Counter-protesting the Scare Tactics of AbortionNO.org at UC Riverside

On May 19th and 20th, 2014, a student organization at UC Riverside invited onto the campus an organization called AbortionNO.org, a pro-life organization which many students regularly see visiting our campus.  Whenever this organization visits, they bring with them an extremely graphic (trigger warning) photo-mural exhibit as part of their College Campus outreach "Genocidal Awareness Project (GAP)", which among other things, includes a host of images not at all relating to their cause: images of tortured American slaves, black men hanging from trees, disfigured children, victims of the Rwandan genocide, pictures of Jews lying in mass graves, etc.

Regardless of the position many took on the actual abortion debate, most students decried the exhibit for the irresponsible nature of the mural; one image appropriated the plight of rape victims and the victims of honor killings in fundamentalist Islamic communities and - without addressing or truly connecting this in any way to the abortion debate - pointed to the barbarism of one act and falsely conflated it with the act of abortion as though to say: rape is barbaric isn't it? We can all agree on that.  Isn't that equal to the aborting the unborn fetuses of the "humiliated rape victims"?, effectively objectifying the bodies of rape victims, using their status as victims to project an entirely different agenda.

Moreover, while the images of disfigured, dismembered, and bloodied fetuses had little to no context in their visual presentation (why was the fetus aborted? For example, was the mother's life at risk? Was its organs not developing correctly? etc.) they were irreverently placed beside pictures of lynched black men in the Jim Crow South, and beside images of the World Trade Center attacks on 9/11 and the attack on Pearl Harbor.

Those who put up this display constantly stated that they are in no way stating that those mothers receiving abortions are equal to the barbarism of the Nazi regime in WWII Germany, yet right above their heads were pictures that stated otherwise.  What's more, they were even willing to bring children as props in their cause, often pointing to the children they had brought with them and asking the counter-protesters (myself included): "Would you rather this child had died?*"

The entire display reeks of Orientalist viewpoints, a tired use of people of color and those in impoverished and developing nations (ESPECIALLY Muslim communities and African nations) as a way of pointing out supposed barbarism that is foreign to the U.S. and placing the U.S. and other post-colonial superpowers above it.  Though the representatives of AbortionNO repeatedly stated otherwise, there is clearly a purpose in only using shocking images of the U.S.'s stated enemies and horrifying historical practices which no one could easily contest without being demonized themselves.

There was no academic argument brought forth in their poorly planned pro-life crusade.  The display was fraught with logical fallacy after logical fallacy, and cultural and political appropriation so infuriatingly irresponsible that many students couldn't help but speak out.  Which we gladly did.

A counter-protest was quickly organized once people caught wind that this organization which clearly is not beneath using psychological attacks and textbook propaganda tactics to force its message.  I myself didn't realize that the protest was underway until I stumbled across it on the way to the library, but once I saw it I quickly jumped in to offer my support.

Signs were made.

I made this sign! :)

Voices were raised.  Signatures were constantly added to a makeshift petition we later presented to the Dean of Students which he graciously accepted with the promise that he would act upon his words.  And we promised him that if AbortionNO.org - or any group like them who were so willing to objectify and belittle the experiences of others to make their own point, to verbally attack instead of to facilitate civil and productive debate - they we would be back too.

I only wish that my phone hadn't died so early in the day.  The group protested for as long as the display remained standing, I believe from at least 10 a.m. until their time was up at 5 p.m.  The group grew
as the day progressed - and so did our support from passing students who were as equally appalled at the belligerent self-righteousness of the display - and I am proud that my university and its student body were willing to take the time out of their day to stand up to groups like this who take the easy path and remain willfully ignorant of the plight of others and bark from their high horses about an issue which they believe to be black and white, but which is colored instead by infinitely many shades of grey.

Finally I am so grateful for the productive conversations I had on abortion from those with opinions on all sides.  Civil debate alone is how we can progress to practical solutions.  Use of images for the purpose of provoking - not thought - but anger and fear?  That doesn't belong on the grounds of any academic institution.

A word to the wise to this kind of organization: bring academic arguments to an academic institution or - in the words of one of my fellow counter-protesters, kindly "fuck off".