Canada
Justin Trudeau’s Liberal government has announced new funding of $8.9 million for international abortion organizations. As outlined in this column last month, Trudeau’s core government “foreign policy” was revealed as a threefold, interconnected, abortion platform: feminism and the rights of women and girls; the right to safe and accessible abortion; and, promotion of LGBTQ rights. In addition, Canada’s deputy minister proudly declared that this platform and funding underline Trudeau’s push for a seat on the U.N. Security Council. (Woops, Canada came up 20 votes short as Norway and Ireland were elected to fill two seats reserved for western Europe and Canada.) In 2019, Trudeau pledged $1.4 billion, every single year until 2030, to international organizations that advocate for and carry out so-called sexual health and reproductive rights in developing countries, with half being reserved for abortion. In June, this paper also introduced porn baron Phil Harvey to our readers. Harvey is a billionaire who funds abortion through his multiple sleazy endeavours (including mail-order porn). He founded and sits on the board of the abortion conglomerate Marie Stopes International. His finger is in the recent funding from the Trudeau government. Out of the new funding of $8.9 million, Marie Stopes, which is already generously funded by Harvey and various governments, will receive $4.9 million from Canadian taxpayers. Another $2 million will go to Ipas, another global abortion provider but which focuses on India. And the U.N. will receive $2 million in their fight against gender-based violence against women. So, these three international abortion supporters and providers will have their coffers topped up with Canadians’ money. Note that all three “endeavours” support the Trudeau government’s ‘foreign policy’ platform. And it was all done under the auspices of pandemic funding.
Choice42 – Choice for two – is a Canadian pro-life, non-profit organization that “connects with abortion-minded women and works with them to help them chose life over termination, and assists them in finding the resources the women need.” Laura Klassen, founder of Choice42, crowd-sourced nearly $3,000 through GoFundMe to assist three pregnant women in need—in Zimbabwe, in Canada and in the United States. GoFundMe, not supportive of the urgency of the women needing the funds, withheld the money because it says that Zimbabwe is not supported by their payment processes, and then cut off contact with Klassen. It was only when she went to social media, explaining that she had done everything the company had asked her to do that a representative of GoFundMe contacted her. However, the stalemate had not been resolved at the time The Interimwent to press, and a member of Choice42 put up her own personal funds to ensure that the three women who are in dire need of help are assisted. Klassen confirmed that her organization will no longer use GoFundMe as their fundraising platform.
United States
The all-but-official Democrat nominee for president, Joe Biden, released a video about his complete support for the abortion agenda. Employing euphemisms to barely disguise his abortion extremism, Biden said: “It’s a simple proposition, health care is a right not dependent on race, gender, income, or zip code. As president I’m going to do everything in my power to expand access to quality affordable health care for women. We will protect women’s constitutional right to choose, and I am proud to stand with you in this fight.” That means taxpayer-funded abortion, for any reason, up to and even after the moment of birth. As a career “Catholic” Democrat, Biden has long opposed taxpayer-funder of abortion, but flip-flopped last summer after abortion activists criticized him for being insufficiently pro-abortion. The Democrats have a litmus test on abortion for candidates for high office: no questioning of the abortion license, no legal limits on the practice of pre-natal or even neo-natal homicide if procured as a choice of the mother.
It will come as no surprise that Planned Parenthood endorsed Joe Biden in the race for U.S. president. What was maybe a tad surprising was the wording that Planned Parenthood’s acting president Alexis McGill Johnson used: “This is literally a life and death election.” We’ll leave it there without comment.
Obianuju (Uju) Ekeocha, an African pro-life leader presently living in the U.K., has appeared many times in The Interim. She is a fierce defender of the unborn and of her traditional African culture. A recent video of Nancy Pelosi (D-California) and her Democratic colleagues kneeling “in solidarity” with black people during the U.S. riots has resulted in comments and criticism worldwide, not the least because of the colourful scarves worn by these kneelers? Uju (and others) pointed out the hypocrisy of these “virtue signallers”: “I had to say something about the American politicians shamelessly and ignorantly using the Kente fabric as a prop in their virtue signaling.” She continued: “Excuse me, Democrats. Don’t treat Africans like we’re children. The fabrics and these colorful things (i.e., in this instance, the scarves) that we have within our culture and our tradition, they all mean something to us. I know you look at us and you say, ‘Oh, Africans are so cute in all your colorful dresses.’ Well, some of those dresses and patterns and colors actually do mean something to us.”
“We’re devastated, grieving and outraged by violence against Black Lives. We must continue to demand accountability, justice and an end to the inequality that continues to define every moment of life for Black America from the racist.” That tweet was sent out during the riots and looting in June. Every respectful person can agree with the statement and maybe share the anguish that the tweeting writers seem to be suffering – except for one small detail. Those who are “devastated, grieving and outraged” are the very persons who prey on black Americans and abort their children. These tweeted “anguished cries” are those of Planned Parenthood, purveyors of death, despair, injustice, and inequality. No, sisters, you have it backward. Because of the violence Planned Parenthood inflicts on unborn black children and the money it makes from the killings, Planned Parenthood has no credibility at all in respect of human life. Spare us the tears; the hypocrisy is numbing.
