The Other McCain

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The Battle of Fitchburg: More About the Pro-Life Fight in Massachusetts

Posted on | January 28, 2010 | 22 Comments

The day I left Massachusetts last week, Da Tech Guy picked up his local newspaper in Fitchburg and learned that Planned Parenthood was planning to open a clinic on Main Street – funded by federal stimulus money. 

The Battle of Fitchburg is rapidly becoming a national cause for the pro-life movement. Da Tech Guy post photos of today’s protests and the Fitchburg Sentinel & Enterprise reports:

Planned Parenthood spokeswoman Melanie Lown said Wednesday that Planned Parenthood officials did not want to comment on today’s planned protest.
“We have made that decision, but we are looking forward to going to the City Council meeting on Feb. 2,” Lown said.
Planned Parenthood officials were invited to the Feb. 2 meeting after a contentious meeting last week during which six city councilors voted to draft a resolution urging Planned Parenthood not to come to Fitchburg.
But Marie Sturgis, executive director of Mass Citizens for Life, was unmoved by [Planned Parenthood League of Massachusetts CEO Dianne] Luby’s assertion that no abortions will be performed in Fitchburg.
“They will be doing abortion referrals no doubt, because that’s a very important piece of what they do,” Sturgis said. . . .
State Rep. Stephen DiNatale, D-Fitchburg, said the protest shows that Planned Parenthood “just raises a lot of issues for the community.”
“And we don’t have any say in it,” said DiNatale, who supported the City Council resolution.

USA Today noticed today and pro-life blogger Paul Anthony Melanson wrote:

 Whatever became of President Obama’s decision to disallow a “family planning provision” from the economic stimulus package?

Indeed. Because federal taxpayer dollars are involved, the Battle of Fitchburg is everybody’s fight. Planned Parenthood’s Dianne Luby doesn’t think pro-lifers are serious:

“I think it is common that people don’t want protesters and those types of things that sometimes occur when we go into a community, but as soon as anti-choice folks realize we don’t provide abortion services there, they don’t protest.”
She used the organization’s Somerville location as an example.
“We had protesters at that location for one day and now we have no protesters,” she said.

Protesters for one day? I don’t know about Somerville, but I spent six days in Fitchburg. It’s a tough blue-collar town and I don’t expect the pro-life people there will give up without a fight. Massachusetts pro-lifer Jay G. explains the rationale of today’s protest:

One purpose is to make the prospective landlord and business people and other neighbors very uncomfortable about having such a death dealing and controversial tenant moving into downtown Fitchburg.

My money says the Battle of Fitchburg will end with Planned Parenthood in full retreat.

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Category: Abortion, Da Tech Guy, Massachusetts, Planned Parenthood, Tea Party

Comments

  • Joan in GA

    Can you post the address or email addresses of the local officials we can write to in Fitchburg to let them know we don;t want our federal dollars being spent on this? Thanks.

  • Joan in GA

    Can you post the address or email addresses of the local officials we can write to in Fitchburg to let them know we don;t want our federal dollars being spent on this? Thanks.

  • patrice

    I second Joan’s comment – who can we write to to protest …. Is this supposed to be a “shovel ready” project to qualify for stimulus money. What a disgrace.

  • patrice

    I second Joan’s comment – who can we write to to protest …. Is this supposed to be a “shovel ready” project to qualify for stimulus money. What a disgrace.

  • Philip Primeau

    “Death dealing”? What a gross and unfair exaggeration. The whole ordeal is much ado about nothing.

    As of 2007, abortion comprised barely 3% of Planned Parenthood’s total activities, with many facilities not even offering it. Contraception, STD treatment, and cancer screening comprised 3/4 of services rendered.

    Indeed, given the popularity of its contraceptive offerings, Planned Parenthood is really a great force in the prevention of abortion.

    Ultimately, the organization facilitates more pregnancies than it terminates, with significant resources dedicated to prenatal health and infertility therapy.

    Sorry, the “Battle of Fitchburg” is, in reality, a baseless brouhaha. Typical soc-con hysterics.

    Phil

  • Philip Primeau

    “Death dealing”? What a gross and unfair exaggeration. The whole ordeal is much ado about nothing.

