November 12, 2009
Accepting biased ads as truth a mistake
Pro-Life Wisconsin (PLW) expressed outrage at Marquette University for rejecting the April 17’s “Advertising Supplements” it (behind the guise of Minnesota’s Human Life Alliance) submitted to The Marquette Tribune. I am writing today to express my outrage at the Student Voice for not doing the same. Apparently, Marquette has higher standards for sifting and winnowing false advertising and money laundering.
The purported “Advertising Supplement” featured medically inaccurate descriptions of abortion care and the same ideologically driven conflation of birth control and abortion that has jeopardized access to birth control for college students and rape victims throughout Wisconsin.
According to Human Life Alliance (HLA) distribution coordinator Jillian Roemer and Virginia Zignego, communications director for PLW, Pro-Life Wisconsin reimbursed HLA the $570 fee for the insert, as well as additional overhead costs to cover the printing and shipping of the inserts. These inserts, which were characterized by Pro-Life Wisconsin as “educational inserts” of “solid pro-life content,” are intentionally designated as “Advertising Supplements” on each page so student newspapers will distribute PLW propaganda, according to Roemer.
Shame on HLA and PLW for using such calculated maneuvers to spread their rag on UW-River Falls. And editor, shame on you too for not taking the time to think about what exactly is being “advertised” by the so-called “Advertising Supplements” you choose to accept.
Nothing was being advertised here; instead, you contributed to the dissemination of 12-page tasteless booklets of disinformation designed to denigrate and shame women who receive abortion care.
Nikki Shonoiki
The article may be found online at http://uwrfvoice.com/index.php/views/article/2538/
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