Oklahoma's Ultrasound Law: Is Medical Information Unwanted Speech When Abortion is Involved?

Opponents of a new law in Oklahoma say that requiring Doctors to convey ultrasound information to patients is "compelling doctors to deliver unwanted speech."They maintain that such medical information is "unwanted," offensive and disturbing to such doctors. These are the same terms often used to describe hate speech. Sonja Corbitt reports on the efforts of the people of Oklahoma to protect life and the opposing efforts of those who promote abortion on demand to thwart their will through misusing the Courts. 

NASHVILLE, TN (Catholic Online) - Should pro-abortion advocates be allowed to claim the Right to Privacy to prevent women from hearing or seeing scientific evidence for life? A new state law in Oklahoma requires an ultrasound and subsequent analysis before any abortion procedure.

Stephanie Toti, attorney for the Center for Reproductive Rights (CRR), filed a challenge to the new law on their behalf, stating, "It is extremely disappointing that the Oklahoma legislature insists on passing a law that is so clearly unconstitutional and so detrimental to women in the state." Detrimental to women? Certainly not to the woman considering an abortion. It provides a window into the womb and vital information to enable her to consider her options.  

In reality, it is being called "unconstitutional" by opponents of the Right to Life such as Ms. Toti, because the intent of the law is to lessen the numbers of abortions, a procedure currently legal under the positive law. Toti's argument illustrates, however, what pro-life advocates have always said: that pro-abortion activists do not want to lessen the number of abortions, which is what the new Oklahoma law is already doing. They actually want unrestrained access to the always lethal procedure, backed up by the Police Power of the State.

Fully Informed

Standard medical practice and ethics includes fully informing a patient about any procedure he or she is considering. Under what other circumstance would it be acceptable to undergo a medical procedure without the doctor's obligation to fully describe the procedure and the possible outcomes of that procedure to the patient?

The new Oklahoma legislation prohibits abortion until women view an ultrasound and are informed of its analysis. Under what other medical circumstance is more information "detrimental" to a patient, as Toti claims?  How can more and better information endanger a patient, especially when the procedure in question terminates a living human being and often causes devastating physical and emotional effects on women decades after having it?

The Oklahoma legislature passed the law according to democratic procedure, the governor vetoed it, the legislature overwhelmingly overrode the veto. However, the Center for Reproductive Rights filed a lawsuit against it, presumably hoping activist judges will overturn the will of the people in Oklahoma.

Actually, that is exactly what happened. Oklahoma state court Judge Noma Gurich indicated Monday that she will enter a restraining order to block the new law.

Such a legal challenge to this law and others like it simply illustrates that pro-abortion activism is an "abortion first mentality," not simply what it purports to be, "pro-choice". Putting aside for a moment that some choices, such as killing the innocent, are always wrong, the use of the word "choice" is a ruse. One cannot call himself/herself pro-choice and believe in hiding important information relevant to that choice.
 
Abortion activism is in the business of withholding information from those who procure abortions, because they know such information will reduce the likelihood that they will be able to sell an abortion or further profit from the fetal tissues that are harvested from the lethal act.

Hiding the Truth

Any notion that abortion clinics routinely give women and young girls accurate, detailed information about their pregnancies must be disabused. Big business, abortion clinics do not "want to give the woman information that could give her a connection with her baby," according to Abby Johnson, former Bryan, TX Planned Parenthood clinic director.

Johnson left her position as director of Planned Parenthood in Texas after watching a 13-week old baby aborted on ultrasound in her clinic, saying, "Planned Parenthood really tries to instill in their employees and the women that are coming in for abortions that this is not a baby. They don't want to talk about when your baby has a heartbeat."

In December, undercover footage surfaced from a Wisconsin Planned Parenthood abortion clinic proving Johnson's confession. The footage shows clinic staff and the abortion doctor lying to two young women about fetal development. The doctor pressures the patient, telling her that abortion is safer than having the baby because "women die having babies."

In one undercover video, women ask a Planned Parenthood counselor if the pregnant woman's 10-week-old unborn child has a heartbeat. Instead, the counselor uses the words "heart tones," and answers, "'Heart beat' is when the fetus is active in the uterus-can survive-which is about seventeen or eighteen weeks." The counselor says although embryologists agree that fetal heartbeat first occurs around 3 weeks gestation.

Wisconsin's Informed Consent law requires that women receive medically accurate information before undergoing an abortion. And now, so does Oklahoma's, in ultrasound clarity, accuracy and detail.

The new law mandates that doctors "describe the dimensions of the fetus, whether arms, legs, and internal organs are visible and whether the physician can detect cardiac activity." State lawmakers were said to legally require abortion providers to describe the ultrasound's images because of "unusual failure" on the part of abortion doctors to pass along ultrasound information to pregnant women.

Toti, attorney for CRR in the case against the new law, says that requiring them to convey ultrasound information to their patients is "compelling doctors to deliver unwanted speech." Such medical information is "unwanted," offensive and disturbing to such doctors. These are the same terms often used to describe hate speech.

She also said, "Politicians have no business making medical decisions." Except and unless a multi-trillion dollar national health care plan is in the balance, one that forces pro-life tax-payers to pay for abortions.

As Oklahoma becomes the abortion battleground, a bright spot emerges through the new law. Many women who go to abortion clinics apparently do not want to kill their babies, and simply wait to be properly informed that the tiny one inside them is a miniature person. CRR officials say the Oklahoma law has drawn emotional responses from patients, sending some women from the ultrasound room in tears after what they saw and heard.

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Sonja Corbitt is a Catholic speaker, Scripture teacher and study author, and a contributing writer for Catholic Online. She is available to speak on the New Feminism, current events and your preferred theme. Visit her at www.pursuingthesummit.com for information and sample videos, or www.pursuingthesummit.blogspot.com.

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