Recap: “Myths” presentation at the University of Portland
The pro-life organization at the University of Portland (UP), Voices For Life, invited me to give my presentation “Deconstructing Pro-Choice Myths” on March 25.
Preceding Events
I wasn’t involved with the events preceding the presentation, but to my understanding they went as follows.
In the weeks before the talk, Voices For Life created this poster to advertise:
They posted copies around campus and then some were defaced or torn down. In response, UP admin had discussed communicating with the campus that such behavior is against UP’s principles of free speech and respectful disagreement. However, that communication didn’t end up happening. Fr. John Donato did send an email the day before the talk, but he did not mention the torn down posters. He did invite the campus to attend the talk.
In a spirit of the club’s openness to fresh and other perspectives, the club has invited Monica Snyder, the executive director of Secular Pro-Life, whose background is in chemical biology and forensic science. She will speak about her pro-life advocacy entirely from the viewpoints of biology, secular philosophy and law. I personally invite you to attend.
Fr. John Donato
This email was controversial, I learned, in part because instead of having the student club which invited the speaker be responsible for promoting the event, now it was campus administration promoting the talk.
One student wrote an op-ed in the school’s student newspaper condemning the email, describing the “Myths” presentation as being filled with “factual extrapolations and non sequiturs.” Many students were angered at UP admin because UP, as a Catholic institution, already allows a pro-life student club and not a pro-choice one. Now it seemed admin was going further and promoting pro-life speakers more than other speakers for other organizations. Pro-choice students were angry not only because they view pro-life advocacy as harmful, but also because they view the campus administration as discriminating against their viewpoints while promoting their opposition.
I was unaware of most of this situation until the day of the presentation. I knew some posters had been defaced or torn down; that’s not unprecedented for our presentations. I didn’t know about campus admin communications regarding the event, campus policies or the controversies surrounding them, student op-eds or social media posts in opposition, or the general anger I was about to walk into.
So I arrived at the event space half an hour early and campus IT people helped me set up laptops and microphones. Some of the pro-life students were already here, some took seats nearer the front.
As start time drew near, many more students poured in, most of them clearly there to protest in some form. The majority wore shades of green, some had shirts with slogans like “If I wanted the government in my uterus, I’d f*** a senator,” and some had handmade signs with slogans such as “Abortion is healthcare,” “forced birth = violence,” and similar.
The room was a lecture hall with an occupancy of over 250. Soon every seat was taken and more students were sitting in the stairways and standing along the back. I learned later that due to potential fire hazard, they had to stop letting students in, lock the doors, and livestream the event in the hallway.
The Presentation
There were two moderators present, primarily to facilitate Q&A later. Before I began the presentation, one moderator made some brief comments about how the University values dialogue and respectful disagreement, and essentially explained students are welcome to protest as long as it doesn’t prevent me from giving the presentation (for example, silently holding signs is fine, yelling while I’m talking is not).
The protesters seemed prepared for that for the most part. When I first began introducing myself and the topic, one guy loudly burped a few times. I paused and asked him (through the mic) “Hey, can you stop burping?” Some people giggled but he stopped. Other than that the only disruptions during the talk were a few times the protesters burst into applause when I discussed facts they approve of, such as the fact that Oregon is one of 8 states which has no gestational limits on abortion, or the fact that the diminished abortion access due to state level bans has been partially mitigated by monumental efforts by abortion rights supporters.
[Read more – Did Dobbs make any difference? Guttmacher reports over 1M abortions in 2023]
But besides those few interruptions, I got through the hour-ish presentation without issue. Then the two moderators each took a wireless microphone, and took turns running the mics through the room for Q&A.
Q&A
We had originally planned on a 15-30 minute Q&A, but there were so many people who wanted to be heard that they asked if I could answer questions longer. I think in the end it was about 45 minutes of Q&A, perhaps slightly more.
Nearly all of the questions were from opposing students. There was a lot of cheering for one another’s questions, shouting comments or questions in between each other, jeering at some of my answers or shouting rebuttals or responses to them, and generally just a lot of anger.
