Priorities: Why stopping rape and murder isn’t always high on the list at RHrealitycheck.org

As some of you know, I’ve been banned from RHrealitycheck.org. This was of course due to no fault of my own (ok, not really). The good news, however, is that I’m still on their email list, thus allowing me to keep informed about Meriam Yahia Ibrahim–a pregnant Sudanese woman who is facing execution.

As of the time that I write this, Meriam is 8 months pregnant and sitting on death row in her native Sudan. Her “crimes” include embracing Christianity and marrying a non-Muslim man. Meriam’s marriage has been annulled and, once she’s been murdered executed, her 18 month-old son will be taken into state custody. Thankfully, the concerned folks at RHrealitycheck.org have been urging people to speak out on Ms. Ibrahim’s behalf.

I’m sorry, that was a typo–I meant to say that RH hasn’t sent me anything thing about Meriam Ibrahim. Instead, I’ve been getting links to articles with names like, “Not the ‘Illuminati’: How Fundamentalist Christians Are Infiltrating State and Federal Government.”

It seems that “investigative reporters” Sofia Resnick and Sharona Coutts have uncovered how a secret, “increasingly powerful” group of conservative attorneys are poised to take over the country. Operating in the shadows, their goal is to turn America “into a Christian theocracy harkening back to the Dark Ages of Europe, a time when society was governed by the laws and officials of the Catholic Church.”

Uh-huh.

You’d think that a website purporting to fight for justice on behalf of women could find more compelling issues to report on than Da Vinci Code-style conspiracy theories. Meriam Ibrahim’s case certainly fits the bill, but there’s a problem: the facts aren’t consistent with RH’s narrative.

The writers at RHrealitycheck.org seem to feel that pro-lifers, Christians, and American conservatives are the main oppressors of women.  So, when a woman is brutally oppressed by an anti-Christian, anti-American regime, RH isn’t quite as keen to talk about it. That’s also why they aren’t keen to talk about the link between abortion and sexual abuse. Put simply, predators depend on keeping evidence hidden and their victims quiet. What the writers at RH don’t want you to know is that time after time, the abortion industry has helped abusers to do both.

British sexual predator Stephen Lobb knew what to do when the girl he was abusing got pregnant: he told her to go to an abortion clinic and “get rid of it.” That approach has been standard operating procedure among perpetrators on this side of the Atlantic, too. It’s been proven that offenders in California, Ohio, and Connecticut have made use of Planned Parenthood’s abortion services to cover-up the proof of their crimes. Two Ohio victims have sued Planned Parenthood under claims that the group negligently failed to uncover the abuse. A third victim,  Denise Fairbanks, alleged in her lawsuit that she explicitly told Planned Parenthood staff she had gotten pregnant after being raped by her father. According to Fairbanks, these pleas were ignored and the abuse continued for months thereafter.

The problem goes far beyond the cases listed above. In 2002, Life Dynamics recorded calls made by an actress to Planned Parenthood and National Abortion Federation centers across the country. The caller identified herself as being a 13-year-old who  needed an abortion to hide the fact that she had been abused by her adult boyfriend. In 813 cases, clinic staff indicated that they had no objections to handling this request.

These results are consistent with what Live Action personnel have encountered. In 2011, volunteers from the group visited Planned Parenthood clinics along the East Coast while portraying themselves as pimps with underage prostitutes. Staff at these facilities were nonchalant about the matter, going so far as offering to set up involuntary abortions. Those findings also fit with what former Planned Parenthood clinic director Abby Johnson had to say about her ex-employer. In 2010, she and six other former Planned Parenthood staffers wrote an open letter to Congress detailing how the organization’s policies and procedures are inadequate to protect victims of abuse.

Obviously, none of this matches the heroic image that RHrealitycheck.org has cast for the abortion industry. Neither is evidence that many (possibly most) abortions are only consented to under pressure, with women facing deadly violence when they refuse. Pointing out that federal funding enables both of these problems would also be a little counter productive.

It’s true that the people who run RHrealitycheck.org are entitled to their priorities (as odd as they may be). It’s also true that America’s elected representatives should have different ones. Pro-lifers can sign an online petition urging that the US push for Meriem’s release. They can also help hold pro-abortion senators like  Kay Hagan (NC), Mark Udall (CO), and Mark Begich (AK) accountable for their defense of Planned Parenthood and the hundreds of millions in public funding that it receives. After all, while we can trust Sofia Resnick and Sharona Coutts to keep on exposing the of dangers of mythical conspiracies, somebody has to deal with reality.