Campaign declaring Wichita the “Abortion Capital” causes a stir among civic leaders
Wichita, KS — The Wichita Eagle published a story along with a huge, page-wide photo about Operation Rescue’s billboards along I-35 in Oklahoma that declare Wichita the nation’s “Abortion Capital.” The story mentions that the Greater Wichita Convention and Visitors Bureau has received some phone calls from people concerned that the billboards might give Wichita a bad name.
“George Tiller is the one who has given Wichita a bad name,” said Operation Rescue President Troy Newman, who moved OR’s offices and staff to Wichita from Southern California to battle Tiller. “The city’s reputation has been further harmed by the fact that so many local companies enable Tiller to continue to his late-term chills-killing operation here by doing business with him.”
Operation Rescue has published the names of the “Top 50 Abortion Collaborators” — Wichita businesses that profit from the deaths of innocent children at Tiller’s world famous abortion mill.
“We believe people have a right to know who is in bed with the abortion industry. Men and women of conscience do not want to spend their money supporting such businesses or communities,” said OR spokesperson Cheryl Sullenger. “We encourage people to contact the abortion collaborators and the Greater Wichita Convention and Visitors Bureau, and voice their concerns about their support of George Tiller’s late-term abortion business.”
Greater Wichita Convention and Visitors Bureau
100 S. Main, Suite 100, Wichita, KS 67202
Voice:(316) 265-2800; Toll Free: (800) 288-9424
Fax: (316) 265-0162
President & CEO John Rolfe: JRolfe@visitwichita.com
Vice President Olivia Reynolds: OReynolds@visitwichita.com
View Abortion Collaborators List
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A new campaign about Wichita
To some, Air Capital is ‘abortion capital’
BY RON SYLVESTER, The Wichita Eagle, March 20, 2006
“Wichita: Abortion Capital of the World.”
That’s the message on two billboards south of Oklahoma City on I-35.
The billboards, facing northbound traffic, were put up by the anti-abortion group Operation Rescue West, which said it paid $1,000 each for the signs. The group gathered donations to pay for the billboards and hopes they will discourage others who share the opinion from patronizing Wichita.
“We’re hoping to establish these billboards on all the major routes leading into Wichita,” Operation Rescue West’s Troy Newman of Wichita told The Eagle.
Newman’s targets are familiar: Women’s Health Care Services and its doctor, George Tiller, who is recognized internationally as a specialist in late-term abortions.
“By Tiller’s own admission, they do more late-term abortions than anywhere in the United States, possibly the world,” Newman said. “It has become an epicenter of the pro-life fight.”
Olivia Simmons of the Greater Wichita Convention and Visitors Bureau said Wichita has been a focal point of the abortion debate since the “Summer of Mercy” protests in 1991.
Simmons said she didn’t expect the billboards to make any more of an impact on visitors to the city, or related businesses such as lodging, shopping and eating, than other notorious stories, such as the BTK serial killer.
“I think people who see the billboards have already made up their minds on where they stand on the issue,” Simmons said. “We’ve gotten a couple of calls from people worried that there might be a negative impact. But we survived BTK, which was an international news story, and we’re moving ahead and growing as a progressive city.”
The Operation Rescue West billboards show a newborn baby and a pensive young woman under the banner “Abortion: One Dead, One Wounded.”
Newman said the Oklahoma billboards want to steer those who oppose abortion rights away from visiting Wichita.
“We also want to give the women driving up from Louisiana, Texas and Oklahoma about 2 ½ hours to think about what they’re doing, and maybe change their minds,” Newman said. “People come from all over the United States to have abortions here.”
The director of a Kansas abortion rights support group called the billboards an intimidation tactic.
“It’s unfortunate,” said Julie Burkhart of ProKanDo, “that some people try to intimidate and shame others for making difficult and responsible decisions about their lives.”
Reach Ron Sylvester at (316) 268-6514 or rsylvester@wichitaeagle.com.
Will the press leave no good turn unstoned?!
“It’s unfortunate,” said Julie Burkhart of ProKanDo, “that some people try to intimidate and shame others for making difficult and responsible decisions about their lives.” … How bassackwards. The decision to murder an innocent child may be difficult; to any person with a functioning heart and mind, it’s unthinkable. But to call it responsible when it is, in fact, the ultimate abdication of responsibility is just another classic example of the Orwellian doublespeak that we have come to know and expect from the death merchants and their allies.
Then there is the phrase, “decisions about their lives”…conveniently ignoring the impact that the decision has on it’s first victim, the unborn child. It’s not by accident that Roe was sold to America (under a very carefully designed, false cover) AFTER the 60′s revolution had made as many people as possible the center of their own universes…the “Me” generation, we were called; all that mattered was “Me.” Julie Burkhart is just another typical manifestation of this narcissistic orientation that won’t look beyond the end of her own nose. And what is calling billboards exposing evil for what it is an intimidation tactic but an intimidation tactic in itself? She should be ashamed of the haughty, pseudo-sensitive, deceitfulness of her own words, in addition to the trail of innocent blood staining every major road leading into and out of Wichita; blood wantonly, senselessly shed in the slaughter of the innocent children brought there without their knowledge, and certainly against their wishes.