However, at the same time, it seemed to me that the majority of the questions were sincere. They were not just posturing, but actually wanted me to respond. And in most cases (once waiting for applause or other minor outbursts to calm), I was able answer and be heard. There were some cases where I would have liked to elaborate further, but the moderators kept Q&A moving pretty steadily, which overall is probably for the best since so many people were waiting to ask questions.
One of my main regrets of the evening was that I didn’t get a recording of Q&A. At the time we thought not recording would make students feel more comfortable asking questions, but in retrospect it would have made little difference because various students were recording on their phones anyway. In any case, I don’t have recordings to transcribe exact exchanges, so the following are my paraphrases from memory.
Questions about data and sources
Many questions centered on my data and sources. The student op-ed published prior to my talk characterized it as misleading, and the protesting students were skeptical of my sources or of my interpretation of those sources. Many of their questions made as much clear. Some examples:
1. Correlation vs causation
In my presentation I highlighted research showing an association between abortion restrictions and increased use of contraception, including highly effective contraception. One student pointed out that correlation isn’t causation (followed by applause) and asked me to comment on that. I responded with a few points:
- Some of the studies I referenced demonstrated more than correlations (e.g. surveys of people citing the overturning of Roe v. Wade as the reason they were more likely to ask partners to use condoms or to have non-penetrative sex to prevent pregnancy).
- While I didn’t include it in my presentation, there actually was a study that found a causal (not correlative) link between abortion legalization and the spread of STDs (gonorrhea and syphilis).
- Correlations aren’t causations, but in addition to the correlative data being supplemented by other kinds of evidence, I don’t know of any proposed third variable that would explain the persistent relationship between more abortion restrictions and more cautious sexual behavior.
It’s true that correlation isn’t causation, and that we should be cautious when examining correlations. But that maxim isn’t a suggestion that we ignore correlations entirely. Correlations are still a type of evidence, to be considered in context.
2. Reading beyond the headlines
In my presentation, I referenced Scott Gilbert’s article in which he claims embryologists have no consensus on when an individual human life begins. Later in the presentation, I made a comment about how it’s important to read beyond just headlines and get into the details.
So one of the questions was from a man who said he looked up the same Scott Gilbert article just now, and believed I was misrepresenting Gilbert. As I understood the student, he was arguing Gilbert was intending to make claims about not only biology, but also philosophy. The student went on to ask me if I could comment on these other elements of Gilbert’s article particularly since, student emphasized, I’m telling people to read beyond just headlines. The protesters burst into laughter and applause.
I responded that I was glad this student looked up one of my sources. I’d like everyone to check the sources. And I explained no, Gilbert was not talking about philosophy in this article. He didn’t claim there was no consensus among philosophers about when personhood begins; he claimed there was no consensus among embryologists about when individual human lives begin.
Gilbert further claimed that embryologists are divided into five groups regarding when they believe human life starts. He cites many embryologists who say life starts at fertilization (my contention). He claims another marker is gastrulation, but cites no one saying life begins at gastrulation, instead citing only one person claiming only that gastrulation is “the most important time in your life.” He suggests a couple other time points but in particular has the audacity to claim that some embryologists believe life doesn’t begin until birth. I asked the student “You read the article. Who does Gilbert quote saying life doesn’t begin until birth?” The student responded he hadn’t gotten that far. I said “He quotes no one. He cites nothing. He claims embryologists are very divided on this issue, but can only cite embryologists saying life begins at fertilization.”
(I elaborated on all of this because, of course, I didn’t read only Gilbert’s headline. I read his article. In fact I’ve written an article about his article: Pro-choice embryologist contradicts his own biology textbook.)
3. Limited data
The second myth in my presentation is the idea that most or all later abortions are medical emergencies. To dispel this myth, I quote women discussing the later abortions they received for non-medical reasons and abortion providers explaining they will perform such abortions even when there’s no major health concern. I reference research outlining non-medical reasons women seek abortion after 20 weeks and even into the third trimester, including lack of resources to abort earlier, difficulty deciding whether they wanted to abort, or simply not realizing they were pregnant until much later in pregnancy.
