Did I over-react? Anti-abortion leafletters

[FuzzyHeaded]

I was wondering if I could get a bit of perspective on this from the folks on this board.

I am a PG student at a university which recently held student elections for various roles - president of the students' union, etc. There were a lot of people standing around the town near university buildings campaigning for positions, handing out leaflets etc. So a lot of people entered "take the leaflet and smile" sort of mode (or hurrying past and not making eye contact!)

I was walking past the students' union and there were a couple of leafletters, who I assumed were involved in the elections, so I took the leaflet they offered, but I handed it back as soon as I saw that it was an anti-abortion leaflet - "to some of us, ten weeks is a lifetime", with a soft-focus image of a probably 20-week foetus. These students were not wearing any badges or clothing or holding any posters that would identify to passers-by what they were campaigning for. A quick google afterwards showed that they were members of a specific campaigning group and had previously campaigned with posters and badges etc. I felt they were deliberately going "undercover" during a time when the university was swarming with leafletters to get people to take their leaflets. I stood and watched them for a little while and watched several people look really quite distressed when they realised what the leaflet was about.

I logged a complaint (by email) with one of the people in the students' union and was told that whilst they kept an eye out for the rest of campaigning week, the union is committed to freedom of speech and opinion. Of course that's fair enough, but was I over-reacting to be concerned about the way that 'freedom of speech' was being practised in that instance? I also feel that there's a gray area with campaigning on issues that people could have very real personal experience of - making it much more important that the style of campaigning used gives people who might be upset by it the chance to cross the road and move on.

Any thoughts? Was I complaining about nothing?

No, I always think using freedom of speech rights to in effect attack freedom of speech, or freedom of action, is a bit .

It sounds like you did exactly the right thing - sent a polite email to complain. It's good for the university to know that there are people complaining about their support for restricting freedoms!

They weren't graphic - more dripping with sentimentality. I only looked at it for about five seconds but it was more of a "oh my god cute babies how COULD you" sort of leaflet than a "you evil murderers" approach. But emotional manipulation nonetheless - and, yes, I think potentially quite disturbing for someone personally affected.

Tricky one.

I have felt really upset and by offended by a similar 'undercover' anti-abortion campaigner who was handing out leaflets outside the tube on Mother's Day one year outside the tube. Just a random old lady saying 'Happy mothers day' to passersby and then handing out a leaflet with pictures of aborted foetuses. I gave her a piece of my mind. It was just so twisted.

However, I've just come back from a conference in Ireland where some anti abortion campaigners were camped outside the conference hotel pretty much permanently and I found their blatant and aggressive stance much more upsetting. There were women, men and children holding up pictures of aborted foetuses and placards with 'stop the killing' type slogans. I said nothing but my blood was boiling. Do pro-choice campaigners feel the need to show graphic photos of women giving birth to babies they did not want? Or of unwanted, neglected children? No. So why do these people feel they have to be so crude and offensive?

Hard to know how to react when you are pro choice!

The 'wont you think of the ickle babies' manipulation is awful, too...

BallsToThat

You're very right about overly blatant / aggressive campainging being a problem too - I'd have a problem with that as well. I guess in a way though they are two very different situations the kernel of my objection would be the same - that neither really gives people the option to "get away" from the message being spouted.

The person in the SU said that they had kept an eye out for similar occurrences during the rest of the week but I guess I had rather hoped they might say they would drop the society a line giving them some guidance on appropriate ways of campaigning outside of student buildings.

I was also deeply upset to discover that a society full of fresh-faced eighteen year olds wanting to ban abortion exists at my university, but that's a wider issue.

Well, as far as them being young goes, there's nothing more likely to make you pro choice than life experience.

fuzzy i don't know whether you saw that documentary a few weeks ago about women seeking abortions in NI and the ROI? those involved in anti-abortion campaigning that faced the public were mostly teenage girls and young women, but you saw the person rallying them before they went off to set up their stall in town was an older man. so i think part of it is that those are the people you are likely to see because it suits the image of the organisation. also having read lots of posts on here about pregnancy choices, i have seen lots of women saying how their opinions changed or their pro-choice stance was reinforced once they had had children, because they more fully understood the reality of bringing a child into the world and how important it was that they be wanted. so i wonder whether there is something relatived that in the youth of the people campaigning - they have a less realistic view of pregnancy, childbirth and parenthood

(some may be parents of course, but it is less likely)

When I was at school and uni I had friends who were anti abortion and marched and leafleted. The crazy thing was that they were both Christians and had never had sex and wouldn't until marriage. So they knew absolutely nothing about having to make any kind of choice about a pregnancy. It seemed so easy for them to have a stance on something that they were never likely to have to deal with .

