Welcome to Family Policy Matters, a weekly podcast and radio show produced by the North Carolina Family Policy Council. Hi, I'm John Rustin, president of NC Family, and each week on Family Policy Matters, we welcome experts and policy leaders to discuss topics that impact faith and family here in North Carolina. Our prayer is that this program will help encourage and equip you to be a voice of persuasion for family values in your community, state, and nation. And now here's the host of Family Policy Matters, Tracy DeVett Griggs. Thanks for joining us this week for Family Policy Matters.
Have you ever noticed that sometimes when people with opposite points of view are explaining their position, their arguments can, on the face of it, make so much sense. But then, when you read what the Bible has to say about it, or talk to someone who is accustomed to debating these issues, you discover that the opposition Argument was just fancy wordsmithing.
Well, today's guest is former North Carolina Representative Paul Skip Stam, an attorney who served 16 years in the North Carolina House, including a decade as Republican leader and speaker pro tem. Over the years, he's been a prominent voice in state policy debates, especially on the issue of abortion. In a recent series of articles, Skip Stam examines what he calls the quote propaganda surrounding abortion, how we can recognize it, and how we can respond. Skip Stam, welcome to Family Policy Matters. Thanks, Tracy.
All right, so in your first article in the series, Abortion Industry Propaganda, talk about how you can tell or how we can tell if we're hearing propaganda instead of reasoned debate. Tracy, I once read an article in USA Today, full page on the abortion question, and not once was the unborn child mentioned. Think about it. And if you watch TV for a year, you may see 10,000 murders or attempted murders in full blood. But you can watch TV for a year and not see one abortion or maybe one or two unborn children if you watch the National Geographic Channel.
It's unreal if you don't see it.
So why do you think that there is this absence of any of this information? Tracy, the reason is that the true information about what unborn children look like and do is so devastating to the cause of abortion rights.
Okay, so you argue that even the use of the words fetus or embryo can sometimes serve as propaganda. What do you mean by that? Fetus, for example, is in Latin, and it means the status of the unborn child after the first trimester. is before that. And so there's a reason why doctors or nurses may use those terms.
But whenever we call someone by a Latin name, we're not familiar with it, it depreciates the meaning. A fetus in Latin just means offspring.
So if they said offspring, it would have a completely different connotation. Explain the difference between the legitimate medical terminology, which of course I think we would all embrace, and what you see as just this intentional dehumanization. For the same reason that some people call other people animals or monsters or used to, slaves were called bad names, or immigrants or people who've committed crimes, or other words are used to dehumanize them. Yes. But they're still humans made in the image of God, no matter how bad they are.
You point out the equivalent medical term for mother would be gravida, a term not commonly used. And so does this help us to sort of understand what's going on with the language here? Sure. If you meet a pregnant friend, you don't say, hey, gravida, how's your fetus coming? No, you say, hey, mom, how's your baby?
That's a lot friendlier. Technically, it's gravida and fetus, embryo. Yes. That's kind of humorous.
So what about the cultural shift you mentioned toward phrases like pregnant people? Yes, of course, it always jars me when I hear that term because normally the first 100,000 times I heard it, it's pregnant women. But now it's pregnant people on the theory that a trans, well, a person who biologically is a woman but is passing as a male can be pregnant. Yes, that person can be pregnant, but still a woman.
So you think that the images of unborn children, you know, are very important. And you mentioned this, that it's just such an amazing thing to see. And we've got the evidence now, right? That we can see the child at the earliest stages. From the very earliest stages, from eight days after conception, can be photographed and seen eight days after conception.
Right. As Christians or people who are pro-life, do we need to be getting these images out there more? Do you think that's even necessary anymore? Yes, it's absolutely necessary. Let's take one example.
For years, even before the law required an ultrasound before an abortion, which North Carolina does, ultrasounds were performed because the abortionist needed to know if the woman was even pregnant and if pregnant, where the embryo was in the fallopian tube or in the uterus. But they wouldn't show that to the woman who comes into the abortion clinic. The screen would be turned away.
So, it's not a matter of what the child looks like, it's a matter of. What the abortionist or the baby doctor is wanting to convey to the woman. It's the same thing. A lot of pro-life supporters are trying to get ultrasound machines into pregnancy resource centers for this very reason, right? Yes, and the state provides millions of dollars for those machines to be provided and the people who operate it to be trained.
There's no lack of knowledge once you're in the abortion clinic to know what the child looks like. Right. So as far as these ultrasound machines that are provided to pregnancy care centers, which of course are pro-life centers that are operated on a nonprofit basis and they're all over the state and all over the country, are these tools that we then need to really embrace as pro-life people? And how would we go about doing that, do you think?
Well, in North Carolina, they're provided by the state.
Now, there are a few pregnancy centers that don't accept money or things from the state for philosophical reasons. But there's no excuse not to know, but that same information is kept away from the general population because it's never shown on social media or TV or, I mean, it's available. You can look for it and find it, but it's not generally available. Tell us this story. You talked about in your article an exchange on a deposition that you did with an abortionist in the wordplay that was used there.