All of this is enough to establish that not all later abortions are for medical reasons, but to establish whether most abortions are for medical reasons, we need quantifiable data. And quantifiable data on this subject is scarce. I talk in the presentation about how abortions 21 weeks and later constitute only 1-2% of all abortions nationwide, and they are highly stigmatized, even more than abortion generally. So there isn’t a lot of information on this particular subset.
However Arizona does collect fairly detailed public health statistics. And so I go over these statistics which show that from 2012-2020, only about 21% of abortions at 21 weeks or later were for any cited maternal or fetal health reason.
[Read more – Making Sense of Arizona’s Late-Term Abortion Statistics]
So a student asked how I could use the word “myth” when I am operating off of what I myself have called limited data to dispel the myth. I responded that it’s true we don’t have as robust data as we’d like to explore these questions. That hasn’t stopped major cultural voices repeatedly claiming later abortions are always or almost always for medical emergencies. All the data we can find (most notably abortion provider testimonies and the quantifiable data from Arizona) point in the opposite direction.
It would be one thing if there was limited data and it pointed to contradictory conclusions. But for years now, I’ve been asking those claiming that later abortions are usually for medical indication for any sources to suggest this is true. So far not once has anyone provided any evidence at all. So if, on balance, we have zero evidence that a pervasive and popular claim is true, and limited evidence the claim is false, I feel comfortable calling the claim a myth.
I also said it’s good for students to think critically about these claims, but to try to make sure they aren’t applying those critical thinking skills only to the claims they don’t like.
4. Research funding
Most of the questions were from students, but nearer the end of the Q&A, an older woman who explained she is faculty at UP said she had both a question and a reflection. The reflection had to do with commentary about internalized misogyny and white hegemony and similar ideas, but the question was something along the lines of “You’ve cited all of these sources, but who is funding this research?” When she asked this, the students applauded and cheered I think more emphatically than at any other point during the evening.
As an aside, my impression is that their support for her question was not just about the question itself, but about their relief or gratitude to have a faculty member there in solidarity with them. Based on the events and campus policies preceding the talk, I think these protesters have felt muted, and the faculty member gave them a feeling of relevance and legitimacy.
That said, the question was bizarre to me, because I took the faculty member to be implying that the research I’m citing to support my claims may be illegitimate or biased if it’s funded by organizations with anti-abortion agendas. That implication makes little sense, because, as I mention multiple times throughout the presentation, much of the research I cite is conducted by abortion rights supporters. For example, sources on why women get later abortions, or sources showing increased birth rates after abortion bans are from researchers who overtly support abortion rights. Other sources are abortion-neutral, such as Gallup polls and embryology textbooks.
In fact, of the 82 sources* I reference in the presentation, I believe only 2 come from pro-life people or organizations: my own op-ed about my undercover abortion clinic visit, and the dissertation by Dr. Steve Jacobs about biologists’ consensus on when human life begins.
In my actual answer to the faculty member, I said much of the research I cite is conducted by abortion rights supporters, and I’m not sure who funds them. The crowd seemed to take this as some kind of admission, but of what I’m not sure.
*In this link I also reference relevant SPL blog posts, but I don’t mention those in the actual presentation.
Questions about my perspective as a pro-lifer
In addition to questions about the presentation itself, there were quite a few questions about my perspective (or SPL’s positions) related to abortion. There’s no way I could remember them all now, but here are ones that stuck with me.
5. Are abortions for mental health “life-saving”?
This was, I think, my weakest moments in the back and forth. It went as follows (paraphrased):
Student: Do you think abortion is healthcare?
Me: I think life-saving abortion is healthcare.*
Student: Do you think mental health counts as a life-saving situation?
(I know I’m misremembering elements because I believe somewhere in this question is when the student said pregnancy was her greatest fear and if she couldn’t get an abortion she would be suicidal. But I can’t recall where specifically that fit into the conversation.)
