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jovitahernandez
Thank you. I viewed the documentary and felt it was biased. I felt it was missing prolife people that are 1. more representative of women like me a pro woman, pro life, 2. The truth and lies of how the real Janet Roe was used to pass this law, and 3. Actual accounts of what abortion is, those who used to be involved in clinics with this procedure, and women who have been misled or have had an abortion and regret it - how about abortion survivors. So no, by no means does it show both sides. What was strange was how it leaves you feeling bad about women having to struggle more and more to get an abortion. It’s more of an alarm to join prochoice groups to protect RoeVWade. It completely shows empathy for one side and your explanation of the editing is an important observation on how it accomplished to make even the most pro life person feel bad about what women are “being denied”. Great work.
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Brian Macintosh
Thank you for the Analysis. I don’t have Netflix so I haven’t seen the program. It sounds like it is aimed at Pro-Life people by the title but apparently pro abortion choice people also are interested in this by the tactics around Kavanaugh’s appointment.
I spoke to a lady at Church about praying for the Babies (88 are executed each week in our state of South Australia). She said that she is more concerned with the women who have no choice. Later in the day I was talking to a lady who is scared that her 28year old son, who is living at home, and the government psychiatrist says is ok to live at home, will kill her. It sounds to me like she is the one with no choice but to abort him postnatally. I guess the people in this film would argue in favour of that too.
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Anonymous
disqus_CkFUZzPj0y easy
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m17l6s85
If the documentary is about a contemporary political issue, I assume it is the opposite of neutral. I actually refuse to even bother watching anything referred to as a "documentary" because I'll just wonder the whole time what information they're leaving out to push me toward the creator's own views and conclusions.
If everyone viewed contemporary political documentaries as propaganda and watched them with that understanding, it wouldn't really bother me. Instead it seems like most people assume "documentary" means "in-depth, objective fact-telling." In my experience, these films are anything but. I find the whole situation very irritating.
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Anonymous
From what I've heard, Lake of Fire is fair to both sides. Or at least, pro-life groups as well as pro-choice groups are willing to hold free screenings for it. If I recall correctly, the film took ten years to make and the director was undecided on abortion both before and after he made it.
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joshbrahm
If I'm remembering the right documentary, I think I agree, although it's been a long time since I saw it. (And I might be mentally confusing it with another film.) The one I'm thinking of showed some good and less flattering moments from both sides of the debate.
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Anonymous
joshbrahm what
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Anonymous
Contains footage of a late abortion and has a lot of focus on clinic bombers, so I think that fits the bill.
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joshbrahm
Yeah, I think your assumption that at least most documentaries are not neutral is reasonable, but I really wish it was otherwise, and I'm arguing in this series that documentaries are less trustworthy when they're so biased.
I still find it helpful to watch biased documentaries because it exposes me to arguments or stories I might not have heard otherwise, but I treat it the same way as when I read articles or books from the other side. I've got my skeptical hat on, aware that some of what I'm reading may not be true.
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Anonymous
I’ll watch later, but from what I’ve heard they cover abortion clinic bombings but make no reference to Kermit Gosnell. That’s a pretty glaring omission, seeing as the Gosnell case was the main catalyst that drove the New ‘10s wave of abortion regulations. Do they discuss partial-birth abortion or the abortion lobby’s full-throated embrace of it? That was also a major game changer in the national debate. There’s even an argument to be made that the pro-life movement would be politically irrelevant today (a lot of sane pro-lifers were ready to give up) if it weren’t for the partial-birth abortion debate.
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joshbrahm
Agreed, omitting the Gosnell case was pretty bad. They do talk about the partial-birth abortion ban, but in one of the most deceptive sections of the documentary. I discuss this in part six of my series. They play two pro-choice people strongly implying that pro-lifers made up the entire procedure, when we merely coined the phrase because it was clearer than saying "dilation and extraction."
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Anonymous
I see I missed the table of contents, my apologies. I look forward to watching the videos.