Pro-abortion influencer targets 'Baby Olivia' as a video 'your crazy uncle' would share

Pro-abortion influencer Jessica Valenti recently targeted Live Action and the animated prenatal development "Baby Olivia" video — which uses the same developmental timeline as a National Geographic-backed prenatal DVD — as "anti-abortion propaganda" that fails to utilize a "real baby."

When life begins and how human development happens in the womb are not propaganda. They are scientific facts frequently ignored for the sake of promoting abortion as a good.

Key Takeaways:

• In a new video series, pro-abortion influencer Jessica Valenti attacked Live Action and its prenatal development education video, "Baby Olivia."

• She called Live Action "extreme" and said there is nothing scientific about "Baby Olivia," which utilizes information on prenatal development that is distributed by National Geographic.

• Valenti also claimed "Baby Olivia" might confuse children and accused Live Action of attempting to indoctrinate young people.

The Backstory:

Created by Live Action with the support of medical experts and world-class artists, “Baby Olivia” was introduced in 2021 as the world's most realistic and medically-accurate, animated video of human development in the womb from fertilization to birth.

It is computer-generated using motion capture technology of real human movement in the womb.

A Never Before Seen Look At Human Life In The Womb | Baby Olivia

Despite the video's accuracy, Baby Olivia has received heavy criticism from pro-abortion groups that have spent decades hiding the truth about prenatal development. Through euphemisms and outright lies, the pro-abortion movement and its allies in the medical community have misled women to believe that abortion is a simple medical procedure that removes mere "tissue" or "cells." The reality is much different.

Since the release of Baby Olivia, several states have passed laws ensuring that public school students get the opportunity to see either that video or a similar animation and/or detailed ultrasound video explaining developmental milestones.

That has led to further objections from abortion proponents, including Jessica Valenti, who is well known for her pro-abortion Substack, "Abortion, Every Day."

The Details:

In a video, as part of the series "Anti-Abortion Glossary" published by The Meteor, Valenti states, "When parents send their kids to school, they expect them to learn about math, reading, science — not anti-abortion propaganda. But that's exactly what children will be getting across the country when they go into classrooms this year. And that's all thanks to Baby Olivia." (Does Valenti object to students learning from graphic, sexualized — and at times, pornographic — material being used for students from the youngest of ages in school classrooms? More on that later.)

Valenti laments that Baby Olivia "isn't a real baby," portraying the video as something "you might see your crazy uncle share on Facebook." She calls Live Action "one of the most extreme anti-abortion organizations in the country." (That last one is more of a compliment.)

Let's break down a few of Valenti's lies:

Lie #1: 'There's nothing scientific about Baby Olivia'

She claims:

"[T]here's nothing scientific about Baby Olivia. It presents religious ideas as fact, like the idea that life begins at conception. It's riddled with lies about fetal development, depicting it as far more advanced than it actually is....

And while Live Action says that the video has been 'reviewed and certified' by leading medical experts, they're actually just anti-abortion organizations."

This is laughable. The prenatal development information and timeline (from fertilization) used in Baby Olivia is identical to that utilized by the Endowment for Human Development, a nonprofit organization dedicated to improving health science education and public health. It states that it is "committed to neutrality regarding all controversial bioethical issues."

In addition, EHD's video, "The Biology of Prenatal Development," is distributed by National Geographic, which is also neutral on the issue and whose support indicates that the prenatal development timeline that Baby Olivia utilizes is accurate.

Despite Valenti's sneering tone, it is possible for medical experts to actually oppose abortion, even though the most touted groups, like the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists and Planned Parenthood, are deeply entwined with and utterly devoted to abortion.

READ: Exposing ACOG: The medical organization that supports and covers for the abortion industry

There isn't a single religious component in Baby Olivia. It is a scientific fact that a new, unique human comes into being at fertilization. The video strictly focuses on biological development.

As for prenatal development being "more advanced" in the Baby Olivia video as Valenti claims, Baby Olivia (like the Endowment for Human Development) uses fertilization as the starting point of pregnancy, not a woman's last menstrual period (LMP). The video states that this is the timeline used.

