For the past couple of weeks we’ve been telling you about the ongoing debate in Mexico City between city politicians and pro-life activists around a proposed bill to make abortion legal in Mexico’s capital. The debate has become hotter and hotter, and is now past the boiling point as Chespirito — a.k.a. Roberto Gómez Bolaños, the creator and star of legendary children’s show El Chavo del Ocho — a celebrity known for uniting Latinos all over the world has taken a step toward dividing Mexicans on this controversial topic.

Bolaños has joined pro-life activists to create television spots in which he recounts how his mother was told by doctors to terminate her pregnancy after an accident. In the spot, he goes on to say: “My mother told him, “Me? Have an abortion? Never.” That is to say, she defended life…my life. And thanks to her I’m here today.”

You can see that video on a site called DenMeChance.org (image from the site pictured below), along with other videos of the celebrity interviewing anonymous women about the allegedly tragic results of the decision to end their pregnancies. The site also features loads of propaganda designed to make women who have had abortions feel like executioners and those considering making the difficult decision killers in the making.

Who’s actually behind this site is unclear. But its internet presence isn’t as disturbing to me as the fact that, according to Mexico’s El Universal, the spot is airing in prime time on Mexico’s Channel 2, Televisa’s “Canal de las Estrellas”.

Mexico City’s La Jornada published an article on Saturday about the video response recorded, with the help of the PRD and the PRI, by a young rape victim named Paulina (pictured below) who could not abort due to the “illegality” of the procedure in Mexicali, Baja California. In fact, in Baja California abortion is legal when the pregnancy is the result of a rape. Though she pleaded with local authorities to allow her to terminate her pregnancy, her voice was muted by the decision of the local diocese and the Secretary of Health, who according to press was defending the PAN party’s “doctrine of protecting life”.

In the message to Chespirito

“…Paulina remembers that at 13 she got pregnant as a result of rape; however, she wasn’t allowed to have an abortion. “My life was cut short; I was a mother when I was a still a child.”

She concludes: “It’s great that Chespirito’s mom had the chance to decide. Both I and my family would have liked to have been able to decide, too.”

The head of Mexico City’s Women’s Institute, Martha Lucía Micher, echoes that sentiment:

“If you would allow me, I’d like to say to ‘Chespirito’ that I respect his position, but that his mother had the right to decide and that’s precisely what we are fighting for.“

Via / El Universal and La Jornada