Don't tell the Canucks, but.....

I'm an inveterate Vancouver Canucks fan. Hockey rules the universe and the Canuckleheads rule my heart. So I can only pray that I am not jinxing them by writing something favourable about the Ottawa Senators, or more specifically, the wives of a number of the Senators' players.

While this news is a bit old, it has only come to my attention lately that a number of Senators hockey wives and girlfriends, who call themselves The Better Halves, are raising money to support, among other things, a local pregnancy centre. Given the sermon on crisis pregnancies that I preached two Sundays ago and subsequently posted here in Ye Olde Blogge, I couldn't be happier that something this good could come out of Ottawa.

But once again I find myself in awe that the (so-called) pro-choice crowd has come out hard against this endeavour. The gist of their complaint is this: the centre (called the First Place Pregnancy Centre) exploits women and pressures them against having abortions.

A CBC column by a Heather Mallick (pictured) is particularly harsh in its criticism (see Hockey wives and abortion, CBC News on-line, Nov. 30, 2007). First she notes certain aspects of her worldview that give us some insight into why she said what she did:

1. I hate picking on women. We're born at a disadvantage and in our wild flailing to stay afloat, we make such easy targets.
   
2. It's bad enough that these women have hooked up with bruised artist-athletes with careers of inevitably brief span, sold by hockey corporations as if they were cans of Spam, shipped around the continent without notice, thus dooming their wives' careers from the start.
3. But must The Better Halves bully young pregnant women during their own brush with greatness?

One has to be careful in coming to firm conclusions on the basis of a few quotes. But one does pick up some of the 'woman as victim' mentality here as a screen against which other judgments are to be made.

Secondly, she doesn't seem to have a lot of respect for professional male athletes. Or perhaps she lacks respect for those women who decide to marry these athletes at the expense of pursuing their own careers. We have no idea whether the Better Halves have made such sacrifices or not, or whether the women saw it as a sacrifice. I doubt if Ms Mallick knows either. But she is using this as her working proposition.

Third, if an organization recommends one of the choices (seeing pregnancies through with plenty of support), without recommending the other choice (aborting), they are by definition bullies, as is anyone who supports such organizations. Presumably women (who in other instances can be trusted to make decisions of all sorts) become very easily fooled, or completely craven, when they cross the thresholds of crisis pregnancy centres.

Having now demolished, through sheer logic, any arguments that might be put forward by the Better Halves or their supporters (Hint: I'm kidding here--it's the complete lack of logic that stands out), she does us a favour by revealing the "insidious means" by which crisis pregnancy centres ply their odious trade:

There are thousands of these centres across North America. They're known in the business as CPCs, as they usually have names resembling Crisis Pregnancy Centre. They have cute websites designed to appeal to teenage girls, lots of advice about boys — giggle — and sites on MySpace. They take great care to look like kindly counselling centres. In fact, they exist solely to prevent abortion.

I took a look at a number of British Columbia CPC websites. There was nary a hint of the Spice Girls and nothing that would make a person giggle. I am not saying that such don't exist, but Ms Mallick's implication that this is the norm is clearly misleading. [Gosh, a pro-choice advocate that actually misleads!! Who'd uh thunk it.]

But presumably women who can be trusted to make responsible decisions on their own can see through such stuff, right? If a girl as young as 13 can be legally allowed to decide on her own, without any parental input, to get an abortion, surely one can assume that she wouldn't be fooled by a flagrant display of Spice Girl cleavage.

Friends, I'm not just trying to be sarcastic here (although Mallick's attempt at coherent thought does invite a raucous laugh or two). I'm trying to show the complete inconsistency of Mallick's remarks. She is clearly a fanatic who is well past rational reasoning.

Here's my take. First of all, I believe that a choice has to be a fully informed choice, whether it's where to go to school, which career to pursue, whether and whom to marry, family formation and so on. So I would be very careful not to run down organizations that make an effort to explain dimensions of the various choices. To attempt to dismiss organizations I don't agree with by making up things about them, or damning them by guilt through association, or by redefining their mission for them, reflects a desire to limit rather than to promote choice. Mallick is guilty of this in spades, if her Nov. 30/07 column is any indication.

Secondly, don't push the woman as victim line and then attack organizations that attempt to meet women's needs when they truly are victimized. A great number of pregnancies are real problems for women, very often problems not of their own making. Those of the Mallick persuasion seem to be suggesting that to offer such women every possible support other than the abortion quick fix suggests ulterior motives and really keeping women from the better choice.

Nonsense. Most women in North America choose to keep their babies. Apparently the pro-life option makes sense to them. Many who have abortions subsequently regret it and feel that they were victimized by others who pushed the abortion option at them. Thousands of women are grateful that someone is willing to help them through their crisis pregnancies. For Mallick to say that such organizations only exist to stop abortions is like saying that doctors only exist to spite the morticians.

I am happy to note that the Senators' management, and the Better Halves themselves, are undeterred by the criticism and are pushing ahead with their plans. I encourage any Ottawa-area readers to throw their support behind this great endeavour.

LATE BREAKING DEVELOPMENT

The following appeared on the CBC website shortly after I posted the article above (see: Ottawa charity declines Sens Foundation help amid anti-abortion flap, Nov. 30/07)

An Ottawa charity facing controversy over its anti-abortion philosophy says it does not want to hurt the positive image of the Ottawa Senators Foundation, and will therefore turn down funding raised at Ottawa Senators games.

First Place Pregnancy Centre said it recognizes "the incredible work and generosity" of the Sens Better Halves, the wives and girlfriends of the Ottawa Senators, who chose the centre as one of three charities they would support by selling raffle tickets at Senators home games between Nov. 29 and Dec. 22.

"However, we do not wish to interfere in even the most indirect way with the Foundation's positive image and valuable contribution to our community," said Terri Mazik, the centre's executive director, in a statement Thursday.

I greatly regret this decision personally. It hurts the image of the Ottawa Senators Foundation more when a perfectly legitimate charity caves in to bullying from an angry critic. The Senators should have insisted that the Centre take the money. No wonder so much of what passes for critique from (so-called) pro-choice advocates is effective. No one will tell the empress that she has no clothes (with apologies to Irene Mathyssen).