Unilateral Pluralism: The Great Anti-Life Idea Sieve
CHAPTER 14 — UNILATERAL PLURALISM: THE GREAT ANTI-LIFE IDEA SIEVE
American Life League
If the fundamentalist mindset can be seen as a psychological disease, it can also be seen as a social disease.
Fundamentalists Anonymous newsletter.[1]
Anti-Life Philosophy.
Reactionary and backwards ideas have no place in our progressive and forward-looking society. Many issues, like a woman's fundamental right to control her own reproductive destiny, have been debated for decades and have finally been laid to rest. It is time to get on to other, more important struggles like racism, sexism and homophobia.
Perhaps more importantly, reactionary ideas and inflammatory rhetoric particularly by those who are anti-choice and anti-gay lead directly to oppression and violence on a large scale against women and minorities. Therefore, this type of speech can reasonably be limited in the interests of society as a whole.
Introduction.
They [La Prensa] accused us of suppressing freedom of expression. This was a lie and we could not let them publish it.
Nelba Blandon, Director of Censorship of
the Sandinista's Interior Ministry.[2]
The word "plurality" has a nice, democratic-sounding ring to it, and implies an even, intelligent discussion of all topics in a free marketplace of ideas.
However, this theory does not operate properly in the United States. Neoliberals have managed to isolate many conservative viewpoints from the marketplace of ideas, and have declared that certain entire schools of thought are prohibited from discussion by so-called "enlightened" or "politically correct" (P.C.) people.
Neoliberals, of course, scoff at the idea that conservative viewpoints are being censored in the name of "political correctness." They claim that they are the champions of free speech. They say that the American Civil Liberties Union is on their side. And they allege that they are on the side of justice.
Meanwhile, they scream loudly that conservatives are the censors. Look at how they're trying to limit freedom of expression by banning sexually explicit material! And see how they're trying to control our children's minds by banning thousands of books from school libraries!
What is the truth of this matter?
This chapter describes why censorship and "unilateral pluralism" is a necessary strategy for the Neoliberal causes. It also gives numerous examples of suppression committed by Neoliberals in five major areas: Censorship of the religious viewpoint, censorship in the public schools and the arts, and censorship by pro-abortionists and homosexuals.
The Idea Sieve: Tool of "Advancement."
When all think alike, then no-one is thinking.
American journalist Walter Lippman.[3]
The Disappearing Middle.
All strategies and tactics have specific goals, and the strategy of Neoliberal censorship is no exception.
Only when politics become radicalized can the anti-life agendas appear to be reasonable to ordinary people. The only way the Left has ever gained ground is by making it appear as if the "middle" on various issues has disappeared. Only when the Neoliberals present themselves as "mainstream" and say that they are the only alternative to a "Fascist, extreme right-wing element" can they possibly achieve victory.
This is why radical groups classify as "mainstream American activities" sex-selection abortions, direct involuntary euthanasia, hard- core pornography, "cross-dressing" (transvestitism), sodomy, and, incredibly, even copulation with animals.
Plurality Inversion.
Anti-life organizations have effectively inverted the accepted meaning of "plurality." In practice, Neoliberal "plurality" is a formidably effective sieve for "acceptable" thought and ideas. Conservatives are strictly forbidden from "imposing their morality," while Neoliberals are perfectly free to impose their own morality, wholesale and with no restrictions, on a vast and pervasive scale.
In essence, Neoliberal "plurality" functions by efficiently eliminating from practical consideration any aspect of societal mores, morals, or tradition that is not agreed upon by everyone.
Ratcheting and the LCD.
As a result, our society operates under the principle of the lowest common denominator (LCD). This means that we are compelled to accept the point of view that imposes the fewest restrictions on moral behavior. This, of course, means that we as a society are relentlessly ratcheting towards having no morals at all, since the members of some "victim group" are always going to object to restrictions on their personal freedom, no matter how trivial in nature those limits may be.
The goals and mechanisms of the Neoliberal "victim status" are discussed in Chapter 9.
Ripping Society's Fabric.
C.S. Lewis was entirely correct in his assessment of the situation when he stated in his work The Abolition of Man that the moral order is of a single cloth a kind of social "Seamless Garment," if you will. One cannot remove many of its threads without seeing the entire garment unravel and disintegrate. We have observed this principle in the gradualist progression from contraception to abortion to euthanasia.
Of course, if almost everyone agreed that abortion (or euthanasia or homosexuality) was abominable, the Neoliberal would have no recourse. However, since a few renegade 'Christian' churches and secular individuals accept abortion, euthanasia, and homosexuality, then all must be forced to accept them.
Christians Stay in Church!
The practical effect of this Neoliberal brand of "pluralism" is that a Christian is perfectly free to believe whatever he or she wants to as long as it is in the privacy of church or home.
Christians are effectively prohibited from banding together to accomplish their goals in the public domain, which is exclusively the Neoliberal field of play. Any intrusion upon this "naked public square" is alleged to be an "unacceptable violation of the Constitutional separation of Church and State," and inevitably results in censure, aggressive litigation, and violence by Neoliberal groups.
The "progressive" therefore demands with no sense of irony or inconsistency whatever that Catholic hospitals perform abortions, even if they accept no public funds; that those who consider fornication a sin be forced to rent to couples who are "shacking up;" that those who believe sodomy to be a serious sin hire homosexuals; and that those who object to birth control and abortion pay for them with their tax dollars.
And any Christian who ventures forth to do battle against what he believes is evil is not only attacked, but labeled mentally ill as well.
Defend Yourself!
The Christian can never prevail against this moral reductionism unless he recognizes it and refutes it at the very beginning. As G.K. Chesterton so wisely counseled, "Against this [anti-life philosophy] there is no weapon at all except a rigid and steely sanity, a resolution not to listen to fads, and not to be infected by diseases."[4]
In other words, we first of all must be willing to do battle. Then we must arm ourselves by studying the strategies and tactics of the opposition so that we may recognize them. Finally, we must use this knowledge to fight the anti-life opposition.
If we remain motionless and allow ourselves to lulled to sleep by compromise and sweet-sounding, deceptive words, we are doing the will of the Enemy, not of God.
The Primary Tactic: Censorship.
Liberal institutions straightaway cease from being liberal the moment they are soundly established: Once this is attained, no more grievous and more thorough enemies of freedom exist than liberal institutions.
German philosopher and committed atheist
Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche.[3]
Totalitarians By Nature.
When Neoliberals suppress a Christian or conservative viewpoint because of its alleged offenses against pluralism, they are obviously violating pluralism themselves by practicing outright censorship.
In other words, they are censoring in the name of free speech.
Anti-life groups are totalitarian by their very nature. Suppression and censorship of dissenting viewpoints is part of their SOP (Standard Operating Procedure). The reason for this is simple to explain: Neoliberals know that, if they allow pro-lifers to have a forum, their own deceptions and immorality will be exposed and the majority of Americans will turn against them. Therefore, the pro-life viewpoints must be blocked.
This censorship becomes bolder and bolder as each successive anti-life goal is achieved. Any opposition to this seemingly unstoppable march of "progress" is immediately painted by the formidable media machine as a "flagrant breach of the wall of separation between church and state."
Some Examples.
A very few of the most blatant examples of Neoliberal censorship are listed below and described in the following paragraphs.
It is important to present a fairly large number of examples in order to give the reader some idea of the almost infinite variety of devious means used by Neoliberals to accomplish their ends. Such knowledge is very important if one is to recognize and thwart such censorship.
Neoliberal censorship usually falls into five categories as listed below. Note that these categories often overlap.
(1) Censorship of the religious viewpoint;
(2) Censorship in the public schools;
(3) Censorship in the arts;
(4) Censorship by pro-abortionists; and
(5) Censorship by homosexuals.
Examples of Neoliberal censorship in each of these areas are described in the following paragraphs.
(1) Censorship of the Religious Viewpoint.
Abortion and Euthanasia.
All experienced pro-life activists have heard the tired allegation that anyone holding the view that life begins at conception is doing so because of his "profoundly religious beliefs," and is therefore banned from public discourse. Meanwhile, the pro- abortionists, who believe that life begins at birth (or, in many cases, at some point in time after birth), do not seem to realize that theirs is also a religious viewpoint; witness literature by the 'Religious' Coalition for Abortion Rights and 'Catholics' for a Free Choice.
