Anti-Abortion Ads in BART?!?

people need to correct that messaging!

Meet BACORR, ANSWER, Code Pink, and others at Pier one on the Embarcadero at 11:00 am

A five-minute call to BART complaints line resulted in the following understanding of BART's position on the issue:

BART is not responsible for selling the ad space, Viacom is. Anyone can buy ad space from Viacom, and it ends up on BART trains, and that is constitutionally-protected free speech.

So, BART both disclaims direct responsibility and justifies their role in the situation as a 1st Amendment issue, see.

Well, then, what about the anti-war movement's difficulties in buying ad space a few years back? Again, it's all up to Viacom.

Welcome to corporate rule.

Lest you think that your message will find shelter under the freedom-loving aegis of BART, provided you come up with the cash and your message is approved for mass distribution by Viacom, there are some lines BART will draw. For examples, they will not run ads for pornography, tobacco or liquor. Even though those are legal industries.

So, go figure. It turns out not to be a 1st amendment thing after all. Just when BART seemed like our heroes!!

In short: customer service representatives are briefed and prepared to respond to complaints, aggressively but not in any depth. They will bottom-line it as a 1st amendment issue pursuant to the constitution and supreme court rulings (interesting they should mention those...), and they will hang up on you. They never asked for a name &c, either. They will not be able to tell you how much money BART is making off the ads.

It would seem that they're expecting a lot of flak, but fuck it, right? They're just BART riders.

Aren't there some kind of BART board-type politicians who could be brought to feel some heat for this outrageous situation?

Mind you, it's not just the patently offensive message that women should be denied their freedom, it's also the hypocrisy of BART accepting right-wing political advertizing, citing the constitution, but refusing left-wing messages as offensive or divisive or whatever, i.e. where oh where were the anti-war ads from moveon.org?????

This seems to be a textbook example of government and the advertizing industry clearly engaged in shaping the paramaters of acceptable public discourse for partisan puropses.

A wonderful legacy of the Bush II years. Right here at home in San Francisco.

To contact the BART Board of Directors, write, phone or email:
BART Board of Directors
P.O. Box 12688
Oakland, CA 94604-2688

(510) 464-6095
kduron [at] bart.gov



Board of Directors Members:

District 1 (Contra Costa): Gail Murray

District 2 (Contra Costa): Joel Keller

District 3 (Alameda/Contra Costa): Bob Franklin

District 4 (Alameda): Carole Ward Allen, President

District 5 (Alameda/Contra Costa): Zoyd Luce

District 6 (Alameda): Thomas Blalock

District 7 (Alameda/Contra Costa/San Francisco): Lynette Sweet, Vice President

District 8 (San Francisco): James Fang

District 9 (San Francisco): Tom Radulovich

Source:

They seem to have meetings too, though they only seem to list the ones that have already happened:

the police might flip out at that - yet if they have large numbers and the two sides merge well in the crowd, they couldn't arrest you all. Personally I would suggest bringing a nice digital camera and photographing funny looking people in the opposition, a la the zombietime site. This is very easy.

http://www.indybay.org/news/2005/09/1770112_comment.php

this was very inept on the part of the police, because I can't believe that any of these charges stuck. (what happened??) But you know this is what they want to do - and they waited pretty much all day until they had their targeted isolated in a big clump. so it seems like keeping the spatial configuration of antiabortion vs antiantiabortion people at the optimum level is key

I dont understand why you would not want to celebrate diversity of openion by welcoming these advertisements, not condemning thier existance. Disagree with thier content, sure. Disagree with their presence, why?

IF you truely support "choice", then why not support someone else's choice of which side of the abortion debate to support?

This discussion reminds me of people who call themselves "pro life", and yet somehow also support the death penalty. How about some consistency in values and beliefs, is all I am saying.

Thanks,
Rick

A few years ago BART and MUNI both ran "pro-choice" ads sponsored by NARAL. What's sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander. If you don't like discourse on sensitive subjects, move to one of the many countries that doesn't allow it.

and next from these "free speech" patriots: pro-slavery ads by the klan.

why not? we had anti-discrimination ads from naacp, just a few years back....

clearly, moveon.org had their ability to buy antiwar ads fucked with just a few years ago. this is about who gets access to adspace, and why.

some of us find messaging that women should be enslaved to someone else's reproductive agenda, FURTHER offensive.

that's why this is listed under both womens' and media issues.

O mr/ms "free speech" idiot.

btw, do you agree with the president that people should "watch what they say" about the war in Iraq?

please, rise to the defense of FREE SPEECH, not just "all the speech you can afford and viacom allows onto the public trains." in return, i'll start believing you're sincere about freedom. as is, you're just another crypto-fascist christian zombie goon. i for one aint buyin it, no way, nohow.

next: we shame you in public, 21 jan, embarcadero. SF is PROCHOICE and will stay that way, whatever your packed court chooses to hand down from so on fucking high.

