Denialism

Bad news for lying “Family Values” associations

—

by

MarkH
in ,

One of the problems with denialists is that they simply can’t accept that science doesn’t conform to their ideology. For instance, it’s not enough to just be morally opposed to abortion, the anti-choice organizations have to misrepresent risks of the procedure, including promoting the false link (NCI) between abortion and breast cancer.

Recently, Talk to Action exposed the lies of Crisis Pregnancy centers, and the dishonest tactics they use to misrepresent the services they offer and lie about the risks of abortion. These centers which use federal money to misrepresent the science, are nothing more than a taxpayer-funded anti-choice scam.

Several years ago, Sean Sweet went to a Pennsylvania CPC that used Klusendorf’s favored shock therapy for “abortion-minded” women.

“I took the pregnancy test. They said, ‘We want you to wait in this room and we’re going to show you a video about abortion.’ I thought it would be about my options,” she recalls. “Instead, there were these horrible images of disfigured babies and aborted fetuses, looking very large like they were almost to term. Then there was a little segment where the woman was supposed to be thrashing around and screaming during her abortion.”

Sweet had had an abortion when she was 14, and she knew she was being lied to. She wanted to leave, but she also wanted the results of her test. It turned out she was pregnant, and though the counselors tried to stop her, she stormed out and later had an abortion. Not knowing she’d ended her pregnancy, a counselor from the center called her three times to tell her, “God loves your baby.”

Your federal dollars at work.

The latest lie they like to peddle is that medical abortion using RU-486 is likely to cause later ectopic pregnancy or future fertility problems. Well, today the NEJM has an authoritative article on the safety of medical abortion, showing it is as safe as surgical abortion and confirms previous evidence that abortion does not increase your risk of ectopic pregnancy, infertility, or later miscarriage as rates were consistent with established rates of each of these problems.

Results Among 11,814 pregnancies in women who had had a previous first-trimester medical abortion (2710 women) or surgical abortion (9104 women), there were 274 ectopic pregnancies (respective incidence rates, 2.4% and 2.3%), 1426 spontaneous abortions (12.2% and 12.7%), 552 preterm births (5.4% and 6.7%), and 478 births with low birth weight (4.0% and 5.1%). After adjustment for maternal age, interval between pregnancies, gestational age at abortion, parity, cohabitation status, and urban or nonurban residence, medical abortion was not associated with a significantly increased risk of ectopic pregnancy (relative risk, 1.04; 95% confidence interval [CI], 0.76 to 1.41), spontaneous abortion (relative risk, 0.87; 95% CI, 0.72 to 1.05), preterm birth (relative risk, 0.88; 95% CI, 0.66 to 1.18), or low birth weight (relative risk, 0.82; 95% CI, 0.61 to 1.11). Gestational age at medical abortion was not significantly associated with any of these adverse outcomes.

From their discussion.

The implications of our data for the long-term safety of medical abortion therefore rely on the premise that surgical abortion in the first trimester is safe, which is supported by the majority of studies in the literature. A review of available data published in 1990 concluded that early surgical abortion by vacuum aspiration, currently the most commonly used method, was not associated with ectopic pregnancy, spontaneous abortion, low birth weight, or preterm birth in a subsequent pregnancy.4 Most studies published since then have supported this conclusion.5,8,14,17,18,19,20,21,22,23,24,25 Among studies reporting increased risks of adverse outcomes in subsequent pregnancies,26,27,28,29,30 the findings have been inconsistent; this inconsistency may reflect the performance of multiple comparisons or recall bias in case-control studies of induced abortion and ectopic pregnancies and the use of older methods for abortion in some cases. Because our study drew from the entire population of Denmark during the study period and because follow-up was almost complete, the study was not susceptible to selection bias. The large sample also provided sufficient power to detect a small effect, if one truly existed. The incidences of spontaneous abortion (12.6%), ectopic pregnancy (2.3%), and stillbirth (0.3%) in our study population were within the ranges reported in the literature.31 The rate of failed medical abortion, defined as medical abortion followed by a surgical procedure (6.9% in our Danish study population), is also consistent with the rates in previous clinical trials32 and in a hospital-based study in Denmark.9 These observations support the validity of our data.