Inevitably, this same double-standard "logic" is now being applied to euthanasia and the so-called "right to die." The anti-lifers say that anyone who opposes euthanasia is operating from a purely religious viewpoint. However, those who support euthanasia claim that they are simply participating in a pluralist debate.
A typical example of this curious double standard was revealed when a pro-euthanasia bill was recently introduced in the Montana House of Representatives. It claimed that "At present, a terminally ill Montana citizen who decides he wants to die immediately rather than protractively is denied that right purely on religious grounds. This Act is offered to correct this flagrant abuse of the First Amendment to the [United States] Constitution ... "[5]
PAW's Brand of "Anti-Pluralism."
As another example of this strange Neoliberal double-standard, Ira Glasser of the American Civil Liberties Union and Anthony Podesta of People for the American Way have objected to private schools and voucher programs as being "anti-pluralist." They allege that a cultlike mentality lurks unseen behind these school initiatives.
Of course, their reasoning is precisely backwards: Private schools and vouchers actually promote true pluralism. The real cause for Neoliberal alarm in such cases is that school-choice and voucher programs might erode support for the Neoliberal agenda by removing children from their iron-fisted control. Neoliberals have widely acknowledged that control of the public school system is the most vital link in implementing their programs. This process is discussed in detail in Chapter 12, "Neoliberal Control of the Schools," and in Chapter 114 of Volume III, "Homeschooling."
Therefore, Neoliberals must censor and suppress private schools and voucher systems. Claiming offenses against "pluralism" is as good an excuse as any.
Unscientific American.
The Neoliberal brand of "unilateral pluralism" often goes far beyond mere censorship and attacks individuals directly.
Forrest Mims knows this from personal experience. He had contributed several articles to Scientific American Magazine under the "Amateur Scientist" byline. The staff of the magazine were so impressed with his work that they offered him a permanent position on the staff.
However, in his final interview, Mims stated that he was pro-life and was a "non-believer in evolution." Although the editors admitted that his scientific work was outstanding, they abruptly withdrew his job offer, alleging fear of a "public relations nightmare."[6]
In other words, the editors of Scientific American agreed that Mims was extremely competent, but that his competency and writing skills were nowhere near as important as being Politically Correct.
Mims and other highly-educated people have learned that education and scientific competence alone mean virtually nothing to Neoliberals. Under the "new old boy" system, only the correct attitudes and political orientations count.
In another case of academic intolerance, three respected scientists who between them held five doctorates, had written more than twenty books, and had a century of combined research experience recently collaborated in writing a non-religious book that compared the theories of evolution and "intelligent design." This book, entitled Of Pandas and People, was reviewed by a panel of 35 scientists (mostly evolutionists), and was unanimously endorsed by the committee.
However, John Buchanan of the supposedly anti-censorship People of the American Way worked hard to ban the book, complaining that it "would breach the walls of church-state separation."[6] Bill Aldridge, executive director of the National Science Teacher's Association, when confronted with the author's extensive qualifications, retorted that "Any bozo can get a Ph.D. in molecular biology and any idiot can write a best-selling college textbook."[6]
This reaction is quite typical of the 'respect' that Neoliberals show for viewpoints that differ from their own.
Religion = Disease?
Humanist groups are not really 'live and let live,' as they like to say. Evidence of this is provided by such Humanist groups as Fundamentalists Anonymous (FA).
Members of FA travel around the country to fringe-type Neoliberal churches like the Unitarian Universalists and the Metropolitan Community Churches (formerly the Sodomy Church), and present the thesis that Fundamentalism is literally a mental disease. According to an FA newsletter, "If the fundamentalist mindset can be seen as a psychological disease, it can also be seen as a social disease."[1]
Needless to say, anyone who had the audacity to state flatly that atheists were, by definition, mentally unbalanced would be accused of "judgmentalism." FA is just another Neoliberal group that automatically stereotypes large groups of people, but would vigorously fight the same type of stereotyping employed against any Neoliberal group say homosexuals.
From Bad Assumptions to Lies.
Some Neoliberal organizations and individuals, in their mad rush to discredit conservative and religious groups, unhesitatingly go far beyond unwarranted assumptions to outright, bare-faced lies.
For example, on October 24, 1990, Julianne Ross Davis, general counsel for the National Endowment for the Arts, attacked the American Family Association in an address to the University of Pennsylvania School of Law. She charged that "The American Family Association ... has a 24-point political agenda it would like to see attained by the year 2000. It includes the elimination of democracy, elimination of public schools, advocates that astrologers, adulterers, blasphemers, homosexuals, and incorrigible children be executed, preferably by stoning. That's one of our enemies. This is true."[7]
Ironically, Davis was a Federal government worker earning more than $77,000 annually. This is yet another example of public tax dollars being used to undermine conservative values.
These forthright Neoliberal lies have two purposes. The basic idea is to intimidate believers from taking useful action (1) by ridiculing any type of faith in God that might lead to Christian action against Neoliberalism, and (2) by slandering, stereotyping, and painting with a broad brush a very sizable population of believers as mentally unstable.
In other words, if a person is a Fundamentalist (or conservative Catholic), he is, by definition, unbalanced. Hence the popular bumpersticker "FUNDAMENTALISM IS MIND DEATH."
It is a shame that nobody has mass-produced a bumpersticker that proclaims that "ATHEISM IS SOUL DEATH."
(2) Censorship Crusade in the Schools.
Child Abuse By the Left.
Conservative parents who care about their children are frantic about the value-free pablum being dished up in the public schools today. Our kids are being subjected to an aggressive propaganda campaign that would break the will of the strongest adult.
Among many other abuses, our children are secretly tested by psychologists; told that no action is really condemnable (unless, of course, it is racist, sexist, 'homophobic' or intolerant); that homosexuals are "just plain folks" like you and me; that abortion is a private decision between a woman and her baby-killer; that there is such a thing as human "life not worth living;" and that the authority of parents is to be sidestepped unless it is absolutely unavoidable.
For more detailed information on the silent atrocities being inflicted upon our children, see Chapter 114 of Volume III, "Home Schooling."
"A Powerful Ally of Humanism."
Left-wing writers readily acknowledge the essential role public schools play in engendering and maintaining their idea of "progress" in our society. Therefore, the Neoliberals must be absolutely certain that the vast majority of public school administrators and teachers have as their highest goal not education, but indoctrination in the "Politically Correct" (P.C.) values.
Humanist C.F. Potter asks a frightening but realistic question in his book, significantly entitled Humanism, a New Religion, "Education is thus a most powerful ally of humanism, and every American public school is a school of humanism. What can the theistic Sunday schools, meeting for an hour once a week, and teaching only a fraction of the children, do to stem the tide of a five-day program of humanistic teaching?"[8]
Another Humanist, John Dunphy, gives us a chilling prophecy: "The battle for humankind's future must be waged and won in the public school classroom between the rotting corpse of Christianity and the new faith of humanism. And humanism will emerge triumphant!" [emphasis in original].[9]
Chief Censor: PAW.
Chief among the self-appointed school censors is the horrendously-misnamed People for the 'American' Way. PAW maintains a running list of "censorship efforts" in the United States. Amid great fanfare and widespread publicity, this list is published annually with the self-serving title Attacks on the Freedom to Learn.[10]
People for the 'American' Way claims that "Some groups believe Webster's Dictionary and Robin Hood are dangerous to read. There are hundreds of books on the Moral Majority's hit list. Works by Steinbeck and Hemingway and even Treasure Island are under attack from groups led by Jerry Falwell, Phyllis Schlafly and textbook censors Mel and Norma Gabler ... Some Moral Majoritarians want to have all homosexuals executed, racially segregate private schools and use tax money to do it, weaken child abuse protections, deny Social Security benefits, and deny equal rights to women."[11]
PAW even encourages public libraries to become caught up in the hysteria. February includes "Banned Book Week" , when many or even most libraries go so far as to assemble cutesy displays of 'banned' books with large signs proclaiming "WARNING: SOME PEOPLE CONSIDER THESE BOOKS DANGEROUS." Some displays even have police tape cordoning them off so people will keep a respectable distance.
