A mum, a dad, a birthday

A few weeks ago, some friends and I decided to attend a meeting hosted by the British Pregnancy Advisory Service (BPAS).

One of the two largest abortion providers in the UK, BPAS was hosting a speaker from the Iranian and Kurdish Women’s Rights Organisation (IKWRO). The meeting was quite surreal for many reasons.

I have had to interact with aggressively pro-abortion women in the past. I have had the pleasure of enduring (whilst running a peaceful prayer vigil outside an abortion centre) many hours of ear-splitting music, intermittent screaming and accusations that we are trying to harass and physically hurt the protestors and the women seeking to abort their children.

These same people have taken pictures of my family and me and have conversations about us online, where they find out as much information as possible about us and document it there, KGB-style. I have been lied about by people from my university lectures who said I harassed them and intimidated them (purely because I was part of the university pro-life society) and of course I’ve had those awful conversations with friends who say, for example, what a pity it is that the one-child policy does not exist in the UK.

But that all seems quite normal compared to discussing abortion over wine and Kettle chips while a BPAS representative proudly announces to the room (of women) that IKWRO and BPAS battled and won against an amendment which sought to outlaw the targeting of unborn baby girls through abortion. Right, so we women, want it to be legal for other women to be able to kill their unborn baby girls purely because they’re girls.

And not only do we wish death on our fellow human beings, who just so happen to be of the same sex, but we want them to die in the most disgusting and excruciating way. All this in a very civilised environment, with networking and hummus galore.

Other conversations from this meeting reminiscent of The Twilight Zone include speaking with a representative from International Planned Parenthood on the subject of honour-based violence. She told me, among many other good and valid points, that the only way that parents can justify killing their children is by de-humanising them and that people who would harm and kill their children walk the streets and look like everyone else. "I know", I was thinking. I almost couldn’t believe the double-think that was going on here.

It beggars belief that in a society where many people think that grinding a baby into indistinguishable mush or ripping their limbs off one-by-one is the compassionate option, there is surprise that there is so much domestic violence in our society, not to mention violence in the streets in the form of gangs and street fights. We have cultivated a society of violence in the womb against those who would normally be protected at all costs, and it naturally spreads from there. This dehumanising approach to the body can be seen elsewhere.

During Wimbledon, I remember watching Benedict Cumberbatch, a passionate liberal, standing in a beautiful suit enjoying all the traditions of Wimbledon - the stunning lawns, the uniforms, this and that rule and the umpire who oversees it, all washed down with champagne and strawberries. There is this feeling that Wimbledon, and everything that goes with it, is properly English and old and something to be preserved and treasured. It’s a beautiful relic that we dust off each year.

Does he, and others like him who push for the most destructive practices (whilst remaining comfortably removed from the devastation they wreak in society), think that these traditions would have developed if our ancestors had ben slaughtering their unborn children? These beautiful traditions came from a society which strove to be decent (note that they strove to be that way; they were by no means perfect), based on a set moral code. There was a strict sense of right and wrong, of what was modest and immodest. That is why there are rules at Wimbledon. That is why it survives and why it is loved by so many - because it stands for something.

Nothing beautiful or good ever has come from our culture of disregarding the sanctity of human life, only more destruction and depravity. And we have the gall to be appalled and outraged that this happens. What exactly were you expecting?

Some people will not be happy until every last scrap of our once decent society has been thrown out. Perhaps then, and only then, can we begin to pick up the pieces and start again. It’s not that difficult; we can start with the basics. As SPUC has said, every child needs three basic things: a Mum, a Dad and a birthday.