I wonder if that means the pro-life groups will take down the hundreds of pages they have that hold onto older, smaller and debunked studies that have been systematically disproven by more thorough analysis. But I won’t hold my breath. This is why I include these organizations among the denialists. It’s not that they have a moral opposition to abortion, it’s that they lie about the science to promote their agenda. The fact is that having an abortion is about 12 times safer than carrying a pregnancy to term. There is no link between abortion and breast cancer, and there is no proven risk of infertility or future ectopic pregnancy. If anything abortion is bears a negative association with risk future ectopic pregnancy.

Comments

  1. Rev. BigDumbChimp

    Our President gave the appointment of the chief of family-planning programs at the Department of Health and Human Services to Eric Keroack. Keroack came from one of the very type of clinics you are talking about above, A Woman’s Concern.

    They push the same nonsense including the abortion leads to breast cancer nonsense.

    Reply
  2. Suricou Raven

    One problem with organisations fighting a self-declared moral war is that they become so used to thinking of themselves as ‘good’ that they become incapable of accepting that they could possibly do anything wrong. They are fighting the Good Cause – every action they perform is morally right, by definition. If it wasn’t morally right, they wouldn’t be doing it.

    Reply
  3. Kagehi

    Someone needs to pass a law that makes funding organizations that lie about science, or using misleading data or facts from them a fineable offense, with possibility, if done often enough, of impeachment proceedings. Unfortunately, they wouldn’t ever pass such a thing, since the moment someone proposed it the nuts would by screaming about conspiracies from the scientists to, “undermine their ability to challenge scientism’s dogma”, or some similarly idiotic BS.

    Reply
  4. S.H.A.M. Scam Sam

    Though I’m anti-abortion, I wouldn’t dare defend these tactics. On the otherhand, I’ve heard Planned Parenthood convincing young women, in an under-handed manner, to have an abortion – something I never hear liberals getting upset about. I also don’t like the way PP tries to keep the parents of minors out the mix as well.

    When I see posts like this here, I wonder about you, Mark: Are you an honest broker or a die-hard “Lefty”? Are you offended by “The Right” or the abuse of science? If you were wrong about something, could you ever admit it?

    For instance, if GW (for instance) doesn’t work out as you predict, are you gonna do a mea culpa? Apologize for the “denialist” tag? Anything?

    Just wondering.

    Reply
  5. Tyler DiPietro

    Following up on Sam’s post, Mark, I have a few questions of my own: 1.) Are you lying about being a “liberal” and really a closet Nazi Communist Terrorist Immigrant (disregarding any potential ambiguity in the distinction)? 2.) Are you currently devising a plan to a murder enough newborn infants to cover the volume of an aircraft carrier? 3.) When you are discovered to be the Nazi Communist Terrorist Immigrant that you are, can have any possessions of your’s not confiscated by the FBI?

    Reply
  6. Tyler DiPietro

    By the way, I’d appreciate straightforward answers, i.e., no stodgy handwaving about “nuance” or my questions being “loaded”. I encounter it I’ll simply use it as proof that the answer to all three questions is “yes”.

    Reply
  7. Ted

    Your federal dollars at work.

    To supplement Tyler DiPietro’s questions of 2:30AM, will you ever post an article on what makes good use of federal dollars? I think education should be funded, but not so sure about research. This being a free market and all, shouldn’t the market decide technology and science directions?

    Reply
  8. sailor

    “On the otherhand, I’ve heard Planned Parenthood convincing young women, in an under-handed manner, to have an abortion”
    They hold these consultations in PUBLIC now?

    Reply
  9. S.H.A.M. Scam Sam

    Maybe I’m missing something but I thought those were honest questions, considering the word “lying” being placed before family values associations, like the two naturally go together.

    As far as the consultations, people have gone undercover to see how PP advises minors, and recorded them telling kids how to skirt the law, how to disregard their parents, etc.

    Sailor, the cynicism of many here, like you, is so common to the Left it makes me wonder how you guys expect to succeed at anything politically. You think so little of others – and life generally. Try to keep in mind that modern conservatism has only been around since the 50’s. It’s the Left (which has dominated politics since WWII) that’s been steadily losing ground, and it may never get it back once conservatism seriously comes into it’s own. My point is, “Wake Up, Laughing Boy”, because while being smug may make you feel good, it ain’t winning you no favors – and it’s revealing you to, possibly, be a fool.

    Reply
  10. Tyler DiPietro

    “This being a free market and all, shouldn’t the market decide technology and science directions?”