In any case, what I had wanted to say was “No, because abortion doesn’t treat any mental health condition.”
What I was actually able to say was “No-” and then the room responded with outrage. And then it was a bit of time before I got to finish my point, because the moderators were trying to move on to the next question. I had to interrupt them 2-3 times to say “I’d like to finish my previous answer” before I was able to. I did eventually get to say “abortion doesn’t treat any mental health condition.” But the gap between “no” and the rest of the sentence felt long, and we didn’t get to discuss it much further than that.
*For our pro-life readers: I recognize that many pro-lifers think “life-saving abortion” is an oxymoron, because they define “abortion” (and believe anyone honest would define “abortion”) as a procedure or medication with the intent to end the life of an embryo or fetus, whereas they define life-saving procedures as having the intent of saving a woman’s life, and the death of the embryo or fetus is foreseeable but not intended. I believe, however, that this explanation of abortion seems at best confusing and at worst ad hoc and duplicitous to the general public. I’ve mentioned this before. So when I’m talking to abortion advocates and/or moderate pro-choice people, rather than try to draw out how pro-lifers define abortion, I try to engage with the word in the way I believe they already understand it, which is (generally) procedures and medications that end the pregnancy early. That’s why I used such phrasing here.
6. Why aren’t the non-medical reasons for later abortion good enough?
The second myth of my presentation is the idea that all or most later abortions are for medical emergencies, and I spend some time elaborating on the non-medical reasons women seek abortion at or after 21 weeks. Research suggests reasons include lack of resources to abort earlier, difficulty deciding whether they wanted to abort, or simply not realizing they were pregnant until much later in pregnancy. So, paraphrasing again:
Student: You talked a lot about the non-medical reasons for later abortion. Why shouldn’t those reasons be sufficient in themselves? Why should it have to be a medical emergency to get a later abortion?
Me: So the later abortion procedure, especially after viability, is labor and delivery. The difference between labor and delivery and transfer to a NICU versus “abortion” is whether they induce fetal demise first: inject feticide into the fetal heart or amniotic fluid, or possibly transect the umbilical cord and wait for the fetus to bleed out. Usually it’s the feticide though. This isn’t about bodily rights. Your body endures labor and delivery either way. Abortion at this late stage isn’t about bodily rights; it’s about the difference between delivering a live child and a dead child. Abortion later in pregnancy for non-medical reasons is about not wanting to give birth to a live child, and everyone, including all pro-choice people, should oppose this.
As far as I can tell, my response angered the students. But I was glad to have the opportunity to be more explicit about this issue. I suspect the vast majority of Americans, and the majority of students in that room, had not thought about what post-viability abortion procedures actually entail.
7. Why do you value zygotes over grown women?
There were several questions of the form “Why do you think [something I don’t think at all]?” In retrospect I wonder what would have happened if I had asked the protesters to choose a spokesperson, and then the spokesperson and I could take turns articulating what we think the other side’s view is and seeing if we get it close. The situation was probably too pressured for that to work, but it would have been interesting to see what conversations transpired if I could have switched them from antagonistic to trying to understand each other.
But we didn’t try that. Instead students asked what, to me, seemed like very loaded question but, to them, probably sounded neutral.
One such exchange (again, paraphrasing from memory):
Student: Why do you value zygotes more than full grown women?
Me: Your question embeds a premise I don’t agree with.
Student: But you do value zygotes more than full grown women.
Me: I don’t.
Student: But you’re pro-life.
Me: Yes. But you’re describing my view from your perspective, not mine. I don’t see this as asking for special rights for fetuses. I see this as a universal right. I think every single person in this room, and everyone you have ever met, all of us, should have had the right to not be killed when we were in that necessary and vulnerable life stage. So the pregnant person should have had the right to not be killed when she was a fetus, and fetuses today should have that same right, and if they grow up and later become pregnant, the fetuses they’re pregnant with should have the right to not be killed. All of us in that life stage should have that right, because we’re all valuable human beings.
