Category Archives: sidewalk snippet

Sidewalk Snippet – It’s Always Something

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It’s always something back at the garage behind EMW to disrupt the peace.

Many mornings preachers from various anti abortion cliques from the local area bring their portable amplified equipment to stand at the garage and preach.

They seem to enjoy the sound of their own voices echoing off the multi-level concrete garage.

Those mornings escorts stationed there are often subjected to personalized Bible readings creatively distorted out of context.

When clients park and exit on foot for the block and a half walk to the clinic, the amplified harassers quickly fall into step behind them and then proceed to verbally assault them in the name of free speech to the clinic property line.

Often times these walks are balancing act of escorts quietly reassuring clients, while gently deescalating companions from wanting to shove the individuals following on their heels preaching at them still mic’d up and amplified from a distance of only a few feet.

Today it was not the usual annoying disturbances. It was a car with an alarm going off repeatedly on the second floor of the garage.

Making ample use of the acoustics and clear morning air, it paused briefly every now and then before starting another 3 minute screech fest.

The bright side to this is it did not confront escorts or chase clients down the sidewalk.

Sidewalk Snippet – Donuts

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As clinics and states make the news for extreme restrictions and lack of access to abortion, more people across the country are taking notice.

For escorts a simple thank you, or a kind gesture, goes a long way in diluting the hate that gets spewed our way everyday when we guide and allow individuals to be empowered as they make their healthcare decisions at Kentucky’s only remaining abortion clinic.

This morning was a pleasant surprise as escorts arrived to fresh donuts provided by a reproductive justice activist and Every Saturday Morning blog reader from New Mexico.

But as always, you never know what’s going to set off antis into a tirade. This morning it was body shaming escorts and those eating donuts.

It seems their entire purpose is to ridicule and shame individuals in the name of their religion for personal decisions they make, whether it be donuts or abortion.

Sometimes you just shake your head and wonder how anybody has that much hatred. Unfortunately, that’s just a Tuesday on the sidewalk in Louisville Kentucky.

Sidewalk Snippet – Overheard

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“Every Tuesday morning” they hissed quietly at the friend walking with them.

“That one right there,” they gestured pointing up the sidewalk.

I turned to see who they were talking about as they walked past.

“Same thing every week, assuming I am going to the clinic. I’m just trying to get to work, I don’t think he’s ever looked at my face.”

As the conversation trailed off I watched as they continued down to the crosswalk.

Sure enough, the preacher with the loudspeaker gets in front of them yet again.

Because he does not see them as a person. Only an individual capable of pregnancy.

Sidewalk Snippet – Never Assume

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Today was a slightly chaotic morning with new church members coming out to scream and preach at escorts and clients alike.

Many of us this morning were working multiple stations on the sidewalk making sure it went as smoothly as possible for clients and companions with appointments.

One of our wonderful escorts had to leave and go to work. As he walked down the sidewalk taking off his vest he encountered a client that asked to be walked in.

He immediately agreed and was accompanied by two additional escorts that were wearing vests for the walk down the sidewalk.

Not two minutes had passed since he had been wearing an orange vest escorting in front of the antis when his group of four approached the property line.

Five of our most persistent daily protesters then swarmed the 3 approaching escorts and client. Pleading with the now vest-less male escort not to kill his baby, take responsibility be a man, and if you love her you won’t let her do this.

The client entered the clinic and the three escorts turned back thinking about the assumptions and judgment the antis make every day on people they know nothing about.

Sidewalk Snippet – 7/27/2017 (TW: Description of anti-choice fetus gore)

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One of the more disgusting OSA tactics that they use in their campaign is the “truth trucks.”  These trucks are covered in various anti-choice images (fetus parts, anti-LGBTQ slogans, Defy the government, etc) and are driven (slowly) by the abortion clinic.  One of these images is a giant headless fetus with the words “America!  Your Hands Are Covered with Blood!  ABORTION God have mercy on us”.  What makes this particular image interesting is that they censored the fetus’s genitals.  They have no issue showing a headless bloody fetus BUT they put a black line over the poor fetus’s junk.  Because I guess seeing a dead fetus penis might offend one of them?  Because they think sex organs are bad and immoral?  So lets get this correct.  Perfectly ok to show a giant, headless, bloody fetus on the back door off a truck and drive it around town BUT you better not show the giant, headless, bloody fetus’s penis.  Got it.

