Part 8 – Arthur’s “high and low” reports
So
let’s talk now about the so-called “studies or investigative
reports” Arthur found in Canada (Source: Page 6 of Arthur’s 2016
report):
The Pretenders (CTV 2000; W-Five).
Exposing Crisis Pregnancy Centres in BC (Arthur 2009).
Deception Used in Counselling Women against Abortion
(Smith 2010a; Toronto Star).
Are Anti-Choice Crisis Pregnancy Centres Targeting
Female Students on Ontario
University Campuses?
(Tilley 2011).
Surrey charity gives dubious abortion advice: investigation
(Woodward 2012; CTV).
Phony Abortion Clinics In Canada Are Scaring Women with
Lies (Khandaker 2013a;
VICE).
Enjeux éthiques de l’intervention auprès de femmes vivant
une grossesse imprévue au
Québec (Gonin et al. 2014).
Mieux comprendre les ressources conseil grossesse anti-choix
au Québec (FQPN 2014).
Toll free but not judgment free: evaluating postabortion
support services in Ontario
(Laroche and Foster
2015).
Now there are a couple of
interesting things to note about these “studies”.
First, of these nine
studies, six of them are not referenced at all in Arthur’s current
study (all the ones in bold above). So why are these
even included in this 2016 study?
Clue:
look at the titles of the studies. All are inflammatory and one-sided
in their negativity of CPCs. Their main purpose for being identified
at all is simply to make sure the reader is well aware of other
anti-CPC reports out there. They add no additional information to
Arthur’s current study, and as mentioned before, all of them used
limited sources or were retracted, or found fraudulent (e.g. Arthur’s
Exposing CPCs in BC) or penned by pro-choice writers with a
partial axe to grind.
Of the
two Quebec studies Arthur mentions, one of them relies heavily on
Arthur’s own 2009 discredited report.
Lastly,
Arthur identifies her own 2009 report, but never references the
report that rebuts that deceptive and discredited report. I suggest
that Crisis Pregnancy Centres in British Columbia: A Respectful
Rebuttal to a Disrespectful Report doesn’t have the same cachet
as Arthur’s other nine examples. Especially if you place its title
right beside the title of her own Exposing Crisis Pregnancy
Centres in BC like this:
“Exposing
Crisis Pregnancy Centres in BC”
“Crisis Pregnancy Centres in British Columbia: A Respectful
Rebuttal to a Disrespectful Report”
I
thought it was very gracious of CAPSS in their choice of the word
“disrespectful” to describe Arthur’s 2009 report. In fact, it
was very Christian of them.
The Pretenders
(CTV 2000; W-Five). This
isn’t online so I couldn’t review it. I’ve asked CTV twice now
to provide me with a link to the show. They never responded.
Upon further investigation, I
learned something very
interesting about this show. A CPC involved in this CTV story sued
the CTV’s W-Five for serious inaccuracies in the show. I also
learned that an out-of-court settlement was agreed upon by both
parties.
Apparently,
the disputed broadcast is not to be aired again.
No wonder I
couldn’t find it online. So why is Arthur identifying it at all
then? I assume the public is unaware of the show since if you Google
it, you won’t find it. So anyone reading Arthur’s current report
would think:
“Wow,
CPCs are pretending, and maltreating women, how horrid, and I can’t
find it online but it must be true!” (Source:
Imagination of Patricia Maloney getting fed up of the untruths,
deception and misinformation about CPCs)
And now Joyce
Arthur is using this no longer available and disputed report as
further “evidence” that all or most CPCs in Canada mislead
women. Arthur even helps the reader along by this notation in
her report about the show, a notation that we have only Arthur’s
word for, since the show is unavailable for viewing:
“CTV. Nov 5, 2000. ‘The
Pretenders.’ W-Five documentary news program exposing maltreatment
by the Calgary Pregnancy Care Centre of a woman seeking abortion.
(Not online)” (Page 34
of Arthur’s 2016 report)
“Maltreatment” by a CPC? No proof and no evidence that this is true. And no way to see the W-Five show. Just Arthur’s say so. And it infers a generalization to all CPCs.
Next we
have this:
Surrey
charity gives dubious abortion advice: investigation
(Woodward 2012; CTV).
This
CTV investigation was initiated by a “client complaint,” CTV
stated. When I first heard about this allegation, I could only
imagine that the “client” had a copy of Joyce Arthur’s 2009
report in hand, a report that has been shown to be inaccurate.
In fact, when I researched
the accuracy of this allegation, I discovered – wait for it –
that there never was a client complaint. Astonishing.
Further, the CTV clips had
its own inaccuracies. After airing, the Crisis Pregnancy Centre of
Vancouver sued CTV for defamation. The Vancouver CPC settled out of
court. Here is a statement made by their executive director Brian
Norton following the settlement at that time:
“CTV
NEWS Update - We described in previous communications with our
supporters concerns we had with how CTV News portrayed our Vancouver
CPC in a series of television broadcasts earlier this year. We
are pleased CTV has since amended the broadcasts posted on its
website, as well as the associated web articles.
CTV
News Director Margo Harper wrote us concerning its investigation’s
purpose:
Our
investigation focused predominantly on whether the medical
information claims offered by Crisis Pregnancy Centres were accurate
… [and] the abortion risks outlined in the brochures offered by
these centres were accurate.
Ms.
Harper confirmed to us in writing of CTV’s conclusion on these
critical issues:
Video
of the Vancouver centre was featured briefly in the second story with
a voice-over that said the centre offered ‘no far-fetched
health warnings’.
CTV
News made no claims in our reports suggesting [your CPC] brochures
were inaccurate.
