On November 13, NARAL launched a new campaign "to build on young people's historic levels of engagement in the political process and to bring their passion and energy to secure the future of our pro-choice America," according to its e-mail announcement.
The website was hip and attractive. But I thought the introductory video, "Free," was too vague. I got a little of it, but felt like I missed the Big Message. I decided I wasn't cool.
Today, NARAL released its 2nd video, "Will," and this one had the same impact on me. I got some of it, but felt like I was the only nonhigh person in a Beatnik coffee house....
Perhaps young people can help me understand what is so great and persuasive about these videos.
Comments:
My sound card's corrupted so I can't hear the videos, but I wouldn't be much help anyways.
I was "cool" for about 2 years when I was in highschool, but I have been decidedly un-cool ever since.
That said, I will say that marketing efforts aimed to be "cool" rarely are.
Posted by: lauren at November 25, 2008 4:10 PMAs an aside, it's really funny watching these without the sound.
Posted by: lauren at November 25, 2008 4:11 PMDid NARAL tell the young people anything about the 30,000,000 young people destroyed with their (NARAL's) blessing in the abortion holocaust? Did they tell those kids that they are "survivors" and lucky to be alive? Did they tell them about the lies NARAL has been telling the American people for 40 years? Did they mention anything about Bernard Nathanson who helped found NARAL and exposed their dishonesty years ago?
How do you "secure the future" when you are helping to destroy the future? I was "anti-choice" as a youth, just like now, so I just don't get it about all this "pro-choice" stuff.
Posted by: Joe at November 25, 2008 4:17 PM"Politicians searching for moral ambiguity instead of whipped cream?"
Carefully chosen words that mean nothing. Isn't that the pro-abort way? These remind me of the old women's lib ads in the 1970's. Reeeally dumb.
Joe,
Did they mention anything about Bernard Nathanson who helped found NARAL and exposed their dishonesty years ago?
Exactly.
Posted by: Janet at November 25, 2008 4:21 PMI agree - these are dumb. I don't think free style poetry slams are going to move anyone to do anything, especially when you can barely understand what they're talking about!
Posted by: Danielle at November 25, 2008 4:32 PMLOL, Danielle. NARAL- out of touch with today's youth.
Posted by: Bobby Bambino at November 25, 2008 4:33 PMI noticed they have a t-shirt contest.
Perhaps we should enter with a nod to Dr. Nathanson.
Posted by: lauren at November 25, 2008 4:35 PMNARAL just continues to prove themselves to the the hypocrites that they are.
The Grieving Parents Act (a bill that requires medical professionals to disclose fetal disposition rights to women who suffer miscarriage) was presented in our state. (and thankfully passed)
Who pushed back and fought against theis bill?
NARAL of course. Why don't they support choice for women who miscarry and want to respectfully say goodbye to THEIR babies who were early birthed form THEIR bodies?
This organization is as phony as you can get.
Sandy, of course not. They care about promoting abortion. Period. When I miscarried my second baby my doctor was anything but supportive. Although he was a Christian doctor, it was obvious that he didn't feel that losing a child to an early miscarriage was much of a loss.
Posted by: lauren at November 25, 2008 4:41 PMWho pushed back and fought against theis bill?
NARAL of course. Why don't they support choice for women who miscarry and want to respectfully say goodbye to THEIR babies who were early birthed form THEIR bodies?
Right you are, Sandy. Boy, do they ever hate it when a woman grieves the loss of her unborn child. They will deny it is possible at all costs, and will ridicule the woman and make her a laughing stock, then go and claim they are "pro-choice". Give me a break.
"Politicians searching for moral ambiguity instead of whipped cream?"
In other words morality is ambiguous so lets find the whipped cream and have fun with sex. It makes sense to the kids that are listening to it. It say man is the master of his own universe, so speak it. After all man is God. It's the same thing Eve fell for in the garden of Eden.
Posted by: jo at November 25, 2008 5:02 PMThey are promoting license not freedom. If and when this entire religion is put into law by the invasive left all the freedom they are seeking will be gone. As the world looks to the right afraid for their rights, the left is sneeking up behind them.
