Fake clinics, often referred to as "Crisis Pregnancy Centers" (CPCs), pose as comprehensive women's health clinics and lure young women into their centers with offers of "free" pregnancy tests and "counseling".
But, beware! These fake clinics propel false information about abortion and birth control and use fear and shame tactics to deter women from choosing abortion as an option. Their most common claims include, "abortion causes breast cancer", "abortion causes infertility" and "abortion causes mental illness and suicide". The studies CPCs use to back up these claims are a thing of the past...too bad CPCs aren't!
What makes them even worse? They specifically target young women on college campuses, or what they deem the "at-risk for abortion" population. They run their deceptive ads on campus bulletin boards and bus stops, in campus newspapers and on Facebook. Additionally, a 2008 survey found that nearly HALF of all responding campus health centers at 4-year colleges and universities refer students facing unintended pregnancies to CPCs.
So what can you do??
Find out if there is a CPC near your campus! Visit www.optionline.org or www.lifecall.org and punch in your zip code (note: these are anti-choice websites with directories of CPCs).
Find out if CPCs are advertising on or around your campus! Check the newspaper, bulletin boards, bus stops, etc. Do they table on campus? Talk to the newspaper editor, student government, student activities, or whoever has the power to stop this, and tell them these fake clinics endanger women's health!
Lastly, find out if your campus health center is referring students to CPCs. If they are, work with the health center director to get them to stop. If you have a hard time, garner support from other progressive student groups, the women's center, multicultural center, women's issues representative in the student body, or student senators.
Check out the FMF's Campaign to Expose Fake Clinics for more information and check out Jacqueline's recent post for more action ideas and information about the "Don't Get Tricked, Get Treated" Week of Action taking place Oct. 25 - 31!
Stay tuned for more to come in the Exposing Fake Clinics Action Series!
2 comments:
Those 2 sites are apparently blocking direct links to their pages that originate from your page. Readers will have to cut and paste the URLs in their browser.
I didn't know what fake clinics were until I went to the March conference. Then I realized that I had seen ads for them in nearly every edition of my college newspaper.
I graduated from Minnesota State, Mankato in '02. Our paper is The Reporter. The current edition (http://media.collegepublisher.com/media/paper937/documents/pxewt91s.pdf) doesn't appear to have any ads in it so maybe they've stopped accepting them.
I read this post in my Google Reader so I didn't have trouble click on the links. I really wish I hadn't. There are far too many in NE Wisconsin and I'm not sure this is a battle I can take on, even in some small way. Especially since I know several members of my family support these places financially. UGH.
Danine
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