VICTOR JOECKS: The March for Life obliterates pro-abortion talking points
After just four years, the Women’s March is fizzling out. Forty-six years later, the March for Life is still going strong.
That’s great news for those who care about protecting innocent life. On Wednesday, the news got even better. President Donald Trump tweeted he will attend this year’s March for Life, becoming the first president to do so.
Scheduled for Friday, the March for Life is a yearly gathering in Washington to support the rights of the unborn. It’s held in January around the anniversary of the Roe v. Wade decision, which legalized abortion in 1973. Since then, more than 61 million unborn children have died from abortions.
You may not have heard about the March for Life before, despite it regularly drawing more than 100,000 attendees. The largest crowd was in 2013, when an estimated 650,000 people attended. Compare that to this year’s Women’s March, which took place last Saturday in D.C. According to their permit, organizers expected a crowd of only 10,000 people.
But while the Women’s March receives extensive coverage, the media downplay the March for Life. That’s not a surprise given the mainstream media’s pro-abortion bent. Honest coverage of the March for Life would obliterate many pro-abortion talking points.
Start with the makeup of the crowd. Just like in past years, it’ll be filled with women. Young, old, teenagers, moms, grandmothers. So much for the idea that supporting limitations on abortion is an example of the patriarchy. Women are the heart and soul of the pro-life movement, which the March for Life routinely demonstrates.
Give the crowd even a passing glance, and you’ll notice something else that doesn’t fit the left’s narrative. The women aren’t clad in red robes from The Handmaid’s Tale or anything close to it. They will overwhelmingly be joyful, not screaming at those who disagree with them. The presence of so many children should be evidence enough that the pro-life movement isn’t anti-sex. Although, given how confused leftists are about basic biology these days, it’s probably too much to expect them to make this connection.
There will be women there who regret having had an abortion. Last year, Leslie Blackwell stood on the steps of the Supreme Court with dozens of other women who wish they hadn’t had an abortion. Her abortion in 1980 left her “feeling hollowed out” and led to drug and alcohol use to mask the pain. Quite a different perspective from those who want women to “shout your abortion.”
The pro-life movement doesn’t end with a march. There are thousands of crisis pregnancy centers throughout the United States. Las Vegas has two, the Women’s Resource Medical Center and First Choice Pregnancy Services. These centers help pregnant women by offering free services, such as pregnancy tests, ultrasounds and counseling. Unlike Planned Parenthood, which receives government funding and charges women, these centers overwhelming rely on private donations. In 2016, more than 80,000 people volunteered 6.5 million hours of their time to those organizations. Those statistics are from Pregnancy Help News.
There’s also no way to count the number of pro-life families around the country involved in adoption and foster care. They wouldn’t be hard to find at today’s gathering, if the media cared to look.
Unborn babies can’t speak from themselves. They can’t describe the unimaginable pain of an abortionist sticking scissors into their skulls or an abortionist ripping them apart limb by limb. They never get a chance to fulfill their hopes and dreams.
Defending their right to life is a cause worth marching for.
Victor Joecks’ column appears in the Opinion section each Sunday, Wednesday and Friday. Listen to him discuss his columns each Monday at 10 a.m. with Kevin Wall on 790 Talk Now. Contact him at vjoecks@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-4698. Follow @victorjoecks on Twitter.