Ryan Anderson on Amnesty International:

AI’s move to changing its policy on abortion has been murmured about for a while now. While looking through the group’s website, Anderson discovered that it’s a done deal and that AI is prepared:

Karen Schneider, the chair of the Sexual and Reproductive Rights Working Group, posted a letter, “Updated April 20th, 2007,” and addressed to volunteer leaders. Before I reveal the beginning, here’s a bit of the ending:

It is very important to be aware of the following: This policy will not be made public at this time. As the IEC [Amnesty International’s International Executive Committee] has written to all sections, “There is to be no proactive external publication of the policy position or of the fact of its adoption issued. This means no section or structure is to issue a press release or public statement or external communication of any kind on the policy decision.” (emphasis original)

Anticipating that news might get out anyway, the website contains links to four other documents—a two-page overview of the new policy, a letter from the executive director explaining the change, and an already-written letter to the editor “that should be used only to respond to critical editorials or letters to the editor in local newspapers.” Members were encouraged to circulate these documents to the public but only in response to prior attacks on Amnesty’s new policy—they’d prefer not to generate any PR if possible, and do damage-control only if they have to. All the documents had the same tone a student takes who after being sent to the principal’s office is then forced to talk with the secretary while awaiting his appointment—defensive rationalizing at the service of cleansing the conscience.

The fourth document, a FAQ, could only “be used to respond to inquiries, but not distributed to the public.” Schneider ends by telling volunteers that they were not to “respond to any inquiries from the news media” but to direct reporters to the AI Communication Department.

Why the preemptive cover-up? Why the anticipatory responses? A letter to the editor already drafted in response to negative stories that haven’t even been written? An answer sheet to frequently asked questions before the new policy has even been announced and enough questions could be asked to generate frequency? Something’s up.

So, how did that letter begin? Schneider started with this: “Amnesty International’s International Executive Committee (IEC) has adopted a new position on Sexual and Reproductive Rights that includes support for abortion in very particular circumstances, in the context of our work to stop grave human rights abuses against women and girls.”

The new policy has three basic goals: (1) provide access to abortion in what they claim will only be “particular circumstances,” (2) ensure that women have access to medical care after botched—whether legal or illegal—abortions, and (3) eliminate all penalties against women seeking abortions and against abortion providers.

The various supporting documents all stress the legitimate concerns of female health and liberty and the good work Amnesty International has done in the past on these issues—but then argue for what will amount to an unlimited right to abortion.

snip

Amnesty International’s new abortion policy will strain—if not completely sever—the close ties it enjoys with many of the staunchest defenders of human rights: religious believers, in particular, the Roman Catholic Church. Though they hope to preempt such a conclusion—and gave their members just such a set of talking points—they are only kidding themselves: