{"id":203482,"date":"2019-05-30T13:32:03","date_gmt":"2019-05-30T18:32:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.liveaction.org\/news\/?p=203482"},"modified":"2019-05-31T13:57:37","modified_gmt":"2019-05-31T18:57:37","slug":"media-matter-live-action-dominating-facebook","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/media-matter-live-action-dominating-facebook\/","title":{"rendered":"Media Matters slams Live Action for ‘dominating’ Facebook’s abortion news"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Media Matters for America, a highly partisan “progressive research and information center dedicated to comprehensively monitoring, analyzing, and correcting conservative misinformation,” according to its own self-description, is going hard after pro-life news sources, including Live Action and founder Lila Rose<\/a>. Claiming in the very first paragraph of its article<\/a> that sites like Live Action use “sensationalized anti-choice rhetoric and harmful misinformation,” the clearly biased “research” center appears to be attempting to get pro-life sites labeled as harmful “fake news.” In actuality, what Media Matters did was show Live Action’s powerful messaging is changing hearts and minds. Media Matters writes:<\/p>\n

A Media Matters study of top-engaged U.S. abortion-related coverage on Facebook in the month of April found that 63% of links with the most Facebook interactions came from right-leaning websites, and 72% of the Facebook page posts with the most interactions came from right-leaning pages. Two anti-abortion websites, LifeNews.com<\/a> and Live Action<\/a><\/strong>, made up almost 30% of viral links, and the two main Facebook pages affiliated with these sites made up more than a quarter of the most popular Facebook posts….<\/em><\/p>\n

Forty-two of the top-engaged posts came from LifeNews.com\u2019s main Facebook page (16.1%), and they earned almost 689,000 interactions (15.2%). Live Action\u2019s<\/strong> main Facebook page had 26 top-engaged posts (10%) that earned over 523,000 interactions (11.6%). The Facebook page affiliated with Live Action President Lila Rose<\/strong> had the fourth highest number of top-engaged posts at 14 (5.4%) and fifth highest number of interactions with over 179,000 interactions (4%). Ben Shapiro\u2019s Facebook page had the third highest number of top-engaged posts at 21(8%) that earned almost 342,000 interactions (7.6%).<\/em><\/p>\n

When combined<\/em> (seen in chart below), Live Action and Live Action president Lila Rose had 40 of the top Facebook page posts about abortion-related coverage in the U.S.:<\/p>\n

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In the chart below, you can see that combined<\/em>, Live Action and Live Action president Lila Rose actually lead all others, with 702,618<\/strong>\u00a0total interactions on Facebook:<\/p>\n

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But further reading in to Media Matters’ accusations reveals the organization is grasping at straws. First, it takes issue with pro-life organizations’ coverage of what many refer to as “heartbeat bills,” or bills that ban abortion once a preborn child’s heartbeat can be detected, usually around six weeks. But in an effort to debunk groups like Live Action, Media Matters uses “medical experts” — otherwise known as doctors who abort children for a living — to claim that preborn children don’t even have heartbeats.<\/p>\n

Good call, Media Matters: be sure to quote as impartial the people who stand to profit the most from getting the public to believe that “cardiac activity” doesn’t indicate life.<\/em><\/p>\n

MM’s accusations of “anti-abortion misinformation” are easily disproven<\/u><\/strong><\/p>\n

Accusing Live Action and others of “anti-abortion misinformation,” Media Matters writes:<\/p>\n

Top-engaged content from right-leaning sources often pushed anti-abortion misinformation. Twenty-three percent of links from right-leaning websites reviewed in this study pushed for six-week bans on abortion (also inaccurately referred to as \u201cheartbeat bills\u201d) based on the anti-choice<\/a> claim that abortion should be banned as soon as fetal cardiac activity is detected, typically by six weeks. Medical experts<\/a>, however, say “cardiac activity isn’t a credible measure of fetal viability.” Right-leaning websites and pages also shared false stories about Democrats supporting \u201cinfanticide\u201d<\/a> (they don\u2019t<\/a>) and anti-conservative censorship by social media platforms (there is none<\/a>).<\/em><\/p>\n

First of all… how is supporting a six-week ban on abortion once a heartbeat is detected, “anti-abortion misinformation”? Media Matters doesn’t clarify. In addition, the argument from pro-lifers has never been about “fetal viability” — it’s always been about\u00a0recognizing\u00a0humanity from the moment of fertilization<\/i>.<\/p>\n

1. Media Matters’ medical “experts” are physicians who make money from abortion<\/b><\/p>\n

The hyperlinked source in the quote for medical “experts” above actually links to a Huffington Post article<\/a> featuring Dr. David Eisenberg, an abortionist and medical director at Planned Parenthood of the St. Louis Region (infamous for his apparent cluelessness about hand washing protocols<\/a> at his abortion facility), as well as Dr. Rebecca Cohen, a Denver-area abortionist<\/a>. Super impartial experts<\/em>, there.\u00a0But the Huffington Post author writes, interestingly enough, that one of the abortionists agrees that the heartbeat is detected at five to six weeks<\/em>:<\/p>\n

A fetal heartbeat is typically detectable at around five or six weeks into a pregnancy, according to Dr. Rebecca Cohen, an assistant professor of obstetrics and gynecology at the University of Colorado.<\/em><\/p>\n

This is exactly what Live Action and Live Action News have reported — again<\/a>, and again<\/a>, and again<\/a>. However, Cohen also claims “it’s not a fully formed heart.” But the preborn child’s heart is actually pumping blood by five weeks gestation<\/a>\u00a0(heartbeat begins between 16 and 21 days, a known and accepted fact), and is fully formed<\/a> by 10 weeks gestation.\u00a0<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n