Graphic signs spark outrage
Jose Paul Corona
It was about 9 a.m. six weeks ago when Denyse Scarberry first saw
the trucks.
“I was contemplating my day and I saw these trucks,” she said
angrily. “I was shocked and my jaw dropped.”
The trucks, with billboards 7-feet high and 21-feet wide, depicted
aborted fetuses. The truck Scarberry saw and several others like it
have been circling local middle and high schools for weeks. They are
the handiwork of the Center for Bio-Ethical Reform, a national
nonprofit anti-abortion group that uses the trucks to get its message
across.
The group has increased the number of trucks making rounds in the
city and filed a lawsuit in reaction to the law passed by the City
Council last month that bans any planes towing advertisements from
flying over the city.
The law infringes on the group’s freedom of speech rights, claims
Gregg Cunningham, center director and founder.
“Abortion is an indefensible act of violence that kills babies,”
Cunningham said.
The group uses the shocking, often upsetting images on trucks and
aerial advertisements, saying it is the only avenue open to them.
“Traditional [advertising] methods are closed off to us,”
Cunningham said.
Newspapers, magazines and TV stations have refused to air the
group’s advertisements because of their graphic nature, he said.
There has been an immense outpouring of public anger over the
photos, which is exactly what the group wants.
“We don’t care what people think of us,” he said. “We care what
people think of abortion.”
By showing the graphic photos, the group hopes to force people to
deal with the issue on a more personal level. Trucks drive near
middle and high schools because children are more susceptible to the
group’s message, Cunningham said.
“Teenagers are being lied to, they are being told that it’s not a
baby,” Cunningham said. “We want to make it very clear to kids that
it is a baby.”
By suing the city, the group hopes to send a message to other
cities that are considering similar laws, Cunningham said.”They’re
hiding behind the 1st Amendment,” she said. “To me it’s wrong. They
are going overboard.”
City Council members said their decision to pass the law was not
an attempt to limit anyone’s freedom of speech, but rather a solution
to a noise pollution problem that residents have complained of for
years.
Scarberry and other parents are outraged by the signs and contend
that children don’t need to see such graphic images.
Scarberry’s 12-year-old son, who attends Marine View Middle
School, was very disturbed after seeing the photos, she said.
“He wanted to know what it meant,” Scarberry said. “How am I
supposed to explain that to him?”
Cunningham argues that crime scene photos and pictures of
terrorist attacks are just as graphic and no one prevents them from
being published.
“We not only have a right to display it, but we have a
responsibility to display it,” he said. “We will not submit to a
double standard.”
The lawsuit was filed in the Santa Ana branch of the U.S. District
Court on Oct. 1. City staff have not yet met to decide what type of
action to take on the lawsuit, said Diane Turner, public information
officer for the city.
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