The Personhood split, Part I: Structure
On June 14, 2014, came the news:
Georgia Right to Life President Daniel Becker today announced the formation of a new national pro-life organization, the National Personhood Alliance, a confederation of faith-based, pro-life organizations and leaders who believe pursuing Personhood is essential to protecting all innocent human beings in the 21st century.
Reading that I became confused, because last I knew Becker was working for Personhood USA, a group that sounded an awful lot like this new group.
Both organizations are founded on the “immediatist” principle of supporting only endeavors and political candidates with no abortion exceptions, such as for rape and incest.
But what could really be the difference between an organization named Personhood USA and one named National Personhood Alliance?
One major difference, I came to learn, was organizational structure.
PA wants to formulate an organization of affiliates to compete against the National Right to Life Committee. (It helps to know NRLC disaffiliated Georgia Right to Life, of which Becker is still president, in March 2014 for a difference of opinion on strategy that culminated in GRTL’s public attempt to thwart a piece of NRLC’s legislation.)
PUSA wants to maintain a tight decision-making framework composed of a small leadership team and donor board, also with affiliates, but with no plan to rival and replace NRLC. Plus, PUSA has worked hard to amass a HUGE (seven million and counting) national database of believers.
I’ll pause to say I have friends and colleagues in both PUSA and PA, and I support both immediatist and incremental approaches to stop abortion - pretty much anything short of violence that attempts to move the ball forward. I only get riled when either camp attempts to thwart the others’ efforts.
That said, and as an aside, in my opinion there is really no such thing as immediatist, or nonincremental, efforts.
While immediatists charge that a 20-week abortion ban omits babies younger than 20 weeks, or that any pro-life law with a rape/incest exception leaves out babies conceived by sexual perpetrators, they cheer initiatives to establish personhood in one state – but which omit 49 other states, or a protest at one abortion clinic – which is not to protest at the other 749 or so others, or saving one baby headed for death – which is not to save the 2,999 or so others murdered by abortion that day. Etc.
[tweet_box]In reality, all pro-lifers are working on incremental steps to stop abortion.[/tweet_box]
In reality, short of a human life amendment to the Constitution, all pro-lifers are working on incremental steps to stop abortion. [UPDATE: A couple people have pointed out to me that even a human life amendment is incremental, since it omits babies in all other pro-abortion countries.]
Some immediatists will then argue there are “principled” vs. “unprincipled” incremental efforts. In other words, there are those babies it is morally acceptable to try to save and those it is not. This really upsets me on a personal level, because I held an aborted baby that immediatists who eschew a 20-week ban would let die. That’s principled?
But back to the split.
PUSA gave PA its blessing upon launch, but the relationship quickly soured. PUSA publicly announced in a September 1 email it would “not be participating in the new National Personhood Alliance.”
In that email PUSA lodged these complaints against PA:
NPA has incorporated in Georgia as a 501c4 under the name “Personhood Inc.” and will be doing business as “Personhood”, Violating Personhood USA’s trademark of Personhood. In addition, the emails and documents we have seen indicate that they intended to use our logos, branding, and intellectual property.
One of the main concerns here is duplication of focus and confusion among all grassroots supporters.
In fact, there have now been three trademark applications submitted: 1) August 28, 2014, for “Personhood” by Georgia Right to Life Committee; 2) October 6, 2014, for “Personhood” plus the design, right, by Personhood USA; and 3) October 6, 2014, for “Personhood USA” by Personhood USA.
I’m told PUSA and PA are trying to settle their differences through private, not legal, mediation, but if they’ve both now applied for the same trademark, it doesn’t look promising.
NEXT: The Personhood split, Part II: Strategy
Jill Stanek is a nurse turned speaker, columnist and blogger, a national figure in the effort to protect both preborn and postborn innocent human life.
All I will say is that prolifers do this because in the end, we’re all human, right?
We need to make abortion unthinkable! It’s a very hard thing to do. Also we need to make it illegal but the pro aborts on the Supreme court have 3 women who want to keep choice legal.
Wow, Jill. I agree 100% with everything you just said. Everyone’s incrementalist–how did that not occur to me before??
So sick of all this infighting.
Eventually, we need to restore laws that protect human life from conception to natural death. Every pro-lifer desires this.
But most pro-lifers realize that government can not solve social problems. Laws against abortion will not be enough to stop abortion. So even the abolition laws that we ardently desire are just one more incremental step.
