Anti-choicers push a dumb conspiracy theory yet again

Crossposted from DemocraticDiva.com

Perhaps looking for something, anything to distract from the devastation (for them) of the Iran nuclear deal (OMG, we’re going to negotiate instead of drop bombs on them, the humanity!), right wingers dredged up the tiresome urban legend of abortion clinics selling fetal body parts for profit on Tuesday. I’ve been familiar with this tale since the early 90s. It always gets debunked as the risible garbage it is but not before it is breathlessly blanketed across right wing media and is picked up by at least some credulous MSM reporters.

When I first saw #PlannedParenthood trending in the morning and saw what it was about, I felt it best to assume the worst before scoffing. Maybe they had (finally) caught someone who worked for Planned Parenthood fiendishly selling fetal organs unbeknownst to patients. Or maybe in full collusion with the dirty abortion-having skanks. Who can tell what may be going on in the febrile imaginations of anti-choicers at any given time? So I tweeted this:

Someone at #PlannedParenthood might be selling fetus organs so I guess women should lose all reproductive choice now.

— Donna Gratehouse (@DonnaDiva) July 14, 2015

Because honestly, if the allegations of the heavily edited “sting” tape were 100% true I would put it in the same category as Margaret Sanger being a fan of eugenics (she was) and Kermit Gosnell (terrible monster who ran a filthy clinic in Philadelphia and killed at least one patient and who is currently in jail for his crimes). When either is thrown at me my response is (something along the lines of): Of what relevance is that to the right of women to have safe legal abortion and access to contraception? Seriously, I and other women should be in constant state of pregnancy in 2015 because Margaret Sanger was a dick about some things a century ago? All clinics should be shut down for “safety” because of one asshole who ran an unsafe one? Absurd.

As the day went on I became safely certain the anti-choice sting operation was bullshit but my tweet, naturally, caused my timeline to be swarmed with angry anti-choicers screaming how I’m a baby killer and whatnot. And Doug MacEachern, editor at the Arizona paper of record where he works the angry birther uncle beat, tweeted this at me because journalism.

@DonnaDiva do you have any idea how pouty and foot-stomping you sound when you say such preposterous things? The PP vid is ghoulish

— Doug MacEachern (@MacEachernDoug) July 14, 2015

I provided MacEachern with a link to Planned Parenthood’s statement in response to the “sting” video so that he might discontinue looking foolish about this, but we’ll see. I hate that this is distracting from real, important news like Iran but anti-choice conspiracy nuttery has a way of becoming widely circulated enough to seem vaguely credible and then used to justify concrete attacks on reproductive health care access so it needs to be quashed quickly.