Top 5 ERI Articles of 2019

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I found the top 5 articles by checking the Google Analytics for the ERI blog, instead of complicating the process by incorporating stats from LifeNews.com, where many of our articles are later republished. (We didn’t do this annual post last year because we had lost two months of analytics due to a technical issue we were unaware of at the time, so we had no way to accurately rank all of the pieces. Luckily that issue is fixed!)

Our blog received 96,622 unique pageviews from more than 44,402 unique people this year.

On to the list!

The Five Most Read New Articles This Year:

#5: How to Help People Talk Themselves Out of Abortion

This is one of the most surprising things I learned from Jacob Nels about sidewalk counseling while we were creating the content for the Sidewalk Counseling Masterclass. It’s also incredibly encouraging for people who are worried about saying the wrong thing.

#4: Heartbeat Laws: What You Need to Know

No, it’s not a discussion about whether it’s a good strategy to attempt to pass state-level abortion bans before Roe vs. Wade has been overturned, although that is an important topic. Instead this is a piece meant to dispel the myth that these bills were written in such a way as to leave open the possibility of imprisoning women who have abortions when every single bill except for Georgia’s made explicitly clear that that wouldn’t happen. (It probably wouldn’t happen in Georgia’s law either, but they made it less explicit.) All of the details are in the piece.

#3: “Abortion is Healthcare”: A Misogynistic Non-Argument

This is my personal favorite article of the year. Rachel absolutely destroys this common pro-choice slogan at multiple levels. It’s must-reading for any pro-life advocate.

#2: Bringing Some Clarity to the Shooting of Marshae Jones Story

Marshae Jones. Photograph: Reuters

Marshae Jones. Photograph: Reuters

This was one of the most discussed news stories for a few days and while looking into it I was annoyed that various news sources weren’t covering all of the relevant details, so I created this post after reading a bunch of articles to try to bring some clarity to what happened, as well as some clear thinking to the situation. The same day I recorded a podcast going over what I had learned.

#1: Refuting Pro-Choice Memes: Responding to Snark with a Winning Argument

This is a 7,000-word resource with prewritten responses to 12 common categories of pro-choice memes! We created this while preparing for our webinar of the same name that we hosted this year. If you’re a member of the Equipped for Life Course, you can also watch that webinar in our new Webinar Archive which also includes several of our other previous webinars.

 

The Three Most Read Articles from Our Archive This Year:

These are articles that were written before 2019, in the order of their continued popularity based on pageviews in 2019.

#3: Autumn in the Sovereign Zone: Why “It’s My Body, I Can Do What I Want” Won’t Do

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This is an excellent article that Timothy wrote several years ago on bodily rights arguments that we’ve made available on our blog. We still use some of these thought experiments with pro-choice students today.

#2: Fellow Pro-Lifers: Please Stop Sharing This Straw Man Meme

It’s a very common pro-life meme and people like it because it appears at first glance to destroy a common pro-choice argument. But it’s actually a subtle strawman, and Tim explains why in this piece.

Having launched a national pro-life organization designed to help pro-life people think more clearly and argue more persuasively, I’m very happy that this piece continues to be one of our most popular articles each year.

#1: Ben Shapiro’s Response to Abortion in the Case of Rape

Ben Shapiro speaking at the 2016 Politicon at the Pasadena Convention Center in Pasadena, California. Picture by Gage Skidmore and use is allowed through a Creative Commons license.

Many of you saw the viral video of Ben Shapiro responding to a woman at a live Q&A event who asked him about abortion in the case of rape. While we have a lot of respect for Shapiro, we do not think that pro-life people should mimic three of the things Shapiro did in their own dialogues.

Those are the lists! Thanks again for following our work this year. I hope it’s been helpful to you as you have potentially life-changing conversations with your pro-choice friends.

Want to see our previous top five posts?

Merry Christmas, and have a happy New Year!

Related Posts:

President

Josh Brahm is the President of Equal Rights Institute, an organization that trains pro-life advocates to think clearly, reason honestly and argue persuasively.

Josh has worked in the pro-life movement since he was 18. A sought-after speaker, Josh has spoken for more than 23,000 people in six countries and in 22 of the 50 states.

Josh’s primary passion is helping pro-life people to be more persuasive when they communicate with pro-choice people. That means ditching faulty rhetoric and tactics and embracing arguments that hold up under philosophical scrutiny.

He has publicly debated leaders from Planned Parenthood, the National Abortion Rights Action League (NARAL), Georgians for Choice, and one of the leading abortion facilities in Atlanta.

Josh also wants to bring relational apologetics to the pro-life movement. “Some pro-choice people will not change their mind after one conversation on a college campus. Some of them will only change their mind after dozens of conversations with a person they trust in the context of friendship.”

Josh is formerly the host of a globally-heard podcast turned radio/TV show, Life Report. He now hosts the Equipped for Life Podcast. He’s also written dozens of articles for LifeNews.com and the ERI blog.

He directed the first 40 Days for Life campaign in Fresno, resulting in up to 60 lives saved.

Josh has been happily married to his wife, Hannah, for 15 years. They have three sons, Noah, William, and Eli. They live in Charlotte, North Carolina.

David Bereit, the National Director of 40 Days for Life, sums up Josh’s expertise this way: “Josh Brahm is one of the brightest, most articulate, and innovative people in the pro-life movement. His cutting-edge work is helping people think more clearly, communicate more effectively, and — most importantly — be better ambassadors for Christ. I wholeheartedly endorse Josh’s work, and I encourage you to join me in following Josh and getting involved in his work today!”

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