All of this idiocy and heated, artificial indignation are meant to do three things: To intimidate and embarrass parents into giving up their rights to see what their kids are learning in school; to impose a "chilling effect" on any citizens who question what kind of trash is in our publicly- funded libraries libraries that are paid for by the same citizens; and to positively identify any individual who has the courage to speak up as a member of a national right-wing "conspiracy of mind control and censorship."
Naturally, PAW's list only includes conservative attempts at censorship, all of which supposedly violate the principle of "pluralism."
Not surprisingly, PAW cleverly omits incidents of Neoliberal censorship, such as the left-wing banning of those books that unfavorably comment on the Neofeminist way of life. Books banned by the Left never make it into bookstores or onto library shelves. Such works include George Gilder's Sexual Suicide (1985) and Men and Marriage (1986), and Nicholas Davidson's The Failure of Feminism (Prometheus, 1988).
Sometimes leftist censorship incidents border on the ludicrous. For example, a group of self-proclaimed Walnut Creek, California witches demanded that Hansel and Gretel be banned from local school libraries because it "... nurtures the same hatred that once led to witch burnings." School board member Dennis McCormac asked "What happened to common sense? It's getting to be if the kids tried [in court] the wolf from the Three Little Pigs, the animal rights people would be upset."[12]
Leftists have also tried to ban Mark Twain's Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and Rudyard Kipling's Just So Stories because they contain the word "nigger." These instances of censorship, of course, are never described in the media.
PAW also never mentions Carol Felsenthal's experience. Felsenthal, author of Phyllis Schlafly: Sweetheart of the Silent Majority, is herself a feminist. However, she reported that most school libraries banned her book and said that salesmen from the book's publishing company Doubleday and Company were routinely screamed at and even physically assaulted by Neofeminist book buyers.[13]
Wouldn't a real feminist be proud of a woman who wrote eight books; who became an expert on the intricacies of nuclear policy; who ran for Congress; who graduated from law school with honors just shy of her 50th birthday; and who raised six children and even taught them to read?
It would seem that this person would be a shining example of what women can do, and should be held up as a role model for all women. But she is instead almost universally reviled because of her unique role as the person who made Constitutional history by almost singlehandedly organizing the opposition that killed the Equal Rights Amendment. Schlafly is therefore the antithesis of Political Correctness.
Finally, PAW is careful never to mention the most blatant censorship of all: The complete exclusion of the Bible from public schools, even as a reference work or as an example of literature.
Tasmanian Devils.
It is interesting and instructive to look beyond our own country to other nations that have been infected with the Neofeminist virus for an even longer period than the United States.
As a general rule, the longer the Neofeminists and Neoliberals have been in charge, the more restrictions there are on freedom of speech and expression, particularly in the public schools and universities.
For example, in Tasmania (an Australian State), Neofeminists sent teams of "anti-sexist" librarians into public schools to purge them of over five hundred books that they claimed were "sexist," including Snow White, Born Free, and of course, the Bible.[14] These books were replaced with scores of blatantly Neofeminist propaganda tracts. Predictably, when concerned parents opposed this pervasive academic coercion, they were met with a chorus of Neofeminist voices hypocritically whining "Censorship!"
Censorship of Pro-Life Films.
Although the complete banning of books that reflect religious (Christian) viewpoints is only the most egregious of the Neoliberal's censorship efforts in the schools, there are many other examples that can be cited, both in the public schools and in the public forum.
A student approached psychology teacher Guy Cavallo at Arlington's Washington-Lee High School, and asked him to show the movie "The Silent Scream." Cavallo agreed, and scheduled an after-school showing. The principal required signed permission slips from parents in order for their children to see the film.
But stopping their own children from seeing the film wasn't good enough for a small group of rabidly pro-abortion parents, who demanded that the film be banned and that nobody else's children be allowed to see it, either. The principal obediently canceled the film.[15]
"The Silent Scream" and its sequel, "Eclipse of Reason," have effectively been banned by almost all secular schools as being "shocking," "offensive," "distasteful," and "propagandistic." Students attempting to distribute pro-life literature on school grounds and, in many cases, even off school grounds are routinely arrested or harassed by administrators, while pro-abortion students have free rein and pro-abortion propaganda tracts are dished out by the hundredweight in school-based health clinics.
And, of course, pro-life clubs are nearly impossible to form, because they are allegedly "Christian" in nature. However, clubs that support "reproductive choice" are invariably welcomed by public schools with open arms.
The Definition of "Defamation."
Debbye Turner, a recent Miss America, was a singer who liked to perform volunteer concerts for school children in her spare time.
However, Jeffrey Simensky, the National Civil Rights Director of the Anti-Defamation League of B'nai B'rith (ADL), complained about her "overt Christian messages" in terms of Jesus Christ being "... the truth, the light, and the way."
The Anti-Defamation League obtained a court order forcing Miss Turner to stop singing Christian songs in front of school children.[16] Songs about Hinduism, Buddhism, Hare Krishna, Native American religions or other pagan religions, of course, were judged inoffensive and entirely appropriate.
When questioners asked what kind of defamation the ADL objected to, League spokesmen replied with the patented stony Neoliberal stare and the usual silence. After all, such questions are antisocial and impolite.
Bible Clubs, Oh My!
After the Supreme Court ruled in June 1990 that public schools must admit Bible study clubs, Edd Doerr of the badly- misnamed group "Americans for Religious Liberty" sniveled that "We can expect school Bible clubs to bring in adult missionaries to proselytize students as young as 11 or 12 without parental consent; divisiveness as students self-select into sectarian clubs on school premises; disappearance of traditional extracurricular activities; disruption of schools by such groups as the Ku Klux Klan, neo-Nazis, and anti-women's right clubs."[17]
The purpose of this propaganda is obvious. It is meant to inject a hysteria into easily-molded minds minds harboring such approved anti- life biases as Christophobia and pro-abortionism.
Humanists, after all, do not really want a free marketplace of ideas; they want to obliterate all traces of Christianity. To do this, they will go to absurd lengths.
For example, a Boulder, Colorado teacher was reprimanded for using the word "Christmas" in a party invitation. She was told that the acceptable term was "winter holiday."[18]
By the way, this terminology is virtually universal in our public schools. Although African religious festivals and Hanukkah appear on most public school calendars, the word "Christmas" is banned because of the extreme sensitivity of anti-Christian watchdogs.
And a Lake Worth, Florida principle ordered his staff to cut a picture of the decades-old Bible Club out of all the school yearbooks with razor blades before he would permit it to be released to students![18]
Pro-Death Women's Unions.
As students rise through the academic ranks, they gain experience and wisdom and therefore become more independent in their thinking.
The Neoliberals know this. They also realize that they cannot win these independent thinkers over to the anti-life side when all arguments can be aired freely, due to the inherently illogical nature of the anti- life positions.
Therefore, the Neoliberals must very strictly control the manner in which debate takes place in colleges and universities. As a student becomes more of a freethinker, alternative points of view must be suppressed even more vigorously so that they will be, in essence, invisible and/or inaccessible.
In order to exert this control, anti-life groups must employ more and more overt censorship at higher levels of education. But the Neoliberals cannot resort to outright brazen censorship; they must dress their actions up in the noble robes of tolerance.
Therefore, they commit censorship in the name of protecting special- interest "victim groups," including women and homosexuals, so that the sacrifice of free speech and free thought takes place in the name of even higher goods: Tolerance, freedom, and nonjudgmentalism.
For a description of some of the many Neoliberal codes and regulations regulating speech and thought at colleges and universities, see Chapter 9, "The Neoliberal Victim Status."
One quick example of censorship at the higher levels of education is very revealing.
College and university Women's Unions have traditionally pledged to be places "for all women of every race, age, ethnicity, ability, class, sexual orientation, religion ..." or words to this effect.
However, more than thirty of these Women's Unions, when confronted with pro-life women who wanted to join them, immediately amended their charters to read that all supporters must support "reproductive choice."
In other words, the "Women's Unions" are not really for all women they are only for women with the politically correct pro-abortion viewpoint.
Although the scourge of Neoliberal censorship at the grade school and high school level is bad, it is just a mild preview of the atrocities commonly practiced on our college and university campuses, where Neoliberals often enjoy complete control.
