ive in their professional communities and were doctors, lawyers, and other professionals less willing to take a public stand because of the pressures they faced. After 1973, members faced fewer cross-pressures: "Because they had relatively few social or political ties to a larger social or professional community, they could be fearlessly 'single issue' activists" (Luker, 1984, 146).
Among the pro-life groups are the National Right to Life Committee, Inc. and Baptists for Life (Stewart, Smith, & Denton, 1989, 178). The intent of the pro-life side is to present arguments supporting the right-to-life position and countering arguments seen as pro-abortion. Trenholm (1989) states that persuasion is rational and noncoercive. It relies on argumentation rather than force, and it should not place individuals under physical or severe mental duress. Persuasion is defined as symbolic, noncoercive influence. Persuasion involves a perception of choice (Trenholm, 1989, 6).
Many of the tactics of the pro-life movement today cross the boundary between persuasion and coercion, at least from the point of view of those targeted and often from an objective point of view as well. Operation Rescue uses a form of the Civil Rights tactic of the sit-in by surrounding abortion clinics with members so that no one can go in or out, with the members letting themselves be arrested without any physical resistance except to let themselves go limp so that they have to be carried. As members are removed, other members try to move in to take their place. This is coercion against those women and medical professionals who want to go into the clinic or avail themselves of its services. Pro-life members also use pictures of aborted fetuses as placards, waving them in front of women trying to enter clinics. They often proselytize at the same time, screaming at the women that they are about to commit a murder and trying to talk them out of entering. The mov...