Fox News co-host Greg Gutfeld blasted Planned Parenthood for its deceptive rhetoric about abortion on Wednesday, saying the group only exists because it sanitizes its gruesome work with euphemism.
"Planned Parenthood's entire existence is basically based on keeping people in the dark through euphemism," Gutfeld said on The Five.
Gutfeld compared media coverage of Planned Parenthood's sale of fetal body parts with coverage of a protected lion named Cecil that was killed in Zimbabwe. The Media Research Center reported Tuesday that "broadcast news shows spent more time in one day on Cecil the Lion than they did on the Planned Parenthood videos in two weeks."
"You know, both things I think we can agree are wrong, but it's a question of proportion and priority," Gutfeld said. "Killing the lion, bad. Dismembering the unborn, worse. But why aren't people saying that? Because big game hunting is not camouflaged by euphemisms. The lion isn't called tissue. Shooting the lion isn't called a medical procedure driven by choice."
In their public statements, supporters of legal abortion use clinical terms like "tissue" and "products of conception" to dehumanize the fetus in utero.
According to Gutfeld, such euphemisms have taken their toll on the public's understanding of abortion.
"I don't think many people even know what we're talking about when we're talking about this dismemberment because they've been told for decades it's reproductive health," Gutfeld said. "You can't say that when you kill a lion. You saw the lion, and you know that it's dead."
Polling has found for years that a strong majority of Americans oppose abortion in the second and third trimesters of pregnancy. A majority supports legal abortion in the first trimester of pregnancy.