    As of 2007, abortion comprised barely 3% of Planned Parenthood’s total activities, with many facilities not even offering it. Contraception, STD treatment, and cancer screening comprised 3/4 of services rendered.

    Indeed, given the popularity of its contraceptive offerings, Planned Parenthood is really a great force in the prevention of abortion.

    Ultimately, the organization facilitates more pregnancies than it terminates, with significant resources dedicated to prenatal health and infertility therapy.

    Sorry, the “Battle of Fitchburg” is, in reality, a baseless brouhaha. Typical soc-con hysterics.

    Phil

  • Philip P

    Checking the surge of bastardism among the urban poor seems a fair enough waste of our money, as things go.

  • Philip P

    Checking the surge of bastardism among the urban poor seems a fair enough waste of our money, as things go.

  • http://worththefighting.blogspot.com/ Philip Primeau

    For more dazzling insight: http://worththefighting.blogspot.com/

    Someone has to keep Stacy honest.

  • http://worththefighting.blogspot.com/ Philip Primeau

    For more dazzling insight: http://worththefighting.blogspot.com/

    Someone has to keep Stacy honest.

  • Pingback: The Sentinel & Enterprise covered yesterday’s protest… « DaTechguy's Blog

  • http://www.haemet.blogivists.com Roxeanne de Luca

    As of 2007, abortion comprised barely 3% of Planned Parenthood’s total activities, with many facilities not even offering it. Contraception, STD treatment, and cancer screening comprised 3/4 of services rendered.

    As a service or by dollar amount? Planned Parenthood performs about 300,000 abortions every year, which works out to about $100 million in revenue. PP’s total annual budget is $1 billion (I think; $350 million of that comes from the feds). So, dollar-for-dollar, abortions compromise about 15% of PP’s non-federal revenue – certainly, no small percentage.

  • http://www.haemet.blogivists.com Roxeanne de Luca

    As of 2007, abortion comprised barely 3% of Planned Parenthood’s total activities, with many facilities not even offering it. Contraception, STD treatment, and cancer screening comprised 3/4 of services rendered.

    As a service or by dollar amount? Planned Parenthood performs about 300,000 abortions every year, which works out to about $100 million in revenue. PP’s total annual budget is $1 billion (I think; $350 million of that comes from the feds). So, dollar-for-dollar, abortions compromise about 15% of PP’s non-federal revenue – certainly, no small percentage.

  • Pingback: Jill Stanek on the Battle of Fitchburg, Mass. : The Other McCain

  • http://www.haemet.blogivists.com Roxeanne de Luca

    Ultimately, the organization facilitates more pregnancies than it terminates, with significant resources dedicated to prenatal health and infertility therapy.

    Um, got a citation for that? Given that PP facilitates about 1 adoption for every 186 abortions, and most PPs (at least in MA) do not offer prenatal health services nor infertility services, I have to wonder about the accuracy of that.

    By the numbers: there are about 1.6 million adopted children in the US (http://www.census.gov/prod/2003pubs/censr-6.pdf), roughly evenly divided amongst all ages. Therefore, there are about 80,000 adoptions every year, including foreign adoptions. Therefore, even if PP facilitated every single adoption (domestic and foreign) in the US every year, it would still work out to only 1/5th of its abortion rate.

    That aside, I’m not aware of PP running sperm banks; it just encourages women to treat their bodies that way.

    Finally, it’s a morally bankrupt metric: you’re saying that murder is okay because there are ultimately more lives created than destroyed. Does that mean that I can stab a few people to death but make up for it by having more babies? Such crap.

  • http://www.haemet.blogivists.com Roxeanne de Luca

    Ultimately, the organization facilitates more pregnancies than it terminates, with significant resources dedicated to prenatal health and infertility therapy.

    Um, got a citation for that? Given that PP facilitates about 1 adoption for every 186 abortions, and most PPs (at least in MA) do not offer prenatal health services nor infertility services, I have to wonder about the accuracy of that.

