Local Waitrose supporting anti-abortion charity

[WaitroseSucks]

Waitrose gives shoppers tokens to drop into collecting points to support local charities. My local Waitrose is currently supporting a 'pregnancy counselling service'. I checked the 'charity's' website, which has all the usual guff about offering 'impartial advice', then checked their parent company and discovered that it's run by these guys.

AIBU to think Waitrose should check the credentials of 'charities' before collecting on their behalf? I imagine there would be outrage if Waitrose openly supported a charity like Abortion Rights, whose name does what it says on the tin.

Have tried to contact someone at my local store, but relevant person is 'away until Wednesday'. Meanwhile the collection points will continue to operate and unwary shoppers will be supporting a 'charity' that is concealing its true agenda.

Have name changed for this, but am MN regular.

"AIBU to think Waitrose should check the credentials of 'charities' before collecting on their behalf?"

No. But YABU to assume that they haven't.

This is a totally legal organisation offering a totally legal service. It's wrong to push one out of a public space just because you disagree with them, and an immensely dangerous and harmful precedent.

If you want to see other charities have their month with the green tokens, positively nominate them.

If you think an organisation should not be a charity, take it up with the Charity Commission.

i would have thought that after the negative exposure the charity would have made sure this didn't happen again.

I agree with Cherryade. Also isn't it better to have this resource if you need help than nothing?

or perhaps you could email the local charity itself raising your concerns?

If you are in touch with the head office at Waitrose why not ask them to put in a collection for Education for Choice, the Abortion support Network, your local Brook (they are federated not a national charity I believe), or the FPA or Abortion Rights?

People keep saying 'they wouldn't ever have a collection for a pro-choice cause..'
But they certainly won't if they think doing that is somehow wrong (more wrong than an anti choice charity collection?) or would be unpopular. Maybe they don't know that: Statistically one in three UK women have abortions. (That means quite a lot of their shoppers!) Around half of those are already mothers. Some women have more than one abortion in their life. Contraception doesn't always work and not everyone does or can use it properly. Abortion is nothing new but thankfully since the 1960s is safe and legal in the UK (lower risk than labour and birth at full term) aside from in Northern Ireland - don't get me started on that one.
It doesn't give you cancer or make you a child abuser it's just that it's still a taboo.

So although the need for abortion isn't a strange outcome for a pregnancy, unintended or unwanted pregnancy and pregnancy choices can be very difficult (partly because choosing or having had an abortion is so stigmatised) so women may want support around making or dealing with their decisions.

Their decision should also be made on the full facts if women want to have them- or equally on the woman's gut instinct about continuing or not with the pregnancy which is just as valid. Her choice. (but it's not genuine 'choice' if she makes her decision as a result of unwittingly being given anti-choice scare stories.)

The pro choice charities need money too and do an important job so I would love to support good causes like that through my local waitrose.

If it's OK for waitrose to collect for Care confidential (which they should have labelled correctly as an 'anti-choice charity' then of course it's OK for them to collect for a clearly labelled 'pro-choice' charity too.

It would be a shame if waitrose got scared off good causes to do with pregnancy and women's rights because this is a very underfunded part of the charity sector.

PS Oh yeah and I wouldn't use 'pro- life' as a descriptor with waitrose (or anyone else) if you don't agree that that is what being 'pro-life' means.
Pro 'choice' obviously does not = being 'pro death' which is the obvious 'pro life' (or 'anti-choice') nonsense claim...

Pro life means anti-abortion. And yes I have a big problem with it. It's a bit disingenuous to pretend you don't understand why when abortion is such a contentious issue.

But then people on both sides of any fence have named themselves to sound as good as possible.
Take 'blood sports' and 'field sports / countryside pursuits'.
(I am completely pro-choice btw)

You have a choice of 3 charities though, they aren't forcing you to support them. You can either decline the token at checkout or give to one of the others. People are entitled to be anti abortion, just as there are to support it. It is the province of the individual. This site goes on about judgmental groups and things but really some posts are extremely judgmental and narrow minded about things like this. MN says it's wrong so let's start a campaign and get it stopped! Yet they would lambast another group with different values who did similar. Two sides to every coin...

Marmite
You are totally missing the point
This is not about being pro-choice/anti-abortion

This is about an organisation misrepresenting itself and using the thin veneer of respectability it gains by claiming to be impartial to then lie to women who are at their most vulnerable.

If they had no problem with their stance, they would be open and upfront about their beliefs. But they know that isn't acceptable, and that wouldn't get them funding or referrals or people through the door.

If you were in Tesco and someone was offering to pack your bags for a pound, saying the money was going to an animal shelter, and you gave that money in good faith, would you then be pissed off to find out it was actually going to an animal testing organisation? Would you think Tesco would have some responsibility to vet those asking for money in its stores?