Posted by: Jeff at November 25, 2008 5:04 PMI'm def not big into the poetry thing, which is why I liked the second one better: less abstract. Modern art, poetry slams... call me a Philistine, but it's not my cup of tea. The second one was okay but the first was waaaay out there. Though I did like the woman's voice.
Posted by: Leah at November 25, 2008 5:42 PMWhat I found really frightening was the image of
Adam and Eve in the garden eating the apple with the serpent looking on. As much as I can understand the video, here it seems to be exalting the choice of evil as part of "will". Like expulsion from Paradise (i.e., hell) is a good, praise-worthy choice!?
Jo hit the nail on the head with,"It says man is the master of his own universe, so speak it. After all man is God. It's the same thing Eve fell for in the garden of Eden." But who is the serpent here? Who is sending the message of "free. will."? NARAL is basically admitting it is of the devil, is it not?
Sylvia, in a sick way people who don't believe in God tend to celebrate the concept of the devil. They respect that he rebelled against God and feel that we should do the same. Of course, the "celebration" is a bit tongue in cheek since they think its all just "fantasy" anyways.
Posted by: lauren at November 25, 2008 6:31 PMThe second video states that the government has no right to regulate skin. I guess that means we should legalize prostitution?
Who are we to say what a person can or cannot do with their bodies? If someone wants to use heroine, it's their body and their right! If someone wants to walk naked around a group of kids, it's their body and their right!
We should also set up suicide clinics so that we can make suicide "safe and sane." These clinics will help reduce blood borne diseases being spread by offering non-bloody ways of death. We should also set up clinics to safely administer heroine to make it "safe and sane." These clinics will make it possible to reduce the transmission of AIDS throughout the population!
What? We should do these things? How come these principles apply to abortion then?
Posted by: segamon at November 25, 2008 7:39 PMLauren.. what you said doesn't make any sense. If someone didn't believe in God, how would they celebrate the concept of the devil rebelling against God?
There are agnostics on here. I wish they'd come comment on this.
Posted by: Josephine at November 25, 2008 7:43 PM"We should do these things?" should have been "We shouldn't do these things?" *grumple* lousy typing too fast... :)
Posted by: segamon at November 25, 2008 7:43 PMThey do it sarcastically, Josephine. They celebrate it because they think the "bad guy" is "cool."
Similar to how people might root for the bad guy in a movie. They think Christians are stupid, and thus mock them by "rooting" for the devil. It's really not a hard concept to understand.
Posted by: lauren at November 25, 2008 7:58 PMI think you're wrong. Where is Hal? He could probably clear it up. Maybe I'm wrong.
Posted by: Josephine at November 25, 2008 8:08 PMGod help us.
Posted by: Jasper at November 25, 2008 8:12 PMwhat exactly is the question? I don't celebrate the concept of the devil, nor do any of my friends (as far as I know) The people I know would never refer to the "devil" other than in jest, and really, not even then. Just never comes up. We were all shocked with that poll came out a few years back :
The poll of 2,455 U.S. adults from Nov 7 to 13 found that 82 percent of those surveyed believed in God, a figure unchanged since the question was asked in 2005.
It further found that 79 percent believed in miracles, 75 percent in heaven, while 72 percent believed that Jesus is God or the Son of God. Belief in hell and the devil was expressed by 62 percent.
Posted by: hal at November 25, 2008 8:20 PMHal, I am talking about people celebrating the devil in jest.
For example, I had friend who would say "God Damn You" after someone sneezed.
People who mock Christianity find it "funny" to side with the devil.
Of course some go beyond hillarious hipster irony and really do side with the devil and his rebellian. Alinsky for example dedicated his book to Satan the "first community organizer."
Posted by: lauren at November 25, 2008 8:26 PMLauren, I'm no authority on people who do that. I don't think I"m one of them. I do, on occasion, mock Christianity, but I'm trying to stop.
Hal, I'm glad to hear you're trying to cut back on your Christian bashing.
Posted by: lauren at November 25, 2008 9:06 PMLaVeyan Satanists don't believe in or worship Satan, but they claim to believe in the exact opposite of Christianity. Basically they just do the opposite of everything Jesus said. Kind of like a Democrat.
...Hahahaha.
Posted by: John Lewandowski at November 25, 2008 9:43 PM. . . felt like I was the only nonhigh person in a Beatnik coffee house
Glad you don't indulge, Jill, but you should really find some more wholesome venues of entertainment.
