The Primary Pro-Life Strategy - Know Your Opponent

Knowing how your opponent will probably respond to your message is key to understanding how to tailor it. Andrew Breitbart's strategy was brilliant concerning how and when to release the videos of the ACORN corruption, and ACORN and the liberal media responded exactly as he knew they would. If he would have released them all at once, the story would have garnered little traction. He spread out the release over a couple of weeks and let the momentum build against ACORN. Except for Fox News and conservative talk radio, the media looked like fools for not even covering it.

Along with this successful strategy, the fact that the masses could actually see videos of the corruption at ACORN was an invaluable tool. If there weren't any videos the whole project would have undoubtedly failed. It would have been ACORN's word against the two posing as a pimp and prostitute, and even FOX or talk radio wouldn't have given it as much attention.

How can this example be transferred to a strategy for the pro-life movement?
First, pro-lifers need to know how their opponent will probably respond to the pro-life message. They have to be able to answer the arguments that others give for abortion. For instance, if they use the "it's my body" or "what if a woman was raped" arguments, then how does one respond? If the pro-abortion crowd doesn't feel they are winning the argument, they often attack the pro-lifer personally or their method of delivering the message. Also, they try to get the pro-lifer to veer off on some tangent so as to distract from the pro-life message. We must be prepared in advance for those tactics to be used against us and respond accordingly.



If one just reads words on a paper that abortion is the killing of an unborn baby, the effect is minimal as compared to seeing what is really being destroyed. The organization Justice For All displays large panels of aborted baby pictures on college campuses which results in a tremendous impact on those who view them. There often are negative reactions from students, but the photographs force them to think about the issue.

The most successful tool in stopping abortions is the use of ultrasounds. The visual impact of seeing one's own child before birth has once again forced those involved to answer the question, "What is being killed in an abortion?" The consensus is that 60-80% of all women who were strongly considering abortion decided to keep the baby after seeing the ultrasound. The group Option Ultrasound states that at least 63,000 babies have been saved because of the ultrasound machines that it helped provide around the country.

The liberal mainstream media of course will not even touch the issue unless it's to portray pro-lifers as right-wing nuts. I believe they will never report the abortion issue fairly and will never display what has been killed in the womb. The way to circumvent them is to use the strategy that Breitbart did with the ACORN scandal, and that is to bypass the liberal media altogether. I don't think Fox is at the point yet where they will show aborted babies, so these images must be spread online or by outdoor displays. But Fox News did show Lila Rose's undercover investigation videos of Planned Parenthood and had many subsequent stories.
This method of getting the pro-life message across must be a sustained effort because it is a battle that has to be fought and ultimately won. But the strategy to combat abortion must be one that identifies the opponent, know how they are going to react, respond correctly to that reaction, all while displaying the pro-life message visually.