Defacement of Anti-Choice BART Ads Tied to Indybay in Corporate Press

Do you have a link or more details - do you mean "Pier 1" as in the actual pier or the store?

FWIW, I wrote on the "9 months" poster I saw last night "That's called a c-section at 9 months" but from now one I am going to be writing "Complain to kduron [at] bart.gov 510 464 7134"

We meet at Pier 1 on the Embarcadero at 11:00. Come prepared with your wits, passion, love and some signs, too.

I'm proud to say that I'm one of the peeps who's been adding comments on the BART ads like "NO" (to answer Have we gone too far?) "LET WOMEN CHOOSE" or "LEAVE WOMEN ALONE"!

Let me get this straight. If BART ran, which I heard they did in the past, pro-abortion (oh, I forgot the term is "pro-choice") ads, that's fine. It's part of "free speech" and a diversity of opinions. But if they run a pro-life ad, that somehow is not okay. I guess free speech is only okay if it's liberal, "progressive" free speech. What a crock!

One more comment. The "activists" (I call them vandals) who defaced the posters are probably the same people who scream for the "rights" of animals. They don't want people to have the "choice" to eat KFC, wear fur, or benefit from animal testing on drugs. It's wrong in their eyes, and it shouldn't be a choice. Yet, to pull a full-term baby out of its mother's womb and slaughter it before the entire body emerged, as in infanticide, is "choice". If the baby were a few minutes older, it would be a crime. Kill babies, but don't eat meat for wear fur. What a crock!

What might be the circumstances of a woman who is undergoing a late term abortion?

How does it affect the mother's health one way or another if a pregnancy goes full-term and the child's head is pulled out? If the child is dead or alive when you pull the rest of him out, what's the difference for the mother's health? What am I missing here?

Really responsible job. Act like children, get trated as such. Really mature. Reflects highly on progressives.

One more comment:

How many times have you seen conservatives trashing liberal posters? Getting violent at street protests? Screaming and yelling?

Why, you ask? Because when you're right, you don't need to scream and shout and vandalize. We have the truth on our side - and no amount of screaming and shouting and violence and property destruction and vandalizing can compete with the truth.

What are you missing? The health and welfare of the woman. Most woman jave late term abortions because complication with the birth that jeopardize their health. Do youre homework. Educate yourself
And, as for have I ever seen conservatives rip down posters and intimidate others...are you kidding?

Regarding indybay.org's Encouragement of Anti-Catholic Vandalism: It is unfortunate that a few individuals' disagreement with the pro-life views of the Roman Catholic Church (yes, capital RCC) has not manifested itself in more fruitful and more place-appropriate forms of political action. Oddly enough, those (including indaybay.org) who condone these egregious acts do so under the guise of free speech, failing to recognize that responsible participation in a deliberative democracy requires them to extend those same rights to others--even those with political ideologies different from their own. Preventing anyone's views from being heard is the worst infringement of free speech possible, and it is wrong.

Who is the one screaming and yelling? Have you ever compared even the most shrill sounding stuff on KPFA with rightwing talk radio. Michael Savage and Rush Limbaugh just complain and whine and play victim every day even though they have it pretty well off. As for vandalism, its bad but when did you hear antiwar protesters complain about all their signs being vandalized and torn down by RIghties. It happens all the time but the last time I heard anyoen complain this much was when the antiwar sign was on someone's house and the RIghties also vandalized the home when they took down the sign (see http://www.indybay.org/archives/archive_by_id.php?id=3619&category_id=18 ).

I have to chuckle at you murderous liberals! OH SO tolerant of freedom of speech, so long as it fits your twisted Marxist world of filth.

Truth hurts, doesnt it ladies?

Personally calling for the overturn of Roe v Wade(which would lead to miliions of deaths of woman) is at this point hate speech. I didn't rip them down or deface them, but I'm very clear on their content and their intent.
If you call for my death. you'll be rebutted directly and vigerously.

It's a shame, isn't it? The beautiful city of San Francisco, blessed with a picturesque Bay, charming hills and neighborhoods, and named for the Catholic saint of St. Francis, has been hijacked by the left and is now hostile to any thought of morality, or God forbid (can I say "God"?) religion. You San Franciscans should be ashamed of yourselves.

Is there verification of Viacom's refusal to carry moveon's ads? Any press stories? It would be helpful to back up the argument that Bart is being selective.

