Pro-life group's work vandalized in Michigan

A pro-life group at Oakland University (OU) in Rochester Hills, Michigan had its sidewalk chalk defaced with pro-choice messages by student vandals last week.

Students for Life (SFL) is among the many groups to utilize campus sidewalks for chalking messages to students at OU. On the evening of September 11th, SFL members chalked pro-life pictures and messages such as, “What about the child’s choice?”

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Not long after, the SFL members discovered two male students dumping water on their work, one of which was a drawing of a hand with the words “Take my hand, we’ll make it I swear” underneath.

Mirna Awrow, the President of SFL, said the boys erased all the fingers but the middle one and transformed it into a turkey.

“We went up to them and talked to them and were like, ok it’s not fair that you guys are doing this, you’re erasing our messages,” Awrow told Campus Reform. “Like we don’t care if you guys write your own messages, but the fact that you are erasing what we are writing, is not fair in general.”

Awrow wrote about the confrontation on SFL’s blog.

“We made sure to be respectful throughout the entire conversation (even though they didn't return the favor) because we knew that they would only listen to us if we treated them with dignity,” Awrow wrote. “We shook hands and they proceeded to laugh and pour water. At this point, we walked away but returned ten minutes later and fixed their destruction.”

The two male students haven’t been identified and it’s unclear whether they worked alone or were later joined by others. According to Awrow and OU faculty, there currently is no active pro-choice group on campus, so the students appear to have acted on their own.

“The fact that we spoke to them and they continued to do it, that is what hurt the most,” Awrow told Campus Reform. “We showed them how passionate we were and they still didn’t care and were still really rude to us. I think that is what hurt the most.”

Awrow says this is not the first time this type of vandalism has happened to the pro-life group, nor do they expect it will be the last.

When Campus Reform asked if the university had any involvement in the case, Awrow said SFL did not expect the administration to become involved.

“We honestly haven’t mentioned it to them,” Awrow told Campus Reform. We didn’t think it would be necessary to, or that they would do anything.”

According to the SFL website, the group was founded in 2005 and is one of the most active pro-life organizations in the state of Michigan, with involvement in both high schools and college.

Follow the author of this article on Twitter: @MaggieLitCRO