Re: Thousands hit Hill to protest against abortion, May 15.
I attended this year's pro-life rally on Parliament Hill for the first time. I saw the thousands of people, but I sure didn't see much media presence.
In the Citizen's news story, the statement that there has been "snickering" at the Parliamentary Pro-Life Caucus' "secretive" reputation in the mainstream media is really kind of silly.
Every year the pro-life caucus holds a press conference at the same time as the rally. A media advisory and a press release went out to the Ottawa Press Gallery before the conference.
Perhaps if some members of the media could have taken a few minutes out from their laborious duties of their round-the-clock coverage of Larry O'Brien's trial or Brian Mulroney's inquiry, they would have had a few minutes left over to cover the Pro-Life Caucus's press conference and rally.
They would have learned something, like who some of the Pro-Life Caucus members are, as many of them attended at the press conference.
Publishing the names of members of a caucus is not normal caucus protocol -- it's up to members to self-identify if they wish.
It's ironic that the subject for this year's press conference was "pro-life free speech suppressed in Canada."
Now that's an understatement.
With the press's little to no coverage of the pro-life rally or caucus press conference, this all seems like a self-fulfilling prophecy.
Patricia Maloney,
Ottawa
Regardless of one's position on abortion, events of this magnitude, on Parliament Hill no less, deserve some coverage. Why? Because informed decisions and mutually respectful dialogue in an open and free-thinking society require access to information. When the media fail to cover an event as large as last Thursday's, they, in a sense, "turn off the lights" because we cannot debate or reflect upon that which we are not aware.
Mario Paolucci
Dollard des Ormeaux