That's my local shop, shall get Facebooking and tweeting- know someone who works there as well.

"Would it be any different if it was a pro abortion charity!"

No such thing as a pro-abortion charity.

It's called pro-choice and supports all choice - be that termination / adoption / continuing with an unplanned pregnancy.

Waitrose have replied saying the charity have given assurances they are impartial...

Offtopic and as a matter of interest, OP, why have you changed your name for this thread? Just curious - still new to Mumsnet and don't really get this name change thing other than for posts of a very personal or identifying nature...

I hope Waitrose doesn't let itself be forced into ending links with this charity. A poster earlier in the thread said she was helped by the charity in post abortion counselling. But if a woman is considering termination why shouldn't she seek all points of view. And can reject the ones she doesn't agree with and or are not for her.

I am pro-choice and have the right to campaign for abortion provision. A.N.Other is anti-abortion and has the right to campaign for it to be banned.

In a free society, this is right and good. Everyone should have a platform. However, neither group has the right to campaign with impunity, and neither of us should lie to achieve our political ends.

I would support a charity that declared their special interest (religion) and offered counselling to women who were happy to allow for that special interest. I would support a charity that only offered support and advice on alternative options, providing they don't claim to be inclusive of all options.

"If you are unexpectedly pregnant and want to find out about alternatives to abortion" is perfectly acceptable a byline for me.

This charity hides their special interest, claims to offer inclusive advice then employs people who tell vulnerable women that they are more likely to commit future child abuse if they proceed with a termination. That is not acceptable to me (Arabella note please )

But if a woman is considering termination why shouldn't she seek all points of view

Agreed. I doubt anyone here would disagree. But it should be an informed choice to seek alternative points of view, and women should not be subjected to an abuse of the trust shown by seeking those points of view.

ItsAllGoingToBeFine Mon 27-Oct-14 17:05:37
Waitrose is probably completely unaware. For a lot of the local causes they support they may not be able to do many checks. /snip

Well they bloody well should be! no excuses

ariadne
Because she's also posted on Waitroses Facebook - I assume that's under her real name. It wouldn't be difficult to link the two if you so wanted.

Vivien
If a woman turns up at a counselling service which claims it is impartial and gives the facts, the woman has every right to believe that is what she is going to get.

If she then is told that there is evidence to say that abortion leads to infertility, turns women into sex abusers and massively increases her chances of developing breast cancer, she is going to believe those things to be true. NONE OF THEM are true.

If anti-abortion groups want to operate, that is fine. They should be able to and women who want to consider their opinions in their decision making process should be able to.

What is totally, completely, 100% unacceptable is a sham organisation pretending to be impartial when it actually wants to pedal its own agenda and bully women into making the choice that the charity wants, using disgusting lies and scare tactics.

I am completely shocked that anyone would think otherwise

It's the deliberate misrepresentation that is the problem. When people see the words "counselling" I presume they assume (unless told to the contrary) that it's non-judgemental, non-directive counselling. This isn't. This is an organisation which has a well documented track record of using scare tactics and lies (claiming there are links, for instance, between abortion and breast cancer when there are not) in order to frighten vulnerable women into continuing with unwanted pregnancies. Despicable.

If it was an organisation like SPUC who are totally upfront about their position, I wouldn't mind. I could put my token in the other boxes in the knowledge that everyone was exercising an informed choice. But the information on the box in my local Waitrose (Exeter) simply said that it was an organisation offering pre and post abortion counselling - no mention of their pro-forced-pregnancy agenda (if the other side can use deliberately aggressive language, then so can I).

Utter arseholes.

Right off to cancel the Internet shop and do a Sainsbury's one instead.

It is a very contentious issue and Waitrose by supporting this charity appear to be taking a side. So YANBU. and well done for getting on their case OP..

If anyone is in any doubt about the impartiality of this organisation, they are currently advertising for volunteers
That advert appears in ONE PLACE ONLY. The notice board for a local evangelical church:
www.maybridge.org.uk/Groups/201764/Maybridge_Community_Church/Church_Life/Noticeboard/Local_and_National/Local_and_National.aspx

If this was about anything other than their own doctrine and beliefs, they would advertise this more widely and be willing to accept volunteers that come from a wider walk of life then just their own church.

Have you heard back from Waitrose about this yet OP?

I haven't heard back from Waitrose.
That's interesting sparechange. To be honest, I was beginning to wonder if this organisation had, in the face of criticism, changed the way it operates and had started to move towards genuine impartiality. However, the fact that they advertise via the local evangelical church church and that their advert says: "Could you be interested in this exciting work? No formal qualifications needed, full training is given – just a love of young people and a desire to influence their thinking for good in their formative years " is very, very telling.

So, no, I am still not convinced about their impartiality.