STATEN ISLAND, NY. -- No matter where people stand on abortion, recent videos from The Center for Medical Progress have sent shockwaves through both sides of the issue.
"If there was a higher gestation and the technicians needed it, there were times when they would just take what they wanted. And these mothers don't know. And there's no way they would know," Holly O'Donnell, a former procurement technician for StemExpress, said.
StemExpress is a harvesting company that partners with Planned Parenthood and is shown in the most recent CMP video.
When a mother-to-be comes to any Planned Parenthood clinic, she's required to sign a form consenting to an abortion. For the body parts of their baby to be harvested she must sign a separate form of consent.
Apparently, that's not always the case.
Harvesting, the Horrifying Nightmare
Harvesting has been going on for some time, but the videos prove it's much worse than anyone ever thought.
"The abortion industry has not reformed itself it has not repented, it has not stopped doing this activity and now of course, with social media, as a much more powerful tool today than we had in the late 90s, we are able to make even more people aware of this in an even shorter time," Father Frank Pavone with Priests for Life said.
Planned Parenthood defends itself by saying the videos are heavily edited and claiming they've done nothing illegal. The only thing Planned Parenthood apologized for was the callous tone used by Planned Parenthood officials in the videos.
As columnist Kirsten Powers wrote in USA Today, it's not the tone that's the problem; "it's the crushing" of babies.
"This is disturbing to so many of our fellow Americans who would not say that they are pro-life, who would not say that they favor eliminating abortion. But when they see this, they are disturbed. Why? Because the word 'abortion' has practically lost all its meaning, and it's only when we see it -- and this is a strategy we've advocated for decades -- it's only when we see it that we get to the point where we realize what an abortion actually is," Pavone said.
There is no nice way to talk about the techniques used to procure the body parts of an aborted baby. They are horrifying. Even those who have taken part in the procedures have been affected.
"The moment I took the tweezers I put them in the dish and I remember grabbing the leg and I said, 'This is the leg,' and the moment I picked it up I could just feel death and pain, like I've never felt that before, shoot up through my body and I started to, I blacked out basically," O'Donnell recalled.
Disturbing Possibilities
Another disturbing question resulting from these videos: Are babies being born alive and then killed to keep their body's intact?
"Kermit Gosnell, the Philadelphia abortionist is serving life sentences right now precisely for having done that -- killing babies after they came out of the womb. This is a question now raised with a higher level of seriousness because in these interviews we see these Planned Parenthood doctors saying that this is something they can do," said Father Pavone.
In the fifth CMP video, Melissa Farrell, a Planned Parenthood official says, "If we alter our process and we are able to obtain intact fetal cadavers, then we can make it part of the budget, that any dissections are this, and splitting the specimens into different shipments is this. I mean, it's all just a matter of line items."
Dr. Alveda King went through several abortions in her early twenties. Now in her sixties, she's still haunted by them and shudders to think what she may have signed while in no physical or mental condition to do so.
"I remember being in the abortion facilities and they'll give you sedatives and antibiotics, shove that at you and a clipboard with papers. At that very stressful time, making decisions without the right type of information, that young mother or the older mother, is not ready to say 'I want to donate tissue to science.' In that particular setting you just want to be done and be finished without really comprehending the whole thing," King said.
Running Out of Tricks
This isn't the first time Planned Parenthood has been exposed. Yet, as video after video is released, its loyal advocates remain silent. Companies are beginning to distance themselves or pull support and the cry to defund the nation's largest abortion provider grows louder and louder.
"Planned Parenthood has played every trick in the book. Planned Parenthood has run out of tricks now, thanks to social media, thanks to what's available in the mainstream media and then those who will go beyond to find truth," King said.
The truth, King says, is that Planned Parenthood isn't in the healing business and can no longer hide behind that claim.
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