While
far from a perfect outcome, many of our concerns have been addressed
and we will not be spending any more of our time or resources on this
issue.” (Source: Christian Advocacy Society of Greater
Vancouver, Newsletter, dated December 2012 (page 2)) (emphasis added)
In a
nutshell, CTV said that the centre offered “no
far-fetched health warnings’ and made “no claims in
our reports suggesting [your CPC] brochures were inaccurate.”
So then
what was the point of Arthur mentioning the show at all, when it is
not even referred to in her report other than identifying it as one
more example to support Arthur’s anti-CPC crusade? Once again it is
the title of the initial report and what it implies about CPCs (e.g.
Surrey charity gives dubious abortion advice) that Arthur
likes.
It
seems the show was just another notch in Arthur’s belt of CPC
attacks. She had to mention it notwithstanding CTV’s News
Director Margo Harper’s written statement.
“Norton
said the investigation didn’t focus on the medical authenticity of
CPC Vancouver’s medical information and instead used
abortion-supporting ‘experts’ to denounce all crisis pregnancy
centres for misleading the public with abortion misinformation.
He
said CTV gave extensive coverage to Greg Smith, the executive
director of Options for Sexual Health (Planned Parenthood B.C.) and
Dr. Wendy Norman of BC Women’s Hospital and the former president of
Options for Sexual Health. He added that CTV did not interview any of
the medical experts involved in writing CPC Vancouver’s …
[client options] brochures.”
“The
report ignored the scientific literature referenced in the centres
brochures which substantiates the centres’ claims that abortion is
associated with increased physical and psychological health risks.
The reporter was told that this brochure had been reviewed and
approved by 25 professional counsellors, physicians and medical
researchers. None of this was mentioned in the CTV report.
“CTV
also declined to interview physicians with expertise in the area of
health risks associated with abortion who had been willing to
corroborate, on air, the claims made in the brochure.
“Furthermore,
Dr. Dan Reilly, an obstetrician/gynaecologist who also teaches ethics
at McMaster, was interviewed by CTV and briefly appeared on the
broadcast, but only his comments that challenged the validity of some
of the comments made by the Surrey centre volunteer were aired. Dr.
Reilly’s written confirmation of the accuracy of the health risks
described in the centre’s brochure was passed on to CTV, but those
comments by Dr. Reilly never made it into CTV’s report. Also left
out of CTV’s report was the fact that the counsellor at the
Vancouver centre received a complete endorsement from Dr. Reilly that
her comments were medically correct.
“CTV
chose to air Dr. Wendy Norman’s comments about abortion being ‘very
safe’, neglecting to tell the viewers that Dr. Norman is an
abortion provider and researcher and ‘has practiced exclusively in
the area of abortion since 1997.’ Her comments to CTV seem to be at
odds with the results of a study she herself co-authored which found
that ‘Postabortion infection after therapeutic abortion, although
uncommon, may have devastating consequences including infertility,
ectopic pregnancy, and pelvic pain syndrome.’”
Part
9 - Exposing Crisis Pregnancy Centres in BC
As noted previously, CAPSS
wrote a lengthy rebuttal of Joyce Arthur’s first report in 2009.
Arthur’s “study” can pretty much be discounted in its entirety
if anyone, including Arthur herself, had the goodwill to actually
read the CAPSS 55-page rebuttal to that horrid 2009 report:
I’ll
go out on a limb here, and say that I’m pretty sure Arthur read the
CAPSS rebuttal. But she never commented on it publicly. She never
told the BCHA about it.
I don’t
imagine she much liked it. I believe it was too close to the truth.
What did Jack Nicholson say in that movie A Few Good Men?
“You can’t handle
the Truth.”
I’ve also written
extensively on Arthur’s 2009 report on my blog:
Here
are more moot references in her 2016 report. They are all American
references, and / or are invalid web sites:
NARAL (American) https://www.prochoiceamerica.org/
http://www.pbs.org/now/shows/329/abortion-debateprint.htm (invalid link: page not found)
The American National Abortion Federation https://prochoice.org/ (American)
The American Cosmopolitan Magazine (American)
CPC Watch http://www.cpcwatch.org (This site is about Car Seat Safety Checks; nothing about CPCs on this site)
The American Guttmacher Institute (American) https://www.guttmacher.org/
And of
course Arthur references her own writings at Abortion Rights
Coalition of Canada and her Pro-Choice Action Network,
the credibility of which are as suspect as any of Arthur’s
writings.
Two French studies:
One of
these sites references Arthur’s 2009 report twelve times,
plus two other references to her ARCC website. That’s
fourteen references in total to Arthur’s own writing.
Naturally she would include these references.
CONCLUSION
On
the whole of it, one must wonder what Arthur’s agenda is as she
continues to hound and persecute CPCs for the good work they do for
women in crisis pregnancy situations.
Why does Arthur feel this obsessive need to denigrate and spread
falsehoods about CPCs on a continual and unabated basis? Where does
this hate come from?
I
can’t answer any of these questions. But I can provide the reader,
in contrast to Arthur, an honest and verifiable perspective about
crisis pregnancy centres.
Crisis
pregnancy centres are safe places for women to go to when
experiencing confusion or fear about an unintended pregnancy. There
they will receive love and compassion from people who are trained in
giving them information about their options, and ultimately
supporting them whatever they decide to do.
It’s
difficult to read and research the hatred that exists towards these
centres. There is so much misinformation and untruths out there made
by persons – prominently here in Canada by abortion activist
Joyce Arthur – who clearly have an agenda to
destroy these centres.
Their
motives are difficult to understand, but the results of their actions
harm and discredit the centres, the people who work there, and the
women they serve. Ultimately, it will be the women and men who use
these centres who will be most affected by the witch hunts of persons
who wish to see these centres closed.
One
quote I found regarding the work CPCs do was this: “They
share God’s love through their actions.”
Amen
I say to that.