Since 1973, 18 million, six hundred and five thousand, two hundred and thirty-seven (18,605,237) black babies have been aborted in the U.S. (as of 12 noon, June 13, 2020 according to the website numberofabortions.com. That website gives the “real-time abortion counter based on the most current statistics,” for a number of categories, including number of black babies eliminated by abortion in America. As the site explains, each abortion counter is a real-time estimate of the number of abortions in the U.S. and worldwide based on the very latest data, although world statistics are not broken down by country. Most of the abortions reported are surgically induced; there has been no attempt to tally the totals for chemically-induced abortions. Pharmacists for Life estimate that there have been approximately 250 million babies aborted chemically in the U.S. since 1973 (Roe v. Wade). The site explains why it includes a “black baby counter.” It was requested by two African-American religious-based groups to “highlight the disparity of the high number of abortions in the black population,” which was part of Planned Parenthood founder Margaret Sanger’s eugenics plan. African-Americans are just under 13 per cent of the U.S. population, and yet 36 per cent of all abortions are obtained by black women. At a ratio of 474 abortions per 1,000 live births, black women have the highest ratio of any group in the country. Abortion is the leading cause of death among blacks, and yet, it is completely ignored by Black Lives Matter and its supporters. If black lives really do matter (and they do) why does BLM support abortion and accept the support of the National Abortion Rights Action League and Planned Parenthood, among others?
In the middle of massive protests against the police killing of George Floyd, two New York police officers ignored the rioting, looting, and lack of social distancing and focused their attention on two black pro-life women peacefully praying in front of the Margaret Sanger Planned Parenthood facility in Manhattan. The women, standing on the public sidewalk obeying distancing rules, not interfering with pedestrian traffic, were praying when they were handcuffed, taken away in a police cruiser, and charged with violating COVID-19 social distancing guidelines. One of the women commented to FOX News: “It’s really truly biased against Christians, against pro-life abolitionists.” In a related incident, David Benham, noted entrepreneur (who with his brother had their home improvement series cancelled on TV because of their non-related pro-life work) and Christian pro-life activist was cuffed and arrested outside a Charlotte, N.C. abortion facility. He claims that his group was following distancing rules, as a video confirms, and his charitable, non-profit Cities 4 Life is allowed to continue its work during the pandemic according to the rules of North Carolina. Senator Ted Cruz (R-Texas) has pledged his support for Benham. Those are only two of a number of pro-life demonstrators being arrested during the pandemic, including another North Carolina group that has engaged The Thomas More Society in filing a federal lawsuit. And yet other demonstrators are allowed flout physical distancing rules in the thousands, with not only impunity but political, corporate, and media cheerleading. The double-standard is sickening and will only further erode trust in our institutions.
Democrat Senator Elizabeth Warren (Mass), reportedly on the short-list of vice presidential candidates being considered by Joe Biden, tweeted in June that “the murder of black trans women is an epidemic.” Of course, the death of any person is a tragedy and every human being, before and after birth, has the right to life. But is there really an epidemic of black trans women murders? One of the self-identified transgender individuals highlighted in Warren’s tweet was shot during a robbery gone bad. That does not seem like a gender identity-related crime to us; more being in the wrong place at the wrong time. In other words, a tragedy. Warren is playing identity politics on steroids pandering to black trans women – not blacks, not women, not trans, but black trans women. It makes you wonder if politicians like Warren see the human being behind the various identities they have.
Zoom meetings became ubiquitous during the pandemic as employers and friends met on the online portal that provides live audio and video. Whatever other issues might arise with Zoom, count on an academic (or two) to find the most bananas criticism possible. Caroline Brooks and Amy Bonomi of Michigan State University published an essay in MSU Today titled “There’s an unconscious bias in virtual meetings. Here’s how you can avoid it.” Brooks and Bonomi wrote: “There’s an issue happening beneath the surface with platforms like Zoom, Teams, and Skype beyond stress and mental health that’s affecting its users.” The problem? The “symbolism and nonverbal cues that reinforce normative social identities with respect to gender, race, sexual preference, and socioeconomic status.” A prime example, they noted was having pictures of weddings or families in the background, which Brooks and Bonomi complain, “unintentionally reinforces the idea that marriage is most fitting between opposite sexes.” Sometimes a picture is just a picture, not systemic oppression.
International
Many jurisdictions are reporting a decline in abortions during the pandemic. The French Health Minister even worried that not enough women were having abortions. The Catholic News Agency reports that there has been a 40 per cent decline in the number of abortions this spring in Mexico as people were confined to their homes. Alison Gonzalez of the pro-life Pasos por la Vida (Steps for Life) said that pro-abortion groups are using the declining number of abortions as a talking point in arguing for do-it-yourself chemical abortions at home. Gonzalez said, “it is incredible that given the times we’re living in, there are institutions that only think about abortion.” Maria Lourdes Varela, director of 40 Days for Life in Ibero-America, Mexico, said “if there are more babies, they should be welcomed as they are human beings who deserve the same rights and opportunities we do.” More good news from Mexico: state legislators in Guanajuato and San Luis Potosi rejected efforts to legalize abortion. Although 18 of 32 Mexican states passed right-to-life measures in 2016, abortion activists have been agitating to remove protection for babies in the womb.