I've heard conflicting accounts...Calif. Peace Action which wanted to run ads showing Donald Rumsfeld shaking hands with Saddam Hussein ran into som eproblems, but it was apparently with the ad agency, not BART

BART is running anti-abortion ads but refuses to run anti-war ads and its a government run agency that shouldnt be taking sides like this.

Pro-war crazies try to run antiwar protesters over with their cars and make death threats. One or perhaps two people deface signs on BART and suddenly every right-wing kook comes crawling out of the woodwork to talk about how oppressed they are? Give me a break.

How many signs have you seen on BART that arent not defaced and usually for nonpolitical reasons? Knowing the likes of most Protest Warriors and other neofacist right wing cult groups the signs were probably self defaced just to give you guys more of an excuse to pretend like your lives are so horrible and your being oppressed by the same poeple you also claim to be powerless and irrelevent (which is it?).

I guess you guys had to find something to complain about this week since you probably are upset over the public celebration of MLK. While your leaders now give lip service to his cause, we all know you were the same people trying to burn the buses of Freedom Riders and hang black folks for just wanting to vote a few decades ago. From Civil RIghts, to Iraq and Vietnam when has history not proved the US Right to be anything other than a bunch of crazed stupid bigots who periodically have to distance yourself from your outdated views.

Protest Warrior was a great idea, as it uses the near same tactics as the rabid left, with the exception that they are more civilized in their approach. I love to see the reaction of you FRISCO libs to the normal members of American society when they correctly call you on your stances!
:o)

"I love to see the reaction of you FRISCO libs to the normal members of American society when they correctly call you on your stances"

Being from the Midwest, I would say progressives are much more inline with what normal Ameticans think than West Coast Righties who are a peculiar breed who only exist here. Most of the US now opposes the war but even in those states that voted solidly for Bush you dont find people like Protest Warriors and you cant find stations carrying anything close to the crazy stuff Michael Savage broadcasts. In Texas, Alabama or Indiana people may be "conservative" but they dont define themselves to being oppressed by liberals which is the slightly crazed view of the West Coast Right. In the 80s I was at a University in the MidWest and remember the Young Americans for Freedom blocking the entrances to a talk by speaker against aparthied. You cant find too many YAFF types left these days but their movement does seem to have given birth to Protest Warriors in places like SF and Berkeley (but you dont see any in places that are more "conservative").

The whole YAFF/Protest Warrior thing is a bit confusing when you think about the motivation. Why would rich kids with confused political views want to copy the failed tactics of radicals when its clear that radical tactics havent been working. Unless of course they really do think the tactics work and are afraid of that? I guess the response is "its fun to pick on you guys but we think your powerless and irrelevent" but that just puts Protest Warriors in the same category as school bullies who pick on the disabled and frat guys who beat up the homeless.

Most Americans are not bullies and have nothing in common with Rightwing crazies. People voted for Bush because "he seemed like a nice guy", not because they agreed with his failed war in Iraq or thought Brownie was the best guy to run FEMA. Most Americans "support the troops" but know that a war waged because of lies hurts the US troops more than other Americans and where I grew up at least most peopel know the real reason peopel went into the military (it had to do with parents pressuring drugged out kids to do something with their lives a lot more than a belief in neocon views of American exceptionalism).

American conservatism (outside of the out of touch confines of YAFFers, NeoNazis and Berkeley College Republicans) is mainly a product of being raised in a country that eats its own and a desire for self discipline (to get off fry or meth or alochol) results in a desire for some strong authority figure to help force such discipline from the outside. Most of the people I went to highschool with who accidently had kids in their teens, got injured due to drunk driving accidents or got brain damage by sniffing glue ended up as conservatives in their middle ages (and the worst off ended up in the military). SF has a drugs and sex reputation but if you reallyw ant to see unsafe sex and drug use try the Bible Belt on any day people arent in church.

West Coast college conservatism comes from the same place as former West Coast college radicalism. Life seems simple and its easy to judge and make up crazy notions that as Amercians (left or right) you can be beacons of freedom to the world until you actually have to live like most Americans and realize how much work we have left to do on ourselves. Only when your most fucked up friend who got several girls pregenant (who ended up getting abortions) and never could hold down a job ended up in the special forces supposedly trying to save Iraqis do you realize why the war in Iraq will end in disaster (and it really doesnt matter if those behind it think it's for oil or power or revenge or democracy)

The motivation for the Protest Warriors and other similar groups is MONEY. They are paid, most likely from right-wing alligned "interest groups" financed through semi-anonymous foundations.

I actually confronted one Protest Warrior at peace rally last year. He was alone so he was as much of "Warrior" as when he's with his buddies! :-) Anyway, I walked up to him and said, "I KNOW you're paid. How do you live with yourself?" He looked really sheepish, shrugged and and said, "So?"

