The New Planned Parenthood Coalition

By Jim Sedlak

There are some things at which Planned Parenthood excels. One of those things is building coalitions with other minority groups to form impressive alliances. In the past, we have seen this kind of activity between Planned Parenthood and black leaders, as well as between Planned Parenthood and homosexual activists.

When you think about these partnerships, they appear very unlikely. In the first case, one must remember that Planned Parenthood’s founder, Margaret Sanger, invited on her original board of directors a man named T. Lothrop Stoddard. Mr. Stoddard was known at the time for a book he had written entitled The Rising Tide of Color against White World-Supremacy. During the first three decades of its existence, Planned Parenthood published a number of articles in its Birth Control Review that talked about the “Negro problem” and even launched the Negro Project in 1939 to reduce the number of black children.

Part of Sanger’s genius was convincing Negro leaders that Negroes were poor because they had too many children. Sanger, a winner of the Humanist of the Year Award, believed man, not God, was in charge and that children were not a blessing from God, but a resource that had to be controlled for the betterment of society. She told Negro leaders that, if they would reduce family size, they would rise economically. Martin Luther King, Jr., was one of the leaders who bought into this line of thinking and he accepted the Margaret Sanger Award in 1966. In his acceptance speech (read by his wife, as he couldn’t attend the presentation), he said, among other things: “For the Negro, therefore, intelligent guides of family planning are a profoundly important ingredient in his quest for security and a decent life. There are mountainous obstacles still separating Negroes from a normal existence. Yet one element in stabilizing his life would be an understanding of and easy access to the means to develop a family related in size to his community environment and to the income potential he can command.”

This line of reasoning is, unfortunately, still prevalent among the black political leaders of today. It explains how an overtly racist organization, that has killed more blacks than the Ku Klux Klan, has been able to get the unwavering support of the Congressional Black Caucus and major black leaders.

The alliance between Planned Parenthood and the homosexual community is also incongruous. Since the main objective of Planned Parenthood has been to reduce population size and institute family planning programs, it would seem that PP has no cause to get involved with the homosexual community, as they are, by their chosen practice, in no need of family planning.

However, Planned Parenthood was one of those who recognized in the 1960s that one way of reducing fertility of the population was to “encourage increased homosexuality.” To accomplish this goal, it began to openly embrace the homosexual community and to support its various activities and demonstrations. To do this, of course, Planned Parenthood had to develop an entirely different approach than it did with the Negro community. The arguments were no longer about family planning and population control, but about healthcare and acceptance.

Although the homosexual community currently has a good relationship with Planned Parenthood, one wonders what would happen if there was ever found a prenatal “marker” for homosexuality and Planned Parenthood fought for the “right” of women to abort their “homosexual preborn child.” Would the homosexual leaders and politicians still fiercely support Planned Parenthood? I guess if we take the black community as an example, the answer would be yes.

With all this as background, Planned Parenthood has launched a new offensive in 2018 to expand its coalition to include many other segments of society. Planned Parenthood has launched a new thrust that it is calling UNSTOPPABLE.

The initiative includes a manifesto that states:

We believe your body is your own. If it is not, you cannot be truly free or equal. We insist on the basic right to live full, healthy lives, make our own decisions, and receive the care we need, when we need it.

We are building a world where everyone has the freedom and opportunity to control their own bodies and their own futures—regardless of race, gender, income, zip code, or immigration status.

Together, we are a movement and we are UNSTOPPABLE.

Once you explore under the skin of the manifesto, you come to understand that the manifesto includes the following objectives:

• Affordable access to birth control
• Affordable “health care”
• Affordable abortions for all
• Freedom from sexual violence
• Freedom from government regulation surrounding women’s bodies
• Economic equality
• Paid family leave
• Homosexual (LGBTQ) “rights”

Just like Planned Parenthood used the blacks and the homosexuals to expand its appeal and broaden its base, it is now trying to form an even broader coalition of groups to bolster its fading popularity.

There is, however, a flaw in Planned Parenthood’s efforts. As even a quick reading of the manifesto will reveal, it is all based on the humanist notion that freedom means being able to control your own body. Planned Parenthood believes that there is no divine purpose for mankind and that we make our own decisions on what is right or wrong based on the situation as we perceive it. This, of course, is rubbish.

The answer to Planned Parenthood is God. The meaning of true freedom was made clear by Pope John Paul II in 1995 when he said, “Every generation of Americans needs to know that freedom consists not in doing what we like, but in having the right to do what we ought.”

Planned Parenthood is, once again, spreading anti-God propaganda. We must take action to expose this effort for what it is.

Jim Sedlak is vice president of American Life League, founder of STOPP International, and host of a weekly talk show on the Radio Maria Network. He has been successfully fighting Planned Parenthood since 1985.

Invitation: Over the next several months, as we embark in combating Planned Parenthood’s Unstoppable campaign, we would like to print your articles on why the idea of people “controlling their own body” as they see fit is wrong. If you send an article (short or long) on why this is untrue to me at jsedlak@all.org, we will print it in this newsletter.