Posted by: The Raving Atheist at November 25, 2008 9:55 PM"Beatnik coffee house?" Seriously? I think that it isn't so much a question of your being not cool, as it is that you're really old.
People who don't believe in God tend to celebrate the concept of the devil, lauren? I'm with Hal. I know plenty of agnostics and none of them "celebrate the devil". But, oh yeh, we'll dress up as the devil at Hallowe'en perhaps, just like we might dress up as ohhh.... other characters and famous people. And just as we 'll use the lord's name in vain. One of the sweariest words in Quebec is "tabernac" which means "f***". I'm sure you Catholics know where that word comes from. Why do they use tabernac?
Oh, but maybe I made that up since Patricia says I apparently know squat about life in Canada.
Posted by: asitis at November 25, 2008 10:47 PM'K, I'm not that old, but those made zero sense to me. :D
Catchy graphics, though.
Posted by: Kel at November 25, 2008 10:51 PMUhm, I'm nineteen and it made okay sense to me. It was still dumb, but I understood what they were conveying.
Posted by: Josephine at November 25, 2008 11:05 PMUhm, I'm nineteen and it made okay sense to me. It was still dumb, but I understood what they were conveying.
Posted by: Josephine at November 25, 2008 11:05 PM
I think basically they were saying "I'll do what I want, you're not the boss of me!" (Imagine a three year old having a tantrum...)
Posted by: Janet at November 25, 2008 11:38 PMJanet, that's basically what I got. I HOPE I speak for people my age when I say that's it's almost insulting to our intelligence to think that's appealing to us. Ugh.
Posted by: Josephine at November 25, 2008 11:45 PMWhen I'm talking about our intelligence, I should really spell check. I meant "that it's".
Posted by: Josephine at November 25, 2008 11:49 PMI'm 25, and I was really ticked off at the first video when they mention the guy "refusing" to put it on. I'm not for contraception but come on....how irresponsable can you be!!
Posted by: Melissa at November 26, 2008 3:01 AMThe second video states that the government has no right to regulate skin. I guess that means we should legalize prostitution?
Posted by: segamon at November 25, 2008 7:39 PM
----
Actually, that would also mean the government has no right to legalize abortion or have any say in the matter, because in both cases, it's skin - the skin of the woman and the baby.
Posted by: Chris Arsenault at November 26, 2008 5:46 AMThe beatnik thing pretty much sums it up. All they need are bongos and black turtlenecks.
I'm guessing that NARAL learned from Obama that vague works. If "Hope" and "Change" were enough to put Harold Saxon in the White House, then "Free" and "Will" and "Power" ought to sell kids on abortion.
Especially the "Will" and the "Power"
Though how powerful you really are when you can only achieve "free" by destroying a 20-gram embryo is something they've never adequately explained.
Posted by: Christina at November 26, 2008 6:25 AMJosephine, can you enlighten the old fogeys here?
The message I got is, "To be genuine you must be one of us, because the alternative is to be Big Brother."
It's really just an updated version of the old Dr Pepper commercials where the guy in the red sneakers danced through town, inviting you to be original by joining the crowd.
Posted by: Christina at November 26, 2008 6:32 AMWow - So in the second video it's all about appreciating the knowledge of Good and Evil?
Anyone want to find out what evil tastes like?
"Will is progress and push - the future you pray for..."
Praying to who? Gaia - the "earth mother"?
"Things rightfully yours, like a body and a voice."
Where do those rights come from and when? Did you get them from the same mother who aborted your siblings?
Looks like mom has the power to bestow rights and life.
Or do the rights come from the abortionists who control life and death?
NARAL is inspiring me! Here's an alternative ad:
(black screen)
slow fade - free.will.power
(audio fade in - girl having orgasm to a laughing, giggling child, a thrown switch, the vacumn pump coming on, the child screaming fading to the mother screaming to the pump being switched off, and then muffled sobs fading down, then "cha-ching" (cash register from Pink Floyd's Money) to an older woman yelling "Next!")
(Fade in - girls hand folding open a crumpled wad of cash)
(older hand grabs the money from the hand - fade to black)
(Sound: cash registers, opening, closing - pink floyd "Money" like)
free.will.power
(is not free.)
