AFLC’s good friend, client, and champion of the pro-life cause, Gregg Cunningham, the executive director of the Center for Bio-Ethical Reform, Inc., wrote an insightful email response to a woman who asked him about the Emily Letts “abortion video” that has gone viral on YouTube. As you may have heard, Ms. Letts claimed to have videotaped her own abortion to apparently show how “cool” it was. Here is Gregg’s response, which is a must read:
You recently asked what I think of the Emily Letts “abortion” video phenomenon. The fact that you saw it in Amsterdam offers evidence of its market penetration. But it is a fake at multiple levels:
May 5, 2014, The Daily Caller published a story headlined “Woman films her own abortion to show the world how ‘cool’ it is.” The article, relying in part on an earlier feature in Cosmopolitan magazine, begins “Emily Letts, a counselor at a New Jersey abortion clinic, decided to film her own abortion and post it on YouTube as a form of positive inspiration to women who are contemplating having the procedure but worry that they might feel guilty afterward.” The Daily Caller is usually a valuable source of news and commentary, but the principal contentions contained in this story are factually incorrect. Ms. Letts didn’t “film her own abortion.” She filmed only her own face during her abortion. The camera never reveals what is going on below her waist. The clinic director would have never permitted her to actually film her abortionist butchering her baby. When we posted video showing viewers how savagely the Northland Family Planning Center, a chain of Michigan abortion clinics, slaughters the unborn children they “terminate,” their director sued us (unsuccessfully) in federal court. [Editor’s note: AFLC successfully defended CBR in this lawsuit]
The complaint she filed, now a matter of public record, admitted that our abortion video, which actually discloses what goes on below a pregnant mother’s waist, had injured their reputation (a reputation the public now knows is built on a foundation of lies) and damaged their business (a business the public now knows is built on acts of violence which kills real babies). We are now preparing a similar parody exposé video with which to counterattack Ms. Letts’ video. Pray that she and her abortion clinic, the Cherry Hill Women’s Center, sue us so we can also get them into court, soundly defeat them, and in the process, draw attention to their depravity.
Next we read that “Letts has no . . . guilt. She recalls the procedure with fondness.” Fogginess might be more accurate than “fondness.” Her voice and affect seem groggy in a way which also suggests she might have been sedated. Laying aside the more fundamental question of whether she has a functioning conscience, the primary reason she feels no guilt may simply be that she chose to look away from her baby’s execution, which “She even describes it as ‘birth-like.’” She adds that “it made her feel good, just like giving birth would.” Letts writes (in Cosmopolitan) that “‘having an abortion and giving birth produce similarly happy feelings.’” As one conservative wag pointed out, Ms. Letts has never given birth, so how would she know what it’s like? This sort of post-modern, moral equivalence is particularly pathetic. Notice that she is talking about abortion’s effect on her emotional wellbeing, not its effect on her baby’s existential being. Birth sustains life. Abortion ends life. Delivering a baby is wonderfully maternal. Killing a baby is horribly homicidal. But in Ms. Lett’s dark world, feeling good is what matters most, even if at the expense of her defenseless child.
The British DailyMail.co.UK posted a related May 6, 2014 story headlined “’I wanted to show it wasn’t scary’: Outrage as US woman posts video of her abortion as it happened on YouTube.” But she didn’t show “it” wasn’t scary because she covered “it” up – even from herself. Ms. Letts is quoted as saying “I knew that what I was going to do was right – it was right for me and for no one else.” This is quintessential moral relativism. Nothing is right. Nothing is wrong. All morality is subjective because all morality is personal. She says “I don’t feel like a bad person,” because she rejects the concept of universally applicable, moral absolutes which would qualify anyone else to judge her behavior. “I feel in awe of the fact that I can make a baby.” And “cool” with the fact that she can kill it. “‘I can make a life, [and take a life] I just want to tell my story,’ she concludes.” Ms. Letts is nothing if not a story-teller.
The Daily Mail story describes her as “a former professional actress.” Twenty-four seems somewhat young to quit any career, until one considers that the film industry website IMDB.com says her most recent cinematic achievement was a 2013, a straight-to-DVD, indie horror flick, titled “Hallows’ Eve,” which garnered a disappointing 3.3 approval rating on a scale of 1-10 among 300 viewers. Ms. Letts is listed as an obscure twenty-fifth in the credits’ order in this obscure bomb, two positions above an unnamed “Teen On Wagon.” That is down in the region of extras. LiveActionNews.org posted a related story headlined, “Did Emily Letts fake her abortion video?” Hollywood may not have thought much about her acting ability but the LiveAction story notes that “the Abortion Care Network held an ‘abortion stigma busting competition’, which had a cash prize for the winners. And yes, her video won.” The competition must have been pretty thin, but then again, Ms. Letts does have experience with the horror genre. She acts happy and denies she is sad, but her performance isn’t particularly convincing — at any level. It has, however, gone viral, garnering 1,619,228 views at press time. That is a wildly larger audience than ever saw her in a handful of failed, low budget films.
The LiveAction article also points out inconsistencies in her story, such as the claim to have been “two to three weeks pregnant.” Abortionists won’t perform the suction-aspiration procedure she claims to have had until six weeks. Even computing based on menstrual weeks, that would have made her only five weeks “pregnant.”
The Daily Caller observes that “Despite aborting her child, she kept the sonogram.” Don’t miss the fact, however, that if this entire production isn’t a fraud, this was merely Ms. Letts’ pregnancy confirmation sonogram, not the sonogram the abortionist uses to perform the termination under ultrasound guidance. This latter scan, depicting her baby being torn limb-from-limb, would have been much harder to flippantly shrug off.
This poor soul is the very definition of self-delusional. “Letts, whose job involves encouraging women to have abortions, sees her own abortion as an entirely positive experience, and hopes the video will prove to be both instructional and morally persuasive. She feels better about herself every time she watches the video, according to Cosmopolitan.” Perhaps this heightened self-esteem derives from an expectation that her fifteen minutes of fame helped revive a flagging acting career? “After the abortion is over, she says, ‘Cool. I feel good.’” At last, Emily Letts is a star – even though the downvotes are running 3-1 against her on YouTube.
The Daily Caller ends by quoting [the far left blog] ThinkProgress, which “hailed Letts for filming her abortion and putting a positive spin on it. ‘For instance, Letts’ story helps demonstrate the fact that abortion isn’t a barbaric procedure that needs additional regulation in order to make it safer,’ wrote ThinkProgress.” What it actually demonstrates is that no one in the abortion industry is willing to reveal just how barbaric abortion really is – but neither are many in the Christian church.
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David Yerushalmi, Gregg Cunningham, and Robert Muise in California Federal Court
Here is Gregg’s response to our request to post his email:
CBR’s purpose is to expose what the abortion industry is hiding. The culture reflexively attempts to disrupt that exposé. That is why AFLC’s litigation support is so vital to everything we do. Without AFLC, we couldn’t have revealed the lies of Northland Family Planning’s baby butchers. Nor could we shine light on the lies of the killers at Cherry Hill Women’s Center. CBR is taken seriously because AFLC is both effective and supportive.