When Adolfo Calero, leader of the Nicaraguan Democratic Front, was invited to give a speech at Northwestern University, Barbara Foley, an assistant professor of English, grabbed the microphone and shouted, "We have to stop this. Stop it! This monster Adolfo Calero has no right to speak here tonight, and we're not going to let him speak. He'll be lucky to get out of here alive!"[19] A riot broke out, and Calero was beaten and splattered with pig blood by a mob screaming "Fascists have no right to speak!"
Foley received a mild reprimand from the school.
Calero is by no means the only 'non-progressive' to be physically attacked or banned from campuses. Virtually every well-known conservative speaker has been denied his or her chance to speak by the campus PC police, including Phyllis Schlafly, William Buckley, Ronald Reagan, Governor Bill Casey of Pennsylvania, and Randy Terry of Operation Rescue.
For many more examples of Neoliberal censorship at the college and university level, see Chapter 9, "The Neoliberal Victim Status."
(3) Censorship in the Arts.
Introduction.
Neoliberal hypocrisy is at its glaring worst in the arts.
While insisting on one hand that there should be no limits whatever on freedom of expression in the arts, Neoliberals vigorously censor any works that carry a pro-life or conservative message, or, in fact, transmit any message that they do not approve of.
This censorship, of course, also depends upon the social hierarchy of the artist. Many times, the Political Correctness of a person's gender, race, 'sexual orientation,' or viewpoint determines whether or not that person's works will be displayed or rejected.
No Dice.
Andrew Dice Clay (also known as "The Diceman"), is an obscene performer who would meet anyone's standards as a racist, sexist "gay-basher." He strides across the stage while spewing vitriol and hatred against every imaginable group of people from White men to left-handed lesbian Lithuanian plumbers. Some viewers call him an "equal opportunity bigot" (this does not really make sense, because you can't be bigoted when you hate everyone equally).
His "performances" are nearly identical in content to the pro-rape and pro-violence lyrics of 2 Live Crew, Niggaz With Attitude (NWA), and several other popular minority groups. In fact, Clay's lyrics are indistinguishable from many of those spewed forth by pro-violence "rap" groups.
Over the course of several years, several City Councils have unanimously issued letters condemning Clay in very strong terms, and have urged citizens to return their non-refundable $25 to $40 tickets in protest. Clay was barred for life from MTV for uttering obscenities at the channel's 1989 video awards ceremony (keep in mind that MTV is the same outfit that issued matchbooks with condoms and the inscription "MTV the best f_cking jazz there is!") He was also shunned by David Letterman, Jay Leno and several performers from the popular variety show "Saturday Night Live."[20]
Yet the same people who shunned and condemned Clay either praised the lyrics of 2 Live Crew as "bold," "provocative," and "progressive," or were completely silent about them.
The difference, of course, is that these Politically Correct Thinkers knew that the Diceman is a White male, and therefore not a member of a certified "victim class." On the other hand, 2 Live Crew and other minority rap groups that spout violent lyrics are members of politically- protected groups, and it is therefore not Politically Correct to utter a word of protest against them.
This unilateral type of censorship is quite typical of the peculiarly blind Neoliberal mind, which sees no conflicts or inconsistencies whatever in such actions. Politically protected (Neoliberal) groups can do or say whatever they want, but conservative groups are held to impossibly high standards, and God help them if they make the slightest error.
Bible-Burning for Fun and Profit.
Conservative activists are intimately familiar with the Neoliberal caricature of the book-burning Baptist censor. This image is bandied about constantly by groups like People for the American Way and many others who themselves commit censorship on a vast scale.
But who really burns the books in this country?
The National Endowment for the 'Arts' (NEA) recently allocated $20,000 to the group Artpark, which in turn bestowed a subgrant to Survival Research Laboratories (SRL) for the purpose of conducting a Lewiston, New York show entitled the "Bible Burn."
SRL posters distributed to art galleries all over the country announced that "SRL will create large, sexually explicit props covered with a generous layer of requisitioned [i.e., stolen] Bibles. After employing these props in a wide variety of unholy rituals, SRL machines will proceed to burn them to ashes. Bibles can always be obtained for free from hotels, churches, and your parents' house."[21]
Strangely, there were no complaints from the People for the American Way about censorship or book-burning when they were informed about this event!
Why not?
Because the Bible is not "Politically Correct."
Even Art Has Its Limits ...
During the intense debate surrounding Congressional funding of the National Endowment for the Arts in 1990, a parade of artists testified that there must never be any limits placed upon their freedom of expression. In other words, "art" that is shackled or limited in any way is really not art at all.
However, this is not true. Art, like every other form of expression, does have its limits and these limits are imposed with an iron fist, not by the legendary "Baptist Bluenose Brigade," but by the Neoliberal artists themselves!
Take for example the use of fetal remains in artwork. Several artists during the time period 1985 to 1990 "created" earrings and other forms of adornment that featured small preborn babies encased in plastic or plexiglass. These "works" were widely praised by art critics.
In 1989, the "Degenerate Art Show" received a symbolic $500 NEA subgrant from "Artist Space." This show featured Shawn Eichman's "Alchemy Cabinet," which displayed her own dismembered second-trimester aborted baby next to the obligatory twisted wire coat hanger.
These displays were defended by the Art Establishment because all of the artists were pro-abortion and were transmitting a Neoliberal message.
But when a pro-life artist attempted to incorporate a preborn baby in her works, the one-way "gate of plurality" was immediately slammed in her face.
Mary Cate Carroll's "American Liberty Upside Down" featured a large canvas of a family scene showing a man and woman sitting on a sofa and holding the dotted outline of a missing child. In the center of the child was a little door, which, when opened, revealed a second-trimester aborted preborn baby that Carroll had obtained from her college's biology department.
In 1987, the Maryland Institute of Art's Alumni Art Show asked Carroll to display five of her works. When presented with her proposals, the art department objected to "American Liberty Upside Down" and pulled it the day before the show opened. Professors from the art department also accused her of violating Federal law by transporting "human remains" across state lines to the Virginia show.
Carroll exposed the raw hypocrisy of the art department when she said that; "It's semantics by not defining it [the baby], it makes it legal to murder it, but then, after it's murdered, you redefine it, make it a human, and then it's illegal to take it across state lines. Is this or is it not human?"[22]
The chairman of the art department hypocritically whined that "Had we allowed the flagrant and crass exploitation of this pathetic form, we would have flouted a moral as well as a legal obligation to treat it with dignity ... "[22]
This was a familiar line to pro-life activists. In other words, the art department had no objection to the act of abortion, just the display of the results.
Why are fetal remains allowed in some artwork but not in others? Why is it a crime to place a fetus in a jar in the middle of a canvas, while at the same time it is not a crime to display them in earrings?
The answer is always the same: It depends entirely upon one's political views. "Alchemy Cabinet" transmitted a "pro-choice" message (remember the wire coathanger)? As such, it was "Politically Correct." "American Liberty Upside Down" attempted to convey a pro-life message. This was not "Politically Correct," and so it was suppressed.
The legend of unlimited free expression in art is just that a legend.
So Christians should feel perfectly free to protest art that they consider unacceptable. After all, the Neoliberals aggressively censor art that they do not want the public to see.
(4) Censorship By Pro-Abortionists.
"The New Ms. Magazine will unfailingly treat a woman's right to an abortion as sacrosanct. There will be no dissent on that in our pages."
Ms. Magazine Editor Robin Morgan, quoted
in the March 5, 1990 Washington Post.
Introduction.
It is axiomatic that the degree of censorship that must be exerted by a group is inversely proportional to the strength of that group's position.
In other words, if a group's position is obviously correct, there is no need to exclude other viewpoints. For example, the inherent wrongness of child molestation and the Nazi viewpoint is generally accepted by almost everyone. Therefore, there is no need to systematically censor the viewpoints of the few persons who believe that child molestation and Nazi genocide are allowable (although these viewpoints are sometimes openly protested). To censor would be counterproductive, because the North American Man-Boy Love Association (NAMBLA) and the Aryan Nations do a very good job of discrediting themselves.
On the other hand, all scientific evidence points to the obvious conclusion that the preborn are living human beings. No pro-abortionist has ever been able to produce a particle of genetic or physiologic evidence that supports the anti-life view that the preborn are just "blobs of tissue."
Therefore, pro-abortion groups are compelled to ruthlessly censor all authentic scientific evidence that supports the pro-life viewpoint, as shown in the following paragraphs.