We will still need to fight against illegal abortions, and judges and law enforcement who refuse to prosecute the abortionists. We will still need to fight for justice for women and children, charity for women and children in need, protection from coercive men… and so forth.
Everything we do is an incremental step toward a Culture of Life.
Actually, Jill even a Human Life Amendment could be seen as incremental. Many Human Life Amendments that were considered during the early 1980s would not have banned abortion. They would have invalided Roe and sent the decisions back to the states.
Which one will support contraception and IVF with reasonable restrictions? I want to be part of that one. Otherwise, it doesn’t matter, because they’re *both* going to lose, and I don’t give two flicks about either of them.
Some years ago, I peacefully bowed out of a pro-life group because it would not get behind a partial-birth ban. Its leaders said such a ban wouldn’t save all the babies. My frustration was beyond expression.
More than a decade later, some of those former colleagues helped pass New Hampshire’s partial-birth abortion ban. Time and experience are great teachers.
Aren’t all Human Life Amendments incremental? They would only protect babies in the United States.
I am really frustrated at the persistence of the mindset that says “I am more pro-life than you because you pass laws that say, “and then you can kill the baby”. I am better. You are less. Blah blah blah.”
We ALL want to pursue the eventual goal of establishing PERSONHOOD. NRLC, AUL, ALL, OR, CBR, PUSA, and PA, PFL, FRC, and the rest of us want this.
When Jesus was asked by his disciples about those casting out demons, but were not part of the 12, Jesus said not to hinder them, for whoever was not against Him was for Him. We seem to have a bunch of Pharisees running around talking about how super spiritual they are when it comes to Pro-Life work. Enough!!! You save babies the best you can, I’ll save babies the best I can, and we work together when we can. The Supreme Court is not going to save the babies (and they are not going to support Personhood anytime in the forseeable future either). God will if we trust Him and do what we need to do as His hands and feet and mouths. There is no more room for egos and power trips on this mission. I will bear no shame for supporting a candidate that CAN WIN but is not totally in agreement at EVERY TURN with me on Life. I will also proudly work to see legislation passed that will save SOME. This reminds me of the scene in National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation where Cousin Eddie’s wife Catherine said he was “holding out for a management position” after years of unemployment. We DO WHAT WE CAN WHEN WE CAN. If you are thinking babies are going to live because you are an absolutist, how many have to die while you wish for unrealistic goals? Sorry to rant — thank you, Jill for being real about these internal issues.
Navi, yes, excellent point!
Dave Plemmons, your critique is a very bad one. I’ve never heard anyone say “i’m a better pro-lifer than you because you support such-n-such bill”. You’re pushing nothing but ad hominem nonsense.
I’ve never heard anyone say “i’m a better pro-lifer than you because you support such-n-such bill”.
You sure about that?
http://prolifeprofiles.com/
Navi, thank you for the link to http://prolifeprofiles.com/
It seems to point out, quite clearly, the positions of many who call themselves Pro-life. Do you have a problem with the assessments? I don’t see anything that points to one person/group establishing a hierarchy over another. The site appears reliable and legitimate.
In the last paragraph of the first page, it says that “those in the fourth tier reject personhood altogether and by definition therefore are not even pro-life. Please be a Tier 1 pro-lifer and only support Tier 1 leaders and groups!”
Logically, the opposite of “not even pro-life” is “very pro-life” (and the page encourages the reader to support and donate only to “Tier 1” organizations). Thus in between “worthy of support” and “not even pro-life”, we have pro-life people and organizations that are inferior to those men and women who have “returned hope and the vision of victory to Christians fighting for the innocent”.
I’m not seeing a “i’m better than you” thing going on in pro-life profile. I see them defining where people stand and condemning certain stands. But it doesn’t appear to be a holy-than-thou approach. Rather, they see certain positions as immoral, so they’re pointing out that those positions are immoral.
You’re splitting hairs if you really claim that dividing pro-life activists into four tiers – not sectors, colours, subsets, or categories but ordered tiers – where those in the fourth tier are “not even pro-life” at all and only those in the first tier are worthy of support is different from saying “I am more pro-life than you because you pass laws that say, ‘and then you can kill the baby'”.
Then there’s the bizarre part where they compare other pro-life organizations (particularly the one that they got kicked out of) to the National Abortion Federation, and to fanatics that shoot abortionists.
Prior to 1968 or so, every state and every person recognized that children in the womb were deserving of all civil and human rights. We all knew that children are persons, and the laws reflected that common sense.