LMP was first used in the early 1800s as a way to make a reasonable guess about the timeline of pregnancy (since ovulation may not occur exactly two weeks following the start of menstruation). But today, with incredibly detailed ultrasound technology and even fertility monitoring apps, calculating a pregnancy based on LMP seems outdated.

As Live Action News previously reported:

... [D]octors Max Mongelli, Associate Professor of Obstetrics and Gynecology at the University of Sydney, and Jason O. Gardosi, Professor of Maternal and Perinatal Health at the University of Warwick, wrote in their 2021 medical journal article titled Evaluation of Gestation (emphasis added):

“Gestational age (GA) refers to the length of pregnancy after the first day of the last menstrual period (LMP) and is usually expressed in weeks and days. This is also known as menstrual age. Conceptional age (CA) is the true fetal age and refers to the length of pregnancy from the time of conception.”

Perhaps Valenti doesn't like dating a pregnancy by true fetal age because it is focusing solely on the baby's development in the womb; this was a complaint of abortionist Daniel Grossman, who blasted Baby Olivia in 2024 for various reasons, including that "[t]here is very little mention of the woman in whose body the embryo is developing, including how she may feel about the pregnancy and how it may be affecting her health."

Lie #2: 'It might be confusing for children'

Valenti claimed, "What might be most confusing for children, though, is that it's designed to look like footage of an actual ultrasound. It's presented like it's a documentary, complete with a British narrator."

Quite the contrary. Kids have loved Baby Olivia. Students at Joshua Christian Academy watched the video and then shared their thoughts, including:

• "I like the narrator because it was... nice to know what was happening in the video cuz...if you had a child, that would all be going on inside of you."

• "30-36 weeks for such like an intricate design is so amazing."

• "I think it's really cool to see it because you can see that all throughout stages of life they are active and they, like, they're real people."

• "It's an absolute miracle and like that little girl is a baby."

An elementary school watches the 'Meet Baby Olivia' video

Planned Parenthood's Sex Ed To Go curriculum, on the other hand, contains numerous errors intended to mislead kids, including images of gestational sacs purported to be images of the human embryos. The MYA Network released these images years ago with the help of The Guardian, and the backlash was swift, even from pro-abortion sources who urged MYA not to give false information — not even to promote abortion.

In the images, the embryos were removed, leaving only the sacs.

A fake image:

A real image:

Abortion proponents do not want children to know the truth about human development in the womb and that is the reason they do not want Baby Olivia (or a detailed ultrasound required as an option in most of the related state legislation) to be shown to children.

Lie #3: 'Baby Olivia is part of a push to indoctrinate young Americans'

Valenti also claimed:

"Baby Olivia is part of a bigger push to indoctrinate young Americans. They know that young people are the most pro-choice demographic right now, and they know that the more people know about pregnancy, the more likely they are to be pro-choice."

Scientific fact backed by non-partisan groups including National Geographic and the Endowment for Human Development — not to mention medical doctors and embryology text books — is not indoctrination. It's education. There's a reason most OB/Gyns don't commit abortions.

A Never-Before-Seen Look at Life’s First Moments | Baby Oliver

What is indoctrination is easy to see in Planned Parenthood's efforts to enter school systems to give sexual education to children as young as Kindergarten.

Planned Parenthood and other pro-abortion groups have been given access to young people through sex education programs allowed in public schools. They have repeatedly been sold the idea that casual sex is no big deal, that sex can be "safe," but that when it isn't, they can just get an abortion — also no big deal, right?

The abortion pill has even been dubbed as a "missed period pill," tricking girls into thinking that there is no baby at all, and they are simply kickstarting their period.

Planned Parenthood has also taught children that virginity is a "social construct"; brought pornographic "sex decks" to school; given coloring books featuring "images of breasts, penises, condoms, pills, and activities to be filled out, included a “sex-lib” fill-in-the-blank," to children ages 8-13; and taught kids that deviant sexual behaviors such as sadomasochism, drinking urine, playing with feces, masturbating with friends, and bestiality are normal.

It's clear who is indoctrinating youth — and it isn't Live Action.

The Bottom Line:

Valenti and her pro-abortion allies hope to silence Baby Olivia just have they have silenced millions of very real preborn children, along with the post-abortive women who regret and mourn over their abortions. Olivia exposes the truth about the humanity of the child in the womb — and the truth threatens the culture of abortion.