TVNZ Pro-Abortion Bias

From: Maia Boonen [mailto:maiab@bsa.govt.nz]

Sent: Wednesday, 8 February 2023 4:02 PM

To: Right to Life - Ken <ken@righttolife.org.nz>

Subject: RE: BSA Complaint #2023-001

Kia ora Ken

TVNZ has made the following comments in response to your complaint. Please take the time to review them, and if you wish to comment in response, could you please do so by 22 February 2023.

TVNZ makes the following comments in regard to the Right to Life referral.

• Standard 4: The programme denigrated unborn children by refusing to acknowledge that they were human beings from conception endowed by their Creator with an inalienable right to life. The programme discriminated against unborn children by promoting the false and unjust belief that if they were unwanted they could be killed. This was not a violation of human rights nor a crime against humanity, but a human right and health care.

Standard 5: The government wants us to accept that violence inflicted on women and their unborn is normal health care. The unborn child is a patient deserving of health care that will protect its life and promote its health. How can the broadcaster belief that poisoning the child, sucking it out of its mother’s womb or violently dismembering it is health care with the bodily remains of the child being treated as medical waste and generally ending up at the local tip.

We note that Right to Life/ Mr Orr has claimed in his referral that: Right to Life is disappointed that the broadcaster supports the legal fiction of the born alive rule and is not at the forefront in promoting the legal recognition of the humanity and right to life of the unborn child. TVNZ simply recorded the Crown Law’s opinion and offered no statement in regard to support of this opinion, or not.

Access to abortion is a legal right in New Zealand and therefore a discussion concerning this is acceptable in the standards. The Ministry of Health advises that Abortion is legal in New Zealand, and changes in the law in 2020 made abortion easier to access in New Zealand/Aotearoa.

• Standard 5: The broadcaster claims that there was no need to interview doctors who were not prepared to terminate the lives of unborn children. I believe that it was necessary as the programme inferred that the killing of unborn children was a normal and accepted part of medical practice.

The Ministry of Health advises that Abortion is legal in New Zealand, and changes in the law in 2020 made abortion easier to access in New Zealand Aotearoa. Abortion is a normal and accepted part of medical practice in New Zealand.

The Ministry of Health also notes that a medical practitioner’s conscientious objection does not override a health practitioner’s professional and legal duty to provide prompt and appropriate medical assistance to any person in a medical emergency (including a surgical emergency).

• Standard 6: The broadcaster claims that there are many doctors and nurses who are prepared to co-operate in the killing of unborn children … Because of the increasing reluctance of doctors to do abortions, the Government changed the law in 2020 to allow nurse practitioners and midwives to prescribe lethal drugs to poison unborn children up to 10 weeks’ gestation. The government is now proposing to train nurses and midwives to perform surgical abortions where the child is sucked out of its mother’s womb or violently dismembered. This is a million dollar industry and the government now has a contract with private enterprise for the killing of unborn children.

The Ministry of Health states that Manatū Hauora has the overall goal of accessible, equitable, and quality abortion services across Aotearoa. A key part of this is increasing the availability of first trimester abortions in primary care and community locations, as this will help reduce the need for people to travel to access abortion services. (accessibility is the reason for providing abortions in primary care and community locations), not as Right to Life claims reluctance by doctors to perform abortions. TVNZ further notes Right to Life have not provided any evidence of this claim.

• A person who kills an abortionist or bombs a clinic may be a terrorist. There is no place in the pro-life movement for such a person. It is unreasonable and defamatory to call those who peacefully protest the killing of defenceless unborn children which includes women who have had an abortion that she deeply regrets. It is sadly ironic that those who oppose violence against women and their unborn children are depicted as terrorists and those who are prepared to violently kill defenceless unborn children are depicted as noble and compassionate medical practitioners.

TVNZ outlined how the statements on this issue were Dr Bourne’s opinion, which was reasonable to hold given what was known (as explained in the TVNZ decision). No female protestor was shown in the Sunday programme at the Kansas abortion clinic. Of the people who attacked the former Kansas abortion clinic Head of Clinic, one was described as a terrorist by sentencing Judges, and the other was described as ‘radicalized’ by family and as a ‘terrorist by commentators.

• The claim that abortion is not violence against women and their unborn is extraordinary. How do you explain the violent and painful dismemberment of a child in the womb as non- violence? What evidence does the broadcaster have to support such an appalling statement?

TVNZ did not claim that abortion is not violence against women and their unborn, we stated that Right to life’s belief in this regard is fallacious given the considerations listed. However we also observe that abortion is no longer part of the Crimes Act 1961. As the Ministry of Health advises Abortion is legal in New Zealand, and changes in the law in 2020 made abortion easier to access in New Zealand Aotearoa.

Right to Life offers an opinion on the validity of abortion as lifesaving procedure in medical emergencies. This is one opinion, and is not an issue which was addressed in the Sunday programme in any detail. However TVNZ notes that this claim has been fact-checked by AP News and found to be false, with doctors providing many examples of medical emergencies when abortion is required to save the mother.

Right to Life states that a female person having to give birth to a pregnancy caused by rape or sexual assault is better than abortion for the pregnant person. Here is the personal story of one woman who has experienced this situation at age 11 years, written many years later when the woman is 65 years old:

Elaine says she was in the early stages of puberty, and didn't know what to look out for after the rape. But her mother was paying attention. Several weeks later, around the time of Elaine's 12th birthday in April, her mother said they needed to go back to the doctor.

"My mom just said, 'We've got to, you know, fix some problems down there,' " Elaine says.

At the time, she didn't understand what was happening. But now, as a retired pharmacist, she recognizes that the doctor was performing a common procedure called dilation and curettage, or D&C, which can be used to terminate a pregnancy.

"What I remember about that was the pain," she says. "My anesthesia was squeezing my mother's hand."

Elaine says her mother explained in more detail what had happened a few years afterward, when she was about 16.

"I just said, 'Thank you,' " she says. "There was just no question it was the right thing to do. No question. And I'm just so grateful that I had a mother and a doctor to get me out of that."

When she reflects on it now, Elaine says she's grateful for how her "very Catholic" mother, who died in 2010, handled an impossible situation. She says she understands that some people have strong moral objections to abortion. But to them, she says: "I'm here to tell you, in this kind of a situation you would throw out your religion in half a second. It's easy to say what other people should do when it's theoretical."

• Standard 8 Fairness

BSA guidance on the Fairness standard is clear The purpose of this standard is to protect the dignity and reputation of those featured in programmes. Pro-life groups in New Zealand were not discussed in the programme. The Kansans Coalition for Life are clearly a US organisation.

Ngā mihi mahana l Warm regards

Maia Boonen (she/her)

Legal Advisor

T: 04 801 4624

M: 021 574 413

E: maiab@bsa.govt.nz

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Broadcasting Standards Authority

Dear Maia,

Thank you for inviting me to respond to the following comments from TVNZ.

Standard 4. The broadcaster is a leading member of the fourth estate and has a duty to the community to be our watchdog to expose evil and to courageously uphold the truth. Human life begins at conception. It was the Royal Commission on Contraception Sterilisation and Abortion that stated in its report to Parliament in 1977 that they had received expert evidence from scientists from all around the world who all agreed that human life began at conception. They advised that there was no point between conception and birth when an unborn child was not a human being. The Commission concluded that the unborn child was the weakest and most defenceless member of the human family and deserved our respect and protection. Defending the humanity and the right to life of the unborn child is the justice issue of this era. The broadcaster has a duty to defend the human rights of our precious unborn and to challenge the legal fiction that the unborn child is not a human being with a right to life until it is born. The broadcaster abandons its duty as a member of the fourth estate by merely recording the Law Commissions fictional opinion.

Standard 5: The government wants us to accept that violence inflicted on women and their unborn is normal health care. The unborn child is a patient deserving of health care that will protect its life and promote its health. How can the broadcaster belief that poisoning the child, sucking it out of its mother’s womb or violently dismembering it is health care with the bodily remains of the child being treated as medical waste and generally ending up at the local tip. It is disputed that the killing of an unborn child is a normal and accepted part of medical practice in New Zealand.

Standard 6; The broadcaster claims that that there are many health professionals in New Zealand who are prepared to co-operate in the killing of unborn children The Ministry of Health advises in its 2022 annual report on abortion services in New Zealand that the workforce prepared to be engaged in killing unborn children in New Zealand was 63 doctors, 97 practice nurses and 2 midwives. These figures highlight the fact very few medical practitioners are prepared to be involved in abortion.

The broadcaster claims that there are many examples of medical emergency when abortion is required to save the mother. The unborn child is a patient that deserves the respect and protection of the medical profession. It should not be necessary to kill the unborn patient in order to save the life of the mother. Ectopic pregnancies are often cited to justify an abortion. The termination of an ectopic pregnancy is not an abortion.

Former United States Surgeon General C. Everett Koop, stated in a 1996 New York Times editorial that "partial-birth abortions are not needed to save the life of the mother."1 Sixteen years earlier, he wrote: "In my thirty-six years in pediatric surgery I have never known of one instance where the child had to be aborted to save the mother's life."2 Even Planned Parenthood's Dr. Alan Guttmacher acknowledged, “Today it is possible for almost any patient to be brought through pregnancy alive, unless she suffers from a fatal illness such as cancer or leukemia, and, if so, abortion would be unlikely to prolong, much less save, life.”

The broadcaster claims that our belief that abortion is violence against women and the unborn is fallacious. Does the broadcaster condone horrific violence against vulnerable women and their unborn on the pretext that it is legal. Is it not incredible that the law states that it is unlawful to smack a child after it is born, but before birth it is legal to kill the child and violently and painfully tear the child’s head and limbs of its defenceless body. I invite the broadcaster to view a photo of a child killed by a doctor before birth and not agree that abortion is violence against the unborn. Since the foundation of this nation abortion was in the Crimes Act. The unborn child was recognised as human being with a right to life. It was a serious crime to kill an unborn child. With the passing of the Abortion Legislation Act 2020, it is now no longer a crime to kill an unborn child, it is now a “reproductive health choice”. The unborn child is now the property of the mother for her to dispose of as she wishes.

The broadcaster recounts the tragic story of Elaine who suffered the terrible crime of rape and was coerced by her mother to have an abortion. The unborn child was an innocent victim who was killed for the crime of her father. Is it not ironic that we don’t impose the death penalty on the father for his heinous crime but impose a death sentence on the innocent child.