Abortuary monitoring pro-lifer's home

VANCOUVER - The Everywoman's abortuary has been caught having installed a pinhole camera aimed at the nearby private home of Vancouver pro-life activist Cecilia Van Dehn. After nearby residents noticed the camera, Van Dehn contacted the abortuary's security company, which assured her the device was not, in fact, a camera. Unconvinced, Van Dehn hired a private investigator who, after photographing the device, was approached by abortuary security personnel and asked what he was doing. The following day, the device was removed. The private investigator has forwarded copies of his report to the abortuary, the security firm and the provincial attorney-general.

Euthanasia guidelines ‘immoral'

HALIFAX - Guidelines that allow doctors to "pull the plug" on patients with futile medical conditions are encouraging immoral hospital policies, says a Dalhousie University professor. Dr. Charles Weijer says standards are encouraging doctors to run roughshod over patients wanting to live as long as possible for religious or cultural reasons. "Medical futility is a trump card physicians use to overrule family and patients. I think it's a bad approach; indeed, an immoral approach." Canadian Medical Association guidelines, in its 1995 Join Statement on Resuscitative Interventions, says "there is no obligation" to offer futile or non-beneficial treatment.

PP gets lottery money CALGARY - The Alberta Federation of Women United for Families is criticizing Calgary's Community Lottery Board for giving $100,000 to Planned Parenthood Alberta. The federation says PP should not receive the money because its efforts have failed to reduce teen abortions over the years. "Planned Parenthood's philosophies and their programs have obviously not worked," said federation president Hermina Dykxhoorn. "They have been active for 15 to 20 years and sexually transmitted diseases have gone up and teen abortions have gone up. We should not reward failed programs. It's a travesty." The lottery board's chairman said his organization doesn't have a policy of approving pro-abortion applications and rejecting pro-life ones, since pro-life groups never applied for allocations.

REAL Women frozen out

AYLMER, Que. - REAL Women of Canada is calling for the abolition of the Federal Status of Women Council after attempts were made to oust its representative from a consultation meeting on gender equality last month. Conference participants tried to intimidate Cecilia Forsyth, and the Lesbian Caucus passed a resolution demanding that REAL Women never be invited to a Status of Women conference again. A panel of cabinet ministers was ridiculed, jeered and shouted at. The Status of Women "must be abolished because it has degenerated into a caricature of what it was intended to be," said Forsyth. It "has become a tool to ridicule and silence women who do not support its propagation of the radical feminist-lesbian ideology."

Lesbians win right to adopt

CALGARY - Two lesbian couples have won Alberta's first same-sex adoption case in a ruling lawyers say will set precendents for about 60 other provincial statutes. Justice Peter Martin said the women were "devoted parents" actively involved in the raising of two "healthy, happy and well-adjusted boys." He added the adoptions were in the best interests of the children. Canada Family Action Council president Roy Beyer expressed grave concerns with both the process and substance of the ruling. The decision was "on an important public policy issue without the hearing of evidence, as well as an attempt by the courts to intimidate citizens who would defend the law."

Pro-life display razed

VANCOUVER - The RCMP launched a criminal investigation after a student group's pro-life display was destroyed at the University of British Columbia Nov. 23. Two hours after Students for Life erected the display, three officers of the university's Alma Mater Society ripped up posters, overturned tables and threw pamphlets to the ground and stomped on them. The RCMP were called in after the AMS declined to take action against its members. One AMS official said the pro-lifers "got what they deserved."

Pornographic PP school play