A small victory was won by Hamilton Right to Life members in November 1984 when the Hamilton-based National Film Board office agreed to show The Slippery Slope – a Gerretsen Productions pro-life documentary – at its theatre for three consecutive days.

 

Hamilton Right to Life members had been picketing in all kinds of weather at the Hamilton-based NFB office to demonstrate their disapproval of NFB’s involvement in the death-promoting films.

 

The NFB theatre has been showing Abortion: Stories North and South and the dubiously named “Democracy on Trial” (the latter film would have been more appropriately named “Anarchy on Trial”).  Both pro-abortion films have been produced, distributed, marketed and promoted by the publicly funded National Film Board at no small cost.

 

Stories from no substance

 

Abortion: Stories from North and South cost Canadian taxpayers 454,000 dollars just for the filming.  Additional funds are allocated for distribution and marketing, according to Sally Bocher, NFB media Relations officer in Montreal.  She would not disclose the amount that is being spent on these activities.

 

The film was written and directed by Gail Singer who has secured several contracts with the CBC since 1970 and with the NFB since 1981.  Besides Singer, the pro-abortion film employed a crew of 13.  Although funded by the National Film Board of Canada, the film was produced in association with the NFB Ontario Regional Production Studio.

 

The usual journalistic practice of providing substantive source information does not seem to apply to Singer as she makes an odd assortment of unproven random remarks.  These range from statistical figures on other countries to historical claims about abortion practices.

 

An example of Singer’s use of flagrant statements appears in The Hamilton Spectator (Nov. 6, 1984).  The opening paragraph focuses on Canadian women.  “They make a curious club of Canadian women in their 50s and 60s who share a guilty secret: They once had an abortion.”  Singer is attributed with saying that she has “met many such women who’ve come forward to confess what they’ve hidden for two or three decades as their own terrible secret.”

 

Are readers to believe that these anonymous women, after having kept their “well-guarded” secret for some 20 to 30 years, would now place their confidence in Gail Singer?  And how many is “many”?  Moreover, if Singer is telling the truth, has she not betrayed the trust of these women by making public their so-called confession (presumably, the women spoke to her in confidence)?

 

The abortionist, Henry Morgentaler, is portrayed as a martyr for women’s rights in the film Democracy on Trial.  Singer’s pro-death film picks up on this theme in the obvious attempt to demonstrate a so-called “need” for abortion clinics in Canada based primarily on her “global perspective.”  In this film, Morgentaler is shown lecturing an audience about the abortion laws of Canada.  As the camera scans quickly across the room it zooms in briefly on feminist activist, Laura Sabia, who appears to be playing the role of an ardent member of the audience.  Laura Sabia is a well-publicized former alderman from St. Catharines who received national recognition in her zealous efforts in the women’s liberation movement and her position as having once headed the National Action Committee on the Status of Women in Canada.

 

It is well known that the federally sponsored organization, also known as NAC, has as one of its goals, “Abortion as a matter of private conscience.”

 

Even though it is difficult to identify members of Morgentaler’s “audience “, it can be presumed that most are feminists who embrace those ideals which work to undermine the rights and protections i.e., laws, family, etc., traditionally given to children.

 

In a final analysis of Singer’s pro-death film, she documents at least one aspect of the abortion issue in a fair manner.  This aspect deals with pagan beliefs and ritualistic practices, which clearly indicate that even pagans recognize abortion to be harmful psychologically and spiritually.

 

Yet in contrast to the pagan religious documentation, Singer denies the same sense of fairplay to the Christian beliefs.  She openly attacks the stand taken by the Roman Catholic Church regarding abortion.  At the onset of the film, she depicts a forlorn woman (an actress) standing beside a brick wall on which is a Christian message of salvation.  The subliminal suggestion is that a lone pregnant female faces a very real problem with no one to help her as she stands in the vacuum of a cold, unfeeling world.

 

Death peddlers

 

Yet no emphasis is placed on a practical application of enforcing laws to provide protection to her and to her unborn child.  Instead, the film supports the message of the pro-abortionist: the only way out of the woman’s “problem” is to kill her baby.

 

The Morgentaler film, gives little if any information of substance.  Apart from the fact that the abortionist was arrested there are only sketchy bits of personal information about this death peddler.  The film is cluttered with dramatic sound effects of slamming prison doors, a view of Morgentaler’s nude, hairy body on a prison bunk, and other obvious film-media ploys to elicit sympathy from the viewer.

 

As a public-funded body, the NFB should be prepared to allocate the same amount of funds and services in support of the pro-life cause.  NFB death propaganda is actually a form of hate “literature.”  In promoting death peddlers, the NFB has at the very least, demonstrated a bias.

 

If death peddlers can continue to wage war on the innocent and helpless in this country with the help of government-funded agencies, then it is time for responsible action to be taken by all Canadians in dealing with this matter.  The good of the public is not being served when children – before and after birth – continue to be denied the protection provided under the Criminal Code.

 

Therefore, the government film commissioner and chairman, Francois Macerola, should be alerted to the seriousness of this matter, and asked to take appropriate measures for remedy.  For if the NFB continues to promote death peddling in this country without giving the same access and consideration – dollar for dollar – to pro-life issues, then the silent majority of the Canadian taxpayers (whose collective voice is heard through their votes at election) should consider making their stand known to federal offices of the Solicitor General and the Minister of Justice.