Lies and the Lying CPCs Who Tell Them

[Ed. Note: This post is one of a series, presented by NARAL Pro-Choice Washington as part of NARAL Pro-Choice America’s CPC Week of Action. For the full list of posts on this topic, click here.]

Posted by Social Media and Project Intern Michelle Auster

Image via UC Irvine/Flickr

NARAL Pro-Choice Virginia has been conducting their own sleuthing into Limited Service Pregnancy Centers, also know as Crisis Pregnancy Centers. A little background: CPCs employ misleading tactics to shame, belittle, and deceive women facing unintended pregnancy in a misguided effort to keep them from choosing abortion.

A woman working with NARAL went undercover into one of these centers in Virginia and recorded the conversation she had with a staff member there. Here are a couple of quotes from an actual CPC employee — proving yet again that the truth is often stranger, and more appalling, than anything we could imagine:

“If you’re on the pill, on the patch, on the shot, and get pregnant… Unintentionally, you will abort that baby because the uterus cannot sustain that pregnancy because the lining has been so altered by those steroids, the artificial hormones.”

Blatantly false. All together now: abortion and contraception are not the same thing.

And it continues:

“[Condoms are] naturally porous — there’s always a chance of them breaking, a chance of spillage,” she said. “The only safe sex is no sex.”

1) Spillage is not a medical term, and 2) Yep. This is another inaccurate statement. And this, of course, is just one of many CPCs nationwide that spew garbage to women while purporting to provide “options counseling.”

You can read the entire article here.

Thunderous applause to NARAL Pro-Choice Virginia for their work on this. Thanks for helping us know where our care is coming from.

More Quotes from the pamphlets Crisis Pregnancy Centers give women

truthfail:

In addition to lying to women, CPCs give them materials that provide misleading medical information, shame women, and promote dangerous gender norms. Below are direct quotes taken from the pamphlets handed out at Missouri CPCs. While some of the content may be disturbing, we feel that it is important to bring the true messages of CPCs into the public conversation. 

Trigger warning: content on abortion, sexual activity, and emotional trauma.

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Who would you trust with your health?

Reddit: An Unlikely Champion in Exposing Crisis Pregnancy Centers

[Ed. Note: This post is one of a series, presented by NARAL Pro-Choice Washington as part of NARAL Pro-Choice America’s CPC Week of Action. For the full list of posts on this topic, click here.]

Posted by Social Media and Project Intern Michelle Auster

Earlier this summer, Salon reported that a Redditor had posted a photo of a limited-service pregnancy center (LSPC) in Louisville, Kentucky, exposing its anti-choice, anti-healthcare agenda. This center, like so many others around the country, is located across the street from a real women’s healthcare provider — and the only license one in the state: EMW Women’s Surgical Center. The Reddit user warned readers (emphasis ours):

Women have come out of this building crying, and on a few rare occasions, without their pants. They take you to the back room for an ultrasound, have you remove your pants, and then begin lecturing you on the sins of aborting. They do not give you back your pants until you have listened, and a few women tricked this far refused to listen and stormed out furious, ashamed, and in their underwear…

There is no “choice” at the Louisville “Women’s Choice” Clinics. Just abuse, shame, and bigots who would rather undress a woman to make her feel vulnerable and then explain how awful of a person she is than let her make HER. CHOICE.

Even setting aside the fact that you typically don’t need to take off your pants for an ultrasound, this really doesn’t sound like healthcare. The Redditor’s use of the word “abuse” seems exactly right.

The Reddit community has a reputation for being sexist, but posts like this one challenge that notion. And this post in particular quickly went viral, showing that Reddit’s users are not short on activism. The post’s influence also shows that regulating LSPCs and standing up to their lies is not a “women’s issue” — it’s something that anyone who cares about patient rights and access to healthcare should care about. Healthcare shouldn’t come with judgment and manipulation. And judgment and manipulation without real healthcare? Well, that’s harassment, plain and simple.

It’s exciting to see people from varying backgrounds, all over the nation, joining in the dialogue exposing these fake clinics. Contribute to the conversation! Consider sharing your story with us, or visit our website for more information. Keep on the lookout for more updates from us!

Know where your care is coming from.

An Introduction to the Mad, Mad World of Crisis Pregnancy Centers

[Ed. Note: This post is one of a series, presented by NARAL Pro-Choice Washington as part of NARAL Pro-Choice America’s CPC Week of Action. For the full list of posts on this topic, click here.]

Posted by Social Media and Project Intern Michelle Auster

Above: Spoiler alert — this is an ad for an anti-choice CPC, although you wouldn’t know it from the vague wording. Go somewhere else for real help!

Play along with me. You suspect you may be pregnant, or someone you know and care about thinks they may be pregnant. Obviously, you seek professional advice. This pregnancy is unintended, and you’re not sure if it’s a good idea to see it to term. You’re worried, you only have so much time to figure out what your options are and make a decision. You see an advertisement for a free pregnancy screening at a local clinic, often called a Crisis Pregnancy Center. Well, you are in crisis, and you need a free pregnancy test. This must be an okay place to go for help, right?

STOP RIGHT THERE.

This is most likely a fake clinic, also known as a Limited-Service Pregnancy Center (LSPC) and often marketed to women as a Crisis Pregnancy Center (CPC).

These centers draw unsuspecting women and their partners in with the promise of a free pregnancy screening, then do everything they can to talk them out of choosing abortion, even if that may be the right decision for them.

The counselors employed in LSPCs are not medical professionals, and are often recruited through churches with a strict anti-choice agenda. These centers do everything in their power to persuade women facing unintended pregnancies to give birth, even if it is against their best interests. They provide outdated, false or inaccurate medical advice, often linking abortions to breast cancer and mental health problems. They sell an abstinence-only agenda to women who are already pregnant, and employ shady techniques to emotionally manipulate the women who come to them for help, either skirting the subject of abortion or shaming women for even considering it.

These centers do not provide abortions or contraception.

And they’re incredibly common, too. In Washington State alone there are over 40 LSPCs, a number which dwarfs that of real women’s health clinics, staffed by real medical professionals and abortion providers. The reason so few people know about them? Women seeking help from an LSPC will not receive unbiased and supportive advice — LSPCs aren’t healthcare providers, but they’re great at pretending they are.

Help spread the word. If you’ve been to one of these clinics yourself, consider sharing your story with us about your treatment at an LSPC to help us with our campaign.

Demand healthcare without delay, hassle, or agenda.

Don’t manipulate women. Know where your care is coming from.