Q&A of the Day – Abortion is much bigger than Planned Parenthood
Each day I’ll feature a listener question that’s been submitted by one of these methods.
Email: brianmudd@iheartmedia.com
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Today’s entry...
I really appreciate the work that you do! I listen every morning! I hope you will stay on for a long time, but I fear that you’re going to get a better gig (with all of the national programming that you’re doing) and leave us.
Anyway, I think it was a Planned Parenthood person who you played this morning saying that abortion has “saved more lives” or something like that. I’ve been trying to find that quote or that clip since I got to my office, but I can’t find it. Could you let me know who said that or just send me a link?
I would really appreciate your help!
Bottom Line: First, thank you! I'm not planning on going anywhere. Yesterday, I brought you the information that more than 61.3 million abortions had been performed since the Roe v Wade decision in 1973. I also shared the information that three quarters of Americans, including a majority of those who identify as “pro-choice” favor restrictions based on timelines for abortions. It was the commentary of a Marilyn McGeorge of “West Virginia Free” that I wrapped my two-part series around. She stated that abortions save lives. As I depicted yesterday there are a net 624,000 women who’ve potentially been saved via abortion compared to a total, multi-generational, loss of life of greater than 104 million. My point in mentioning isn’t specific advocacy, as I mentioned yesterday, I’m understanding of women facing adversity having a choice. But your note serves another point. Planned Parenthood is very much in the fight against every state law recently passed, and they are the single largest provider of abortions but there’s much more to the story.
Planned Parenthood has become the poster child for the abortion debate for good reason. They are the single largest provider of abortions in the United States. But they’re far from the majority provider of abortions. Of the greater than 61.3 million abortions performed in the US since Roe v Wade, Planned Parenthood is responsible for performing about 8.2 million of them. That’s only 13% of all abortions.
The woman representing “West Virginia Free” is much more the norm than the average Planned Parenthood representative. It reminds me of my recent story on retailers in the United States. Despite the dominance of Amazon and Wal-Mart, 70% of US retailers have ten or fewer employees. The point is this. The battle over abortions is deeply entrenched with many clinics you’d never recognize by name (would you associate West Virginia Free with being an abortion clinic?) and will be fought by interest groups you’re familiar with like the ACLU but also many more you’ve never heard of. Many pro-life groups have argued for defunding Planned Parenthood (removing Federal tax dollars) but even if they didn’t exist tomorrow, 87% of abortions would still take place as usual. There’s a lot more to the story & many more organizations at the grassroots level ready to fight for the status quo.