that the pro-abortion activists are not holding shut.

In a separate article in the current Time magazine (3rd May 2010) Terry O’Neill, President of the pro-abortion National Organization for Women, concedes in passing that those on the pro-life side ‘are winning the abortion fight.’

Her intuition was reflected in a number of polls in the last year suggesting that a tipping point may have been reached in American public opinion with the pro-abortion view on the brink of slipping into a minority position as the trend edges in a pro-life direction.

Polls by Gallup and Pew have found rises in the numbers taking a pro-life position and falls in the numbers taking a pro-abortion position. Gallup’s poll exactly a year ago, found ‘51% of Americans calling themselves “pro-life” on the issue of abortion and 42% “pro-choice”.’

Gallup says “this is the first time a majority of US adults have identified themselves as pro-life since Gallup began asking this question in 1995.”

At a time when pro-choice campaigners should be exulting in their current successes – the election of the most pro-abortion politician in America as President, control of Congress by the Democrats, pro-abortion since 1980 - they are instead keenly aware that things are not going their way. Without becoming complacent, pro-life supporters should take heart from these encouraging and uplifting developments.

News corporations impose pro-abortion newspeak on reporters

US National Public Radio has just issued a mandatory censorship protocol for reporters.

They are no longer allowed to use the word ‘pro-life’ to those campaigning for the right to life of unborn children. They have to call them ‘abortion rights opponents’.

 

In describing those who support abortion, reporters have been forbidden to use the phrase ‘pro-abortion.’ They may, naturally, describe those who oppose abortion as ‘anti-abortion’.

 

Similar thought-control policies have been adopted by major US news corporations Associated Press, Washington Post, New York Times, Philadelphia Inquirer, CNN, CBS and NBC.

Dictats on what words reporters are allowed to use? Prescribed words? Forbidden words? Sound familiar?

This kind of ideological censorship was chillingly diagnosed by George Orwell in his final novel, 1984. The totalitarian society seeks to suppress and eventually eliminate dissent from the officially desired thoughts by gradually imposing a new obligatory official language called Newspeak so that dissenting opinion, not only cannot be articulated in a publicly approved way, but, in the end, cannot even be thought privately.

 

As Orwell put it, the purpose was not only to provide a medium of expression for the ‘proper’ worldview and mental habits, ‘but to make all other modes of thought impossible’ – it was intended that when Newspeak.had been adopted for once and for all, an unorthodox thought ‘should be literally unthinkable.’ This was done, he says, ‘chiefly by the eliminating undesirable words and by stripping such words as remained of unorthodox meanings.’ The imposed words, Orwell says, ‘had been deliberately constructed for political purposes’, that is, they ‘were intended to impose a desirable mental attitude upon the person using them.’

What a terrible irony – major news organizations in the free world are imposing Newspeak on their reporters.

Now we have major news outlets in the free world succumbing to the ideology of abortion rights which renders the unborn child what in Orwellian Newspeak presciently calls an ‘unperson.’

In Nazi Germany, gleichschaltung was the process by which one institution after another conformed to the totalitarian ideology in power, sometimes without even having to be compelled - they just saw the way the wind was blowing and got in line voluntarily.

The fact that major news institutions in the US are engaging in a self-imposed pro-abortion gleichschaltung is hard not to read it as a move of desperation on the part of the pro-abortion ideological elite.

They sense public opinion gradually shifting from majority pro-abortion to majority pro-life. They see this reflected in polls showing a majority in the US for the first time in recent years describing itself as pro-life rather than pro-abortion.

 

They see one movie after another exploring unexpected pregnancies in a positive light and showing ways forward, movies like Waitress, Knocked Up, Juno, Precious and Leonera, and on the other hand, the even more radical emergence of movies showing the dark side of abortion, movies like 4 Months, 3 Weeks & 2 Days.

They see women who’ve been through abortion coming forward together asking for their experience to be heard and heeded.

They’re losing the debate, so they’re changing tack. ‘If we can’t win the debate, let’s not have the debate, let’s suppress it’, they seem to be saying.

If news outlets opt to turn themselves into a pro-abortion echo-chamber – talking to one another in a fake language designed to pretend that abortion is not destroying a human life - they will lose half the public.

With the click of a mouse, the days of this kind of censorship are well and truly numbered.

Groups pressure Lancet editor to delay publication of maternal mortality research

Lancet, a leading medical journal, has just published a new study of international maternal mortality rates, which finds that the World Bank, the WHO and UNICEF statistics for maternal mortality were over 100,000 too high due to reporting and methodological problems.

But in a corrupt and brazen, and thankfully, unsuccessful, attempt to subordinate science to politics, ‘advocacy groups’ lobbied the editor of Lancet, Dr Richard Horton to delay the publication of the new study until after upcoming meetings of the UN Commission on Population and Development, the Women Deliver Conference and the next UN Assembly, which are scheduled to discuss maternal mortality.

What’s bugging these ‘advocates’? Dr Donna Harrison, President of the American Academy of Pro-Life Obstetricians and Gynaecologists, said of the new Lancet article:

"The study uses the best statistical methods currently available and clearly demonstrates that worldwide legalization of abortion is unnecessary to bring about significant decreases in maternal mortality. The American Academy of Pro-Life Obstetricians and Gynaecologists encourages the UN member nations to continue to develop even better statistical information by improving the identification of maternal mortality causality, especially induced abortion related mortality, which is most often underreported or misreported".

Where the UN bodies have been pushing for ‘safe’ and ‘legal’ abortion as the key to bringing improving maternal mortality rates, the new Lancet article does not. It found key causal factors improving maternal mortality – falling pregnancy rates in some countries, higher per capita income, higher education rates for women, and increasing availability of basic medical care, and in particular, ‘skilled birth attendants’.

You can read more about the new research in the New York Times here

You can access the Lancet article here