This week's edition of The 3, a review of three stories of relevance to the Christian community, includes analysis of a pro-life amendment that was rejected by the voters of Kansas last week. Also, two pro-life organizations have found themselves censored by Big Tech companies. And, health care employees in Illinois will be receiving a financial settlement in a lawsuit filed after their religious exemptions to the COVID shot were denied.
Kansas voters reject pro-life amendment
It was called the "Value Them Both" Amendment, a reference to a woman and her unborn child. Going into a vote on that amendment, on the ballot in Kansas last Tuesday, the polling data indicated it had a good chance of passage. But, the only poll that counted told a different story, and it was defeated by an almost 60-40 margin.
Live Action News reported on the vote, stating that the amendment "would have confirmed there is no right to abortion in the state constitution and allowed the state legislators to create pro-life laws. The amendment would not have banned abortion but would have simply allowed pro-life protections to be enacted in the state." The amendment "would have overturned the state Supreme Court’s decision to deem abortion as a right in the Kansas constitution."
The Washington Stand quoted from state Rep. Ron Estes, who said, "Unfortunately, there was a lot of money that came in from out of state. And a lot of confusion was created in people’s minds about what really was being voted on and what it really meant..." Noted pro-life professor Michael New, who serves with the Charlotte Lozier Institute, said, "It wasn’t really clear what the implications of this amendment were,” adding, “Many thought that would result in a statewide abortion ban, which is not the case. But that’s the messaging the other side used to great effect.” The article noted:
Those who wish to increase protections for unborn children should not let the Kansas vote convince them to throw in the towel. “We are not promised an easy-glide path to victory after Dobbs. We’re going to have to take this to the states, and we’re even going to run into resistance, even in conservative states,” New explained.
Pro-life groups face media censorship
There are those who would want to distort or silence the pro-life message in a number of ways, and the run-up to the Kansas vote is illustrative of that. Plus, enormous amounts of pro-abortion money can threatened to drown it out - but not if pro-life people continue to engage one-on-one and on social media.
But, censorship by Big Tech, unfortunately, is another strategy that is being used against pro-lifers. The organization Live Action has found itself censored by TikTok. Its Life Action News website related:
Another tech company has censored Live Action, with TikTok completely blocking Live Action founder and president Lila Rose’s account. In addition, the Live Action account has been barred from advertising on the platform altogether.
In a Twitter thread, Rose shared what happened. “My account (@lilaroselife) has been BANNED from [TikTok] and [Live Action] has been BANNED from advertising,” she wrote. “This extreme political bias by Tiktok is a blatant double standard and places the lives of children in danger. All [Live Action] advertisements have been BANNED; [TikTok] claim our ads were ‘driven by partisan political motives.’ But TikTok is the one being partisan & political — allowing pro-abort groups to run ads while penalizing pro-life groups.”
National Religious Broadcasters reported on its website that a Faith Radio programmer has experienced social media censorship. Life Issues Institute President Brad Mattes stated: “We knew that we had a window of time when people were more focused on abortion,” adding, "Capitalizing on public interest in the Supreme Court’s then-forthcoming decision in Dobbs v. Jackson, we put together a program focused on those individuals who were not pro-life but could be persuaded.”
The article notes:
But after the leaked Dobbs decision appeared in the media, rather than spiking in visibility, the campaign took a sharp downturn. Life Issues Institute’s compelling videos, previously viewed by over 10,000 people per day, began averaging approximately 2,500 daily views.
The organization had run into some issues even trying to get its content on Google, being required to submit pieces of information over and over again. A "media professional" working with Life Issues said that this recent occurrence was, according to the NRB article, "'the most blatant example of censorship' they had ever seen."
Health care workers win financial settlement from lawsuit, reinstated
Its deeply troubling to see how health care workers who had been lauded for the bravery in responding to the coronavirus pandemic were maligned by employers and government authorities because of their refusal to receive a COVID shot because of religious objections.
Standing for Freedom Center reports that a class action lawsuit by health care employees has been settled for over $10 million. The article reports:
The state of Illinois had put in place a mandate that required all workers in the healthcare system to be vaccinated or receive weekly testing and wear masks. NorthShore, which operates six hospitals and a large physician group with more than 140 locations in the Chicago region, initially gave employees the impression that they would allow religious accommodations, but later informed them that no religious exemptions would be granted.Liberty Counsel represented the plaintiffs, and the complaint they filed, said, according to the Cook County Record, quoted in the Standing for Freedom article: “Despite being willing and capable of complying with all social distancing, testing, monitoring, and facial covering requirements (and all other reasonable requests arising from accommodation for their sincerely held religious beliefs), Plaintiffs are being discriminatorily targeted, singled out, and punished for the exercise of their sincerely held religious beliefs.”
NorthShore also agreed to allow any terminated workers to be rehired if they apply within 90 days and to be reinstated to their previous seniority level. The health system will also change its vaccine policy to allow for religious exemptions.
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