That made me laugh for days!

Amen! Couldn't have said it better myself!

Im a Christian and love life
and think fetuses deserve to live
so we can send them to die in Iraq
because we elected an idiot who had no
idea that as a result of the war
fundamentalists will take over and make it
an executable offense to preach Christianity in Iraq

Im a Christian and love life and think
fetuses must be saved so they
can fight wars
even though I only support wars that
are by Bush and claimed to oppose nation-building
under Clinton

Love me, Im a Christian, I respect life
and want all unborn children to live in
this wonderful world where they wont receive
medical care since poor people born out of
unplanned pregenciess shouldnt get government healthcare
and as long as they are born before they die from
disease then God's will is fulfillled

Im a Christian and talk about values but
if Jesus were alive I would run him over in my
SUV because he was way too much of a liberal
wus for my tastes and that thing with the money and
the temple just stinked of Commie propaganda

Im a Christain and talk about God but its only
because I know Im taking his name in vain
and with my prowar antipoor views Im already
going to hell so I might as well use Gods name in
vain too just too round out the evil

Once you got a lettle deeper into the issues, and they couldn't simply regurgitate their right wing AM-nut radio talking points, they fell apart and would say things, like, "Yeah, I guess you're right"..ect.. Some of them weren't so bad, jsut confused kids who've been brainwashed/indoctrinated into a culture that basically teaches you not to care about the next person.....then there were the angry Fox news sheep, who, like their younger counterparts, couldn't go beyond their mindless hypocritical sloaganeering. They seemed like they would have been more at home in a trailer, watching springer, than out at a protest with a diverse crowd, many of who were critical thinkers beyond the PW's wildest dreams. They were small in number, and small in power.

"They seemed like they would have been more at home in a trailer, watching springer"

Spinger has pretty good politics if you have heard his Air America program and while the rural poor did seem to go for Bush in the lat election they have little in common withProtest Warriors who are typically middle class kids starving for attention not workingless people stuck in trailer parks because of American inequality. The peopel fighting the war in Iraq may in many cases be from the same segement of American society that lives in trailer parks but the peopel behind the war and attending prowar rallies are not. There are not that many people who have relatives or friends in Iraq who actually think Bush has any idea what he was doing when he invaded.

I applaud the BART system for running the "Have we gone too far ads." And the response by the pro-abortion/culture of death crowd highlights the danger of leftist ideaology. Tolerance for them only goes as far as if you agree with their view. Free speach only applies to those who agree with them. They use Nazi tactics in reponse by demeaning and defacing rather than engaging in reasoned debate. They are a dangerous breed, and resort to guerilla tactics because they are a dying force in America. Good ridance!!

Isnt the accusation that people messed up some ads in public places? If you see grafitti by kids as a form of guerilla warfare that endagers your freedom I think you need to lay of the hard drugs.

Too bad all the brainwashed sheep who voted for the chimp president weren't aborted.

It's a Train station , one takes a Train get the point ?

it's Not a sounding board for any thing , I remember some time back that I-pod had it's adds up all over the Powll street station just like abortion it's a saling point . I go there to take a train not to be sold by or on some-thing .

But people don't give a fuck that is any more , the right the left what does it matter - I chose when to have a kid or not , what is up with you people it is plane simple wrong all of you are don't ever tell me when or how to live my life .

I think pro-life ads are fine.

Happy Martin Luther King day.

Rev. Martin Luther King, an American Baptist Minister, would be out front in saving lives of unborn children if he were alive today.

Its a baby, not a "choice'.

Love it. If you won't, I will happily.

So, let me make sure I understood this correctly. America is bombarded everyday with speech, signs, televised broadcasts, all lauding "reproductive freedom". Yet, one advertisment on SF trains, and the liberals go ballistic? I don't care if conservatives are freaking out about the "defacement" or not, however it should be considered. The fact is, the pro-choice people can't even take a dose of their own medicine.

It's about sane thinking people and religious right whaco-freaks.

It's not a baby until after it's been born.

Do you think they'll have any problems with this one?

why is VIACOM

deciding what ads run on BART?

and how is that FREE SPEECH (when in fact it costs $43K)?

someone's trying to confuse terms to cover up their own CORRUPTION.

Just like some animals in orwells 1984 were more equal than others.

I suggest we take BARTs willingness to allow free speech to heart in the spirit of our founding fathers, and I'm sure in the spirit which maybe at least a couple of people at BART intend, although they have no control over the wealthy uncaring monolith that BART is.

Enjoy. Redesign the ads that you see, whenever you see them. Don't rip them down. Keep telling the story of your experiences as women. And when the busloads of right wingers have come and gone next weekend, this will still be OUR COMMUNITY, not theirs. We fight bigotry and sexism, we don't pretend it doesn't exist.

See you in the streets sisters!

Flyers? On BART?

What an idea! That would be FREE SPEECH!

Can whoever did them contact BACORR? Please/
bacorrinfo [at] riseup.net

Fight the Extremists, or this could be you.

here's a crazy idea - if you don't want to have a kid, don't be a slut and get knocked up. it's not rocket science. there's the "choice" right there. But unfortunately, I do understand that there are way too many stupid people in this country, and that penis + vagina = baby is a bit over their heads, so I actually am pro-choice (with a few limitations) The thought of someone too stupid to grasp that concept actually raising a kid is scary.

But I digress...

For a site that claims to be for free speech, I just don't understand the calls for vandalism to signs that you disagree with. That doesn't sound like people that believe in free speech, rather people that believe in leftist fascism, otherwise, opposing viewpoints would be debated or countered, not torn down and spraypainted.

Seems hypocritical. What say you, free speech lovers of IMC?

Just insecure, and somewhat fearful The 'slut"comment is all about you raising yourself a few notches so we can marvel at your ability to keep your legs closed and your virtue intact. Pardon me if I forget to genuflect.
As far the ripping down of the posters? No I think they should tsay where they are. I think they should be written on and editorialized as much as possibe; 43,000 bucks were spent on those things. we should use that money and turn them into a forum for our views.

As expected, "free speech" counts for "activists" only as long as they agree with it.

Once they don't, they declare it isn't "really" free speech but part of some evil and enormous RIGHT WING CONSPIRACY(tm), so it's OK to vandalize it.

It's the usual claim--"no free speech for fascists!"--when "fascist", in practice if not in theory, is defined as "anybody who disagrees with me".

The pathetic thing about it is that they activists' "protest" (attempt at censorship) usually creates the opposite of the intended result, i.e., far more attention is paid to the content of the vandalized ads they try to silence.

It's the usual activist "shoot yourself in the foot by acting in rage without considering the likely consequences" so-called "protest".

i am pro-choice. fyi, as long as their is parental notification for minors and so long as the procedure is done early in the pregnancy. I wasnt being facetious at all earlier. I truly believe that there are too many stupid people in the world and that we're better off not stopping them from aborting their equally as stupid offspring.

But aside from that, I still really haven't got an answer from anyone as to why you feel it is ok to vandalize things just because they have a message you disagree with. This is the exact opposite of what I've seen so many IMC nuts state they believe in - free speech.

Seems to me that vandalizing or defacing posters is more along the lines of fascism. Kind of a "free speech for everyone until I disagree with it" type of approach. Don't ever whine about free speech then turn around and let your actions contradict what you claim your principles to be by defacing or damaging posters, signs, billboards, etc. just because you don't agree with the message. You make yourself look foolish, unintelligent, and dare I say.... probably a little immature. Just wondering how many of you that are "pro-vandalizing" are in college and living off of mommy and daddy's money. I haven't really seen anyone try and refute this point I've made, logically anyways.

You won't vandalize them, right?

It does seem kind of interesting that from what I hear, the people who run BART have rejected the free speech of others in favor of the anti-choice point of view.

If NARAL or BACORR were to run a similar ad campaign, BART should have no problems whatsoever. We're talking about "free speech", for everyone, not just some of us, right?

Maybe we should ask BART if they'd have a problem running a prochoice ad campaign.

BART Station and In-Train Poster Display Advertising
Managed by Viacom Outdoor
contact: Matt Timberlake at (415) 402-6862

where did you see "so many" claim that? a single reference or two would be nice, a URL link would be better. of course, you're attacking straw men with that line, some kind of preconcieved notion about the values of the left

besides, AVM, you are a liar. you claim to be some reasonable pro-choice person, but it's soooo obvious you are not. you are a dyed-in-the-wool AM-radio frothing right-winger. you just use too many cliches to be believable. from "sluts" to "nuts", to the rabid right-wing favorite of all time, lazy unemloyed leftists (i.e. mommies money). your vomit is probably more original than your slander here

you're credibility is zip and your claims of middlegroundedness are a farce

you're busted

the speech being argued over isn't free speech-- it is regulated commercial content on a public mass transit system. it's managed by both viacom and bart for content by their own admission, and it costs $43K. they have all sorts of rules about what can or can't appear, again by their own admission.

all y'all can ignore that all ya want, but it makes your whining about "free speech" and "nazi leftists" seem like the patent hypocrisy that it is. by the way, clue time: the republicans control all three branches of the federal government, as well as the california state governorship. they are not oppressed by anything we do.