Posted by: Chris Arsenault at November 26, 2008 6:35 AMHere's one of the commercials they remind me of: Dr Pepper
Posted by: Christina at November 26, 2008 6:40 AMI think NARAL needs to read Aquinas' treatise on the will.
Posted by: Bobby Bambino at November 26, 2008 6:41 AMWow, Chris, you nailed it!
Posted by: Christina at November 26, 2008 6:48 AMI just watched this video. What. The. Heck?
Posted by: Kristen at November 26, 2008 8:54 AMWhat.The.Heck.Cute!
Glad I wasn't the only one not getting things. I was further thrown by the apparent inference that not putting on a condom is what a free person does.
Sorry about the Beatnik coffee house analogy. Fact is, I AM old. I have no clue what a contemporary analogy would be. Disco dance floor? No. Please help me.
Posted by: Jill Stanek at November 26, 2008 9:15 AM(audio fade in - girl having orgasm to a laughing, giggling child, a thrown switch, the vacumn pump coming on, the child screaming fading to the mother screaming to the pump being switched off, and then muffled sobs fading down, then "cha-ching" (cash register from Pink Floyd's Money) to an older woman yelling "Next!")
Abortion, the last act, of a sexual act.
Posted by: yllas at November 26, 2008 9:51 AMDoctor Strangemind, or Yllas, I presume?
Posted by: Mary II at November 26, 2008 10:06 AMJill, you make me laugh. Don't feel bad though, I'm young and I'm still about a million miles from cool.
Slam poetry really is this generation's beatnik. I mean, they've even got the turtlenecks and smoky coffe houses (Or haus if you're *really* cool)
:)
Posted by: lauren at November 26, 2008 10:07 AMHerman Munster was the only true Beatnik.
Posted by: The Raving Atheist at November 26, 2008 2:38 PMIf someone wants to walk naked around a group of kids, it's their body and their right!
This aversion to nudity is sort of perverse in its own right. There's a difference between nudity and being sexually perverted. Why should children be hidden from nudity? They have bodies too. There's a difference between naked people and pedophilia.
I modeled unclothed last week for an art class. I have never felt so confident or so beautiful. Nudity is not something to fear. Use your body that God gave you! It's beautiful and it's a miracle. Don't be ashamed.
Posted by: Leah at November 26, 2008 3:37 PMJill,
Cue the hip bongo music:
Beatnik Gal: "Me, yeah me. I want to, yeah, be free. Free to, yeah, kill my bay - be."
Superimpose on screen: This is NARAL's ramp-up to build support for the so-called "Freedom of Choice Act" FOCA. Don't buy it. Visit:
http://www.stopFOCAwi.com
Blessings Jill!
--Mike
Mike,
I am in WI! How can I help?
Both videos bored me immediately. I could hardly sit and watch them the full 1:13 min. ZZZZZ. What was NARAL thinking (or not thinking?)
Posted by: linda at November 26, 2008 11:13 PMI hope you realize that my last post was filled with hyperbole.
I was making fun of the video's claim that the government should not regulate our skin.
When I mentioned being nude in front of children, I was trying to convey a type of sexual connotation being forced upon the children (such as a father walking around the house and neighborhood naked even if his children/wife/family/neighbors don't like it).
I was also making the point that if we can legalize abortion because of the "right to skin" then we can also legalize prostitution, illegal drugs etc. Of course, the hilarity is that if we use the principle of "right to privacy" we could legalize almost anything!
Posted by: segamon at November 27, 2008 12:50 AM"satan has complicated ideas about your personal freedom"
How about using some Free WillPower?
Posted by: Mary at November 27, 2008 5:36 AMSegamon, we should legalize illegal drugs, prostitution, etc.
Posted by: hal at November 27, 2008 12:36 PMHal, I guess we should legalize murder of born people then. We can even make it "safe and sane" for the murderer!
Posted by: segamon at November 28, 2008 2:23 PMSegamon, there's no significant amount of opinion for changing the laws against murder we have now.
Posted by: Doug at November 29, 2008 12:49 PMSo... you're not against legalizing murder? ...?
Posted by: segamon at November 29, 2008 6:10 PM
