The episode was called “Small Victories,” but “Parenthood” producers might have done better to call it “Small Dead Baby.” On Tuesday night, the popular NBC drama about dysfunctional people featured Planned Parenthood’s number-one service, abortion, in an episode where a teenage girl finds out she is pregnant and quickly has an abortion.
Parenthood is a continuing saga of angst and drama, but in a recent episode, teenagers Drew and Amy had sex and got caught in the act. In this week’s episode, Amy finds out she is pregnant. She tells Drew as they sit in front of their high school:
“I called Planned Parenthood, and I made an appointment for Wednesday before school.”
Drew asks, “Why, to have an abortion?”
“No,” Amy says, “they have to confirm the pregnancy before I can do anything about it. … It’s just like a consultation.”
He asks her if she is going to tell her parents, and she says she doesn’t know.
Next we see Amy’s appointment, where a Planned Parenthood worker tells her, “If you decide to continue the pregnancy, we’d be happy to refer you for prenatal care.” A random “adoption is always an option” is thrown in the spiel.
As they leave, Amy says to Drew, “There’s only one option,” and she decides to get an appointment for an abortion the next day, though Drew argues that there are other options. Emotional, she says, “If I have this baby, my life is over.” She asks for help paying for the abortion. He agrees, and in their next scene, they are in a crowded waiting room under the infamous Planned Parenthood logo.
As they drive home afterwards, both quiet, she tells Drew she needs time, then quickly sweeps her hand through her hair to smooth it and asks if she looks “normal” before she goes inside her house.
This scene, which makes abortion look like a quick and easy option, was a big deal to Planned Parenthood, who bragged in tweets that it was being featured on the show, and then said Amy could discuss all her options at Planned Parenthood.
And even in the show, we see reality when the Planned Parenthood worker tells Amy that if she decides to “continue the pregnancy” (not “keep the baby,” of course; it’s always a “pregnancy” of a “fetus” to Planned Parenthood, even on television), they will refer her out for prenatal care. That’s because Planned Parenthood isn’t caught much caring for babies – only killing them.
This episode, obviously endorsed by Planned Parenthood itself, was more like a giant advertisement for the abortion provider than it was an entertainment show. What is shameful is that a network TV show would use its prized airtime to create a glorified commercial for teens to have an abortion without parental consent. Likewise, it’s irresponsible – though, admittedly, we don’t yet know where the show will take this. However, it’s probably not too big of a leap to assume they won’t have Amy became a pro-life warrior who speaks out for post-abortive women. And that’s too bad, since real-life situations like this lead to great trauma and regret.
It doesn’t seem like “Parenthood” is the place anyone would go for a solid family story, though, as the rest of the content Tuesday night included discussions of when men start ejaculating, “wet dreams,” and other sexual talk. Tonight’s show was not so much surprising as it was a sad commentary on today’s entertainment, and the norms we’ve accepted that not that long ago were taboos.
NBC and the producers of “Parenthood” have sold themselves out as entertainment and become part of the Planned Parenthood propaganda sweeping the nation, which is why many of Tuesday night’s viewers probably thought little of Amy in her local Planned Parenthood office. That’s why media presentations like this are a contributor to the view that Planned Parenthood is a normative center for care rather than the largest producer of abortions.
