I am writing this letter in regards to the antiabortion demonstration at Five Corners today (April 29th) around lunch time. This protest featured several images of aborted fetuses (and similar) in an extremely gory and, I felt, unnecessary display. I am not going to bother touching the hot topic behind the images, but I really must say that these photos were done in extremely bad taste. The images presented were exceedingly disturbing and upsetting, and I feel that it could have been handled much better.
Think about it this way: If an image would cause a movie to be rated R, what makes it okay to display in public in such a way? I understand the shock value. I understand that you need to pull people out of their complacence and make them seriously think about the issue. However pictures the size of a person displaying a dead child is not something I find even remotely appropriate to use.
I am not the kind of person to avoid an issue because it is messy or controversial. I deliberately seek out causes I believe in, and do not shelter myself from the sad or scary images that accurately display these causes. However, the images displayed hurt me very deeply and I spent several minutes of my lunch hour in tears before I returned to work and warned all of my co-workers to avoid that corner.
Can you imagine if I was someone that had lost a child? Or someone with young kids in the car? Or a doctor or nurse that faces life and death every single day? How can you hold those images up knowing what kind of effect they would have on these people?
Finally, I feel that the displays you used are very destructive to your own point. You say these children were murdered? That they were lives to be cherished and loved? So what gives you the right to display their mangled bodies in such a thoughtless and insensitive way?
I understand that you feel the need to effect change in the world, but your demonstration did not promote positive debate in my household, only tears and disappointment that you couldn’t treat this with more delicacy. Please have a little more respect next time, and maybe think outside the box to find a way that gets people into a positive discussion of values instead.
Margaret Johnston
