NEWS- Picket payday: Planned Parenthood one-ups protesters
Published March 1, 2007 in issue 0609 of the HooK.
By COURTENEY STUART [email protected]
"Save the baby," call the protesters in front of Planned Parenthood to a woman arriving in the center's Hydraulic Road parking lot. "We're praying for you!" they shout, and several make the sign of the cross.
It's 10am, warm and sunny, on Thursday, February 22, and a group of nearly two dozen men, women, and children have gathered on the sidewalk to make a statement. These members of various area Catholic churches don't carry the graphic posters that accompany some anti-abortion demonstrations. In fact, they say they're not here to protest abortion, but are instead holding a prayer vigil for the "sanctity of life."
Holding a nearly six-foot-tall painting of the Virgin Mary, they're hoping for a "conversion from the culture of death to the culture of life." Unwittingly, however, they're also helping raise money for the cause they oppose.
As two women emerge from the clinic carrying a large wooden sign, the vigil suddenly breaks up. Protesters quickly fold the Virgin Mary painting, and at least 15 of the 21 disperse, heading down the sidewalk away from the clinic as Planned Parenthood employee Becky Reid begins her speech.
"Good morning," Reid begins loudly. "I'd like to tell you about our program called Pledge-A-Picket."
The program is in its seventh year, Reid explains. Supporters of Planned Parenthood have pledged to donate a dollar for every picketer who shows up on any given day. Many Planned Parenthoods across the country are now using this tactic, and since it began locally in 2001, Planned Parenthood of the Blue Ridge has raised more than $100,000 as a direct result of protesters, Reid says.
All over America, abortion clinics are confronted with demonstrations outside their front doors. While many protests are peaceful and are protected speech under the First Amendment, there have been numerous cases in which abortion clinics and doctors have been targets of violence. Here in Charlottesville, a local man was involuntarily committed to a psychiatric hospital in late December after he left a message threatening to unleash his AK-47 on this same Planned Parenthood clinic.
Reid says Planned Parenthood respects the right of free speech but says she wants the clinic to be a "welcoming environment." Pledge-A-Picket seems to be working. Most of this day's protesters prepare to leave before Reid finishes her speech.
"So thank you," Reid concludes to the now smaller crowd, "for helping raise money for women who are in need of any of the healthcare services offered at Planned Parenthood."
"Does it help the women who die?" calls out Mary Ann Heerschap, here with four of her six children. "Planned Parenthood makes so much money," Heerschap adds quietly. "I'm not sure they need the extra money except to fight lawsuits for botched abortions."
Also remaining is Mike Smith of Greene County. He admits his fellow protesters left because "We didn't want them to get a lot of pledge dollars." (In fact, Reid says, she counts protesters before she brings the sign out.)
Reid says the presence of the protesters is "upsetting" to the clinic's patients, who must drive past them to get into the parking lot. Pledge-A-Picket is an effective tactic, she says. "It deters them from coming back week after week."
John Whitehead, founder of the free speech/religious freedom nonprofit the Rutherford Institute, says Pledge-A-Picket is a "psychological game," but he hopes protesters won't stop picketing just because they're helping to raise money. "If the picketers are leaving," Whitehead says, "I'd say shame on them." Planned Parenthood is already well-funded, he says, and the right to exercise free speech on any issue is worth "millions."
"What's more important," Whitehead asks, "the right to be out there or $20?"
Despite the partial exodus, Smith insists the Pledge-a-Picket plan won't keep abortion foes from their mission. "We will continue to bear loving witness," says Smith, adding that the group is praying for the patients as well as the doctors, nurses, and volunteers who staff the clinic.
When Reid asks the group why, if they are opposed to abortion, they don't support any of the reproductive healthcare services Planned Parenthood provides to help prevent unwanted pregnancies, Smith has a ready comment.
"The whole problem boils down to birth control," he says, which led to "so-called free sex" since it became readily available in the 1950s. "There's nothing free about it," Smith adds. Until families return to natural birth control, also known as the "rhythm method"-- which Heerschap says allowed her to space her six children as she wished-- the "culture of death" will remain, he says.
Heerschap says there's never an excuse for abortion, and points out one of her fellow protesters who's accompanied by her six adopted children. "We give these children homes," Heerschap says. "These babies will grow up to be great."