    We wouldn’t have the internet without 30 years worth of funding from the NSF and DARPA, not to mention contributions from Bell Labs (i.e., the fiber optic cable, the semiconductor, etc.) that were made while AT&T had a government sanctioned monopoly. Or the contribution of the Mosaic browser and the various protocols from public universities. I don’t know about “should”, but I sure do like having the internet.

    Reply
  11. Graculus

    considering the word “lying” being placed before family values associations

    How about “reality-challenged”?

    Though I’m anti-abortion

    Fine, don’t have one.

    Reply
  12. George Cauldron

    Though I’m anti-abortion, I wouldn’t dare defend these tactics. On the otherhand, I’ve heard Planned Parenthood convincing young women, in an under-handed manner, to have an abortion – something I never hear liberals getting upset about. I also don’t like the way PP tries to keep the parents of minors out the mix as well.

    I think I smells me a Concern Troll.

    Not a very convincing one, though.

    Reply
  13. Anonymous

    considering the word “lying” being placed before family values associations

    Do you prefer the term “reality-challenged”?

    Though I’m anti-abortion

    Fine, don’t have one.

    Reply
  14. Graculus

    Erm, “Anonymous” was me.

    Reply
  15. S.H.A.M. Scam Sam

    O.K., I’ll bite:

    What’s a “Concern Troll”?

    Reply
  16. A. Political

    From wikipedia:
    “A concern troll is a pseudonym created by a user whose point of view is opposed to the one his/her sockpuppet claims to hold. The concern troll posts in web forums devoted to its declared point of view (for example, Democrats or fans of the Prius), and attempts to sway the group’s actions or opinions while claiming to share their goals but with some “concerns”. The goal is to sow doubt and confusion within the group.”

    Reply
  17. Wes

    I don’t think Sam counts as a concern troll. He’s not hiding the fact that he’s right wing, anti-abortion and a global warming denier. A concern troll would pretend he’s not those things and that he’s only “raising questions”.

    Sam, I of course can’t speak for Mark, but from my point of view, if I saw compelling evidence that global warming was false, I’d gladly accept it. I’d much rather live in a world without global warming than with it. But sadly, most of the “evidence” people use against the global warming hypothesis is either sloppy or outright dishonest, and the Hoofnagle brothers do a good job of documenting this.

    As for Planned Parenthood, they shouldn’t be considered to represent the views of all people who think abortion should be legal. I, personally, am strongly in favor of abortion being legal, but I’ve never aligned myself with their crusade. But I think it’s not right to compare PP to these Crisis Pregnancy Centers. You disagree with PP’s tactics and policies. Fine. That’s your right. But Mark’s criticism of Crisis Pregnancy was that they were deliberately spreading false information. You yourself even admitted that even though you agree with Crisis Pregnancy’s stance, you can’t condone actively spreading false information. So it seems to me that your problems with PP are of a different type than Mark’s problems with Crisis Pregnancy. And Mark is perfectly within reason to call groups like Crisis Pregnancy “lying”, because what other word should one use to describe a group that deliberately spreads false info? If you disagree with the term “lying”, then the burden of proof is now on you to show that what Crisis Pregnancy is doing is not lying, because Mark has already provided good evidence to show that they are in fact lying.

    Reply
  18. Kagehi

    Ok, you want a “liberal” to complain about people pressuring kids into getting abortions, fine. I think its bloody stupid and unacceptable behavior. Now its your turn. You need to explain why it is, when there are billions of Christians in this country, a few million of them can continue to support idiots like Falwell or Robertson, without significant of noticeable challenge from the other, just guessing, 2.5 **billion** of them… Seems to me, you have a much bigger problem than we do.

    Also, explain how passing laws that undermine the ability of doctors or even only one person in a relationship to make the choice isn’t more dangerous than leaving it as it is. There was someone that posted a while back on the subject, describing his experience. His wife was bleeding internally, the child she carried had **no** chance of surviving if removed in a non-abortive manner, and if they tried, she would have died in the process of attempting it. She was also unconscious, and thus **unable** to give any consent for a procedure. This was thankfully a year or so *prior* to some of the new legislation that was passed where they live, which would have, if in effect at the time, denied the doctor the right to opt for the medical procedure **without** consulting and getting permission from “both” people involved. I.e., under the current law, you would have two corpses **period**.

