Thinking Out Loud with Alan Shlemon - Dishonest Images of the Unborn

Episode Date: April 12, 2023

A recent article in The Guardian displayed some misleading images of what is removed in an abortion from a 9-week pregnancy. Alan explains the problems with the article and the images.

What did the remains of an abortion look like at nine weeks of pregnancy? Well, according to an abortion provider who posted an article on a prominent online news source, the remains look like a wet piece of white cotton and there's no observable human being or its remains. Now, is this an accurate and fair depiction of a nine-week abortion? Well, that's what I want to talk to you about in the latest episode of my podcast, Thinking Out Loud with Alan Schliemann. Abortionist Dr. Joan Fleischman says she sometimes shows her patients the pregnancy tissue she

removes after an abortion now she says that post-abortive women are quote stunned by what it actually looks like end quote and the women quote feel they've been deceived, end quote. Now, her testimony was recently reported by The Guardian, which is a large, prominent online news source. And in this story, the story was called What a Pregnancy Actually Looks Like Before 10 Weeks in Pictures. Now, this article contains pictures of a pregnancy at four, five, six, seven, eight, and nine weeks. Now, when I saw these pictures, and by the way, you can go to str.org and look up my article, Unborn Images Matter, just do a search for that article. And in the article, I have links to all of these images from The Guardian. But when I saw these pictures on The Guardian website, I was actually stunned as well.

And not only could I not believe my eyes, but I also couldn't believe the dishonesty of this story. And the reason is, is because you just have to see the images for yourself, especially the image in the article labeled as nine weeks of pregnancy. And it's surprising because the image doesn't show anything resembling a tiny person or even what one would imagine looks like a tiny embryo. All you can see is what appears like wet cotton material floating in a petri dish. Now, it's no wonder the article slams pro-lifers for propping up images that, as Dr. Fleischman claims, leads women to expect to see a little fetus with hands, you know, a developed miniature baby. Because after seeing the tissue, women

responded with, what? You're kidding. This is all it was? Now, of course, this is very misleading because the image that you see in that picture is not at all what pregnancy looks like at nine weeks. In fact, you could turn to any number of pregnancy books or human development websites or medical journals and see what the unborn looks like at nine weeks gestation. And contrary to the Guardian's report, you will see a little miniature baby, okay? Now, perhaps the most well-known images were published in 1965 by a Swedish photographer named Lennart Nilsson, who became actually very,

very famous with these photographs. And you can see his photographs that he took of a human embryo at similar development stages as the image that's provided by the Guardian story. Now, when you see Nilsen's photographs of a nine-week embryo, you can clearly see the head, the eyes, and the fingers of the unborn, right? It's a human embryo. Now, besides seeing more accurately what the pregnancy looks like, the irony of Nilsen's image that I used in my article to kind of compare it to The Guardian was that Nilsen's image was actually taken from The Guardian's own website. You see, 13 years ago, The Guardian published a story highlighting the impact of Nilsen's work and then attached his image of the unborn.

No doubt the human embryo at this stage is small, right? It's only about an inch long. And if an abortion were to take place, it might be difficult for anyone to clearly see identifiable body parts with the naked eye. But the Guardian's article and imagery suggest that there is no human body parts at nine weeks development. And that's just not true. Now, the additional irony is that the article is guilty of the deception that it castigates, right? The author claims that abortion providers, quote,

want people to know what is actually being removed in early pregnancy, end quote. And even Fleischman demands that people deserve accurate information. Well, and of course, that's why the author laments that women often feel like they've been deceived by images they've seen online. But the crazy thing is, is that it's The Guardian that has now posted misleading images online that deceive people as to what is actually being removed in early pregnancy. We know it's an unborn human being who's removed and killed, and to suggest otherwise is complete deception. As I said, I encourage you to head to str.org and then do a search for my article titled

Unborn Images Matter, and there you'll be able to see some of the misleading pictures that The Guardian posted recently, as well as, ironically, the more accurate ones they posted 13 years ago. Well, that's all I have for you today. If you enjoy these short podcast episodes where I talk about apologetics, theology, and cultural issues, be sure to rate or review my podcast on iTunes, Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts on. And thanks for listening. I look forward to thinking out loud with you next time.