Tell us that story. Dr. Tacky Christ, who committed 65,000 abortions. He was the number one abortion volume provider in Jacksonville, North Carolina for decades. And he had his abortion business, but he also had a side business as a fertility clinic.
So one day I saw in the Raleigh News and Observer a half-page ad saying Mr. and Mrs. Johnson meet their son for the first time. And it showed an image of an unborn child six weeks after fertilization. And he was using a picture of this child to get people into his fertility clinic.
Well, he was at the same time suing protesters because they called what he was doing in his abortion business, you know, the killing of unborn children. They were calling it murder, and he didn't like that.
So I asked him, well, tell me about this ad. He said, I never really liked that ad. I said, well, why did you run it? He said, well, my staff liked it and put it together.
So why did he run it? To make more money. Why did he not show it to his abortion patients? Patients, clients, whatever, money. In other words, they can use the images that make them the most money.
Well, you know, we know that this happens in all kinds of advertising, but when it has to do with an unborn child, that's pretty chilling, isn't it? Yes, chilling and deadly. Yeah.
So talk about your years in public office and policy leadership. What kinds of things did you see, besides this, where language was manipulated in ways that were really effective? That because you were in that position, you were able to point them out. For example, reproductive rights is used to argue for the necessity of abortion. But, you know, if you're pregnant, you've already reproduced.
It's not a reproductive rights. It's a right to kill what you've reproduced. Abortion, as you've seen the slogan, abortion is medical care.
Well, not really. What disease is being cured by an abortion? No disease at all. It's not medical care. It's population care.
It's just the killing of an unborn child.
So you see these euphemisms all the time in their language.
So if listeners want to better recognize abortion-related propaganda in the media or politics, are there some practical signs or habits that you would advise them to develop? Sure. Read and watch carefully what is attempted to be conveyed by a phrase, a slogan. You know, once you're alerted to what they're trying to do, it's easily recognizable. Read a lot, especially, I would imagine, some of your articles and the things that you all write.
There's a lot of good stuff out there.
So, you know, get North Carolina Family Policy Council materials. And you can also, a lot of this is on my website, which is paulstem.info. I-N-F-O. We don't usually use that domain, but paulstem.info.info.
Okay.
So let's just take a moment to talk about the importance of your presence in the North Carolina General Assembly. You were there for so many years. And I know I speak with Christians sometimes, and they just feel like engaging in trying to persuade public policy is just not something that Christians need to do because, you know, it's just gotten more and more difficult to communicate in the This polarized world. Can you just speak to that? I mean, why is it important for not everybody, of course, but at least Christians that are called to be active in the legislature and in other public policy arenas?
First, they can be very effective if they are knowledgeable and they can become knowledgeable very quickly and if they're determined to get their voices through. Frankly, having been there on most bills, I would receive at most one contact from one person.
So it was a little bit more controversial, maybe 10 contacts. And then in some, you would get thousands, but they would all be the same contact. You know, they would all say the same thing. And you easily become able to recognize the mass-produced contacts.
So the most important thing is to know who your representatives and senators are. and to see them in person, preferably in their district before they go to Raleigh and not wait until it's just an email campaign the day before a vote. The day before a vote is almost worthless.
Okay, so tell me how you would go about doing that, because I've visited my lawmakers but at the legislature and I don't even know where I would start to visit them in their own district. How would a person go about doing that?
Well, it's all online. Their address. You know, you have to do a little research to find that out. Go with somebody, you know, go with two or three other people to their place of business or where they want to meet with you. And they actually like to meet with constituents.
It's very rare that you're turned down from meeting with a representative of a senator, except right during the session, right before a vote, when they're not there.
So see them on a Friday, Saturday, Sunday, or Monday when they're in the district. And they're almost always in the district right now because from now until April, they're not in Raleigh except occasionally.
So take advantage of, you know, find a friend, go see 'em. Right, so send an email, set something up, I'm assuming. All the emails are on the website. I'll give you this website: nclegleg.gov. Gives all the contact information for current members of the assembly.
And don't worry if you think that person is against you. See him anyway. Because they may push their side. less fervently If they know their constituents are watching, even if they disagree with you and vote against you, they won't do it as hard if they know that they have opposition in their own district.
Okay.
Well, you already gave us your website information, but please give it to us again.
So, skip Stam. Where can our listeners go to follow your work and, of course, find these articles? Sure. Paul Stam, one word, one m dot info, I n f o. Under articles, primarily for 2025, but there are many in previous years.
All right. Paul Skip Stam, thank you for joining us today on Family Policy Matters. Thank you very much, Tracy. Thank you for listening to Family Policy Matters. If you enjoyed this episode, please subscribe to the show and leave us a review.
To learn more about NC Family and the work we do to promote and preserve faith and family in North Carolina, visit our website at ncfamily.org. That's ncfamily.org. And check us out on social media at NC Family Policy. Thanks and may God bless you and your family.
