REBUTTING ‘SCREAM II’

Should the 535 members of Congress get around to slipping on the audiocassette that hit their desks last week, they’ll hear the sound of four leading brain researchers, along with science-fiction superstar Isaac Asimov and narrator Patricia Jaworski, a biologist and radio documentarian in New York. But the tape may not be music to their ears: It’s called “Thinking About the Silent Scream,” a 30-minute report that seeks to refute the notion that a fetus can feel pain.

That possibility was put forth in the highly publicized anti-abortion film “The Silent Scream,” which purported to depict an actual abortion (with fetus silently wailing). It prompted Jaworski to invest $20,000 in preparing a rebuttal. Her documentary has run on public radio stations nationwide, and now--with a sequel, “The Eclipse of Reason,” about to come out--Washington-based Catholics for a Free Choice has provided $5,000 to dub and distribute the cassette to the Hill.

“We felt that given the continuing controversy about fetal personhood, and particularly the question of fetal pain and the imminent release of ‘Silent Scream II,’ that it was important that members of Congress have accurate scientific information on fetal development available,” said a spokeswoman for the free-choice group.