Anti-Abortion '180' Film Billboards Rejected by L.A. Ad Companies
Pro-life evangelist and filmmaker Ray Comfort, whose controversial 33-minute anti-abortion video "180" recently upset Jewish groups, says billboard companies in Southern California have turned down his requests to put up signs promoting the film.
A Jewish advocacy group recently denounced the video, which juxtaposes the murders that took place during the Nazi-led Holocaust with abortions performed in the United States, as an outrageous abuse of the memory of the tragedy that occurred during World War II.
Comfort told The Christian Post that three of the largest billboard companies in the Los Angeles area, including Lamar Advertising, CBS Outdoor, and one he did not name, have “declined to promote the pro-life movie ‘180.’”
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“One is owned by a Jewish family. Their spokesperson was very upset that we dared to compare American abortion to the Holocaust,” Comfort said.
The Living Waters Ministry leader said that he plans to continue his effort to put up the billboards, which will have no graphic abortion images, and state, “The ‘hottest movie’ on the Internet – 1 million views in 22 days – 33 minutes that will rock your world! Free viewing: 180movie.com.”
The documentary, which was released in late September, has been viewed more than 1.6 million times at 180Movie.com and YouTube. On Oct. 25, about 200,000 DVD copies of the film were passed out to students at more than 100 universities throughout the U.S., Canada and New Zealand.
The decision-making process of the billboard companies is being questioned by Comfort.
“They have the right to refuse, but I think their refusal hasn’t been well thought out,” he said. “These are the same companies that advertise atheists’ mockery of God and the Bible, promote strip clubs, and porn conventions.”
Comfort, who was born to a Jewish mother and father, ran into trouble earlier this month when the Anti-Defamation League stated its outrage over “180.”
"The film is a perverse attempt to make a case against abortion in America through the cynical abuse of the memory of those killed in the Holocaust," said ADL National Director Abraham H. Foxman, a Holocaust survivor. "Not only does the film try to assert a moral equivalency between the Holocaust and abortion, but it also brings Jews and Jewish history into the discussion and then calls on its viewers to repent and accept Jesus as their savior.”
Comfort argues that in the same way that Hitler fueled the Nazi war machine by the death of human beings and sale of their possessions and belongings, so too is the abortion business in the U.S. profiting by the selling of services to perform abortion.
“If they don’t see the comparison of the killing of six million Jews with the slaughter of nearly 60 million Americans through abortion, it’s probably because they don’t consider a baby in the womb to be human,” Comfort said. “That’s exactly what Hitler did with the Jews. He said that they weren’t human, and then he made billions when he killed them and seized their assets.”
“American abortion makes billions through the slaughter of the unborn, and like the Nazi machine, it is a well-run money-making industry that has been successful in brainwashing millions into believing that a baby is something other than a baby,” he explains.
Some churches across the U.S. have begun promoting the film, including a small Florida church that displayed banners with the film’s website address and 4,000 white crosses on its lawn meant to represent the number of babies lost to abortion each day in the United States.
Comfort said he is hoping more churches decide to help promote the film in light of the trouble he is having with finding approved billboard locations.
Attempts by CP to contact the billboard companies for comments were unsuccessful.
