Pro-Choice USA Today Columnist Admits Planned Parenthood Videos ‘Raise Doubts’

September 1st, 2015 10:16 AM

Here, finally, is in indication of the kind of impact the Center for Medical Progress’s Planned Parenthood videos might be having if ABC, CBS, NBC et al would stop censoring them to protect the nation’s largest abortion mill.

In the Opinion section of USA Today, Ruben Navarrette Jr., a prominent columnist, member of the Board of Contributors, and self-proclaimed pro-choicer, lamented that his pro-choice stance has taken a pounding in light of the Planned Parenthood videos.

“After forcing myself to watch what are now eight ghoulish videos exposing what goes on behind closed doors at Planned Parenthood, I’m still pro-choice,” he wrote. “I’m also anguished, despite the latest news conference raising questions about the videos.”

Navarrette has been an avid pro-choice supporter for over three decades and took up residence in the pro-choice camp during his college years adopting the usual talking points:

I became pro-choice for three reasons. First, I bought the line that the procedures should be legal, safe and rare. Second, I was repulsed by the tactics of the pro-life movement, which included threatening doctors and bombing clinics. Third, I adopted the feminist gospel that, as a man, I couldn’t tell a woman what to do with her body.

Navarrette has allegedly refrained from writing about abortion during his career until now. After watching the undercover Planned Parenthood videos for himself, he has begun questioning his support for abortion. Navarrette claimed his eyes had been opened to the horrific and egregious practices of Planned Parenthood and wrote, “[t]hese videos are just evil enough to raise doubts and change minds.” Which, again, is because the abortion industry owes so much to its media protectors.

The “evils” of the videos has Navarrette coming off not only as doubting, but as being pained and conflicted by his decision to continue on as a pro-choice supporter. After watching one of the videos that included testimony from Holly O’Donnell, a former procurement technician for StemExpress, explaining her experience with gestated fetus recognizable as a baby being killed and slaughtered for its organs, Navarrette admitted, “[i]t had a heartbeat. It was alive. Then it wasn’t.”

The Planned Parenthood videos also left Navarrette in a state of shock over the demeanor of the employees and the nature of the dialogue. “The material is heavily disturbing. Doctors and other personnel callously discuss the street value of fetal organs and negotiate prices like car salesmen.”

Navarrette still claims to be pro-choice, but with a “heavy heart.” He concluded, “I find myself envying those who are free of doubt and whose minds are made up.”

With the promise of more disturbing videos to be released, a complete change of heart may also be in Navarrette’s future.