Service Learning Log #1 (Week of 3/15/12)

This week was my third week doing clinic escorting at Planned Parenthood's west side clinic. While VOX UCF is nominally my community partner, I haven't had direct contact with anyone from VOX for a while due to spring break; my main contact has been Cristina, the volunteer coordinator for Planned Parenthood. Both this week and last week, I stayed for the full four hours planned as there was significant protestor activity. (Last week, March 7, was especially vigorous as there was apparently someone with a camera filming them for a documentary or something.) This is likely to continue through the rest of Lent (40 Days for Life), so I expect to be doing the same on the next two Wednesdays.

A major rhetorical point being made repeatedly by the protestors is that they are the bearers of a "truth" that Planned Parenthood is trying to keep from its patients. They frequently shout about visiting pro-life websites or watching YouTube videos of "actual" abortions in order to get the "full story." They are, essentially, using the theory of objective knowledge—the idea that YouTube videos never lie and that more information, regardless of the source, is always better for an "informed" decision. This ignores the situated nature of knowledge—no source, especially not those promoted by "pro-life" organizations, is ever neutral, and for "objective" knowledge to be intentionally forced upon a person in an emotionally vulnerable state is also hardly neutral.

Yet for all their talk about "the facts," politically conservative people have proven surprisingly apt at co-opting postmodern rhetoric as well. The best example is the evolution debate, where they insist that no one "really" knows the truth about the origin of life and that therefore all viewpoints (meaning just theirs) should be presented. In other words, that objective knowledge is actually impossible and therefore that we might as well accept their standpoint as "truth" since it's as good as any other. The clinic protestors are also very good at co-opting the rhetoric of racial justice as well, shouting and waving signs about "black genocide" and pointing out that the patients at the clinic are disproportionately black. (Which couldn't possibly be because black women are about twice as likely to lack health insurance ("People without health insurance coverage," 2008), or that the west side clinic is in a predominantly black neighborhood (Fischer, 2010)!)

Ultimately, the rhetoric of the conservative "pro-life" movement generally demonstrates that they don't have any particularly coherent underlying theory, and that they're mostly just saying whatever they think will get an emotional reaction.

As far as what I've personally been getting out of it, so far it's hard to say specifically. It does at least mean that I've had a reason to start getting out of bed before sunrise on Wednesdays, and that I've met some new and interesting people through volunteering.

Works Cited

Fischer, Eric (2010). Race and ethnicity: Orlando. Retrieved 3/14/2012, from http://www.flickr.com/photos/walkingsf/5011035554/.  

People without health insurance coverage, by race and ethnicity. (2008). Center for Disease Control and Prevention. Retrieved 3/14/2012, from http://www.cdc.gov/Features/dsHealthInsurance/.