The Super Bowl is only four days away, and it will likely be the biggest entertainment event of the year with nearly 100 million households tuning in. The pro-life organization Faces of Choice wanted to capitalize on this incredible opportunity and created a 30-second Super Bowl ad featuring the faces of abortion survivors.

Despite being in contact with Fox about the ad for the last six months, Faces of Choice has still been unable to get an answer from Fox about whether or not the ad could be aired.

It’s all profoundly disappointing to Lyric Gillett, the founder and executive director of the organization.

“It’s very frustrating and it just feels very disrespectful in the professional sense that you can’t give someone the dignity of the response,” Gillett said in an interview with The Daily Citizen. “It seems pretty clear to me, that there is more going on than just standard business practice.”

This saga all started last July when Faces of Choice first contacted Fox about the possibility of creating an ad for the Super Bowl. As one of the first groups to contact the network about ad space, they were hoping that any issue could be worked through with the network in order to guarantee that ad got to air and was seen by a wide audience.

The final product is only thirty-seconds long and does not even contain the word abortion. The ad states: “Will you look me in the eye. Can you look me in the eye and tell me I shouldn’t be alive? Can you tell me that I didn’t deserve to survive? One reality binds us together, one event we all share. One choice tried to steal our lives, but we survived. We are the survivors of the choice. We are the faces of choice. I am the face of choice. I am that choice.”

One of the survivors featured in the video is Hope Hoffman, a survivor of dilation and curettage abortion who lost part of her cranium in the abortion procedure that tried to take her life. She is still dealing with the physical ramifications of that abortion, including cerebral palsy and seizures.

“I’m not seeking to preach to the choir,” Gillett said. “I’m not even seeking to create controversy, although I know that is a great vehicle and God is using that. The point of wanting to get on the Super Bowl was to reach everyday Americans who have a certain concept of the word ‘pro-choice’ and it’s a wrong concept. It’s a misnomer. I want people to understand that when you say that you are pro-choice, you are actually looking a survivor in the eye and telling them they should not exist. Because if you support the choice, and that choice was made to kill them, then by default you are against their survival. … I want this ad to completely change the verbiage and the mental image that people get when they hear the word ‘choice.’”

Unfortunately, Fox has never given Lyric a final decision about whether or not the video is approved to air, regardless of the available ad space. After promising many times to finally give the Faces of Choice ad a yes or no, Fox has left them in limbo.

Currently, there is a petition running through My Faith Votes, with assistance from Jason Yates, that has achieved more than 27,000 signatures. Lyric also suggested that a way to demonstrate to Fox frustration over the decision would be to turn your televisions off during the commercials and watch some of the amazing videos about the survivors instead.

The voices of abortion survivors should not be silenced, and it is frustrating to see a major television network seemingly denying their lives, experiences and testimonies. Abortion survivors’ matter, and their stories are both heart wrenching but also encouraging. They need to be told.

If you would like to support this effort, consider praying for Lyric and her team. That they would be protected from the spiritual warfare surrounding the project, and for protection, wisdom and direction. Pray also for the protection and healing for the survivors, and for this to perhaps change the cultural perception on abortion and ‘choice.’

 

Photo from Youtube