Censorship NOW. Human Life of Washington (the state Right to Life affiliate) placed a series of ads on Washington Transit Authority busses. These ads consisted of a photograph of a 17-week old unborn baby swimming in its mother's womb with the caption "ENJOY LIFE. GOOD THINGS COME IN SMALL PACKAGES." The objective of the ads was not to stop abortions, but to warn the public about the effects of alcohol and substance abuse and diet on fetal development.
The Reproductive Rights Task Force of the Seattle Chapter of the National Organization for Women (NOW) immediately initiated a telephone harassment campaign directed against Washington Transit, claiming that the photos and ads were, in NOW's lofty opinion, "too graphic."[23] The Washington Transit Authority quickly broke its contract with Human Life and obediently pulled the ads.
A NOW spokeswoman explained that "NOW works to promote and protect the human rights of women. It is in keeping with the work that we do that we protest advertising the intent of which is harmful to the health and well- being of women, and which deprives women of their full rights as human beings."[24]
When asked how the advertising was "harmful to the health and well- being of women," and how it "deprived women of their full rights as human beings," the NOW people refused to answer.
In other words, NOW does not even want the public to know basic facts about human reproduction, because the sight of a healthy unborn baby might make some women change their minds about abortion!
The anti-life philosophy denies the slightest degree protection to the preborn, a "no-exceptions" consistency that is brilliantly admirable (and missing) in the pro-life movement. For example, Marilyn Fitterman of the New York chapter of the National Organization for Women (NOW) opposed a bill that would post warning signs taverns stating that liquor would harm their preborn babies. She claimed that "To warn of fetal damage in the absence of other health warnings is purely and simply an attempt of the anti-choicers to establish a vocabulary of fetal rights in excess of the rights of the women in whose bodies those fetuses reside."[25]
When questioned about how such signs would elevate the fetus over the woman, Fitterman refused to answer.
Apparently, the NOW simply does not care about Fetal Alcohol Syndrome (FAS), which is not only the leading cause of infant mental retardation in the United States, but also causes about 8,000 babies to be born annually with serious physical handicaps.[25]
Champions for Life.
In 1990, the American Life League produced a video entitled "Champions for Life," which featured professional athletes speaking out for the preborn. These stars included New York Giants tight end Mark Bavaro, who was instrumental in helping his football team win a tightly-contested game with the Buffalo Bills in Super Bowl XXV.
The reaction from the pro-abortion press was even more vehement than pro-lifers expected. Sports Illustrated Magazine went to the trouble of printing a special column to snivel about Bavaro's stand.[26] Even more outrageously, though Bavaro had five pass receptions in the Super Bowl, including three in the drive for the winning touchdown, the magazine did not even mention his name in its 7-page article on the game!
Law professor Laurence Tribe wasn't satisfied with Bavaro being reduced to the status of an invisible person. Tribe threatened legal action, asserting that "It is ethically dubious to use a film of fans who came to see a game, to support one side of a political issue."[26]
Strangely, Tribe and his morally-blind cohorts saw no problem with more than a dozen female movie stars cavorting in the pro-abort's 1989 March for Death in Washington, D.C. These "Bimbos for Choice" included Anne Archer, Polly Bergen, Ellen Burstyn, Glenn Close, Judy Collins, Mary Crosby, Jill Eikenberry, Shelly Fabares, Morgan Fairchild, "Hanoi Jane" Fonda, Bonnie Franklin, Terri Garr, Whoopi Goldberg, Lee Grant, Jennifer Grey, Veronica Hamel, Valerie Harper, Amy Madigan, Melissa Manchester, Penny Marshall, Kelly McGillis, Donna Mills, Susan Sarandon, Cybill Shepherd, Marlo Thomas, and Daphne Zuniga.
Pro-Abortion Vandalism.
Delaware Right to Life rented six billboards from Reagan National Advertising in October 1990. The billboards featured a photograph of a beautiful unborn baby with an inoffensive pro-life message. Within two days, all six billboards were torn apart and the pictures of the unborn babies were vandalized. Obscenities and the slogan "THIS IS A PRO-CHOICE NEIGHBORHOOD" were spraypainted on the wreckage.[27]
In response to this aggressive censorship, Lou Jacquet of the newspaper Dialog wrote that "The pro-abortion movement has to destroy pro-life billboards to keep people from learning the ugly facts about what abortion involves ... One of the recurring problems facing those who favor legalized abortion is the growing body of knowledge proving beyond a doubt how vital human life already is well before actual birth occurs ... It's not the kind of information pro-abortion activists can afford to acknowledge. So they've taken to a simple solution tearing down and spraying over billboards. Aren't these the same folks who call pro-life activists who picket abortion clinics 'uncivilized?'"[27]
Pro-Abortion Technological Regression.
You must learn to turn your eyes away.
Albert Speer, the architect for Adolf Hitler's
Jewish Extermination Program.[28]
At the October 1989 annual conference of the National Abortion Rights Action League, pollster Harrison Hickman stated that "Probably nothing has been as damaging to our cause as technological advances that show pictures of the fetus."[29]
In his 'how-to' baby-killing book Abortion Practice, Warren Hern buttresses this viewpoint; "Television interviews, in particular, should focus on the public issue involved (right to confidential and professional medical care, freedom of choice, and so forth) and not on the specific details of the abortion procedures."[30]
The new and promising field of fetal surgery is also very worrisome to pro-abortionists, who recognize that there is a paradox in performing surgical procedures on an entity that isn't supposed to exist. Judith Pasternak of the American Civil Liberties Union's Reproductive Freedom Project is only one of the many pro-abortionists desperately trying to downplay the significance of in-utero fetal surgery; "But these [fetal surgery] techniques and this success are new indeed, so dazzlingly new as to blind us, perhaps, to the fact that the moral premise of abortion remains unchanged. The "issue of abortion" remains the issue of the right of the woman to choose whether or not to carry something in her own body. No technological advances can rob her of her right to choose whether or not to keep it there."[31]
These examples show that the pro-abortion cause actively resists the discovery of new scientific evidence. This is analogous to the Flat-Earth Society ridiculing information showing that our planet is actually spherical in shape.
It is also extremely important for the pro-abortionists to suppress any evidence that "safe and legal abortions" are, in fact, unsafe. According to Dr. Vincent Rue, post-abortion syndrome expert and co-director of the Institute for Abortion Recovery and Research, based in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, Planned Parenthood successfully pressured the publisher Harper & Row into canceling Dr. Anne Speckhard's book Psycho-Social Stress Following Abortion.[32]
Pro-life activists are intimately familiar with other instances of pro-abortion censorship of information pertaining to Post-Abortion Syndrome (PAS). In fact, no pro-abort group has even acknowledged the existence of this syndrome, despite the fact that many thousands of its victims are finally speaking out.
Pro-Lifers: Out of Politics!
It is common knowledge that pro- abortion groups dump millions of dollars into the coffers of politicians who support baby-killing. In fact, the National Abortion Rights Action League (NARAL) targets the most prominent pro-life politicians in the country in election years and works tirelessly to defeat them. In 1990, this list was known at "The NARAL Nine."
While NARAL is deeply involved in the political arena, it seeks to deny pro-lifers the same opportunity to participate in the process.
In 1985, NARAL convinced the Federal Election Commission to take action against a Massachusetts pro-life group that was distributing campaign literature. NARAL asserted in this action that pro-life groups have no right whatever to endorse pro-life candidates, even if the pro- life groups are not tax-exempt!
In the ensuing lawsuit, FEC v. Massachusetts Citizens for Life, Inc., the right to distribute such literature was upheld.[33]
This litigation is typical of the harassment brought by NARAL and other pro-abortionists against any effective pro-life action. The hypocrisy of insisting that your opponents do not have the rights that you yourself exercise in the same arena is glaring.
Another pro-abortionist filed a major lawsuit against a pro-life group merely for having the temerity to oppose his bid for mayor.
After St. Paul Mayor Jim Scheibel won his city's November 1989 election, he filed a lawsuit against Minnesota Citizens Concerned for Life (MCCL) and other defendants for legally distributing literature that merely reiterated his pro-abortion stand.