Reid stresses that Planned Parenthood is always willing to help a woman through an unwanted pregnancy, and the organization supports the idea of adoption-- but it shouldn't be a woman's only choice.
"Outlawing abortions does not stop it," she says. "It just subverts it to an underground market where it's neither safe nor accessible to poor women."
Mary Ann Heerschap with four of her six children, from left, Maria, Jozef, Seth, and Peter.
PHOTO BY COURTENEY STUART
The group of protesters holds a massive painting of the Virgin Mary for a "prayer vigil" outside the Planned Parenthood clinic on Hydraulic Road. "She's the patron saint of the Americas," says Mary Ann Heerschap.
PHOTO BY COURTENEY STUART
Planned Parenthood's Becky Reid adds to the Pledge-A-Picket thermometer. Since 2001, the organization has raised more than $100,000 through the creative fund-raiser, she says.
PHOTO BY COURTENEY STUART
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Discuss "NEWS- Picket payday: Planned Parenthood one-ups protesters" Below
The one thing Planned Parenthood can't stand is grace. Keep fasting and praying for the conversion of all who work there and all who use their services.
I am not going to pray for the proud baby killers and those who support their wickedness. I am going to pray for repentant sinners who earnestly seek salvation.
If you want to write letters to Planned Parenthood complaining about the fact that they perform abortions, go ahead. But yelling at people picking up their medication and waiving signs with photos of fetuses in their faces is harassment. Would you make such a big fuss if Planned Parenthood was providing inexpensive chemotherapy to low-income patients?
If I find out where they're handing out low-income chemotherapy, I'm going right over there with my signs picturing innocent cancer cells that never had a chance to see the light of day and try to persuade those Godless cancer sufferers to see the error of their ways.
I am free to seek medical care where I choose and should be able to walk into any building to get care without harrassment. I have used Planned Parenthood at various points in my life to control my fertility and deal with other reproductive health issues, and have never had an abortion. I hope the time will come when the need for abortion is extremely rare and we seem to be making progress in that direction. Sometimes, though, a woman is faced with a pregnancy which she can not carry to term. It may be legal for these protesters to intrude their beliefs into other peoples lives but it is deeply offensive and should be socially unacceptable behavior.(I'll take my chances with hell- everyone does NOT believe what you do!)
Natural Family Planning is NOT the "rhythm method" as the author of this article so erroneously states. The rhythm method (also called the calander method) is about 91% effective according to Planned Parenthood's website. I actually disagree. I would say that so many women who do not a standard 27-28 day cycle (and therefore who were probably not included in the study) would find this method to be MUCH worse. I'd estimate it was about 60% effective--having based this estimate on those given by Web MD. However, Natural Family Planning is a very effective way to space pregnancies. And it available at no cost and helps women to understand how their bodies work and what is going on inside of them. By charting only one's basal body temperature (the body temperature of a woman after at least 3 hours of sleep in a row), couples can avoid pregnancy 98% of the time according to Planned Parenthood's website. By charting only cervical mucus signs, couples can avoid pregnancy 97% of the time according to Planned Parenthood's website. However, by doing both in what is called the symptothermal method of Natural Family Planning, couples can avoid pregnancy by an even higher percentage. Although Planned Parenthood's website does not give this percentage, according to a recent study done by the secular University of Heidelberg (link below), the effectiveness rate was found to be 99.6%. This rate is indeed higher than any artificial form of contraception, and, of course, it poses none of the associated health risks that artificial birth control have.
LINKS:
The Planned Parenthood website on NFP/FAM: http://www.plannedparenthood.org/birth-control-pregnancy/birth-control/fertility-awareness-based-methods.htm Please note: although their effectiveness rates are accurate, many of the so-called "drawbacks" are actually not true. This method can easily adapt to breast-feeding, menopasual and non-regular women.
The University of Heidelberg research results posted in an article here: http://www.catholicnewsagency.com/new.php?n=8754
More infomartion about Natural Family Planning:
http://www.ovusoft.com/
www.ccli.org
www.onemoresoul.com
Thanks for reading!!!!
The central issue though is that,legalities aside, medical privacy should be respected. People should make the case against abortion in the press and in their communities without hounding people who are already in the painful process of ending a pregnancy. This is a matter of simple respect and decency.