More than 50,000 show support for Tebow pro-life Super Bowl ad

'When someone this prominent is willing to put himself out there with a positive message about Life, we need to defend him.'

WASHINGTON, D.C. (CNA) - Over 50,000 people have reportedly submitted comments to a website in support of college football star Tim Tebow's appearance in a pro-life Super Bowl ad.

The Susan B. Anthony List set up the site BlockHardForTebow.com to show support for the ad, in which Tebow and his mother Pam discuss how Pam refused to abort Tebow despite a life-threatening infection.

"When someone this prominent is willing to put himself out there with a positive message about Life, we need to defend him," the site says.

The website, launched Jan. 27, allows visitors to send personal comments of support to Tebow. It also hosts a short ESPN video about Tebow.

The ad, sponsored by Focus on the Family for broadcast on CBS, has drawn protest from the National Organization for Women (NOW) and other pro-abortion women's groups.

Susan B. Anthony List president Marjorie Dannenfelser claimed that NOW and its allies are "on the wrong side of American public opinion."

"The outcry of national support for Tim Tebow's pro-life leadership illustrates the strength of the growing American pro-life majority."

She claimed that the campaign against CBS, the Tebow family and Focus on the Family was "going nowhere fast." In Dannenfelser's view, it was being led by "old guard feminists" whose "desperate arguments" ring hollow.

"The 'pro-choice' label has worn out its usefulness - it is an empty platitude for the pain women feel when they've made the abortion choice. Arguments that abortion is somehow as liberating and self-sacrificing as Pam Tebow's decision to choose life in the face of great personal pain just don't stand the straight face test. Such callous attitudes grate on the conscience and defy experience."

The Susan B. Anthony List reports that the pro-abortion rights group EMILY's List has collected 16,000 signatures asking CBS to refuse to broadcast the ad.

A New York Times editorial criticized the protests against the ad as "puzzling and dismaying."

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