you wanna talk about political hypocrisy? oh goody, let's shall.

where was the outrage when moveon.org was denied public advertizing opportunities it could pay for during the war, by-- Viacom:

"[moveon.org] also attempted to place anti-war advertisements on the sides of buildings, billboards and buses but was thwarted when Viacom, which owns the largest outdoor-advertising entity in North America, refused to run the ads."

source:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_MoveOn.org


i also really want to know what all these rightwing goons (with nothing better to do than troll indybay) think of George W. Bush's recent adminitions that people should "watch what they say" against the war, something that goes all the way back to at least spring 2002. here's a source:

"President Bush warned Democratic critics of his Iraq policy on Tuesday to watch what they say or risk giving "comfort to our adversaries" and suffering at the ballot box in November."

from SF Chronicle Online:
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2006/01/11/national/w080318S15.DTL

that makes me wonder if lynne chaney is still keeping files on anti-war professors &c. so that they can be singled out and punished, as reported in late 2001 in the SJ Mercury News article entitled "Lynne Cheney-Joe Lieberman Group Puts Out a Blacklist."

preserved from the memory hole here:
http://www.commondreams.org/views01/1213-05.htm

or, what about all these academic "freedom" goons that want to persecute leftie professors, trying to ecercise their free speech in their onw classrooms? the ones they have republican students spying on and reporting free speech campus-based activities to the ADL, the "Free" Republic types, &c. &c?

oh, republicans dont do that type of thing? then what is this:
http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=17915

well... what about that? why isn't any of that a violation of "free speech," and where oh where are our rightwing heroes in the face of this onslaught against "free speech"?

it also makes me wonder, if you righties are so for free speech (if only in a market context), how the Dixie Chicks ended up in so much hot water, for expressing an opinion at their very own show, so that radio stations owned by Clear Channel started refusing them media access-- even at the cost of profit? so bold.

and not just the DC's either:
http://www.sourcewatch.org/wiki.phtml?title=Clear_Channel_Worldwide

so, where are all of our free-speech "defenders" now?
hypocrites, one and all-- just like they are on the "life" issue.

but then, the nazis did always hide behind a democratic veneer to brutalize their opposition at all levels of the political process-- until they got power and the veneer was no longer necessary. the national "socialists" werent socialist at all in the end, though the nationalist part was certainly true enough. this kind of "free speecher" isn't for anyone's speech but their own, being crammed down everyone's throats as the only allowed point of view. their creepy anti-women agenda as re. abortion is of course, an inherent proof that this particular contention is true.

we'll see how it all plays out in the Alito Era, I would imagine. I would like to ask our righties here to remember their outrage in this moment in time, when the next round of corporate/government censorship is approved as some kind of crypto-police-state "executive order." plenty more where the "patriot" act is from, so buck up, kids, for a bumpy ride. it's a scandal a week with "President Armageddeon," now isnt it? and behold, none of it's good news for free speech.

yes, please, by all means, defend free speech.

all of that evil oppressive shit is double-edged, ya know-- not just the parts you dont care for, and not just when someone else is weilding it.

I think you think you are, but your ignorance is preventing you from truly attaining that state.
Here's a question, which you could answer, with some reading and research. You obviuosly have access to the web. That's all you need
Why are more woman these days getting second trimester abortions? (hint: think geography and money)
Go for it, AVM. Everyone, let's cheer her on. She just needs some encouragement to expand her personal findings re: abortion.

After all, the defacement was clearly political -- sometimes it took the form of mini-essays scrawled across the ad. It's not just random vandalism. If there is a marketplace of ideas, this is what it looks like.

Well with that line of thinking, defacing an abortion clinic would also be protected under the first amendment.

and a medical clinic. A medical clinic isn't a form of free speech. It's a medical clinic.

when you document their hypocrisy to their face.

From the AP wire, as per the SF Chronicle website front page:

"Radical" UCLA professors targeted by alumni group

Wednesday, January 18, 2006

(01-18) 05:19 PST Los Angeles (AP) --

An alumni group is offering students up to $100 per class to supply tapes and notes exposing University of California, Los Angeles professors who allegedly express extreme left-wing political views.

The year-old Bruin Alumni Association on its Web site says it is concerned about professors who use lecture time to press positions against President Bush, the military and multinational corporations, among other things.

The site includes a list of what the group calls the college's 30 most radical professors.

"We're just trying to get people back on a professional level of things," said the group's president and founder, Andrew Jones, a 2003 UCLA graduate and former chairman of the student Bruin Republicans.

"Having been a student myself up until 2003, and then watching what other students like myself have gone through, I'm very concerned about the level of professional teaching at UCLA."

