Identity Theft

I now have a mustache. I also have a charge on my Sears card for a vacuum cleaner purchased in California. I am male and my name is Javier. I'm not bad looking. But if you know anything about me, you know I live in Texas and just survived menopause. Put this all together? Identity Theft. It happened to me. I discovered it when my bank sent my debit card with Javier's photo on it. My name, but Javier's picture. He had stolen by social security number, opened several bank accounts and charged $150 at Sears.

I was incensed when I called the bank branch in California and they told me I had to prove who I was, that the social security number belonged to me and not Javier. I contacted the credit agencies and answered questions about my life- when and where I was born, if I was married, how long I'd lived at my present address. I felt violated. Someone had used my life to recreate their own. Javier didn't care about me, what he was doing to my life, my credit history, my future. Javier only cared about Javier.

Identity Theft is a crime. I had to fight to protect myself against it. But what about those who are too small and weak to fight a crime perpetrated against them? When an unborn child experiences an elective abortion, his identity is ruthlessly stolen. His right to personhood is taken in the most brutal way. Our society is saying we don't care about this child, what pain he experiences as his body is sliced into removable pieces, his right to be born, his right to a future. We don't care about his identity, we only care about our own.

But this child's identity is intimately linked to us. Edward Albee, American playwright and a three time Pulitzer prize winner for Drama (Who's Afraid of Virgina Wolff, Three Tall Women, A Delicate Balance), was often asked what his plays were about. One time he had this answer:





"You know, if anybody wants me to say it, in one sentence, what my plays are about, they're about the nature of identity," Albee finally says. "Who we are, how we permit ourselves to be viewed, how we permit ourselves to view ourselves, how we practice identity or lack of identity."

Albee says identity is not just how I see myself, it's also how I permit myself to see myself. In other words, I might conveniently blind myself to something I know is there, but don't want to admit to.

As a society, we also have an identity. And we also conveniently blind ourselves. We are a nation with laws that protect and give rights to the masses. But what about the most basic human right- the right to be born? We cannot admit we approve laws that allow a child to be killed as it sleeps in the warmth of the womb.

If we perceive the unborn as a mass of cells with no identity, then what might this say about the way we treat human life in general? Could this contempt for our earliest beginnings be reflected in the increasing suicide, murder, child abuse, spousal abuse, abuse of the elderly, alcoholism, drug abuse rates occurring in this country? I think yes. A respect for the identity of the unborn is connected like an umbilical cord to the identity of all human beings. Only it is the unborn that protects humanity. Without the desire to protect the unborn, our society is defenseless against all evil.

I was able to prove who I was to my bank, but the child in the womb cannot prove he is human. He is completely dependent upon us to speak for him. If we as a society do not stand for the right to be born, we have stolen not only the child's identity, but our own as well.

Rewired Reading

Graphic novels are changing the way people perceive literature. From Pulitzer Prize Winner Maus by Art Spiegelman to Printz Award Winner American Born Chinese by Gene Yang, these works are shaking up everything educators have held sacred. In case you don’t know, a graphic novel is an illustrated work accompanied by language. Think comic book, but with the story long enough to require a book spine.

I had the opportunity to meet Gene Yang at the Montgomery County Teen Book Festival held at College Park High School in The Woodlands, Texas in January ’09. As a tutor working with struggling students in the public school system, I asked him if he had any concerns about students “reading” graphic novels (with all those pictures!) instead of traditional novels containing only text. What he shared surprised me. Studies have shown that graphic novels are a “gateway” to reading for reluctant readers. These comics with heft are also used effectively with ESL (English as a Second Language) students . Since they are heavy on the pictures and light on the wording, these novels do not overwhelm struggling readers. The story is easier to follow because emotions and actions can be interpreted through both the pictures and the dialogue. Also, because the words are handwritten, the reader experiences a certain intimacy with the artist. The novel has the effect of reading a handwritten letter—you feel closer to the author. Lastly, the “gutters”, the white space between the pictures, allow readers time to reflect on what they just read- something poor readers don’t do and accomplished reader do automatically.

With his insights firmly planted in my pea brain, I promptly read both his book, American Born Chinese (author Gene Yang below) and Spiegleman’s Maus. I am now thoroughly enchanted by the possibilities this “new” genre has for my students.



I encourage you to read Maus. I have to admit when I heard a graphic novel won the Pulitzer, I had reservations. However, I believe this book will affect generations for a long time to come. Maus is the story of a Holocaust survivor, Vladek Spiegleman, the author's father. For everyone in the Pro-Life movement, this story is a must read. The evil that was perpetrated, that was condoned, that was ignored reminds me so much of the abortion holocaust that is happening in our world today. Take a couple of days and read this book- it shouldn't take too long, after all, it’s mostly pictures!

Whatever You Do, Don't . . .

Werewolves, Dracula, Frankenstein, Freddie. They creep across the screen in the theater. I want to scream to the unsuspecting woman in the film, "Whatever you do, don't stay in that house (swamp, cemetery, laboratory). Run!" But her boyfriend usually says something inane like-"Whatever you do, don't turn around!"

Why? Because he doesn't want to frighten her. He wants to keep her safe from witnessing the horror. In a way, a noble cause, but if you think about it for oh, at least a millisecond, you know his intent is not in his love's best interest. If she doesn't turn around, if she doesn't see the danger, the terror will literally consume her. She won't survive.

Our present laws on abortion are similar. They seem to protect a noble cause, but in reality they are not in the best interest of women, men and babies in our county. SILENT NO MORE is an organization dedicated to encouraging women to voice the damage they have experienced after having had an abortion. Depression, alcoholism, drug addiction, overwhelming guilt, thoughts of suicide and suicide attempts are only a few of the lasting aftershocks. Men have also joined SILENT NO MORE to share their own sense of loss as fathers and uncles who have encouraged, assisted, and insisted their wives, sisters, and girlfriends procure an abortion. In our fervor to save women from the so-called horror of unwanted pregnancies, there are aftereffects of the procedure we haven't wanted to acknowledge.

Father Frank Pavone, head of Priests for Life, believes the people of this country will never oppose abortion until they see abortion. I mean actual photos of aborted babies. If you are Pro-Choice or Pro-Life with a litany of caveats, whatever you do, don't click on the links to see the photos and videos of aborted babies. Why? Because the photos are a horror to see and remaining ignorant of this evil helps you stay Pro-Choice. Because if you do see them, it will change the way you see a baby. And when you see the tiny arms, legs, torsos, heads, when you watch the video of the dead baby's body being wrapped in a piece of butcher paper, you will see Pro-Choice from a different perspective. And you will turn around.