Okay, so a Crisis Pregnancy Center (CPC) has moved into the college area of my university (San Diego State).
I found out about their presence today as I was reading our school newspaper and saw their ad promoting free pregnancy testing. However, unlike most CPC's they explictly state that they do not provide abortion services, they prefer to discourage abortion through lies about its effects e.g. abortion causes breast cancer.
So, I am posting this today asking for advice on what to do to limit their influence on my fellow female colleagues.
My friend and I have already thought of contacting the school newspaper and asking them to not run their ads or to run a counter ad or possibly an opinion piece disclosing the true nature of their clinic.
Any other suggestions? There presence near my school is not a good one. It frightens me very much that what they're doing is legal. Also, on their site they have used the SDSU campus as a backdrop...Im going to find out if they even have permission to do that. If not I guess I'll have to use my feminist forces and find out who authorized it.
Overall, I just think that misleading and deceiving young students is wrong and I want them and their agenda exposed to the student body before anyone thinks of utilizing their services.
Thanks!
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Re: newspaper ads- if you bring this request to the people in charge and they nix it because they need the money, see if you can get them to charge more than the usual price for this place to buy ad space.
A potentially more effective way to use the newspaper is to go into the center under guise of being scared and pregnant, collect as much literature as you can, and maybe even see if you can write down what they're telling you (this may take some subtlety, perhaps by asking them for pen and paper rather than bringing your own). Then write an article or give what you've collected to a staff writer and get that printed.
Since that will only be in one issue of the paper, this assumes a decent readership who will get the idea in their heads that center = bad. If only a few people read it and the ads run consistently, it may not be that effective overall. But if anyone refers to it down the road when talking to a friend who's thinking about going there, you'll have done quite a bit of good.
"Overall, I just think that misleading and deceiving young students is wrong and I want them and their agenda exposed to the student body before anyone thinks of utilizing their services."
I know it is the common meme here to say that all CPC's are evil and misleading, but, sigh, I just am a glutton for punishment. I read through their site and, except for the talk about post-abortion syndrome, I can't find anything remotely horrible-- except that they exist to dissuade people from abortion.
Can someone tell me what is so awful about the CPC that tells you up front it doesn't provide abortions, and doesn't fill its website wih a pack of distortions?
I mean, it offers help to women who want to keep their pregnancy, right? Which is more than a lot of Planned Parenthoods do...
http://www.capsonline.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=27&Itemid=35
I'll wager you didn't see this page. Unless you think there aren't any distortions there.
Another layer of fail in these places is that they're called "crisis pregnancy centers", which sounds like the place you run over to first thing if you find out you're pregnant. Getting lectured about why abortion is bad (which is essentially what they do, according to other sources) when you're in the HOLY SHIT I'M PREGNANT WTF DO I DO state of mind is not something to which many people would willingly subject themselves.
Basically, they're a wholly partisan, agenda-driven organization that implies they're simply around to help in your time of need. It's rubbish. And, sadly, they'll get people who come in and fuck with their heads because it's almost impossible to spread the word about them as thoroughly as is needed.