Some of the group's targets accuse it of conducting a witch-hunt.

"Any sober, concerned citizen would look at this and see right through it as a reactionary form of McCarthyism," said education professor Peter McLaren, whom the associated named as No. 1 on its "The Dirty Thirty: Ranking the Worst of the Worst."

"Any decent American is going to see through this kind of right-wing propaganda. I just find it has no credibility."

The association's decision to name targets and pay students for information led to the resignation of at least one of its 20-plus advisory board members.

"That just seems to me way too intrusive," said Harvard historian Stephan Thernstrom, an affirmative action opponent and former UCLA professor. "It seems to me a kind of vigilantism that I very much object to."

Other advisory board members, according to the association Web site, include Linda Chavez, a former federal civil rights commissioner in the Reagan administration and head of a Virginia-based anti-affirmative action group; former Republican Rep. Jim Rogan; KABC-AM (790) radio host Al Rantel; and activist Joe Hicks.

UCLA officials said they will warn the association that selling copies of professors' lectures would violate campus rules and raise copyright issues.

The nonprofit association has raised $22,000 from 100 donors, said Jones, 24.

Personally I am very committed to reproductive freedom and real choices for all women. I do not have a problem, however, with someone putting up signs on BART or wherever that express a different opinion - if you think abortion is wrong, is murder, is irresponsible, or whatever, bring it on! What I DO have a problem with is ads that lie about abortion or reproductive rights. The Supreme Court never said any such thing about women being able to have an abortion for 9 months. And to be clear, there are maybe 2 providers in the country that do abortions after 6 months and you have to have a serious heatlh problem and about $10,000 to pay for it (no insurance accepted). I know. I have spent most of the last 10 years working directly with women seeking abortions, from 4 weeks to 24 weeks pregnant, and can tell you that even in California, many many of these women are unable to get an abortion. The idea that abortion is super easy to get, that you can get one in the third trimester, that it's unsafe or causes breast cancer or infertility, etc. are all LIES and are cop-outs used by people who are afraid to take the argument on as a moral issue. If you think abortion is wrong, let's have that argument. But don't lie and try to scare people just because you can't come up with a better way to convince people you're right.

As for the defacement, I don't they should be ripped down or torn up. I do think that responding to them is a political dialogue - adding notes, personal stories, commentary etc is a legitimate free speech response and is in part a frustration of the fact that this isn't a real dialogue, it's one group with lots of money putting up UNTRUE statements with no way for the rest of us to respond. This is not graffiti in the sense that it's not teenagers putting their initials on whatever just to tag it. This is topical, political response to the message of the ads. And I say let the best man or woman's argument win - if people think the ads are right and the graffiti-ers wrong, fine. If they see the point of the graffiti and it makes them think, great. Because unlike whoever above who seems to think everyone (especially women) are stupid, I actually have faith that most people can see a defaced poster and make their own judgment about the messages put out on it.

I sent an email to bart and got some good responses, but they wanted some dates & organizations for the anti-war denials any evidence I can use?

that had the problem as far as I know.

I just wanted to put a few arguments forth, and see how people respond.

I see that some people think it's not a baby until it's born. But, to me, there are problems with such an argument.

Partial birth abortions seem clearly wrong--is being halfway out of the womb really grounds to not consider it a child? This is a matter of moments here--how could it possibly not be a baby at that point? At that stage of development, where the baby is seems like a non-issue. It's simply a matter of about a foot--I don't see how being in the womb makes you not alive.

My further point is, would you feel it's ok to kill a person who is on life support, but know that he or she will recover in a few months. In nine months? Just because they can't live on their own at this point, that makes it ok to kill them?

Added to this is that sometimes babies can survive outside the womb before nine months.

To me, it's clearly a life that is being killed, from conception and beyond. That's my understanding of life--though I know others will disagree.

I think arguments about when consciousness emerges and when the fetus/baby can feel pain are based on things we don't know. We don't know the basis of consciousness in the first place, and it's a bit disturbing to me to see people making conclusions that consciousness is a result of the brain. We simply don't know that, at least at this point. So another point of mine is, granted that we don't know when consciousness comes into the body, would you feel comfortable killing someone/something that might be conscious? Doesn't it seem wrong to even take the chance?

There's certainly more that can be discussed, but I am genuinely curious about how people feel about this.

Why is she gettting an abortion at 9 months? Doesnt this tip you off to the possibility of a grievous issue with the pregnancy?
Why are you not asking questions about the woman?
And, so you know, it's beeen scientifically proven that fetuses don't develop a nervous sytem that can respond to "pain" at 28 weeks...

