It’s long past time that men step up and support the American people’s right to a safe and legal abortion. This is not a fight people who are able to get pregnant can fight alone. Thankfully, those who create campaign ads designed to energize voters in the fight for reproductive justice realize that and have begun targeting men by using men.
Groups such as Dads on Doors, a grassroots group based in Minnesota, recently began running an ad appealing to fathers to vote pro-choice to protect and stand up for their daughters.
Another ad from Democrat Katie Hobbs, who is running for governor in Arizona, features a male sheriff in Pima County, Chris Nanos, who says that cops being forced to arrest pregnant people, doctors, and nurses is a “waste of [the] resources” that his department desperately needs to keep the community safe.
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Will Bunnett, a political strategist with Clarify, which is a progressive digital brain agency, tells Vox, “The hypothesis is that men are not super good at empathy or understanding and are more likely to listen if we sort of make it about them ... So we’re looking to tap into male identity. And some of the ways that are proving most effective make me a little uncomfortable personally, but I’m already sold on this issue, and we’re trying to target the people who need to see something and get on board.”
When Kansas was facing a vote in early August on an amendment that would have ridiculously restricted access to abortion, voters in the state came out in droves to vote it down. As Vox reports, Kansans for Constitutional Freedom sponsored ads that featured a small group of men: a pastor, a doctor, and a voiceover narrated by a man.
The strategy of Democrats focusing on abortion rights has been the keystone to this year’s upcoming midterm elections, and the focus on male voters by using men in ads seems to be having an impact.
Political data scientist at Civis Analytics, Josh Yazman, a Democrat-aligned research shop, tells Vox that when compared to traditional pro-choice ads that featured women, ads that featured male characters did better with men.
Yazman explains that in one ad featuring a mom, aged 40, versus a “bro” talking about his fear for the women in his life losing the right to an abortion, “The bro’s overall appeal was similar, but a lot stronger with men, Republicans, and younger voters, while the mom did better with more traditional pro-choice audiences.”
Oren Jacobson, the co-founder of Men4Choice, an organization based in Illinois that educates and organizes male allies in the fight for reproductive freedom, tells Vox that men simply respond better to hearing about the issue of abortion from other men.
“It’s harder for someone who is not a man to convince another man that abortion is their issue ... I think we have to reckon with the reality that a lot of men have heard women talk about abortion for decades and have largely ignored those voices.”
Vox reports that Men4Choice and Planned Parenthood will run joint ads targeting Black men in Atlanta, Georgia, in the upcoming weeks.
Here are few example of the ads focusing on male characters for male voters:
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