Abby Johnson Recalls: Planned Parenthood Alarm Was 2229 (BABY)

Opinion   |   Abby Johnson   |   Sep 2, 2011   |   5:22PM   |   Washington, DC

It took a few weeks before I got the alarm code to our clinic.  I guess it takes that long for them to trust you.  I remember getting the code and feeling shocked.  The code was 2229.  That seems innocent…until they told me what it spelled out…BABY.  Really.  Wow.  We were really joking about that…our alarm code was mocking the murder of children.

A few weeks later I was introduced to our freezer in the POC (products of conception) lab.  This was the freezer that held the fetal tissue until the biohazard truck came for disposal.  I found out the name for that freezer…the nursery.  Again, that was a joke.  How had that become a joke?

A few days later I learned the password to our phone system…2229…BABY.

A couple years later I remember walking in on my supervisor making jokes with the abortionist and another employee in that same POC lab.  They were joking about how the fetal tissue floating in this dish looked like bar-b-que.  Did I hear that right?  Did they really just say that?  Then one of them said, “I actually think this part looks like strawberry jam.”  I turned around and walked out without saying a word.  I felt sick to my stomach. How did that conversation begin?  How could they say that?  Was it enough to make me leave?  No.  I was one of them now.  I am drenched in the evil of this place.

Several years later I found out that my affiliate was going to build the largest abortion clinic in the Western Hemisphere.  I remember my boss making the announcement. “We are building the largest abortuary in the country!”  We all busted out laughing as we applauded.  We loved hearing all of the words pro-lifers called our clinics. We were all so proud.  We were doing something that would go down in the history books.  Good for us, we thought.

About a year before I left, the Coalition for Life group had moved in next door to our clinic.  We joked about sending them a “welcome to the neighborhood” gift.  Maybe we should send them cookies in the shape of babies with red icing on them that resembles blood.  We laughed.  We thought we were so witty.  It was not wit.

I could go on and on.  I look back now and wonder how I could let my mind become so numb to something so terrible.

You may wonder why I am sharing this with you.  Why would I let you in on conversations that are so disgusting?  I guess I need you to see what it is really like inside these clinics.  Was my experience unique?  Was mine the only clinic that joked around like this?  No.  We are all the same.  Can someone be prolife and work in the abortion industry?  Absolutely not.  Can someone refer a woman to have an abortion and be prolife?  Of course not.

Don’t allow people, in or out of the abortion industry, to believe something that isn’t true.  If we can’t speak the truth, and do it out of compassion, then what are we doing?  If we can’t confront the inconsistencies in someone’s belief system, then why bother being prolife?

There are things that are just true.  You can’t be prolife and work in the abortion industry.  You can’t have an abortion and say you are prolife while you are lying on the abortion table.  You can’t receive a paycheck from the abortion industry and say that you are prolife.  Those things just don’t wash.

It’s time to show consistency in this movement.  It’s time to be honest.  It’s time to start speaking out.