Former Abortion Advocate: We Lied

I had read or heard much of this before, but I recently stumbled across an article quoting Dr. Bernard Nathanson, a co-founder of the pro-abortion group NARAL, who later became pro life and an outspoken critic of abortion.

One of the things he has consistently said is that in the quest to get unlimited abortion legal and to keep it legal, abortion advocates have consistently lied. (I remember that during the partial -birth abortion debate, one of the spokespeople for the pro-abortion groups also admitted that they lied.)

Nathanson pointed out that abortion advocates purposely created slogans to appeal to people.

"Women must have control over their own bodies."
"Safe and legal abortion is every woman's right."
"Who decides? You decide!"
"Freedom of choice -- a basic American right."

"I remember laughing when we made those slogans up," Nathanson said. "We were looking for some sexy, catchy slogans to capture public opinion. They were very cynical slogans then, just as all of these slogans today are very, very cynical."

"In 1968 I met Lawrence Lader. Lader had just finished a book called Abortion, and in it had made the audacious demand that abortion should be legalized throughout the country. I had just finished a residency in obstetrics and gynecology and was impressed with the number of women who were coming into our clinics, wards and hospitals suffering from illegal, infected, botched abortions."

"Lader and I were perfect for each other. We sat down and plotted out the organization now known as NARAL. With Betty Friedan, we set up this organization and began working on the strategy."

"We persuaded the media that the cause of permissive abortion was a liberal, enlightened, sophisticated one. Knowing that if a true poll were taken, we would be soundly defeated, we simply fabricated the results of fictional polls."

In other words, they lied.

"We announced to the media that we had taken polls and that 60 percent of Americans were in favor of permissive abortion. This is the tactic of the self-fulfilling lie.

Admitting to lying.

"Few people care to be in the minority. We aroused enough sympathy to sell our program of permissive abortion by fabricating the number of illegal abortions done annually in the U.S."

Fabricating. In other words, they lied.

"The actual figure was approaching 100,000, but the figure we gave to the media repeatedly was 1,000,000."

"Repeating the big lie often enough convinces the public."

Sounds familiar. Propaganda 101 - lie.

"The number of women dying from illegal abortions was around 200-250 annually. The figure we constantly fed to the media was 10,000. These false figures took root in the consciousness of Americans, convincing many that we needed to crack the abortion law."

Again, they intentionally lied.

"Another myth we fed to the public through the media was that legalizing abortion would only mean that the abortions taking place illegally would then be done legally. In fact, of course, abortion is now being used as a primary method of birth control in the U.S. and the annual number of abortions has increased by 1,500 percent since legalization."

Myth. A synonym for "lie."

The target was New York, which had had a law outlawing abortion on its books for 140- years.

"In two years of work, we at NARAL struck that law down. We lobbied the legislature, we captured the media, we spent money on public relations. … Our first year's budget was $7,500. Of that, $5,000 was allotted to a public relations firm to persuade the media of the correctness of our position. That was in 1969."

And four years later, the abortion plague spread across American with Roe v. Wade.

Oh, by the way, Norma McCorvey (whom I interviewed back when I was a reporter), who was Jane Roe, later became a pro-lifer herself and admitted that in her original suit that went to the Supreme Court ... she had lied.

Legal abortion is based on lies. It is sustained by lies.

And we all know who the Father of Lies is.