To my delight, this answer inspired the minority of pro-life students to applaud. I appreciate the encouragement, but I also like seeing them take steps to push back a little.
8. You’re actually pro-choice.
My brother lives not far outside Portland, so I had stayed with him for the trip and he had driven me to the presentation. He was in the auditorium the whole time, and after it was all over we reviewed the ups and downs of the night. He told me the following was his favorite exchange.
A student had asked about abortion in cases of rape, and in the course of my response I explained that Secular Pro-Life doesn’t take a stance on the rape exception. This drew more indignation from the crowd but not so much that I couldn’t continue. I explained that while the voices with the biggest platforms on the pro-life side pretty uniformly oppose a rape exception, if you look at polls of people who call themselves “pro-life” generally, there’s a greater variety of perspectives. Again, paraphrasing:
Me: Our leadership and followers are divided on this issue, and generally speaking Secular Pro-Life is trying to build coalitions of people interested in working together to fight elective abortion, even as we may differ on how we view the situations of rape or fatal anomaly or-
Another student: That’s pro-CHOICE.
Other student(s)?: That’s what pro-choice is!
Me: You think I’m pro-choice?
Students: Yeah!
Me: So you think we’re on the same side then?
Students: NOOOOOOOO!
I raised my eyebrows and shrugged.
There were a great many more questions and exchanges than the above. After about 45 minutes of Q&A we wrapped up the official event, but I stayed longer still to speak to students who came to talk more one on one.
Some of these students were pro-choicers with questions they hadn’t had a chance to ask. (Variously they asked about mitigating harmful effects of abortion bans, whether SPL works to help born children too, why we oppose early first trimester abortions, whether a vanishing twin would be considered murder, and what we think of Plan B). Uniformly the dialogues were calm and reasonable, a stark contrast from the situation with the larger crowd of protesters.
Most of these last lingering students, though, were pro-lifers. They shook my hand and thanked me for coming, which meant a lot to me. Flatteringly and a little embarrassingly, two asked me to autograph the SPL brochures they had picked up. Some asked to take selfies.
It was not a bad way to end the evening.
Following Events
Student newspaper and Wellness Center responses
The next day, the student newspaper (The Beacon) published Anti-abortion speaker draws protests. The authors listed the three myths I was deconstructing and quoted me explaining “This presentation is meant to be just about things you can actually verify regardless of how you view the ethics of bodily rights, fetal personhood, access to health care, all of those things.” The article also linked to my sources page, which is fantastic. The rest of the article primarily quoted pro-choice students’ thoughts on the presentation or on the campus administration’s handling of the event and other policies.
Then, nearer the end, the article references the response of their university’s Wellness Center to my talk, as explained in their Instagram post:
I understand that many people view anti-abortion advocacy as harmful and immoral. They see us as stripping human rights away from pregnant people and putting them in danger. They have very strong opinions/feelings about this.
But they treat this topic as if it is only pro-choice people who have strong ethical objections or experience serious negative impacts of the abortion debate and varying abortion laws. This is at best a shallow understanding of the issue, and at worst unbelievably entitled. This is the basis for “Don’t like abortion? Don’t get one” or op-eds centered on the “It’s okay for you to personally be pro-life, but…” mentality. It entirely misunderstands or never even considers what people who oppose abortion actually think, or have actually experienced.
People who oppose abortion see pro-abortion advocacy as harmful and immoral. We see it as lethal dehumanization of vulnerable children (negatively impacting plenty of other groups in the process), and we have very strong opinions/feelings about this as well.
The personal philosophies, metaphysical suppositions, deeply held ethical views, and lived experiences of pro-choice people are no more worthy and deserve no more centering than those of pro-life people, or of anyone in between. But I doubt you will find a parallel example of a university Wellness Center reaching out with reassurance and comfort after major campus speaking events promoting abortion happen “in opposition to some of the experiences and beliefs” of pro-life students. If I’m wrong about that, someone let us know.
