Christy stepped up the podium, preparing to share the most significant story of her life — her own personal story — to the crowd gathered around. Her topic? An issue that has polarized a nation and politicized pregnancy and women’s health care for decades. Her story? Abortion.
But as Christy started sharing her story, her voice was overwhelmed by a screaming crowd set on spewing an agenda of abortion at no cost… and abortion at all costs. More intent on promoting an ideology than listening to that ideology’s impact on women, the crowd protested and drowned out Christy’s story.
Their chant? “My body, my choice!”
What about Christy’s body? What of her choice?
It’s one thing to disagree with someone. It’s quite another to deny their experience because it doesn’t fit into your political or ideological box.
You see, Christy’s story isn’t one of empowerment after her abortion. It’s the opposite. Christy shared the impact of abortion on her life: She suffered through years of intense depression and even contemplated suicide as an escape from the emotional pain she felt after her abortion. She saw the death of her dream to have a large family after discovering her abortion left her infertile. She lived much of her life with regret from her decision, and lamented that Planned Parenthood had failed her by not sharing any of the potential negative side effects with her.
Ironically, the crowd held signs reading “Stand with Planned Parenthood.” And that’s the problem. They don’t stand with women. They don’t stand for the emotional or physical health of women. They stand with an organization that monetarily benefits from a singular option: Abortion.
Sadly, this same organization was the one who misinformed and manipulated Christy and drastically changed the course of her life. By holding signs demonstrating their support for that organization, they disregarded her story, her experience, and her pain.
They proved, yet again, they don’t really stand for women or their health.
Get more pro-life stories, straight to your inbox
“Planned Parenthood is hoping that women like me will remain silent, that we will just suck it up, shut up and remain in anger and denial,” Christy said. “We share our stories because our experience proves that Planned Parenthood cannot stand behind their false rhetoric. They will not silence us, and they will not keep us in anger and denial, lost in our physical, emotional and spiritual pain.”
But Planned Parenthood can’t silence women forever. They can’t chant loud enough to drown out the stories of millions of women and families who’ve been hurt by abortion. As more women share, more people will have to confront the reality that Planned Parenthood doesn’t stand for women.
So why should women stand with Planned Parenthood?
It’s time to reveal the truth: Planned Parenthood is anti-women and anti-women’s health care. But they’ve deceived an entire nation into believing just the opposite. And now we know how. They’ve drowned out women’s stories, silencing them the same way the pro-choice movement silenced Norma McCorvey (Jane Roe of Roe v. Wade) after she was no longer useful to the movement.
If Planned Parenthood insists on women “shouting their abortions,” maybe they should take the time to listen to ALL stories, not just the ones that fit their narrowly defined narrative.
And if not, it’s time for “pro-choice” advocates and Planned Parenthood supporters to surrender the slogan of choice when it’s obvious they just stand for abortion.
