By Garrick Hoffman

Every Friday in Portland, a band of pro-life – or anti-abortion, if you choose that description – individuals gather to protest and to offer “sidewalk counseling” to incoming patients at Planned Parenthood of Northern New England, located on Congress Street. They protest the women’s choices in addition to the clinic’s practices.
In November 2013, a buffer zone was created at the height of complaints from the clinic and its patients that the protesters were being aggressive and harassing. In July of this year, however, the buffer zone was repealed in the wake of a Supreme Court ruling, which stated that the buffer zone was ultimately a violation of the First Amendment. This ruling re-enabled the protesters to have more freedom to carry on with their missions.

Anti-abortion arguments vary, but they weigh heavily on the basis that abortion is “murder.” Some protesters, encouraging the women to have their baby, remind the women that they could hold their baby and celebrate birthdays in the future. Ironically, one of the protesters admitted to having four abortions in her lifetime.

Some of the protesters brandish signs with dramatic pictures and messages, the latter of which declaring that “Christ died for your sins. You do not have to murder your baby.” Or, “You will never forget the day you murdered your baby.”
The Portland Police have not made any arrests or issued any summonses, but they have issued warnings. One warning was issued when one protester obstructed the entrance for an incoming patient. Another warning was issued when the hollers and shouts of the protesters were heard from inside the Planned Parenthood building, which is deemed a violation of Maine Civil Rights. It’s also been reported that protesters once went as far as noting a woman’s license plate information and subsequently calling the woman to harass her about her choice.

The protesters in question are on a pro-life crusade, sometimes quietly standing on the sidewalks, sometimes leveling merciless verbal attacks on women at a time when the women are enduring a throe of vulnerability and anguish. The nature of what these protesters do is not really dissimilar to the Westboro Baptist Church – they’re knowingly picketing at a location where human somberness lay. We can ask: are they offering counseling, or are they offering propaganda? Aren’t they really just offering their own self-interested rhetoric and ideologies, using biblical fodder as their ammunition to prevent the death of an unborn child and to proselytize women? Further, is what the protesters doing fair? The women receiving an abortion surely consider every possibility before they come to their difficult decision, and what if they themselves aren’t religious like their pro-life counterparts so often – or perhaps invariably – are? Can’t we assume the women have calculated their decision with great depth prior to receiving the operation? Finally, what if the women in question don’t subscribe to the sanctity of human life? As George Carlin once implored, “Why is it that when it’s us it’s an abortion, but when it’s a chicken, it’s an omelette?”

What the protesters might not consider, too, is how they would react if someone protested in front of their respective churches, brandishing signs that proclaim, “Priests have molested children under the steeple!” Or, “Men, women, and children have been murdered under God’s command!” Or perhaps, “Wars have been waged in the name of God!” What if someone stood in front of a church and halted every church-goer in their tracks to preach secularity? Would they feel harassed, impeded on, offended? And the Supreme Court’s decision empowers anyone to do so, but how often is this really seen?

Let’s keep in mind why the women reach the decision to terminate their unborn child. The women come from a plurality of backgrounds, with a plurality of affairs occurring. Some are students, some are very young, some are working low-income jobs, some are trying to build a fine credit score so they can afford commodities in their futures such as a house or car, and some are already waist-deep in debt. Some are working towards a prosperous life in which they can actually afford to raise a child. There are even cases in which women are raped and impregnated as a result, which anyone with any sense of humanity would argue is grounds for abortion if the woman so chose. But out there in the world are people who bear similar ideals to, say, Rick Santorum, a Republican who ran for the 2012 presidential election. In an interview in 2012, Santorum admonished women in these situations to nevertheless give birth, saying it’s “not a matter of religious values,” then later saying, “accept…the gift of human life…accept what God has given to you.”

Given their respective circumstances, isn’t it fair to say that many of these women may not be in any position to be taking care of another human life besides their own, even with government assistance? How would women in such circumstances be affected if they chose to give birth? And women who undergo the abortion procedure aren’t “anti-life,” as the protesters may or may not describe them. In fact, many of these women who receive abortions go on to give birth to children later in their lives. It’s simply that these women often conceive a child at a time in which they are no place to bear or raise one.
Perhaps these protesters should consider a different approach. If they want to see change, if they want to see women abstain from terminating their child, they should consider why the women choose not to have children at the time. Instead of inappropriately and aggressively harassing women who are already in the midst of emotional wreckage, the protesters should consider allocating their energy elsewhere. They could instead be crusading for social amelioration such as, say, increasing the minimum wage, or for more accessible and improved healthcare for all – especially since tremendous scores of pregnant women with no access to healthcare miscarry due to malnutrition and poor health. If more people had the means for a prosperous, healthy life, perhaps some women would be more inclined to keep their children instead of walking through the doors of Planned Parenthood. And the protesters would then be less inclined to inhabit the Congress Street sidewalks.
Sure, some sexually active people are reckless and don’t take the correct preventive measures to eschew pregnancy. But ultimately, this matter comes down to choice, a choice that belongs to a woman who has the right to go about living her own life for the betterment of herself. It is her body, it is her choice. Who has the right to infringe upon that?