Welcome to PulsePoint with James Williams for 14th November 2024. In this episode:
- Pharmac moves to “demedicalise” abortion. 0:41
- Attempts to silence an anti-abortion campaigner in Australia. 2:40
- Disinformation bill in Australia wants to suppress free speech for some. 5:45
- Trump’s day one promises, we highlight a few that could change the world. 7:41
- Mixed reactions to the Trans & Pregnant documentary. 14:49
- And…It’s time for us to stand against abortion and March For Life. 17:02
PulsePoint features the latest media stories and research related to family and society that you need to know about – issues from both New Zealand and overseas that the Family First team have been monitoring and researching over the last week. It’s time to cut through the spin and uncover the real issues. We’ll keep watching the news… so that you don’t have to.
TRANSCRIPT:
Hello friends, welcome to PulsePoint. In this episode…
-Pharmac moves to “demedicalise” abortion
– Attempts to silence an anti-abortion campaigner in Australia.
-Trump’s day one promises, we highlight a few that could change the world.
-And…it’s time for us to stand against abortion and March For Life.
This and much more to come.
Let’s get into it…I’m James Williams.
1.
Pharmac says it is “demedicalising” abortion in its latest move to fund at home testing kits.
The crown entity has this week announced it will fund the urine based test kits so that those who chose to kill their baby in the womb by taking a pill can make sure that the baby is actually dead.
Pharmac says more than 9000 New Zealanders will have access to these kits in the first year of funding.
This means, we as taxpayers are paying to “demedicalise” abortion. This is simply a further attempt to normalise and make it easier to undertake this evil act.
Also, on the 9000 people set to use the kits…let’s put that into perspective.
In its 2023 report on abortion, the Ministry of Health showed that in 2022 there were 14,164 abortions. We have since received information from the Ministry that 2023’s statistics show abortions increasing even more, to 16,277.
The ministry’s statistics also showed that in 2022 for the first time ever, Early Medical Abortions or EMA’s, eg taking the pills, outnumbered surgical abortions. See on the graph there it says in 2022 there were 7171 EMA procedures. Again, updated figures show an increase in 2023 to around 10,000 early medical abortions.
As we can see abortion rates continue to skyrocket.
More women are now taking a pill to kill their unborn child…and Pharmac are so supportive of this that they are providing kits to make sure they’ve done the job.
2.
Across the ditch..
Anti-abortion campaigner, Dr Joanna Howe, has been banned from the South Australian parliament…in what she says is a hit job in an attempt to silence her.
Dr Howe, a professor of law at University of Adelaide, had involvement in preparing the Forced Birth law, which would have seen late term abortions stopped in favour of the babies being birthed alive and adopted out.
The legislation was narrowly outvoted and failed to progress.
According to Legislative Council president Terry Stephens, he received several complaints of intimidating behaviour by Dr Howe.
On her social media, Joanna Howe denies the claims calling it a “hit job”.
{watch video}
Joanna Howe says the ban has not been given any expiration date so could be forever.
Dr Howe also says she has not been given a chance to respond to the claims nor any way to seek justice.
3.
Still in Australia, a bill which aims to limit free speech continues to make its way through parliament.
The Combatting Misinformation and Disinformation Bill 2024 had another reading last week, and seemingly has one final hurdle to jump…the Australian Senate…before it officially becomes law.
It would see the Australian Communications and Media Authority deem what is categorized misinformation and disinformation.
Social media companies would need to quickly stop the information or risk massive fines.
Sky News recently produced this commentary.
{watch video}
The current bill has exemptions…for example, information used for satire or parody or information as part of news, scientific, academic, artistic or religious content.
Both this story and the previous, should be concerning, given we have seen New Zealand’s governing bodies follow Australia’s lead on many occasions.
4.
Now that the US election is all done, many are looking to President-elect Donald Trump keeping his numerous day one promises.
While we won’t cover all of them today, we will look at three.
We will start with Trump saying that he will free prisoners wrongly targeted by the Biden administration including pro-lifers.
{watch video}
Donald Trump has also stated he will move to restrict trans rights.
{watch video}
And Trump is also supporting the growing movement of homeschooling.
{watch video}
We hope that the President-elect will honour these promises. There is also hope that these changes may influence similar sentiment throughout the world.
5.
There have been mixed reactions to the Trans and Pregnant documentary which was aired on TVNZ this week.
It follows a woman, who now identifies as a man, as she bears a child.
Comments on social media range from calling it “shocking” or “disgusting”…while others were more literal in their description by saying it’s a woman with facial hair having a baby with a bi-sexual man.
Here are a few short clips.
{watch video}
This week’s McBlog has more detail on the documentary, be sure to tune in on the Family First website or our social media sites.
6.
And finally, it is time for you and I to stand against the killing of babies in the womb.
On Saturday 7 December you have an opportunity to give up some of your valuable time to March for Life on the streets of Wellington.
Given that in the last 3 decades the leaders of every country in the world, except for around 20 countries, have turned their back on defending the unborn to some degree…it’s now up to us, the people, to bear witness to this horrific act. If we don’t do it, who will?
One of this year’s guest speakers is Quiana Casamayor. Be sure to watch her Family Matters interview with Simon O’Connor this week.
Please also make sure to visit marchforlife.nz for more details about the upcoming event.
Conclusion
Thank you for watching PulsePoint.
You can check out MORE on our website familyfirst.nz.
I’m James Williams, see you next week.