    Anti-abortion people need to realize that you can’t legislate those kinds of choices for people, without killing people in the process. Its what causes many of us to describe pro-life groups as “anti-life” groups. They are more fracking concerned with a potential life than the people that are already alive, or the consequences to anything from the level of poverty someone may find themselves in, to the ruined futures of fools that make bad choices. They also miss one **big** issue, because they want to deny that its true. Teens, as a whole, assess risk less emotionally than adults, list out all the possible risks, along side all the things they can get from doing something, then, almost always, over exaggerate that value of what they can gain from it. In other words, if its pregnancy vs. intimacy + acceptance + what ever else, they will *always* pick the later one. This has been shown in multiple studies. Yet, the same fools that want to try to stop abortions, without thought or care for any one else’s consequences, are usually the same ones that don’t want sex ed and refuse to acknowledge that alternatives “must” be provided, instead of just telling kids to “say no”. They will even go so far as to fire people they think are wrong, and replace them with people that think, “Just say no.”, actually means a damn thing.

    The only thing they get right is that you have to *create* an emotional response in a teen to stop them from doing something. The problem is, they use lies, distortions of fact and made up dangers, which any teen not already indoctrinated into believing everything their church or state tells them, (both of which is unhealthy when they do), can figure out damn fast are nothing but lies, and will immediately ignore.

    There are plenty of legitimate situations where abortions **must** be legal. The problem therefor must be to get our heads out of our collective asses and find ways that work to prevent unwanted pregnancies instead. But the anti-abortion people don’t want to do that right either, for the most part, so its damn hard to solve the problem.

    Reply
  19. lifeethics

    Kagehi, that’s the most bogus story I’ve ever read about abortion. It is not consistent with any medical practice or State law. Unconscious patient, bleeding internally and no one can consent? Baloney.

    Reply
  20. plunge

    Sam, can you be more specific on what you’ve heard? It’s easy to briefly summarize something in a vague way that may misrepresent or blow it out of proportion.

    For instance, if only one or two people went undercover and then supply only one or two examples of a behavior that they tried to elicit, I’m not sure how telling that really is. And the specifics of the cases are also important. If, for instance, a girl has been raped by her father, maybe the PP aren’t so crazy for not immediately seeking her father’s permission for the session, even if it is state law.

    Reply
  21. S.H.A.M. Scam Sam

    A. Political,

    Thanks for clearing that up.

    Wes,

    You’re right – I’m not a concern troll – just can’t be put in a box easily: how many Republican atheists can?

    I think we all have to accept that this medium (the internet) isn’t always the best for discussing ideas, so it may take two or three posts to get some clarity. All kinds of things get in the way, like I can’t type, so sometimes something gets lost because I’m rushing and may not have time to be thorough. Or there’s always the jokers who will steer a conversation this way or that, y’know?

    About the “lying” label: I didn’t see Mark as just attacking one place or group but Family Values as a whole – despite the fact he was writing primarily about the Crisis Pregnancy Center. That may have been a mistake, on my part, but the way he put “lying” before Family Values in the title got to me.

    Kagehi,

    I’m not against *all* abortions, just the industry as it’s currently practiced. (I, too, think common sense should play a role in medical decisions, O.K.?) But there are many aspects of post-modern feminism that I don’t agree with and abortion on demand is one of them.

    Lifeethics,

    Stranger things have happened.

    Plunge,

    Not too long ago, a female teen was sent undercover to PP (claiming she was 15 and her boyfriend got her pregnant) and they were recorded telling her how to lie on the forms so her family – especially her father – wouldn’t be involved, etc.. This type of sting had been done before, and this particular one was a check-up on their behavior, which they failed.

    To me, unless you buy into the idea that all men (or most men) are total dogs – or there’s an epidemic of rapist fathers out there – the various (yes) new age feminist attacks on men having a role in public life (especially in their own families) are reprehensible. I don’t understand why men, today, go along when no one’s going to pay a price for it but men. Women seem to be playing a zero-sum game with power in society – and showing very little attentiveness to the concept of fairness – so, to me, it makes no sense to hand over power just to be beat over the head with it when it suits a woman.

    Needless to say (maybe) many of my views on this sprang out of my divorce: for instance, seeing the way a restraining order will be used for advantage in court – with no proof what-so-ever – just the assumption a man did it/will do it/may do it. (Just like your rape scenario.) That one act will bring the power of the state down on his head, put police at his door, make him lose his kids, etc. (It’s no wonder, to anyone that’s been through it, why so many men go ballistic or commit suicide.) Or the assumption, from friends, cops, the courts, etc., that if a woman (who may be, as my wife was, a cheating new age U.F.O. loving “metaphysical” loon and liar) says, for whatever reason, she’s dissatisfied in her marriage – which may be good or, maybe, just average – then it must be the man’s fault. (LanceR just hit me with that one on another thread.)

