In a profile piece published by the Washington Post, Caren Spruch, Planned Parenthood’s director of arts and entertainment engagement, said she has advised Hollywood on more than 150 productions since 2014.
Spruch’s role within the abortion industry is to approach celebrities, directors and producers with the sole objective of shaping their TV shows, movies and music into strategic abortion promotionals.
This past year has brought devastating defeats for Planned Parenthood. From March through May, 13 states introduced pro-life legislation with the explicit intent to have those laws challenged before the Supreme Court in hopes of overturning Roe v. Wade. Additionally, the nation’s largest abortion provider is experiencing the loss of $60 million of taxpayer funding due to its decision in August to withdraw from the federal Title X program because of new restrictions.
With success in Washington waning, Planned Parenthood has diverted its attention to Hollywood.
“We’re in a place where abortion rights advocates don’t have a lot of hope of progress, particularly on the federal level,” admitted Gretchen Sisson, a sociologist at the University of California at San Francisco who studies abortion in pop culture. “The potential of popular culture, and particularly television, is that it doesn’t need to wait for policy progress to happen.”
Kristan Hawkins, president of Students for Life of America, is fully aware of Planned Parenthood’s game plan: “You can’t just change laws; you have to change culture, and young people are the drivers of culture. Planned Parenthood is trying to influence this generation.”
And Hollywood is playing right into the abortion giant’s hands. “Nobody used to call me,” said Spruch. “I would be watching TV and going to the movies and figuring out who I thought might be open to including these [abortion] storylines. Now I have a couple of repeat clients. Now people call me.”
Spruch, dubbed Planned Parenthood’s “secret weapon,” often works as a “script doctor,” pushing the screenwriters of many of today’s hit television shows to incorporate storylines around abortion, birth control or sexually transmitted diseases.
“I think they’re marketing to a specific demographic,” said Steven Aden, chief legal officer of Americans United for Life. “I am concerned that people who haven’t experienced much of life, the younger set, may be led into thinking that abortion is normal and glamorous and painless and lacking in consequences—all those things that Hollywood would like them to believe.”
But Mallory Quigley, vice president of communications at Susan B. Anthony List, is optimistic about pro-lifers’ fortitude amid Hollywood’s barrage of abortion propaganda.
“The abortion industry’s grip on Hollywood is well-known, but what might be surprising is how soundly their propaganda has failed to move Americans’ minds and hearts,” she said. “Pro-life sentiment is on the rise. … Americans are tired of pro-abortion elites telling them what to think and value.”
This was never more obvious than with the release of “Unplanned,” the biopic of former Planned Parenthood director-turned-pro-life activist Abby Johnson. The movie quickly became a hit, raking in more than $14 million at the box office in its first two weeks.
“This movie pulls back the curtain on many of the lies about abortion,” posted Franklin Graham on Facebook.