If this institutionalized assuaging must exist, it should exist in a viewpoint-neutral way, sure. But to be frank, I’d be similarly unimpressed if a university offered such reassurance toward pro-life students. I don’t want pro-life people to be so coddled. I want us to expect opposition, and be prepared intellectually and emotionally to engage it. Lean in, speak out, stand up. This is how we push for change.
[Read more – 3 reasons you should let people know you’re pro-life]
Which brings me to the best part of my UP experience.
Student messages to SPL
(All the screencaps below are reprinted with permission.)
A couple hours after the presentation was over, our SPL Instagram account received this message:
Even later that night, another pro-choice student messaged our Instagram:
We had yet another such message the next morning with similar sentiments, though he asked not to have his reprinted.
Remember the most vitriolic voices don’t represent everyone. Useful conversations happen all the time.
We also heard from some pro-life students through private message. One of my favorites was a student who invited her pro-choice friends (it is good and important to have friends who disagree with you) to the talk.
This student went on to explain her pro-choice friend was interested when I argued every one of us should have had the right to not be killed when we were fetuses, and was uncomfortable with the idea of later abortion. She took interest in the fact that abortion restrictions impact population level sexual behavior. And she disliked the accusations and yelling during Q&A. Specifically, she said “that when facts were laid out she was confused why people were still disagreeing.”
I’m proud of this pro-life student for having friends who disagree, having the kinds of friendships where they can talk about it, and having the foresight to invite her friend to my presentation. Very cool.
But here is my favorite message, which I got the next morning:
A pro-life student sat through protesters variously arguing, yelling, laughing, and generally being furious with me for 1-2 hours, and when it was all done, she decided to formally join the pro-life student club. That is a fantastic point of entry. I love these stories.
Takeaways
Remember the silent listeners.
It’s understandable for all of our focus to go toward the loudest, most vitriolic people, but it’s also a mistake. I believe there were broadly four types of people in the audience that night:
- Pro-life students
- Pro-choice students there to angrily protest
- Pro-choice students there to engage in useful dialogue
- People undecided about their views of abortion
Yes, the second group was frequently disruptive and flippant. For example, near the end of Q&A a student asked how long it had taken me to create my presentation. I said, truthfully, that I update the presentation each time I give it, which doesn’t take too long, but the original from-scratch version took about 50-60 hours to research and put together. The crowd laughed—and that’s useful to me. Because this kind of incivility may bolster the courage of the angry protesters, but it pushes the other three groups away from that tribe.
This is one of the reasons it’s important to remain civil (not obsequious, but calm and sincere) particularly in larger public interactions: our target audience is rarely the person we’re engaging directly, and often the people watching or listening to the exchange. And our demeanor significantly affects how well the silent listeners hear us.
[Read more – Quick tips for making online debates worthwhile]
Stay focused.
The “Myths” presentation is approximately an hour long, and I’ve given it enough times that I can do much of it kind of on autopilot. So as I was presenting I had some time to contemplate the Q&A I knew was coming. My first thought was how much this was probably going to suck.
But my second thought was that there’s really little downside, and some major potential upside, to this situation. Sure, a lot of people are enraged, and a lot of them aren’t going to listen to anything I say. But there are hundreds of people in this room. Some of them are going to catch some of my points. The reasonable pro-choice or undecided students will have information they likely haven’t heard before. The pro-life students will see me stand and defend a pro-life viewpoint.
And as far as those who had made up their minds before they ever spoke to me: what can they do? Be loudly angry and sometimes trollish. I’ll live. I’ve been arguing about abortion for so long now, at this point it’s almost impossible these students could say anything worse than things that have already been said to me. And I don’t care.
Advocating for the unborn is not at all convenient. It involves receiving a lot of ignorance and mockery and, more importantly, witnessing many heartbreaking defeats as the slaughter continues. We advocate anyway, because we can’t unknow, and these children deserve a voice. I can’t make people agree with our perspective, but I won’t fail to at least make a case.
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