It's been nearly a year since the overturning of Roe V. Wade. How are pro-life centers handling the shift?
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It's been nearly a year since the overturning of Roe v. Wade. The overturning of the 50 year U.S. Supreme Court case came as somewhat of a shock to the general population. After an information leak that the case was likely to be overturned in the near future, on June 24th 2022, five conservative judges led the charge on the revocation.
Since the reversal of Roe v. Wade; there have been more than 100 instances of pro-life organizations, churches, or properties attacked.The morning after the overturning of Roe v. Wade, pro-abortion extremists set ablaze a Christian pro-life center. Life Choices, a pro-life center in Longmont, Colorado, was set on fire and vandalized. Graffitied on the wall was the phrase "If abortions aren't safe, neither are you." A sentence that has become all too synonymous with the infamous pro-abortion extremist group Jane's Revenge.
As will be revealed over the course of this series; these attacks were merely the beginning.
A lie can travel half way around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes.”
― Mark Twain
Big Tech Censorship post Roe v. Wade
Palmetto Women's Center is situated in Rock Hill, S.C. Tucked away in between the bustling city of Charlotte, N.C. and Winthrop University, this pro-life center is a hub of activity for those facing unplanned pregnancies. However, this particular pregnancy center has seen some peculiar things with their Google ads and SEO metrics.
Starsha Thompson, Executive Director of Palmetto Women's Center, has been working there for 4 years. Overseer of all executive functions, including marketing, Thompson was surprised to see that their metrics were lower than previous years before the overturning.
"Google analytics have put so many restrictions on pregnancy centers. We have had to spend thousands of dollars on marketing to get around the restrictions. Certain words are restricted. If you google 'abortion near me' years ago, our name would be towards the top of the list. Now if someone googles abortion near me, the centers that provide abortion pop up first. There’s a box on google to check to give suggestions to pro-life clinics."
Google & Mark Warner
Amid pressure from Democrats following the Supreme Court's overturning of Roe V. Wade, Google has been cracking down on search results for pro-life pregnancy centers (CPCs). A movement led by Sen. Mark Warner, D-Va., seeks to "take action" against CPCs.
Senator Mark Warner serves as the vice-chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee. The goals of this position is to strengthen national security in the interests of U.S. citizens. Elected in 2008 and reelected to a third term in November 2020, Warner runs on a platform centered on helping the families of Virginia by bringing in jobs and committing himself to protecting the rights of American citizens. Warner has also been a longtime supporter of abortion rights. He is a cosponsor of the Women's Health Protection Act, which would have codified Roe V. Wade.
On June 17, 2022, Warner and Rep. Elissa Slotkin wrote a letter urging Google to "crack down on manipulative search results."Both were prompted by a study released by the nonprofit Center for Countering Digital Hate. The study found that 11 percent of the results where one searched for "abortion clinic near me" or "abortion pill" directed the user to centers that opposed abortion. "Directing women towards fake clinics that traffic in misinformation and don't provide comprehensive health services is dangerous to women's health and undermines the integrity of Google's search results," the lawmakers penned.
Another issue that Warner and Slotkin took issue with were the ads displayed at the top of Google search results. Apparently, google added a disclaimer to these ads. "Albeit, one that appears in small font and is easily missed...The prevalence of these misleads ads marks what appears to be a concerning reversal to Google's pledge in 2014 to take down ads from crisis pregnancy centers that engage in overt deception of women seeking out abortion information online."
Below features one of Warner's tweets concerning the matter.
The letter also requested Sundar Pichai, CEO of Alphabet Inc. and its subsidiary Google, to respond to the letter and provide the following:
A plan to limit anti-abortion clinics in Google search results, ads, and maps.
A plan to add disclaimers to showcase whether a pregnancy center does or does not provide abortions.
A plan to provide accurate search results in healthcare for the future.
You can read the full letter here
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As of August 25, 2022, Google announced that it would comply to Warner and Slotkin's letter. Google stated that they would clearly label facilities that provide abortions so that users seeking abortions are not misled by anti-abortion fake clinics or CPCs. They also announced that "those who search for 'abortion clinics near me' will only see facilities that have been verified to provide abortions in the local search results box on Google, unless they affirmatively choose to see additional, potentially less relevant results. Additionally, Google will clearly label results for searches such as 'abortion clinics' to indicate whether the facility provides abortions.'"
You can read the full statement made by google here
There are two very important statements to pull from the google announcement:
We have clear and longstanding policies that govern abortion-related advertising on our platforms. In order to run ads on Search that target keywords or phrases related to getting an abortion, advertisers in the United States must complete our abortion certification process and verify whether they do or do not provide abortions.
For topics where quality information is particularly important -- like health, finance, civic information and crisis situations -- we place an even greater emphasis on factors related to expertise and trustworthiness.
As pro-life centers generally do not provide abortions, they are unable to be certified per Google's policies. This means, according to Mark Isakowitz (Vice President of Government affairs and Public Policy of U.S. and Canada), pro-life centers are unable to run ads on Google's search bar that target keywords or phrases related to getting an abortion. The second statement above also raises concerns amongst pro-life centers. Who determines what is trustworthy?
The Effects of Big Tech Censorship
Due to the admitted censorship of pro-life centers, CPCs have experienced a reduction of clientele. One of the many affected CPC's is New York's own CompassCare Pregnancy Services. One of the national leaders in pro-life movement, CompassCare has been serving their community for over 40 years. The CEO of this organization, Rev. Jim Harden, is known for his national and international appearances and publications discussing attacks on pro-life people, medical and media ethics, and the rising politicization of law enforcement.
CompassCare came under unique censorship attack due to the then Attorney General Letitia James' involvement. "Our pregnancy center was targeted by a propaganda campaign. And google essentially wiped us off the maps. We were listed as permanently closed," Harden says. "[This had] dramatic impact on our patient load....The Attorney General Letitia James from New York wrote an open letter asking google to wipe us off the map. Google actually complied." Due to this, Harden says "We are seeing a significant reduction of patient load because of this."
Because of the censorship, many pro-life centers had to increase their marketing budget, thus draining resources that could be used for more patient care. Mountain Area Pregnancy center, a pro-life center stationed in the Blue Ridge Mountains of Asheville, has also experienced the severe censorship. "We see the suppression with the google ads. I have a marketing person who does that for us. He is definitely seeing suppression with the free google adds. In the five years of me serving, there has definitely been big tech censorship," says Kristi Brown executive director of Mountain Area Pregnancy Center.
In the next article, we will discuss more on Jane's Revenge and actual physical attacks on pro-life centers since the overturning of Roe v. Wade.
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