WCF Strikes Back, Belatedly, Inaccurately

Kathryn Joyce: The World Congress of Families, a right-wing “pro-family” group that I wrote about in a March cover story for The Nation (“Missing: The Right Babies”), severely misquoted me in a press release issued Oct. 30 to promote its documentary film, “Demographic Winter: The Decline of the Human Family.” They attributed a quote to me, falsely claiming I called them “racists” and “neo-Nazis,” that was in fact written by their own PR officer, Don Feder, in an attack article he wrote about me after my article came out. My article was about the subtle nature of the “pro-family” movement’s race-baiting in Europe, building upon immigration fears to import U.S.-style culture war tactics against abortion, family planning, gay rights and secularism, and contained no language of the sort. (Also in his article, Feder, ostensibly hoping to underscore the WCF’s paternalistic, anti-woman credentials — their anti-contraception, pro-patriarchy platform includes their definition of women’s rights as limited to the right to give birth to, breastfeed, and raise children — referred to me as “little Katie” lost “in a lefty version of ‘The Wizard of Oz.'”) The WCF’s VP, Larry Jacobs, and Feder have both apologized to me for the misquote, have removed their webpage of the press release, and have promised a correction. In the meantime, if you’d like to read what I actually wrote, my article is here.