I was pretty anti-abortion when I was younger (I've seen the error of my ways - please don't hate me), though I wouldn't have leafleted or marched. For me, the change came when DSis got pregnant at 19. She knew immediately she wanted to keep the baby (fair enough), but seeing how hard it has been for her (even with massive family support) I became far more aware of how what anti-abortionists are actually asking women to put themselves through, and I realised that I'm not prepared to force that on anyone.

Fair enough r.e. the age thing - I think I was probably taken aback because I'm not much older. I was probably being a bit idealistic about my generation! The role of life experience is a really good point.

I dislike that stance...but in reality that's what it looks like, that's the action taken against the foetus, maybe your upset because you have had a glimpse of this particular reality. Let's face it, abortion is fairly brutal, wether you agree with it or not.

I'm not sure about this. I am vehemently pro-choice but the freedom we enjoy in this country does I think have to include the right of others to distribute leaflets we disagree with.

Agree about the life experience thing. I was anti-abortion at age 17 (though definitely not to the extent of leafleting or even broadcasting my views). Definitely pro choice now. Life does that so not surprised about the young ones - life seems v black & white at that age.

Maybe we pro-choicers should be spelling out the consequences of banning abortion in more graphic detail. I think we're starting to take it for granted in the UK, people forget how horrific it used to be. Backstreet abortion, unwanted children, multiple lives ruined by rape. There's even a theory that the long-term decline in crime is due to legalisation of abortion.

Anyone read Rebecca Schiller's book All that matters? Scary stuff ... We should be out marching to protect our reproductive rights, like my mum did in the 1970s!

Yes, you should be. Don't take it for granted - you can be sure the forces working to keep abortion unconstitutional in Ireland are interested in getting rid of it everywhere.

I'm assuming OP is not in NI so it is hopefully the case that their leaflets will be so obviously nonsense that they are counter- productive.

I'm sure we've all at some time been presented with poorly written, over -emotive pamphlet and just thought " rubbish"

On what subjects, Still? Because I can't think of any offhand, so I'm interested to know which ones you've been handed.....

puffins, the anti animal testing ones are pretty emotive. Can't think of any others though.

StillLost

Sorry - I thought I'd written a reply earlier but it didn't seem to go through! I do see your point about freedom of speech. My main concern was that the way they went about it didn't give people who might be personally affected by the issue the chance to "opt out", as it were. I feel that in the context of leafletting outside a university building the university has some responsibility to balance freedom of speech with the welfare of potentially vulnerable students.

Beaky, I think that's a really good point, and Apocalypse, you're very right. I do worry a lot that these rights might be chipped away at bit by bit - and people won't realise it soon enough to think and get angry about the ramifications. I remember Jeremy Hunt just last year talking about wanting to restrict the time limit on abortions.

And I'm not in NI.

puffins really? Never been handed some end of the world is nigh/ Jesus is your saviour/boycott this/boycott that/weird church you've never heard of pamphlet?

Fuzzy I'm not sure why students are any more potentially vulnerable than any other group.

Still

That wasn't my point, but the context of the situation was a student group campaigning outside a student building, mostly leafleting to students, and me raising the issue with a representative of the student union. And universities DO have a responsibility towards the welfare of their students, and I believe that include at ensuring that student groups campaigning etc on university grounds are doing so in a reasonable and considerate manner. I also think the student body may well include individuals who due to their age and the circumstance of being away from home in a new environment are potentially vulnerable (many first year undergraduates at my university are still legally children). I guess the hypothetical individual I had in mind was a 17, 18 year old woman who was either considering an abortion or had gone through one and then found this leaflet in their hand. It may be discarded as "rubbish" by people with, as we were discussing above, more life experience, but that hypothetical young person (whose local support network IS the university) may be distressed by it.

*that includes

Beaky - good point.

My argument when ever this debate arises is always just that.

Women have abortions whether its outlawed or not, so pro-abortion campaigners need to be forced to face up to what their stance means: horrific back street abortion; women shamed into travelling abroad to have the procedure at a much later stage than they would have been able to access it if it were legal; women forced to have and raise children they didnt want, alone, often young women who end up raising children without fathers in circumstances of deprivation.

Its not a pretty picture and to the previous poster who said that safe, legal abortion is brutal - it isnt as brutal as the alternatives.