How Media Mistakes Fueled The High Court Abortion Ruling

[Hissyspit]

http://www.alternet.org/mediaculture/50788

How Media Mistakes Fueled the High Court Abortion Ruling

By Gloria Feldt, Women's Media Center. Posted April 21, 2007.

The federal abortion ban is the result of language bought and repeated endlessly by journalists who were sometimes uninformed and sometimes just too lazy to get it right.

(The) partial birth abortion ban is a political scam but (also) a public relations goldmine. ... The major benefit is the debate that surrounds it. -- Randall Terry

So said the founder of Operation Rescue, a militant anti-choice group that blockaded abortion providers, in 2003.

Wednesday's U.S. Supreme Court decision (Gonzales v. Carhart) upholding the federal abortion ban is the fruition of that pubic relations goldmine. It is a travesty of language bought and repeated endlessly by journalists who were sometimes uninformed and sometimes just too lazy to get it right.

Indeed, the travesty of language around abortion is so pervasive that even Justice Anthony Kennedy, writing the decision for the court's majority, in addition to using the inaccurate term "partial birth abortion," also referred to the "abortion doctor" repeatedly in the ruling. Why did he not simply refer to doctors as "doctors," or "ob/gyns"? If another surgical procedure were under scrutiny, would he have he referred to "tonsillectomy doctor" or "hysterectomy doctor"? Of course not. But those who want to take away entirely a woman's human right to make her own childbearing decisions have used the term "abortion doctor" for so long as an epithet that they have succeeded in getting even the highest court in the land to adopt their language.

Such bias is just the tip of the iceberg in the battle over what losing plaintiff Dr. Leroy Carhart has called "partial truth abortion." There is no such thing as partial birth abortion. The term will be found in no medical book. It was coined in 1995 by Douglas Johnson, legislative director for the National Right-to-Life Committee, and former Congressional representative and current Florida appeals court judge Charles Canady explicitly to confuse, horrify, and deceive -- to manipulate language with the intent of sensationalizing the abortion debate. In particular, they intended to take the focus away from the woman in order to place the greater value on the fetus. Leading medical associations all agreed it was a misleading term, but the media never checked their language and by 2001, 90% of articles were using the term without so much as a "so-called" attached. As I reported in my 2004 book The War on Choice, an AP managing editor admitted when challenged that "partial birth abortion" was emotionally loaded, but said they continued to use it because it was instantly recognizable. Another major daily newspaper editor admitted it wasn't correct but said it was easier to use than alternatives.

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[MadHound]

1. This wasn't a "mistake" This was deliberate.

The rabid RW started using this language, and the pushed it out into the RW echo chamber where it bounced around Rush, CNS, Worldnut, etc for awhile, and was gradually picked up and put into usage by the MSM. Though attempts to correct this were made, the MSM instead listened to the urgings of its corporate masters and kept the language. Thus we were innundated with this BS language, and as we all know, even small things like language choice make a big difference in people's minds.

And down we have a partial birth abortion ban in place, and frankly there are doctors out there, most of them, who have no clue as to what this ban really covers, since PBA isn't a specific medical term, and what it does say can cover a lot of ground.

[Hidden Stillness]

2. This is an Important Point

This is a very important statement, getting rid of the word "mistakes," and it explains, painfully, why this extremist group is able to win victories even when the overwhelming majority of people are against them and what they want. I started noticing during the 1980s, when they first started getting these very threatening ads on TV, that even "news"casters were starting to refer to "the unborn child" rather than the fetus, or to "a woman and her 'unborn baby' " rather than to a pregnant woman. It was NEVER, NEVER explained that women need late-term abortions exactly because they had no intention of getting an abortion at all, but something medically has gone wrong or has increased dangerously during the latest stages of the pregnancy, and now can't be continued. This group's poisoning of the language has made many people so cut off from actual meaning, that to them (even to the likes of Harry Reid, etc.) it seems like some gratuitous procedure for silly, selfish women--or I don't know what--rather than the life-saver that was not going to be used until it had to be, as a medical emergency to save her life. Yet again, male legislators have destroyed a procedure necessary for women, left them with this medical threat--then cut out! You are on your own, hated woman.

[wakemeupwhenitsover]

3. It's not just the MSM that repeats the 'partial birth abortion'

BS. I see it amongst progressives all the time. Just check out DU. How many times do you see that written? Even by members who oppose the ban.

I really wish that DUers would take the pledge to never repeat that line.

[omega minimo]

4. “But if thought corrupts language, language can also corrupt thought.”

“Political language. . . is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable, and to give an appearance of solidity to pure wind.”

--George Orwell




These were not "mistakes"-- it was misdirection and manipulation.

Last night the PBS pundits used "so called partial birth abortion" a few times, perhaps to distance themselves from their professional failings.

     

[Gabi Hayes]

5. this is how we've become a fascist nation. from Bernays to Goebbels to Deaver to Rove:

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=language+perversion+totalitarianism&btnG=Search

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Guardian Unlimited | Archive Search... of language and meaning and the massacre of millions under totalitarianism. ... to the perversion of language as a necessary part of the 'cause'. ...
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[omega minimo]

6. Great post

:kick: