Readers Have Their Say on Abortion Documentary

We get letters. . . .

Today’s bundle concerns Thursday’s column (“Ted Turner Has His Say With ‘Abortion: For Survival’ ”) on a program advocating, without opposition, the pro-choice position in the abortion debate.

The program ran on Turner’s cable superstation TBS, followed by a chaotic panel discussion featuring two representatives from each side of the abortion issue. The panel discussion was punctuated by taped pro-choice promos and marked by moderator Martin Agronsky’s utter helplessness in controlling the participants.

The letters:

I am especially upset over your assertion that anti-choice people have an obligation to impose their views on the rest of society “if they truly believe, rightly or wrongly, that abortion is murder.”

The belief that abortion is murder is held almost entirely by people who base this on a religious ground. I’m not trying to dismiss these people because of this, but if you look at the issue with logic and some scientific understanding, it’s apparent that we are dealing with something in the process of becoming a person, not something that is yet an individual life.

It is also important to remember that church and state in this country are supposedly separate. If you believe that abortion is morally wrong, that is your perfect right. But if you don’t believe in the right of each woman to decide for themselves, you believe in compulsory pregnancy.

You ask me to be angry that the pro-choice voice is given such wide exposure. I find that absurd when the anti-choice forces are the most powerful and heavily funded organization around, and their side is being forced on me by the governor, the President and the Supreme Court.

CLAIRE MARSH,

San Gabriel

Does the pro-choice factor get an opportunity to present its side whenever the Pope or the President or other so-called leaders give their views about abortion? Of course not.

Thus, it is only a whisper and a short span of time in TV when Ted Turner runs “Abortion: For Survival.” Obviously you never can and never will understand the horrors of unwanted births and unwanted children--all over the world.

Hooray for Ted Turner. He is to be congratulated. You are not.

ANNABEL WILSON,

Santa Barbara

You are just another one of the many conservatives working for the Los Angeles Times, spreading anti-choice propaganda, and likely you are one of the many white males who feel threatened that women are taking back their own reproductive rights and power.

Let me ask you this: Are you willing and able to house the homeless and abused children of this world that are living right now? Is our society ready to hold men responsible for the child rearing in this country? Should we have also the right to legislate men’s bodies? How about mandatory castration for all men who rape?

I say hooey to you and The Times.

DEBRA L. DEWEESE,

Long Beach

I love the question you started your article with: “Is it really true that abortion opponents dislike children and sex?” It is nothing less than ludicrous for anyone, especially from the pro-death people who make a very profitable business of killing the unborn child, to even hint that the pro-life are against children. That is as ridiculous as saying Jews are against kosher food.

HARRY H. WILSON,

Cerritos

I really don’t see why the anti-abortionists are demanding equal time, or why Ted Turner should even consider offering them any time on “his” network. After all, I don’t see Paul Crouch or Pat Robertson offering any equal time for opposing viewpoints on their respective networks, the Trinity Broadcasting Network and the Christian Broadcasting Network.

LESLIE TYNDALL,

Santa Monica

The next time Operation Rescue is in town, sir, please go to their warm-up rally, usually the night before their Saturday actions to close clinics. I did this past June.

For three hours, I listened to speaker after speaker literally demonize any and all of the citizens who disagree with their position. I also listened to their calls for the imposition of a theocracy in this country.

Where are the moderates? And where will our Bill of Rights go if these people are successful? They do not believe in our Constitution, nor in separation of church and state.

So I question, sir, your tacit support for true believers, while engaging in the rhetoric of neutrality and using the cover of the journalists’ middle ground. The sad fact is that the pro-choice people, Ted Turner et al., are the middle ground.

JAMES LASPINA,

Reseda

Ted Turner calling anti-abortionists “bozos” just doesn’t go far enough. Ignorant bozos would have been much better.

ANTHONY DEROSE,

West Hollywood

Those of us who are unable to accept the extremes on either side of the issue seem to be a very small minority. I would like to know, though, how you tell the difference between “excellent propaganda (‘Abortion: For Survival’)” and “outrageously slanted propaganda (‘The Silent Scream’).”

Does the difference depend on your viewpoint?

W. F. RYLAARSDAM,

Santa Ana