Prolife Propaganda--Warning: Offensive Content Included!

Anyone will tell you that I am contrarian. Drop me in a pool full of liberals, and I get defensively conservative. In a privileged, conservative environment, and I'm suddenly Che bloody Guevera and willing to pick out who goes up against the wall first, once the revolution comes.

Sometimes, it feels like being hit on the knee at the doctor's office, and my foot swings. In the end, I tend to settle somewhere left of center, but I can sure get hardcore when something pushes my buttons.

And Prolife Across America does that to me with their billboards. You see a few of them around in the Cities, where they are often quickly defaced. Head outside of the metropolitan areas, however, and they grow like weeds--they are all over the place. The one that has just totally pushed me into the "Abortion on demand: no restrictions" camp is this one:

I absolutely hate this ad, because it exploits a slippery slope without acknowledging that there is any difference between a just fertilized egg and a full term infant. In fact, the "babies" on the billboard are probably at least6-8 months old, as they are holding their own heads up, they are sitting up without assistance, and they seem to have control over their arms and hands.

When I first saw this billboard, last summer, the first thing that popped into my head was an alternative billboard.


Sure, it's offensive, but if you aren't going to make any distinctions between embryos, fetuses, newborns and infants, why stop there? Why not address the possible futures of these zygotes? "Embryos are just tiny clumps of cells with a significant chance of dying from cancer!" "Embryos are just tiny drunk drivers who will kill or injure another person in their lifetime!" "Embryos are just tiny divorced parents, who will make life miserable for their own children!" or "Embryos are just tiny children who will stuff you into a nursing home in order to get control of your assets and then ignore you until you die!"

I mean, in the interests of fairness, shouldn't all different sides of the story be presented?

Yes, it's tasteless and crude of me, but they just make me so angry. There are many many reasons women find themselves faced with the possibility of an abortion, and it's probably not because they didn't know that pregnancy might lead to children. It's a hard enough decision for a woman to make without having to be preached to from billboards in such an insulting way.

Okay. Rant over. Persiflage to continue in future posts.