    Or the fact that – with 70% of divorces being initiated by women – no matter what the woman may have done to destroy the marriage, in our “no-fault” divorce culture, a man will have to assume half of the blame for the destruction of that marriage. (No fault, BTW, was never put to a vote – it’s purely a feminist construction, from what I’m told, and have read.) Personally, I lost too much, trying to play the nice guy, never knowing the deck was stacked so much to one side once I was blind-sided in that relationship war game I didn’t even know was coming. (Because women are seen as “weaker” they’re allowed by society to play dirty.) It’s just all wrong to me.

    So much of feminist whining, today, is born from a culture of new age victimization and empowerment – and “a woman needs a man like a fish needs a bicycle” conditioning – not actual oppression – so I’ve removed myself from the “chivalrous” column, to one where I’ll regard women as equals, and treat them the same way I will a man: you want more power – take it – if you can. Like Frank Zappa said, when asked why he’s willing to bomb on women so aggressively:

    Hey, “equality” means you take your lumps like everyone else.

    I await my public stoning.

    Reply
  22. kagehi

    Kagehi, that’s the most bogus story I’ve ever read about abortion. It is not consistent with any medical practice or State law. Unconscious patient, bleeding internally and no one can consent? Baloney.

    Not my fault if your not paying attention to the types of stupid laws they are trying to pass. I am not sure if it was a law they hadn’t yet voted on, but which made it as far as a vote (scary enough), or just the delusional idiocy of some clown who thought denying the doctors right to operate with the consent of both “parents”, was a brilliant idea. But this was a guy that was borderline pro-choice, until he realized the sort of BS come right wing legislators wanted to make into laws.

    It wasn’t about “no one” being able to consent, it was about an absurd chain of logic:

    1. Is patient dying? Yes. She needs surgery.
    2. Is patient pregnant? Yes. See next question.
    3. Would performing the surgery possibly kill the child? Yes. See next question.
    4. Could the child be saved? No.
    5. Since an abortion **is** necessary, see new rules on consent, designed to limit abortions by people without consent of all parties. (If we can’t legally stop you having them, then we sure can make it more complicated)
    5. Error – No consideration for this situation exists, so by default, no solution exists, which won’t result in “someone” or “everyone” losing.

    This isn’t an intended consequence, any more than it would be a similar consequence in a case where consent is required from a teens parent, in the same situation. **Most** laws that get passed with such restrictions **explicitly** state that medical decisions by a doctor trump the law. This would does/would have (not sure if it became a law or not) explicitly deny the doctor the right to make such a decision, on the basis that such decisions are often made to “hide” abortions that are *not* required to save anyone’s life.

    Hmm. First find on Google has a proposed Ohio law requiring that “even if not married or the father is unknown”, that the mother get “consent” from the father. This would *require* a test to determine paternity, from a list of possible fathers *or* a police report proving a rape was reported:

    http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2007/08/02/2945/

    Note that is a mutual consent case, since the mother has to consent too, which one presumes would mean that without said consent, people could get sued. It may have been an interpretation of this law that pissed off the guy who read it, and caused him to abandon his pro-life position. And you have to be blind to not find cases of people proposing the denial of doctors rights to perform abortions without some similar sort of consent.

    If it wasn’t specifically saying what I suggested, then its not hard to imagine some nut trying to pass either an addendum to an law like the above, or one that can/does create the very situation suggested. And in case you missed it. He was talking about what would have happened **under** a proposed law that he didn’t actually have to deal with, not an existing one, so complaining that there isn’t such a law, doesn’t win you any points.

    Reply
  23. sueinNM

    Sam:

    Wow. Just wow. You’ve exposed your whole agenda in great detail. Because your wife divorced you … and it was all her fault, of course … you have contempt for women and loathing for feminism.

    I’ll tell you another story. My husband and I have been married for 22 years. He calls himself a feminist. We have a loving, equal relationship; divorce has never even come up. We both earn approximately the same amount of money. We split up household chores. We respect and like each other.

    Maybe you should take the log out of your own eye and try, as hard as it may be, to imagine why your wife wanted to divorce you. Maybe she just got tired of your utter comtempt for women.

    Reply

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *