Will CBS Abort Tim Tebow Super Bowl Pro-Life Ad?
Tim Tebow's Pro-Life Ad Continues to Stir Up Controversy
Thus far CBS, the network airing the Super Bowl, has only given preliminary approval for the Tim Tebow Super Bowl ad. A spokesperson for CBS told Media Daily News that the network had approved a script for an ad spot bought by the pro-life evangelical Focus on Family. The commercial, as per CBS policy, will still have to go through a final approval phase, where the network will watch the actual Super Bowl ad to be aired, before the ad is fully approved. However, the network noted that it foresaw no major problems.
CBS has maintained strict standards for advertisements over the years when they have broadcast the Super Bowl, steering clear of blatant or overt issue-oriented ads. A pro-life ad seems to fall into the "issue-oriented" category.
Focus on Family is a non-profit evangelical Christian organization founded by James Dobson that promotes family values and is at the forefront of many conservative political issues. The group hired Tim Tebow and his mother, Pam, to do the pro-life Super Bowl ad to promote Focus on Family's "Celebrate Family, Celebrate Life" campaign. Pam Tebow was advised while pregnant with Tim to have an abortion because of complications.
It is unclear how the Tim Tebow Super Bowl ad will present a pro-life message without, at the same time, being overtly anti-abortion. But as these things generally go, banning the ad will generate possibly more publicity for the campaign than actually getting to place the ad during the Super Bowl. GoDaddy.com has mad a tradition of making bannable Super Bowel ads and posting the them on the Internet.
According to Care2 Petitionsite, a site petitioning CBS to not air the controversial anti-abortion ad, the network has refused to air ad spots in the past by PETA, MoveOn.org, and the United Church of Christ because of their controversial content.
One way or the other, the Focus on Family pro-life/ anti-abortion message will get out. Millions will read about, hear about, and weigh in on the controversy. If CBS decides to air the Tim Tebow Super Bowl ad, millions more will see and hear that message. If CBS decides not to air the ad, the publicity generated from the refusal and from religious and pro-life groups -- especially Focus on Family -- crying foul will ensure that the anti-abortion message gets heard.
Regardless of one's opinion on the matter, the message will be heard. In fact, for the most part, the message has already been heard...
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Published by Saul Relative
WVU graduate, with degrees in History, English, Secondary Education, Computer Programming, and Psychology (and nearly a degree in Political Science). Originally from West Virginia, with stints in Virginia,... View profile
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20 Comments
Post a CommentGood article, and non-objective. Probably would have liked to have heard more information about the women (pro-choices) against this ad. I heard Gloria Alred wasn't too thrilled with this.
This whole pro-choice is a load of crap. There are more women out there screwing around and using abortion as a form of birth-control than women who might need abortion for life-threatening issues. If your're gonna play, then you should be responsible to take care of the protection on the front-end not after you've been caught with your pants down.
Juli Juli - the pro-choice posters are just as hypocritical as you claim the pro-life posters are They should be celebrating the fact that this woman elected to use her right to CHOOSE in spite of pressure from doctors to the contrary.
Rats! This the rest of my post;
What FOTF is trying to say via Tebow & his mom is that they would rather see a woman *die* than have access to a safe, legal abortion. Not they, nor the rest of you have any right to make that decision for any woman, and to try to force a woman to stay pregnant against her will regardless of the circumstances, even to the point of *death* is simply evil & sick.
If you really want to save lives, demand health care & affordable birth controll for all.
To the so called "pro life" posters, you're hypocrites. First of all, you only support free speech when represents your side. In this case, Focus on the Family. You support CBS's censorship of UCC's add because they don't ban gays from their churches like Focus on the Family does.
BTW, Focus on the Family is not pro-life, just pro birth. If they were pro-life, their would support health care for all, and reliable, affordable birth control. As it is, they & the rest of you could not care less if the woman was a victim of rape or incest, or if the mother & child both die, as long as it's not by abortion.
And as for free speech ? Where were you when CBS was censoring PETA or UCC ? Where was your moral outrage then ?
But what it really boils down to is this; Focus on the Family & Tebow don't just want to express an opinion. They, and the rest of the "pro lifers" want to legislate their religious beliefs and force them on women. Tebow & his mom are saying that they w
Loved seeing this on TMZ :)
It's...um...Focus on the Famil.y, although truth be told, they tend of focus on hatred of others not in lockstep with their little boxc of beliefs.
Tebow has every right to his beliefs, but aligning himself with Fcous, he's made a deal with the devil, so to speak. Focus is virulently homophobic and while I'm sure most evangelical orginzations have a similar mindset, the amount of money and time Focus puts into its anti=gay agenda puts in a class by itself.
I heard the ad cost $2.5 million. Surely Fcous could find better use for their supporters' donations than this...like maybe throwing some support to Haiti or to the needy and hungry in our own country?
go tebow!
Check out what the people paying for the ad stand for. It's not 1964 anymore.
No one seems to get that the ad is likely to be focused on asking woman to not take the abortion route, not advocating changing the abortion law.
This is what the abortion crown has fallen to now, not in favor of abortion rights but abortion itself.
Did not Bill Clinton say abortion should be safe, legal and rare? The Tebos will just be emphasizing why it should be rare - but somehow that bothers people. How sad.