Aside from the children destroyed by these “decisions”, ORW has posted several glowing testimonials to the effect that at least some of Tillers “satisfied customers” found their actual abortion experiences to be a far cry from what they were misled to expect, as have thousands of other post-abortive women since Roe.
When thinking what informed these decisions, “responsibility” somehow does not spring to mind nearly as readily as manipulation of truth, the emotions of somone in crisis, and the vested interests of a merciless hit-man. (A classic example of “responsibility” as defined by ProKanDo is the heat with which it’s infamous leader chases any ambulance that carries yet another of his already-born victims to a hospital. Why is he running so fast? To persuade the woman and/or her family, should she not survive, not to sue his sorry hide, and to be on hand to see that the records of her injuries do not threaten his standing in the community…to protect HIM and his killing agenda, NOT THE WOMEN. See Tiller run, run, run, from responsibility.
Simmons also does no one any credit in referring to the murder of these children as “an issue”. An issue is something abstract, that can be negotiated. An induced abortion is a concrete, physical act of violence that deliberately murders a real, innocent human being.
And “progress”, in itself, is not a necessarily good thing; that all depends on the direction in which one is progressing. Some people refer to “progress” in an egg, for instance, as “going bad”.
It has been amply demonstrated again and again, here, that George Tiller and his minions are deliberately, shamelessly, heartlessly and senselessly doing all they can to move Wichita, Kansas, and the U.S. in the direction of the Third Reich.
If there is anything wrong with what ORW is doing, it is that it isn’t strong enough…but at least someone is doing something; and, since we know good and well that Burkhart, Simmons, Sylvester, et al, would have nary a critical word to say if it was their endangered lives ORW was trying to save, it is certainly inappropriate to cast the aspersions on their efforts to save others at least equally deserving and desirous (Please see silentscream.org for documentation of that claim, if any is really needed) of the intervention they would want if their positions were reversed.
The way some people ( such as Tiller ) choose to live their lives is something they should be ashamed of. The only reason his merry band is crying about those billboards is because they show people what abortion truly is. It’s easy to justify the killing when you aren’t faced with the victim. And I can’t think of anything sadder than an innocent baby being torn to shreds. I speak from my own experience in Tiller’s mill. The description of the process is very technical in its terminology, they refer to the baby as a “product of conception”. I will never forget the day Tiller stopped my son’s heart with his needle full of digoxin. The two things I remember most were Tiller yelling at me while I was on the table not to move or he’d just have to do it again and going from feeling my baby move to feeling stillness. I wish women who were going in there could know how heartbreaking that is before they make the biggest mistake of their lives. Believe me, it is not easy to admit that I made a mistake that cost another human being his life, but if I can stop even one other woman from doing it, then it’s all worth it. Tiller is not a nice man, he has no respect for his patients. Every day I was in there, he made some type of condescending, snitty comment. The laminaria insertions are painful and I writhed aroud on the table, he became agitated and held up his hand and told me that he was going to give me a biology lesson and the lesson was that the more I move the more he will hurt me, he said that his fingers do not bend the way my body was bending. On the day of my induction, after he broke my water, he told me not to scream ( as he was using forceps and shoving his entire hand inside of my body ) or I would scare the other patients and I cried and told him that I had never been in that much pain. He condescendingly told me that I’ve never been pregnant before either.
Any group or person that works overtime to defend a murderer has something fundamentally wrong with them.
These billboards are fantastic. Good job.
Good for you!! Keep it up. Add more of them.
It would take a lot of nerve to be more graphic. But, i hope it does come to that. Nothing could turn the stomache more than seeing all the baby dismembered body parts on a table. Beside that a smiling woman and the “choice” on her t-shirt. People don’t know how ugly the business is. I know, it’s taste-less. But, so is the pro-death lobby group. Fight fire with fire.
Peace (may we all learn to embrace each other),
Stefan Simon
Isn’t it amazing that everyone who makes cash off the deaths of children always touts the “agonzing choice” that has to be made.
Newsflash: it is only agonizing because it kills a baby!!! And that agony never goes away. Killing a baby is NEVER “responsible”.
If photos of abortion are too horrible then the act is also.
OR needs to keep telling the world about our city of murder.
Tina, If you are reading this-I just want to tell you how sorry I am that you went through that horrific experience @ the hands of that scuz-bag murderer! Im sure your heart breaks over the death of your son. Im glad that people like you are exposing the industry for what it is. It sounds like you have faced the truth,and you are not trying to down play it.I hope that others will learn from your story.The billboards are fantastic! We need more of them.It sounds to me like Tiller is a sexual pervert and gets off on abusing women.He must be stopped!
How about this-STOP TILLER THE KILLER and LEROY CARHARTLESS
We need more of these all across the USA
While I support this organization’s right to express its opinion, I am using my tourism dollars to support the community of Wichita. I support a woman’s right to choose and I am very thankful that there are some that don’t bow to the intimidation and fearmongering organizations such as this one use.