Everybody Loves Shouting?

We are yuge fans of screaming — something you’d conclude if you knew nothing about America other than what you learned at presidential campaign events or on social media and comments sections online.

Sometime last week, I was probably in a cab going between events, and saw that my friend Gloria Purvis posted a video about the work of the Northwest Center (she’s on the board there) in Washington, D.C. It included personal stories from the people who are living them. It wasn’t political. It was human. It’s more of the kind of thing we need to see: People on the front-lines of civil society, helping one another.

A Pregnancy Center & Maternity Home that cares for the mother father & child b4 and after birth. https://t.co/yCrSsPL4eu

— Gloria Purvis (@gloria_purvis) May 12, 2016

After tweeting a shout-out to them, folks associated with the Center went out of their way to thank me. A little love — or a simple tweet — can sometimes go a long way in bringing good things to the attention of people.

Fast forward a few days.

I’m just done visiting the Facebook page of the Northwest Center, a pregnancy care resource in Washington, D.C. They were overjoyed when Patricia Heaton, star of ABC’s The Middle and formerly of Everybody Loves Raymond, also tweeted a shout-out to them and their work and a video of testimonies about the life-saving and flourishing work they do. She frequently gives support to good people and causes – and supporting women in choosing life is one close to her heart, long associated with my friends at Feminists for Life.

Heaton’s tweet, posted with gratitude on the Northwest Center Facebook page, was fairly innocuous – supportive, again nothing political and the word abortion is never mentioned, as you’ll see:

Choose, celebrate, support Life! Thanks Northwest Center! https://t.co/EAC6gtrXpO

— Patricia Heaton (@PatriciaHeaton) May 12, 2016

Facebook saw it as clearly “anti-abortion.”

And so on the Northwest Center’s Facebook page you can now find:

Shut up RICH WOMAN! Dripping in money….and has an opinion re: choices women making less than million dollars an episode struggle with? Again, share your opinion at the country club with other 1%ers and leave the 99%ers alone. I’ll stop watching the Middle now. You don’t support regular women so I don’t support you

And:

if you don’t like abortions then don’t do it! 

Why must everyone else follow your safe exact world view?

And:

another idiot heard from

As well as:

I always knew there was something I hated about her.

And:

Pro-choice. I do not want to see this country going BACKWARDS where women had to go into the back alleys for an abortion. Nor would I EVER want to see a woman forced into giving birth to her rapists’ child. That’s complete BS. This is MY BODY and there is no way ANYONE will tell me what I can and can’t do with it. Period.

You get the idea.

Some of the reflexive anger may come from deep pain and experience, some from misunderstanding, some a reaction to a miserable politics surrounding this issue – one that accentuates division when we’re a country where there’s more common ground than our public debate ever takes a deep breath to realize.

This kind of comment, however, betrays that there wasn’t a whole lot watching of the video Heaton linked to in her retweeting:

You DON’T support life, though. You just don’t support someone’s right to choose, is all.

And: 

Typical. Pro-birth anti-everything else, such as birth control and a choice about women’s reproductive health.

If you watch the actual video, you hear from women and men who found a “save haven” in circumstances where they had “no support” otherwise. “I didn’t really have anywhere to go.” And the Northwest Center was there for them, and became a part of their lives.

Poll numbers show that most Americans are generous people who want to make sure women have support when they find themselves in difficult, desperate circumstances. “Choice” has become pressure for abortion as a solution, sometimes preferred, sometimes expected — albeit not always by the woman. Sometimes a woman simply needs to know there is someone who will help her have her baby and be a mother to her, or find a family who can provide a home for child.

If you don’t like where America is these days — not just this presidential election but cycle after cycle and a culture that is numbing itself to pain or lashing out rather than getting in the mix of people actually helping improve lives — men and women like the staff and clients of the Northwest Center. Please, stop believing headlines and stop shouting long enough to watch hear the voices of what people who the most contentious issues of our day actually want and need.