 

 

Creating and Affirming Their Own Narratives

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Anti’s love to “argue” with escorts and clients, but it isn’t a typical argument.  After the client has gone into the clinic, the anti’s will (using amplification) have an
argument with them.  The anti’s play themselves and the client.  They speak for the client, then knock down their made up client’s concerns with their own ideas.  They
do this with escorts too, since we won’t engage with them (see the Points of Unity).  We aren’t there to debate with anti’s, so anti’s create an escort argument that they
can “win” over. They also get really upset that we won’t talk to them.  “Will you get in trouble if you talk to me?  Why won’t you debate me?  You have no argument against
what I am saying?  Why can’t we dialog and reason together?”.  As if the personal medical choices of a third-party would be up for debate by two strangers on a sidewalk.
Talk about bad logic and reasoning.

Sidewalk Snippet 6/22/17

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When it comes to our local anti-choice protesters, it seems the bigger the better for intimidation purposes.

Bigger signs, louder sound systems, step stools to loom over the sidewalk, over-big battery-powered bull horns, but very small cameras.


In the age of GoPros and camera phones, there is one particular hold out who shows up on a regular basis with a very vintage 1990s handheld camcorder.

This individual likes to point it at clients, escorts and any passerby. It’s the size of a shoe and even has the handy dandy, very sporty Velcro hand strap.

I don’t even think they make film for those recorders anymore. This is just another tool of psychological intimidation.

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Louisville Clinic Escorts is currently raising money for our Legal Defense Fund. We will be having a concert fundraiser June 25 at 6PM in Louisville, KY. The venue will be announced 24 hours before the fundraiser’s start time on this blog and at the event link below. Donations can be made in person at this event. The fundraiser will feature music by two local bands, a tap takeover at the venue, and a local restaurant selling food. Event information can be found here: http://www.bit.ly/LCEfundraiser

Additionally, donations can be made via PayPal. Just send your donations to everysaturdaymorning@gmail.com (Louisville Clinic Escorts is not a 501c3)

The Day the Circus Came to Town ~ by Penny

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Escorting is always a high-tension job, even on a relatively normal Saturday.  Saturdays always bring out the highest numbers of protesters, and the larger their numbers, the greater their escalations.  This past weekend came with new and frustrating challenges – the whole circus came to town.  

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Operation Save America rode into Louisville this past week in a cargo van emblazoned with headstones and some favorite graphic “dead baby” imagery, with a few lies about breast cancer sprinkled in for variety.  While the clinic was only targeted on Friday and Saturday, the protesters did their best to cause as much disruption as possible during their stay. 

An hour before the clinic opened on Saturday, they set up two large speakers (each on a six foot tripod) along the edge of the property line just outside the waiting room.  Cords were left dangling between these without a care in the world for the trip and fall hazard this creates in a very highly-trafficked area – because nothing says pro-life like harming people.  

As soon as the setup was finished, escorts holding the property line were treated to some Christian-soft-rock at a volume which could be clearly heard around the entire block.

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And again, an entire hour before the clinic even opened its doors:
16559425_2351336238425900_1400690639_nAfter the warm-up tape ran its course, OSA members went on to take turns haranguing escorts and clients about our sinning and iniquity as per usual.  

The rhetoric itself is not what made Saturday special.  When a national, well-funded group like OSA comes to town, our regular cohort of sidewalk “counselors,” sign-wavers, and other motley shamers gets all stirred up.  More of them come.  Many of these unfamiliar faces are not familiar with the property line, the FACE Act, or, it seems, common decency.  Their heightened sense of importance and urgency, combined with the extra crowding and assaulting volume from the speakers, made it a very nervous morning. There were places where the sidewalk was nearly entirely obstructed, either by too many bodies or so that OSA could make room for the props they brought along for extra “poignancy.”

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This is the corner of 2nd and Market – this is what clients had to walk through before even being able to see the clinic’s doors.


