It was a typical morning. I caught the 80 bus to go to class, and as I approached the entrance to Library Mall and prepared to weave my way through construction, something caught my eye. My view was partially blocked, but I could see activists of some kind handing pamphlets out. The crowd shifted and before I knew what was happening I was faced with a large, graphic photo of what I could only assume was an aborted fetus. It wasn’t even lunch yet and here I was staring down the bloody aftermath of abortion. I’m fairly pro-life, but as I was admittedly shocked by the graphic nature of the demonstration, I shrugged off a pamphlet and continued on my way to class.
This kind of promotion is entirely permissible within the realm of free speech. They had the right to be out expressing their views on abortion. The question is whether this kind of protest is the best way to express the pro-life message.
There are effective communication methods and non-effective communication methods. Shock value in the form of graphic images are ultimately detrimental to the campaign as they alienate viewers and, in the context of abortion, are misleading.
The point of any public political promotion is to spread your stance on the issue and hopefully gain new followers in the process. In my perception, the image was an emotional appeal by the demonstrators. It was meant to draw simultaneous sympathy for the aborted fetus and disgust at the gory, unaltered “reality of abortion.” Confronted with the image, this mixture of sympathy and disgust was meant to persuade people to stand against abortion, or at least look further into the pro-life movement. The image was successful in drawing disgust, but ultimately this disgust leads to alienation and not the intended result.
How many people rejected a pamphlet, the chance to learn about the organization’s specific stances, because they were distracted or downright turned off by the image in front of them? This alienation does not stem from our unwillingness to discuss abortion, but rather our understandably low tolerance for having graphic images thrown at us. Images are worth a thousand words, yet anyone who knows something about surgical abortion, pro-life or pro-choice, knows the aftermath is explicit. Is it really necessary to show it? Take other advocacy groups. It is unnecessary, it borders on redundant and it is all for shock value.
Proponents of the images state that this is simply the reality of abortion, yet in this sense, the images are misleading. There are two methods of abortion – medical and surgical. Medical abortions involve the use of an oral pill to terminate a pregnancy, and have been growing more prevalent every year since their introduction in 2000 and were around 27 percent of all early abortions performed in America in 2010. While they still terminate, the results are much less graphic (think very heavy period as opposed to gory remains). The images try to show the reality of abortion, but they only show one reality, the more visually graphic one. At best, this is an incidental occurrence and at worst, it is a manipulation of information to serve shock value purposes.
In the end, you’ll catch more flies with honey than vinegar, and you’ll get more people to listen without graphically showing aborted fetuses. To voluntarily remove these images from pro-life demonstrations would strategically maximize results; it is not censorship. If pro-life organizations wish to gain new supporters, they must stop the use of these alienating and misleading graphic images in their demonstrations.
Madeline Sweitzer ([email protected]) is a sophomore majoring in political science and intending to major in journalism.