The issue you raise is an important one, but it's not what I was asking about. I'm curious about people's reasoning for justifying aborting a baby when there is no health-related reason for the woman. They are separate, though related, issues.

As I understand (please correct me if I'm wrong), most abortions are not because of health reasons on the part of the woman. There are even some pro-life people that support abortions if the life of the woman is at risk.

As for the pain reasoning, I don't think we should equate the presence of consciousness with a scientific verdict about what a baby/fetus feels. When I think of death, pain is not the most significant part, but the extinguishing of life. This idea of life, closely related to consciousness, is what's at stake, rather than a feeling of pain.

For all we know, the baby may become conscious before the nervous system develops. Maybe consciousness, that experiencing agent, begins at conception. How do we know? Then how do we justify terminating it?

It is on this matter that I'm curious about other's reasoning.

Though not quite related to this argument, here is an article of interest about the long-term psychological effects of abortion on women: http://www.theepochtimes.com/news/6-1-15/36977.html

That you should be informed by an individual why they are seeking an abortion? That is a violation of their privacy. You can't presume to know why they are doing it, whether for medical reasons or moral reasons that you personally disagree with.

Please tell us where you stand on Rape victims right to abortion?

I suppose we have rather different ways of approaching this issue. What I would like to see is others' reasons for why an abortion is not killing a life. I think it would be interesting to see the moral and philosophical foundations used to support abortion.

I think the moral side of abortion as an issue should be considered before privacy. If it is killing after all, then I hope people would consider the privacy issue absurd: we don't think it appropriate for people to kill adults or children, private or not, right? (Of course people have different views about war, the death penalty, and euthenasia)

The question of rape victims further pushes the central issue aside, though I do realize it is an important case. If one considers abortion to be killing, meaning one considers the child/fetus to be a life, perhaps already imbued with consciousness, would it be fair to that life to kill it, even in such a case? When we deal with matters of killing or murder, then it seems most appropriate to think first about the life in question.

Then I suppose there's the question of whether putting up a child for adoption is better or worse than aborting it. To me, that shouldn't be a question, but to others, perhaps it is.

I am not trying to mitigate the seriousness of rape or the profound psychological impact it can have on a person. I'm looking at the problem from a certain moral standpoint, one that I know others will disagree with.

However, these special cases or other considerations seem to be deflecting my main question of whether abortion is killing. The issue can be analyzed without looking towards the other cases. I realize that these cases are important parts in how abortion is defended in modern society, but I would like to look deeper than that. Once there is a clearer moral foundation established, then it seems more reasonable to approach the special cases.

feels incomplete to me- I can tell you that I've been pushed/asked to have problems with the abortins I have had- any negative feelings I'v had have to do with societal disaproval. Did the study ask why these women had negative feelings? The procedure itself , in all cases(ive had more than one) was refreshigly mundane, and in one experince, was actually empowering because of the atmosphere of collaboration with other reproductive rights activists.
You need a nervous system to attain consciouness. The University of San Francisco has done the work to map the developent of the bervous systems of fetal life
You could prefer to take a non quantifiable approach to undetstand the impact of abortion on the feturs, but...(fillin the blank)

You did presume that there was no health related issue with a woman getting a late term abortion. Go back and read your response.

I wanted to actually try to respond to the points raised about moral questions re: abortion and killing.

First, I take issue with the idea that the difference between something being in my uterus and being outside my body is "only the matter of a foot or so". Of course the distance isn't far in inches, but the distinction between inside my body and not inside my body is pretty huge.

I personally believe that abortion is killing or ending a life. But it is a life at a very early stage and it is a life growing inside of a woman, who also has a life which is much more developed. I cannot see how we cannot give the woman's life and needs more weight than those of a fetus. And I do not accept any comparisons to other situations because there are no comparable situations - unless you can show me another example of one entity growing or living inside of another human being. This is not about semantics, it's about the unique reality of pregnancy. So I don't think the relevant quesiton is, do you think abortion is killing. To me the question is, is it moral to force a woman to have a child against her will, or do we trust women to make their own moral decisions and know what is possible or best for her?

This goes to your other point about health issues. When a woman wants to have an abortion at 5 or 6 months or later in pregnancy, I believe 100% that there is a serious, compelling, undeniable reason for that decision. It may be physical health, it may be mental health, it may be something else. But I trust that any woman who is that pregnant knows she is that pregnant, and knows what it means, and knows why she needs an abortion and I will support her in the decision because only she can know what is right for her in that situation.

And just to repeat what I said in my earlier post, there are maybe 5 places in the country (and maybe the world, since many patients at those places are international) that do abortions in the third trimester for ANY reason. So can we all stop talking about women having abortions at 8 months? Trust me when I say it doesn't happen.