Jor-El Godsey
Photo:HBI An online publication has rebuked claims that a recent investigative report into an international pro-life group was fuelled by bias.
Heartbeat International (HBI) had issued a statement on February 13 which said that an investigation into their crisis pregnancy centres throughout the world by openDemocracy was swayed by pro-choice bias.
However, openDemocracy said that HBI’s statement on their findings were factually incorrect.
“There are a number of points made by Heartbeat which question the integrity of our reporting,” said the online publication, who added that these points were “not put to openDemocracy for comment”.
The misrepresented information in question was of how findings from the investigators at clinics supported by HBI in 18 countries were recorded.
Reports that clinic workers told patients that abortions could “turn their partners gay” or increase the likelihood that mothers would become child abusers were found to be inaccurate.
In response openDemocracy said: “We did not find staff in the clinics claiming that abortion could turn a partner gay. This claim was made in Heartbeat’s own online training course.”
The UK-based political website also said it “does not only investigate groups on the political right” and cited their investigation into the Liberal Democrats (a pro-Remain liberal party) for last December’s UK election as an example of this.
HBI president Jor-El Godsey had said on February 11 that the report, released on February 10, was based on “misreporting” rather than “misinformation” of what their clinic workers said.
Mr Godsey says attempts to discredit pro-life pregnancy resource centres are not new: “The attack is very familiar. It’s just coming from different players.”
Following the initial publication of this article, openDemocracy contacted The Irish Catholic with a statement:
openDemocracy is a global news outlet that produces responsible, fact-based reporting on a wide range of issues, including the economy, environment, democracy, politics and human rights. It is not part of any pro-abortion lobby and we have not ‘misreported’ any of our findings. While openDemocracy sent the results of our investigation to Heartbeat prior to publication and, at their request, extended the deadline for comment, Heartbeat has subsequently published a number of inaccurate claims about openDemocracy, none of which were put to us for comment or verification. We believe that readers across the world, whatever their position on abortion, will be very concerned by our findings, which show that women across the world are being misled about their legal and reproductive options. If Heartbeat took their duty of care to women and girls seriously, they would be taking immediate steps to investigate.