Alyssa Milano's comments on abortion an example of 'racism,' 'ignorance,' says Benjamin Watson
New England Patriots tight end Benjamin Watson has criticized actress Alyssa Milano for claiming that the right to an abortion benefits “women of color,” calling the actress’s comments an example of “ignorance” and “racism.”
After Georgia's governor signed the "heartbeat bill" — banning abortions if a fetal heartbeat can be detected, which can be as early as six weeks — Milano went on Twitter to call for a sex strike until "we get bodily autonomy back."
"Any woman of privilege that lives in one of these states, if this goes through, they're going to be able to travel to a state to get a safe reproductive healthcare," Milano told CNN’s Chris Cuomo. "But for the women of color, for the women that are marginalized, for the women that are (in) low-income communities ... these bills are going to be catastrophic."
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Watson, a father of seven and pro-life advocate, responded to Milano’s remarks on Twitter, calling it an example of “ignorance, racism or some combination of both.”
“To claim that giving MORE children of color the right to be born will negatively affect ‘women of color’ reveals IGNORANCE, RACISM or some combination of both,” Watson said. “Our children and families are capable of greatness and lies like this harm our future. Don’t patronize us.”
In recent months, several states have passed laws significantly restricting or banning abortion.
Last week, Alabama outraged abortion supporters by passing the most restrictive law in the nation, banning abortion even in cases of rape or incest, while allowing an exception for the life of the mother.
Additionally, Missouri, Kentucky, Mississippi, Ohio and Georgia have passed "heartbeat laws" that ban abortions at a point in a pregnancy when a heartbeat is regularly detectable.
A devout Christian who often speaks out publicly on a wide range of racial and political issues, Watson frequently advocates for the unborn. During a pro-life rally held in New York’s Times Square on May 5, the athlete called on men to not avoid conversations about abortion, but rather “to step up and to step into these conversations with boldness and with grace and with conviction.”
“As families across our country are being destroyed and as lives are being extinguished, we must expose the lies that are being told. We must peel back those layers of deceit,” said Watson.
“We have to be men who are willing to step into that boldly and with confidence because we were made to be protectors and providers. You have what it takes to be the man God designed you to be.”
Watson said that the voice of pro-life men is “greatly needed” in the “public sphere,” also stressing that “fatherhood begins in the womb.”
“That’s where it starts,” continued Watson. “It doesn’t start when the baby is out. The relationship you have with the mother, the relationship you have talking to that child en utero. Fatherhood begins in the womb.”
“There are millions of preborn children and courageous, precious mothers that are depending on us men to be men. So let’s do it.”
Data from the Kaiser Family Foundation found that 60 percent of legal abortions in the state of Alabama were obtained by black women in 2015.
In 2016, Watson argued that the abortion agenda seems to be focused primarily on minorities, pointing out that the nation's largest abortion business was founded by Margaret Sanger, who has often been accused of being a racist and a eugenicist.
"I do know that blacks kind of represent a large portion of the abortions, and I do know that honestly the whole idea with Planned Parenthood and Sanger in the past was to exterminate blacks, and it's kind of ironic that it's working," Watson said. "We [as minorities] support candidates, and overwhelmingly support the idea of having Planned Parenthood and the like, and yet, that is why she created it."
Watson criticized minorities for buying into the abortion agenda “hook, line, and sinker.”
“It's just amazing to me and abortion saddens me, period,” he said. “But it seems to be something that is really pushed on minorities and provided to minorities especially as something that they should do. In the public, it seems to be painted that when minorities get pregnant they need to get abortions, especially when it comes to teen pregnancy.
"We sit here and talk about advancing the black agenda, whatever that means, we talk about our interests, and what's important to us — like having political power and advancement and all those things — and then we are turning around and we are killing our children," Watson asserted. "And we are buying the lie that it's our personal decision to make."