    By the numbers: there are about 1.6 million adopted children in the US (http://www.census.gov/prod/2003pubs/censr-6.pdf), roughly evenly divided amongst all ages. Therefore, there are about 80,000 adoptions every year, including foreign adoptions. Therefore, even if PP facilitated every single adoption (domestic and foreign) in the US every year, it would still work out to only 1/5th of its abortion rate.

    That aside, I’m not aware of PP running sperm banks; it just encourages women to treat their bodies that way.

    Finally, it’s a morally bankrupt metric: you’re saying that murder is okay because there are ultimately more lives created than destroyed. Does that mean that I can stab a few people to death but make up for it by having more babies? Such crap.

  • Philip

    Who’s talking about murder? I’m talking about abortion.

    And whether or not you think it’s bankrupt, that’s just one point among several. The main thrust of my argument is this: PP has little to do with abortion. It is overwhelmingly — overwhelmingly — dedicated to contraception and sexual health and education, with only a small fraction of its services going towards termination.

  • Philip

    Who’s talking about murder? I’m talking about abortion.

    And whether or not you think it’s bankrupt, that’s just one point among several. The main thrust of my argument is this: PP has little to do with abortion. It is overwhelmingly — overwhelmingly — dedicated to contraception and sexual health and education, with only a small fraction of its services going towards termination.

  • http://www.haemet.blogivists.com Roxeanne de Luca

    300,000 abortions (at least) per year = “little”?!

    That’s 1/4th of the abortions in this country. That’s “little”?

    Murder is the deliberate taking of a human life with malice aforethought. How does abortion not qualify?

  • http://www.haemet.blogivists.com Roxeanne de Luca

    300,000 abortions (at least) per year = “little”?!

    That’s 1/4th of the abortions in this country. That’s “little”?

    Murder is the deliberate taking of a human life with malice aforethought. How does abortion not qualify?

  • Philip

    Humanness is a complex condition with a strong experiential component. I do not consider, for example, a week-old fetus “human” in any meaningful sense. It is not possessed by the flame that sets our species apart, at least not yet. It is alive, sure, but there’s a real distinction between a human life and a human being. Indeed, my recently departed friend Bryan has, in my eyes, more humanity than the globule of cells my mother expelled from her womb as a young girl.

    Murder? Bah. You can’t be sincere in that belief. If you are, if you truly believe we are in the midst of a decades-long campaign of mass murder that has claimed tens of millions of innocent lives, then you are duty-bound to rise against this government, which is worse than Hitler’s, Stalin’s, or Mao’s.

    With the knowledge (so-called) that you possess, to do anything besides ferment armed revolution is the moral equivalent of sitting outside the gates of Auschwitz frowning, wagging your finger.

    Perhaps you think I am disgusting. Yet, if your conviction that abortion is murder is 100% honest, then you are infinitely more loathsome than I. You are a coward, a passive spectator of holocaust. Or you are simply engaging in empty but highly inflammatory (and thus dangerous) rhetoric.

    So, which is it: Are you yellow, or are you a liar?

  • Philip

    Humanness is a complex condition with a strong experiential component. I do not consider, for example, a week-old fetus “human” in any meaningful sense. It is not possessed by the flame that sets our species apart, at least not yet. It is alive, sure, but there’s a real distinction between a human life and a human being. Indeed, my recently departed friend Bryan has, in my eyes, more humanity than the globule of cells my mother expelled from her womb as a young girl.

    Murder? Bah. You can’t be sincere in that belief. If you are, if you truly believe we are in the midst of a decades-long campaign of mass murder that has claimed tens of millions of innocent lives, then you are duty-bound to rise against this government, which is worse than Hitler’s, Stalin’s, or Mao’s.

    With the knowledge (so-called) that you possess, to do anything besides ferment armed revolution is the moral equivalent of sitting outside the gates of Auschwitz frowning, wagging your finger.

    Perhaps you think I am disgusting. Yet, if your conviction that abortion is murder is 100% honest, then you are infinitely more loathsome than I. You are a coward, a passive spectator of holocaust. Or you are simply engaging in empty but highly inflammatory (and thus dangerous) rhetoric.

    So, which is it: Are you yellow, or are you a liar?

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