NARAL overcame this reality by focusing on the supposedly squalid conditions of illegal abortionists. Pictures of a few dead women overwhelmed our common sense.
Pro-life sentiment is growing by the same method: We are showing the squalid conditions of the legal abortion industry. We are showing the women whom they kill. People are also forced to see the children — ultrasound images of living children and terrible pictures of dead ones.
Notice that the cultural change is independent of the laws, whether just or unjust.
We need to have just laws that protect women and children. Just don’t be seduced by the notion that good laws will bring about a good culture. We had good laws, and the culture went bad. If we restore good laws tomorrow (let’s say, by overturning Roe v. Wade), our culture will still be a Culture of Death.
The right to life from conception is specifically written into the constitution of Germany and yet they still have abortion albeit heavily restricted. As you might suspect activist judges ruled that blah blah reasons could allow non enforcement.
Prior to 1968 or so, every state and every person recognized that children in the womb were deserving of all civil and human rights. – ‘every person’? You have the polling results to illustrate that this is the case?
We all knew that children are persons, and the laws reflected that common sense. – again, I dispute your claim, can you prove that ‘we all’ ‘knew’ such a thing? Since we’ve rather left 1968 behind and given the outcomes of ‘personhood’ amendments…..
NARAL overcame this reality by focusing on the supposedly squalid conditions of illegal abortionists. Pictures of a few dead women overwhelmed our common sense. – I disagree, they brought us to common sense.
Pro-life sentiment is growing by the same method: We are showing the squalid conditions of the legal abortion industry. We are showing the women whom they kill. – so now all those nice, new, super-sized womens health facilities are appearing, thank you. Abortion is safer than than full-term delivery.
People are also forced to see the children — ultrasound images of living children and terrible pictures of dead ones. – are those the ultrasounds which can show deformities etc. and cause people to terminate? And when women find themselves with an unwanted pregnancy, guess what.
Notice that the cultural change is independent of the laws, whether just or unjust. – and…?
We need to have just laws that protect women and children. – we have, why do you want to change that.
Just don’t be seduced by the notion that good laws will bring about a good culture. – ah, but can a good culture bring about good laws? Like same-sex marriage, legalizing pot, and womens reproductive freedom.
We had good laws, and the culture went bad. – which laws are you referring to? The ones that said women couldn’t vote? Or have bank accounts? That people of differing colors couldn’t wed? Those laws?
If we restore good laws tomorrow (let’s say, by overturning Roe v. Wade), our culture will still be a Culture of Death. – disregarding for a moment that this ‘Culture of Death’ thing doesn’t actually exist (apart from for people like Rick Perry perhaps), what would be the point?
Navi, you are right on. I think if some of the American Right to Life, PUSA types that subscribe to the prolifeprofiles.com “tiered ranking” philosophy were honest, they would accuse those of us, who have worked since Roe to enact any restrictions we could on the state and federal level, of being complicit to murder. They also seem hesitant to address the prospect that IF the CURRENT U.S. Supreme Court strikes down a Personhood Amendment, we could lose ALL OF THE LEGISLATIVE AND JUDICIAL progress made over the last 40 years. But of course, they say what we have is no progress at all. I shudder to think how many children we would be seeing killed if not for all the legislation passed since Roe. How many children have been saved by Personhood legislation and amendments that have been defeated by the voters? Zero. Idealism is great if there are results. But someone I trust once said, “Faith without works is dead.”
Personhood USA has never been against incrementalism as long as it is principled. They have simply opposed any kind incrementalism that supports evil, hoping good will come of it.
http://americanrtl.org/abortion-incrementalism-good-vs-bad
Sorry, Darrellb — I’m calling Bull**** on your veiled swipe. Please give an example of incrementalism that is principled, vs. unprincipled. And is “principled” as defined by PUSA opposed to “possible”? I’d like to know the common ground.
Ok, so I followed the link and read the article. HOWEVER, it still stands to reason that we MUST stop WHAT WE CAN — IN THE HERE AND NOW. Unless and until the Courts (through better nominations, public outcry, societal pressure, or constitutional argumentation) reflect true pro-life sentiment in their rulings, OR the states AND/OR Congress ratify an Amendment doing the same, the Killing is not going to be stopped by expensive and up-to-now fruitless pursuits. What is undeniable is that MANY CHILDREN are being saved by incremental efforts — both ones you call principled AND ones you don’t.