Good News out of South Bend, mayor Peter Buttigieg vetoed a fake clinic’s attempt to move in next door to Whole Woman’s Health Center’s new abortion clinic. Congrats to the team of all volunteers at Pro-Choice South Bend for working around the clock to make sure this crisis pregnancy center did not move in next door!

And this brings us to… of course… the conservative outrage which includes this embarrassing subheader from The Federalist: “Giving Babies Diapers Is Not a Threat” NO SHIT (well, def some shit, in those diapers). But that’s not what fake clinics do and it’s incredibly deceitful and malicious to claim that that’s all these crisis pregnancy centers do. So we wanted to quickly run down a few things in this Federalist cryfest that we just are gonna keep hitting over and over again until these places STOP ACTING LIKE THEY’RE THE FUCKING VICTIMS AND NOT ALL THE WOMEN THEY DECEIVE.

 

  • Of course it’s political: Women’s Care Center claims it doesn’t “engage in political advocacy” and we call bullshit. Even without knowing anything about the center the very FACT that they are opening next door to an abortion clinic shows they’re political. They’re making tactical moves. They’re not these sweet little places trying to bring good, they’re actively trying to trick people to go to their center, I mean, just look at their super vague name.  This Federalist writer tries to argue that Whole Woman’s is worried about “the competition” but… THEY ARE NOT THE COMPETITION THEY DON’T PROVIDE ABORTIONS!
  • Of course they are deceitful: The Federalist article paints the fake clinic as this idyllic non-judgmental place where women and pregnant people are listened to and helped. The way anti-choicers write about fake clinics, anyone not familiar with the situation might be like “oh, that place sounds nice and good, why are these mean feminists going after these nice ladies.” BUT WE CALL BULLSHIT. Because all you have to do is look at the Women’s Care Center website to realize they are a bunch of creepy, judgmental, cunts. First things first, the homepage which at one point reads “As many as 40% of early pregnancies end in natural miscarriage, so a positive pregnancy test doesn’t necessarily mean you are having a baby.” This is a distortion fake clinics use to trick pregnant people into thinking “hey, maybe I can just roll the dice, and don’t need an abortion.” It is insane and it is predatory. They’re banking on people, who are probably worried about their financial situation,  trusting them and not scheduling an abortion in time.
  • Of course they’re judgmental: On the Women’s Care Center main site under “about” that say they don’t provide abortions. And yet… they have an “abortions” tab. In the tab they do so much talking around the actual procedure, it’s insulting. They even have an email you can send abortion questions to. And they say they’re offering to “make a plan that is best for you.” Hmmm, but that plan can’t include an abortion at their site. We know from experience that a lot of fake clinics lie and say that abortion is dangerous, that it causes cancer (not true obvs), and that it will make you depressed. But even, even, even we being AS GENEROUS as possible with this place and saying maybe, maybe they don’t do that here, they’re still tricking pregnant people. They’re saying they have “medical grade pregnancy tests” which you can get at a pharmacy, they’re pushing that miscarriage lie again (hey look, you might not even BE pregnant), and they’re not explicitly stating at the end of their 5 step process that in fact, you can’t get an abortion there and they are opposed to abortion. You can’t have a “pro-life” mission without being judgmental. It’s impossible.

 

There are places that actually help families make family planning decisions called Community Health Centers and you better believe they are not getting the funding these fake clinics are getting to deceive pregnant people. Or you know, there’s Planned Parenthood. Fake clinic supporters act like there’s nowhere to go to talk about your abortion decision without judgment but you know where you could fucking go to do that… an abortion clinic. Contrary to what anti-choicers would have you believe, they are in NO way, shape, or form forcing people to have abortions at REAL clinics. You have to talk to a counselor, fill out paperwork, and confirm that you are 100% sure that this is what you really want. It’s a whole process. But at an abortion clinic you won’t be judged for your decision. Not so at these fake clinics. So yes, giving diapers away is not a threat. It’s the rest of the stuff.