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And for reference, here is the view around that same corner.  See the speakers taking up half the sidewalk?  Can you imagine the courage clients and companions have to summon to get through this mess?  Can you think of any other medical practice where this intimidation is tolerated?

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Yes, the picture above is of a tiny white coffin, complete with plastic fetus dolls along the top in a row, on a tray table pushed out into the path of clients on their way in.  

One begins to wonder, looking at their van, their sound system, their tiny caskets – how many women could this money have really helped, if they cared as much as they claim to?  How many meals could this have made for a food-insecure pregnant person, how many nice outfits to go on interviews, how many hours of childcare for the babies already in this world?  If this weren’t actually about controlling the minds and bodies of women, how much of that lobbying power could they throw behind paid medical leave for all new parents?  Looking at the fancy equipment, and the van that’s certainly much newer than any vehicle I’ve ever owned, I have to wonder:  what do they believe their GoPros, amplifiers, custom paint jobs, and bags of tiny plastic fetuses are accomplishing?  

 

 

Subtle, but not very….

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Emotions can run high on the sidewalk, even though it may not always be outwardly visible.  If anything, escorts do our best to keep things “normal”.  “Normal”, at least in my estimation, is walking to the doctor’s office with as little drama or personal space violation as possible.  You  know, like walking down any other sidewalk on any other street would be. That is the goal.  Minimal nonsense and maximum expediency to the door for the client.

Enter the anti’s.  Their goal is disruption.  Their tools are harassment, shame, and outrageous statements, but their main goal is to stop the client from walking into the abortion clinic. The shame and nonsense that comes out of their mouths is their most obvious weapon. “Don’t kill your baby. That baby will look just like you.  Young man, we are called to protect women, stand up for her.”  The litany goes on and on. Their most subtle, and in my opinion the most insidious thing that anti’s do is they themselves get “emotional”.  Their voices rise and their voices break and they beg and cry and implore.  They also put their bodies in front of the clients and the escorts to impede walking down the sidewalk. “But this is a BAAAAAYYYBBEEEEEEE” is a favorite of the anti that we call “The Cryer”.  She often trails behind the clients and wails at their backs. As soon as the client is in the clinic, however, she and others are back on the sidewalk chatting with their fellow protesters.  It is so ridiculous for them to be so dialed in and emotional one second, then completely composed the next.  It seems fake and a pantomime of someone who actually cares.  Not only faking the emotion, but then throwing it into a strangers face.

Another “tactic” that the preaching protesters like to use is while crying and wailing for the unborn, they assign innocence or guilt to a fetus that deserves neither.  They plead constantly for the “innocent baby that you are going to kill” and in the next breath “God will judge you guilty of murder”.  They talk about the “innocence of the baby in the womb” then “At our birth we are bound for hell.” The double talk that goes on with the sidewalk preachers is constant and ridiculous.  Save the baby so it will be bound for hell unless it does what we say.  Yeah. Subtle, but not very.

Sidewalk Snippet ~ {11/11/13}

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Escorts hear this a lot, but this morning was such a clear example of what the antis believe about choice I wanted to share.

The antis always come out armed with pamphlets to give to the clients and companions. When you go into the clinic lobby any morning, frequently these pamphlets that were thrust into their hands are scattered on the floor; left behind because they were unwanted.

This morning an escort followed a client inside of the lobby to answer a question. While they were there, the client handed them the pamphlet that had just been shoved towards them as they crossed the property line. Three antis were watching the escort and client from the property line as they talked. They were closely lined up to get a clear vision through the the glass door. D said, “I knew it. Did you see that?”

When the escort came out, they stood at the entrance and ripped the pamphlet up. Trainee (fully trained now) said, “You have just destroyed her opportunity to make a choice. You are not giving her a choice.”

Really? As if the choice wasn’t made and that one pamphlet was the key to making a decision? What about their choice to not have the pamphlet? If the client had wanted to read it, they would have kept it. If they hadn’t made their decision before reaching the sign-in window of the clinic, I’m sure one pamphlet wouldn’t have made up their mind either.

The antis constantly berate escorts about their definition of “choice.” They seem to have a different meaning for the word than we do.