The reporting on this matter has been, in my opinion, rather bizarre. Let’s start with the fact that some have described The Silent Scream as graphic. Even the website Yang used to show the video comments that the program is graphic.
I am terribly sorry to inform you, but having seen The Silent Scream numerous times, and having watched segments of it on the national news shortly after Dr. Bernard Nathanson unveiled it at a private showing with President Ronald Reagan in 1984, I can assure you that this video is far from being graphic by any sensible set of standards. What the video is, in fact, is brutally honest about what the act of abortion does to the preborn baby.
The Silent Scream is an ultrasound, and a rather archaic ultrasound at that. Yes, Dr. Nathanson provides the commentary, and yes he does get into the details of the abortion, but what he says and what the viewer sees are nothing compared to the nightly news reports documenting murder and mayhem in the streets of our cities, on the campuses of our schools and in the war-torn areas of the world.
What’s even more interesting about this situation is that apparently there are an equal number of parents defending Yang as parents decrying his actions. Some parents saw the presentation as one way of attempting to encourage young people not to have sex and thus avoid teen pregnancy while others simply could not tolerate the idea. Some argued that it was totally unacceptable for any teacher to “go against the rules and decide on his own what message the kids should get.”
I wonder if that same group of protesting parents would say something if Planned Parenthood presented their condom education class? I bet not.
The sad fact is that in today’s society sexually explicit courses are available at every age level, including kindergarten, but those who attempt to share the reality of what abortion does to a child are the ones blamed with being “inappropriate” and “gruesome.” Apparently an honest presentation of the details about what abortion does to a child is unacceptable according to today’s immoral standards.
It is as if “education” is a term that defines not what the facts are but what the politically correct ideas about a certain topic are. And when it comes to abortion, facts are not welcome, thank you!
I feel bad for Randy Yang and I wish he had pleaded his case in the court of public opinion, or sought the aid of a pro-life attorney in defending his actions. Perhaps the outcome would have been different. Be that as it may, the good news is that for one day in the life of a group of eighth graders who attended Yang’s chemistry classes, each of them got an opportunity to see through a window to the womb and understand exactly who dies during an abortion. Maybe that message and those images will stick; maybe they will one day save a baby’s life.