The action sought $50,000 in compensatory damages and a like amount for punitive damages, although Scheibel admitted that he had suffered no actual damages. He also confessed that he was out to "punish" MCCL simply because he did not like its position on abortion, and revealed that he had not even read the Supreme Court's Roe v. Wade decision.
In March of 1991, Hennipen County District Court Judge Stephen D. Swanson threw the frivolous suit out of court. The St. Cloud Times subsequently published an article entitled "St. Paul Mayor Needs a Thicker Skin."[34]
Pro-abortion censorship in politics is not a quaint or annoying theoretical question. In many cases, it can have concrete and devastating consequences for the pro-life movement. In the critical few weeks before Doug Wilder won the Virginia governor's race by less than 5,000 votes (less than one-half of one percent of the total), the nine local television stations ran pro-Wilder ads by the National Abortion Rights Action League (NARAL), but unanimously refused to air pro-life ads by the National Right to Life Committee PAC and its local affiliates which demonstrated Wilder's extreme pro-abortion position.[35] The stations denounced these ads with the usual pro-abortion adjectives: "Offensive" and "inflammatory."
Most political analysts agreed that this blatant media censorship decided the race in Wilder's favor, in light of the fact that he won by just 5,000 votes cast out of a total of more than a million.[35]
Ain't No Such Thing ...
Jackie Schweitz, a member of the National Pro-Life Democrats and a delegate to the 1988 Democratic National Convention, found out about pro-abortion obstructionism at the same time and in the same place the Democrats were preaching 'equality for everyone.'
The group National Pro-Life Democrats is a non-profit organization. However, when Schweitz attempted to secure a booth for the convention, organizers told her that she could not have a non-profit booth. She was told that she would have to apply for a considerably more expensive commercial booth.[36]
When she applied for that type of booth, she was flatly refused. When she asked for justification, she was met with silence.
After the flap over the booth died down, Schweitz revealed that pro- life Democrats were illegally barred from attending numerous state caucus meetings, because, as she was told, "You cannot be both pro-life and a Democrat."[36]
Apparently, the Democrats did not feel guilty about their blatant bullying. During the 1992 Democratic National Convention, six pro-abortion Republican women were allowed to speak but pro-life Democrat Bill Casey, governor of the State of Pennsylvania, was banned from the floor. Additionally, the few pro-life delegates to the convention were physically assaulted, spat upon, blocked, and cursed at during the entire three days of the event. None of this cowardly violence was mentioned in the media.
Try to imagine the uproar that would have occurred in the media had the Republicans treated pro-aborts in the same manner at their convention.
Ain't plurality wonderful?
Print This Or Else!
Pro-abortionists not only want pro-lifers to shut up, they want pro-lifers to approve of their baby-killing.
This theme is central to the anti-life philosophy: It is not enough to reduce your opponents to sullen, glowering disapproval they must enthusiastically applaud your immoral activities!
And so, pro-lifers are now not just fighting to stop abortion in many cases they are struggling just for the right not to support it!
A prime example of this type of pro-abortion coercion can be found in the litigation Paquette v. Regal Art Press.
In early 1990, a Vermont Catholic couple who ran a private printing press, Regal Art Press, refused to print membership forms for the state chapter of 'Catholics' for a Free Choice (CFFC). Chuck and Susan Baker said that they refused because CFFC lies about Catholic teachings.[37]
Linda Paquette, a member of Vermont CFFC (VCFC), whimpered that she was "bewildered" by the Bakers' refusal, since VCFC "promotes freedom of conscience" and "tolerance."[38]
Paquette could easily have taken her business to any other printer, but she was apparently driven to punish the Bakers because they were pro- life and had the courage to stand up for their convictions. Hypocritically ignoring the Bakers' "freedom of conscience," Paquette, showing a complete lack of "tolerance," complained to the Vermont Human Rights Commission, which threatened the Bakers with a $10,000 fine and a lawsuit for compensatory and punitive damages. The charge? "Religious discrimination!"
The Commission's Investigative Report of July 11, 1990 found that businesses " ... cannot deny services to individuals based on religious doctrine ... even if the result has the effect of curtailing the ... free exercise of the owner's religious beliefs."[38]
Perhaps most incredibly, the Vermont chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), which alleges that it champions free speech, agreed to prosecute the Bakers for exercising their 'freedom to choose!'
Note that this couple ran a private printing press. They received no government money, and were not a tax-deductible charity. In other words, they were a private small business but they were being forced into printing material that violated their religious beliefs!
This silliness leads one to speculate what action the Vermont Human Rights Commission would take if a Jewish printer refused to print flyers for the White Aryan Resistance or for any other overtly racist group.
The answer to that question should be obvious.
Unlucky Charms.
The General Mills Corporation (GMC) manufactures Cheerios, Lucky Charms, Wheaties, and Betty Crocker products. GMC offered Steve Largent, star wide receiver of the Seattle Seahawks football team, $10,000 for the privilege of putting his photograph on a Wheaties box.
As part of this package agreement, General Mills also offered him $1,000 for every touchdown he scored and $100 for every pass he caught during the 1988 NFL season. This money would go to a charity of Largent's choice.
When Largent said that he wanted to donate the money to a local crisis pregnancy center, General Mills welshed on its promise, claiming that such a donation would be "too controversial." Oddly, General Mills and other large corporations donate more than $35 million annually to Planned Parenthood, NOW, and NARAL, whom they naturally consider to be "noncontroversial."
Hear No Evil ...
On September 26, 1990, the "Pro-Choice Network of Western New York" won an injunction from U.S. District Judge Richard J. Arcara against Project Rescue and member ministers of the Western New York Pro-Life Clergy Council, who preach in support of rescue missions at abortion clinics.
The injunction specifically prohibited these ministers from quoting Proverbs 24:11 ("rescue those being dragged to the slaughter ..."), even when the verse would not be used in conjunction with a sermon on rescues. Any mention whatever of this Scripture passage would mean an immediate $10,000 fine.[39] Fortunately, these brave pastors had the courage to openly defy this bizarre ruling. They knew that if they caved in, the pro- aborts would work for even more ludicrous restrictions.
So we have arrived at the point where the government can summarily dictate to pastors which Scripture passages are 'offensive' and 'illegal.'
The pro-abortionists, of course, did not see this as a violation of the separation of church and state.
Pro-Lifers to the Back of the (Medical) Bus.
With the eager backing of every pro-abortion group in the country, many medical schools used to grill prospective applicants on their political and religious views and then flatly refuse admission to all candidates who dared express any opposition to or uneasiness about abortion. Many obstetrics-gynecology graduates were refused residencies for the same reason.
Studies performed by the United States Department of Health, Education and Welfare (HEW) and by Eugene F. Diamond, M.D., found that two-thirds of all medical schools either asked their applicants about their views on abortion (which has absolutely nothing to do with academic accomplishments or competence), or admitted that the subject was broached during interviews. Some school interviewers stated that an applicant's opposition to abortion would be a negative factor on his record. Fully one-sixth of the schools said that opposition to abortion by students created insurmountable "administrative difficulties" that would be considered when it was time to award slots in new medical school classes.
One paper revealed the reason for this bias; "Studies have shown that students who come in contact with women seeking abortions learn the proper medical techniques and are more likely, later in their careers, to have tolerant attitudes about abortion and to be willing to perform the procedure."[40]
For years, the Residency Review Committee of the American Board of Obstetrics and Gynecology held that a doctor had to know abortion procedures in order to be considered "competent and safe," and the Council on Resident Education in Obstetrics and Gynecology (CREOG) listed abortion as a skill that all doctors should learn and practice.[41]
Finally, Senator Richard S. Schweiker (R-Pa.) introduced S.784 in February of 1977 and, in November of the same year, an attachment to S.2159, the 'Conscience Clause' of the Public Programs Act of 1973 amendments, in order to correct medical school bias against pro-lifers.
Of course, pro-abortion groups still contest the right of physicians to not perform abortions. All pro-abortion groups oppose medical 'conscience clauses' for doctors and nurses. As originally written, the so-called "Freedom of Choice Act," sponsored by virtually all pro-abortion United States Congressmen and Senators, would have specifically banned all conscience clauses.
