Opinion columnist accuses pro-life movement of “inherent racism”

Pro-life billboard

On Monday, the Minnesota Daily published an opinion column by Leah Lancaster. Upset by graphic images of abortion Lancaster had seen on her way to buy lunch, she launched into a diatribe on the “inherent racism” of the pro-life movement.

Interestingly, the pro-life movement as a whole is the movement that speaks out on behalf of the minority babies that are disproportionately aborted. Ever seen one of these signs on the road? They’re put up by pro-life groups. I’m not sure why a “racist” group would speak out in favor of saving minority babies. I’m also not sure how pro-lifers are the racists when Planned Parenthood is the group that places a disproportionate number of their clinics in areas of town that are populated by minorities.

THIS is racism.

Here’s another sign put up by the pro-life movement, but vandalized by abortion supporters who apparently want to kill black babies. Remind me again who’s really the racist?

To explain herself, Lancaster wrote:

No amount of misplaced Martin Luther King Jr. quotes or Created Equal propaganda can cover up the inherent racism within the pro-life movement. These claims only act as a distraction from the fact that most pro-life advocates are white Christians that face a completely different set of circumstances than that of low-income, minority women. The lengths to which they will go to avoid the reality of inequality are frightening.

The only problem is that Lancaster is wrong. Entirely and completely wrong in the above statement. The pro-life movement makes no such attempt to “avoid the reality of inequality.” The pro-life movement has specific branches that reach out to minority communities and attempt to provide them with the help and resources they need. And the majority of our movement reaches out to the culture as a whole and calls out the genocide that’s occurring within the minorities of America. We are the voice that is calling for an end to the targeting of black babies for abortion while Planned Parenthood gladly accepts donations to specifically kill black babies.

Christian Bjornson, a university student in Minnesota, wrote a courageous and accurate challenge to Lancaster that was published in today’s Minnesota Daily. Bjornson wrote, in part:

I read with shock Leah Lancaster’s Oct. 22 column ‘Behind the propaganda’ on abortion. While Lancaster delivers good evidence that abortion is more prevalent among low-income and minority women, she uses this to justify a ridiculous attack that the pro-life movement has ‘inherent racism.’ Lancaster blatantly ignores the fact that these demographics are some of the most pro-life groups in the U.S.

According to the respected polling firm Gallup, which has been conducting the same poll on abortion for decades, people of color surveyed earlier this year identified as pro-life by a whopping 14 point margin; with white voters, the same difference was 7 points.

With low-income voters the trend is more pronounced, with people making less than $30,000 a year identifying as pro-life by a 16 point margin, versus a 4 point margin in favor of choice for those making over $75,000. Women identify as pro-life by a 2 point margin, 44-46 percent.

These results closely follow those of other polls from places like CNN and CBS, and they point to exactly the opposite of Lancaster’s baseless claims that ‘most pro-life advocates are white Christians that face a completely different set of circumstances than that of low-income, minority women.’

In fact, low-income, minority women make up a significant portion of the pro-life movement, as Lancaster would observe if she familiarized herself with it before making unsubstantiated claims.

Needless to say, Bjornson is exactly the type of college student this nation needs – a young person equipped with knowledge and unafraid to speak up for the truth. Pro-lifers need to stop allowing abortion supporters to get away with their constant lies and mischaracterizations. If anyone’s a racist, it’s Planned Parenthood. The investigations are on our side. The statistics are on our side. The American people as a whole continue to move to our side.

And in the end, it’s not “our side” and “their side.” It’s not a petty argument between children. It’s a real battle between life and death. You are on the side of life, or you are on the side of death. And I, along with college students like Christian Bjornson all across the nation, choose life for all. You with us?