This coercion commonly occurs at the state level as well. In March 1991, pro-abort Maryland legislators passed a law that repealed the state's 24-year old conscience clause and mandated that hospitals that do not make abortion referrals (including Catholic hospitals) will no longer be protected by insurance. Pro-lifers accurately tagged this law the "Abortion Industry Protection Act of 1991." The only restriction in this law is a parental-notification clause, which can be overridden if the abortionist decides the minor is mature enough to make her own decision.[42] Obviously, in the eyes of an abortionist, all minors are mature enough to make such a decision. After all, there's money to be made!
Many pro-aborts have gone so far as to claim that any pro-life medical professional is, by definition, incompetent and, in the interest of public safety, must immediately get out of medical practice![43]
How's that for 'freedom of choice?'
Perhaps sensing that the war on individual conscience clauses would be a tough battle, the pro-abortionists have turned their attention to pro- life medical institutions.
In late 1990, United States District Court Judge Herbert Murray ruled that the Catholic St. Agnes Hospital of Baltimore would lose its accreditation as an obstetrics and gynecology teaching facility unless it agreed to teach its residents how to abort and sterilize.[44]
Maryland has a conscience clause, but Judge Murray simply dismissed it as "irrelevant."
St. Agnes is one of 41 Catholic hospitals in the United States with obstetrics/gynecology residency programs. Acceptance to the St. Agnes residency program requires adherence to its prolife philosophy.
This litigation was initiated in 1986 when the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education (ACGME) withdrew the hospital's accreditation for program "deficiencies." St. Agnes sued the ACGME, but Judge Murray ruled that the ACGME move was "justified" because of its "compelling interest in satisfactory physician education."[44]
In other words, Judge Murray was stating that, if you are a pro-life doctor who doesn't perform abortions, you are by definition improperly educated and incompetent!
The implications of this bizarre ruling are almost unlimited.
The Bottom Line: Pro-Lifers, Shut Up!
Although they dress up their goals in the noble language of plurality and religious tolerance, the pro- abortionists are actually masters of propaganda and are natural totalitarians. Their real goal is to eliminate all visible opposition.
Bill Baird, a New York abortionist, has said that "I have been calling for a 500-foot quiet zone by every single clinic. I don't think that people have a right to demonstrate in front of clinics. The analogy that I use is the Soviet embassy. You cannot picket within 500 feet."[45]
This sentiment is echoed by the violent sodomite group that calls itself the Bay Area Coalition Against Operation Rescue (BACAOR, pronounced bay-con-heds). This group, in its March 1989 publication entitled "Clinic Defense: A Model," claims that pro-lifers have no right to be on a public sidewalk in front of an abortuary, even for the purposes of peaceful picketing and prayer; "As OR [Operation Rescue] has shifted to picketing more than blockading, we've learned that we can't relax and let them "just" picket. It's critical to keep pushing, to not lend any legitimacy to their harassment of women on any level. As much as we can, we are drawing lines, saying no, you can not picket on the sidewalk in front of the clinic; this is our territory. Go across the street, go away, go wherever but as far away from the clients as is possible to assert. Even if the sidewalk is "public," we've had success at putting enough of us out, early enough, to basically bully the OR's into staying across the street."
It would be interesting indeed to ask members of BACAOR what they would think of a total ban on their activities, even if they were performed on a public sidewalk. But BACAOR members wouldn't go for that, of course. It's different for them just ask them!
And, of course, the National Organization for Women (NOW) has weighed in with its own opinion on Constitutional rights for pro-lifers. After whining that women's rights were being trampled on by Operation Rescue, NOW member Beth David grumbled that "So the women are still being hassled because they let some of the sidewalk counselors stay out, and that's the next step forward, I think [to eliminate sidewalk counseling]. Not just gaining access, not just having the injunctions to write them and all that stuff, but to say "No." Even if you're out there and you're not physically diving at doorways or knocking us down, you're still violating our rights. I do not want to see a church service when I'm going in to see my gynecologist."[46]
This mentality is made clear in the many lawsuits brought against pro- life rescuers. The abortionists not only attempt to gain injunctions against rescuing, but invariably try to "piggyback" by getting the public sidewalk in front of the clinics declared off-limits to legal pro-life activities as well. The purpose of this, of course, is to shield their clients from the pro-life message conveyed by sidewalk counselors and picketers.
(5) Censorship By Homosexuals.
I hate liberality nine times out of ten it is cowardice, and the tenth time lack of principle.
British Prime Minister Henry Addington.[3]
The Propah Perspective, My Deah. In June of 1990, The Wall Street Journal editorialized that it seems to be entirely permissible to discuss homosexuality, race, or gender, but only if you hold "the approved point of view."[47]
This restrictive policy is precisely the one held by sodomite groups. You can say whatever you want to about "gay rights" as long as you are in favor of them.
Death to Political Activists!
Dr. Chuck McIlhenny has been pastor of San Francisco's First Orthodox Presbyterian Church for 17 years. In 1989, he helped defeat a domestic partnership law that would have forced everyone to treat two sodomites as a family. Under the new law, anyone who did not willingly comply would be heavily fined or jailed.
As one of the city's few politically active pastors, McIlhenny and his family became the focus of extreme sodomite hate. For three years, they received thousands of threatening and harassing phone calls 24 hours a day, and many callers swore to sodomize and then kill the McIlhenny's three daughters.[48]
Both the pastor's home and church were firebombed. In 1990, sodomite groups repeatedly vandalized his church and home with graffiti like "Dykes for Choice," and attacked the crisis pregnancy center housed in the church. Cowardly, skulking sodomites broke the church's windows so many times the parishioners considered boarding them up permanently.[48]
ACT-UP Vandalism.
The Sacramento Union found out how violent homosexuals can get after it published several editorials against pro- abortion and pro-homosexual initiatives during the summer of 1990. Shortly thereafter, vandals destroyed more than a hundred of the paper's vending machines, causing more than $45,000 of damage. The wrecked machines were plastered with ACT-UP stickers.
ACT-UP is the AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power, a sodomite activist group that physically and violently attacks those who dare to oppose its perverted agenda in any way.[17]
Conclusions.
It is obvious that we have arrived at the point in this country where even the definition of "free speech" has become warped beyond recognition, and a person's degree of freedom of speech depends entirely upon his politics or his positions on the issues.
People who burn the American flag, urinate on crucifixes, masturbate and parade naked in public, or photograph children having sex with adults and animals are engaging in Constitutionally-protected "free speech." Legal 'scholars' including Harvard's Laurence Tribe have even argued that women "speak with their bodies" when they kill their preborn babies!
However, people who want to talk about religion in the schools or hold signs outside abortion mills are learning very quickly that all speech is free, but some speech is freer than other speech and more expensive, as well.
And so, we have arrived at the point where a teacher may invoke the protection of the First Amendment when showing school children pornography and the same Amendment can be used to prosecute a teacher who reads the Bible to her class next door! In this country, our tax dollars are being used to fund the submergence of crucifixes in urine but the funding of beautiful religious art is banned as a "violation of the separation of church and state." And the same privacy laws that protect pornographers as they brutalize small children into participating in "kiddie porn" are now being used to ban protestors from the sidewalks in front of porn shops.
Where will it ever end?
References: Anti-Life Censorship.
[1] Fundamentalists Anonymous newsletter, described in News of Interest. "Group Organizes to Fight Christians." National Federation for Decency Journal, January 1986, page 11.
[2] Nelba Blandon, Director of Censorship of Sandinista Interior Ministry. Quoted in Liberation Bulletin and on page 11 of the November 6, 1987 National Review.
[3] Quotes from Jonathon Green. The Cynic's Lexicon. New York: St. Martin's Press. 1984, 220 pages.
[4] G.K. Chesterton, quoted in Joseph Sobran. "Life and Death in Tendency Land." Human Life Review, Summer 1982, page 13.
[5] Montana State House of Representatives Bill 137. Discussed in Father Paul Marx' And Now ... Euthanasia. Gaithersburg, Maryland. Human Life International, 1985. Second Revised Edition, page 31.
[6] Rob Weiman. "Evolutionists Censor Science Textbooks." Focus on the Family Citizen, March 18, 1991, page 12.
[7] "AFA Sues General Counsel." The Wanderer, December 6, 1990, page 2.
[8] C.F. Potter. Humanism, a New Religion. Quoted in Dr. D.L. Cuddy. "Are Public Schools Opening the Door to Humanism?" National Federation for Decency Journal, October 1986, page 21.
[9] John Dunphy. The Humanist, January-February 1983. Also quoted in Dr. D.L. Cuddy. "Are Public Schools Opening the Door to Humanism?" National Federation for Decency Journal, October 1986, page 21.
[10] "Who Are the Real Censors?" The Phyllis Schlafly Report, August 1990.
[11] "Who is Censoring Books: The Debate Continues." Education Update, October 1982, page 1. The Heritage Foundation.
[12] "Witches Tell Board 'Hansel and Gretel' Unfair." The [Vancouver, Washington] Columbian, June 1, 1992, page A8.
[13] Marcia Sielaff. "Book About a 'Sweetheart' Greeted With Hostility, Blacklist." The Phoenix Gazette, Wednesday, June 9, 1982, page 6, Section A.
[14] Valerie Riches. "A Radical Feminist Charter." Feminism v. Mankind. Family Publications: Wicken, Milton Keynes, Britain, 1990. Page 35.
[15] Cal Thomas and Wayne Stayskal. Liberals for Lunch. Westchester, Illinois: Crossway Books, 1985. Page 45.
[16] The Jonesboro, Arkansas Times, March 15, 1990.
[17] Newspage. "Did Homosexuals Vandalize Pro-Life Newspaper's Machines?" Focus on the Family Citizen, November 19, 1990, page 5.
[18] Carl Horn. "The Struggle for America's Soul." ALL About Issues, January-February 1986, pages 24 and 25.
[19] Margaret Anne Gallagher. "A Tyranny of Pity." National Review, September 26, 1986, page 31. See also July 4, 1986, page 51.
[20] Randy Gragg. "[Portland, Oregon City] Council Finds Nothing Funny, Says No Dice." The Oregonian, February 13, 1991, page A1.
[21] "So That's Where Our Tax Money Goes!" The Phyllis Schlafly Report, January 1991.
[22] "American Liberty Upside Down Aborted Fetus As Art is Censored." ALL About Issues, February 1984, pages 28 and 29.
[23] "Pro-Life Ad Pulled From Seattle Buses." Portland, Oregon Catholic Sentinel. November 3, 1989, page 22.
[24] Living World, Volume 5, Number 2, page 28.
[25] Angela Hornsby. "Drinking Warnings Required." The Oregonian, Tuesday, June 25, 1991, page A10.
[26] American Life League fundraising letter dated March 1991.
[27] "Billboards Carry Pro-Life Message." Voices for the Unborn (Feasterville, Pennsylvania), October 1990, page 10.
[28] Albert Speer, the architect for Adolf Hitler's Jewish Extermination Program. Quoted in ""Civility" and the Right to Life." Free Speech Advocates newsletter of May 1989.
[29] Human Life of Washington State. Human Life News, January/February 1990, page 1.
[30] Warren Hern, M.D. Abortion Practice. New York: J.B. Lippincott Company, 1984. Page 323.
[31] Judith Pasternak, Reproductive Freedom Project, ACLU Foundation, New York City, quoted in "Worth Quoting." National Right to Life News, February 3, 1983, page 19.
[32] Charles Isenhart. "Experts Discuss Impact of 'Post-Abortion Syndrome'." National Catholic Register, June 24, 1990, pages 1 and 9.
[33] "Frontline Updates." National Right to Life News, August 22, 1985, page 4.
[34] "St. Paul Mayor's Suit Against Pro-Lifers Dismissed." The Wanderer, March 14, 1991, pages 1 and 6.
[35] "TV Stations Censor Pro-Life Ads in Governor's Race." American Family Association Journal, January 1990, page 21.
[36] Robert J. Hutchinson. "Pro-Life Democrats." Catholic Twin Circle, August 13, 1989, pages 12 to 14.
[37] Free Speech Advocates fundraising letter of September 1990.
[38] "Pro-Life Printers Wage Battle of Conscience." Free Speech Advocates newsletter, New Hope, Kentucky, January 1991, pages 2 and 3.
[39] "Local Ministers Challenge Injunction." The Buffalo News, October 1, 1990, page C1.
[40] Eugene F. Diamond, M.D. "Do the Medical Schools Discriminate Against Anti-Abortion Applicants?" Linacre Quarterly, February 1976. Also see Doug Harbrecht. "School Bias on Abortion Attacked In Bill." The Pittsburgh Press, November 5, 1977, page 18. Also see news release from the office of Senator Richard S. Schweiker (R-Pa.), dated Friday, November 4, 1977, entitled "Pro-Life Med Students Would Be Protected Under Schweiker Amendment."
[41] Barbara L. Lindheim and Maureen A. Cotterill. "Training in Induced Abortion By Obstetrics and Gynecology Residency Programs." Alan Guttmacher Institute, Family Planning Perspectives, January/February 1978, pages 24 to 28.
[42] "Maryland Bans the Pro-Life Conscience With New Law." Our Sunday Visitor, March 10, 1991, page 17.
[43] One example of such a demand may be found in Marc D. Stern's article "Abortion Conscience Clauses," in the November 1975 edition of the Columbia Journal of Law and Social Problems, pages 571 to 627. Further information on pro-abortion opposition to 'conscience clauses' can be found in the Human Life Review: Jonas Robitscher. "How Psychiatrists Usurp Authority: Abortion and the Draft," Summer 1981, page 41, and Germain Grisez and Joseph M. Boyle, Jr. "The Liberty to Stand Aloof." Winter 1979, page 88. For more examples of pro-abortion opposition to conscience clauses, see Harriet Pilpel and Dorothy E. Patton. "Abortion, Conscience, and the Constitution: An Examination of Federal Institutional Conscience Clauses."
Columbia Human Rights Law Review, 6(1974-1975), pages 279 to 305.
[44] Jack Fowler. "Prolife Hospital Faces Sanctions." National Catholic Register, February 3, 1991. Pages 1 and 9.
[45] Abortionist Bill Baird, quoted in "Bill Baird, Fighter for Women's Right to Abortion." Women and Revolution, Spring 1989, pages 9 to 13.
[46] Beth David, at the National Organization for Women National Conference, New York City, July 5, 1991.
[47] Paul Harvey. "Name of the Game is Intolerance." Conservative Chronicle, June 20, 1990, Page 27.
[48] "The McIlhennys: Victims of Hate." Focus on the Family Citizen, August 20, 1990, pages 14 and 15.
Further Reading: Anti-Life Censorship.
Greenhaven Press. Censorship: Opposing Viewpoints.
Greenhaven Press Opposing Viewpoints Series, Post Office Box 289009, San Diego, California 92128-9009. 1985, 234 pages. Each section includes several essays by leading authorities on both sides of each issue. The questions asked are: "Should There Be Limits to Free Speech?;" "Is School and Library Censorship Justified?;" "Should the News Media Be Regulated?;" "Does National Security Justify Censorship?;" and "Should Pornography Be Censored?" Authors include Nat Hentoff, Phyllis Schlafly, Bob Packwood, the American Library Association, the American Bar Association, and the Association of American Publishers. A catalog is available from the above address and can be obtained by calling 1-(800) 231-5163.
The Rutherford Institute Journal.
Formerly entitled Action, this monthly publication covers the rights of pro-lifers to assemble and speak, and gives details on some of the more outrageous Neoliberal attempts to censor or eliminate opposing viewpoints. Subscribe by writing to The Rutherford Institute, Post Office Box 7482, Charlottesville, Virginia 22906-7482. Telephone: (804) 978-3888.
R. Emmett Tyrrell, Jr. The Liberal Crack-Up.
New York City: Simon & Schuster, 1984. 256 pages. Reviewed by Victor Gold on page 35 of the March 1985 Conservative Digest. His thesis: "New Age Liberalism is no longer the sensible, tolerant, highly principled body of thought that liberalism was in decades past. Sometime in the 1960s or early 1970s, it cracked up into a riot of enthusiasms, usually contradictory, always extremist, often non compos mentis."
Paul Vitz, Ph.D. Censorship: Evidence of Bias in Our Children's Textbooks.
Servant Books, Post Office Box 8617, Ann Arbor, Michigan 48107. Reviewed by Chilton Williamson, Jr., on page 64 of the January 30, 1987 National Review.
© American Life League BBS — 1-703-659-7111
This is a chapter of the Pro-Life Activist's Encyclopedia, published by American Life League.
