Mike Schouten
Mike Schouten is the Director of Advocacy for ARPA Canada and the Director of its pro-life initiative, We Need a Law campaign. He lives in British Columbia with his wife Jennifer and their six children.
Bio last updated December 9th, 2019.
Articles by Mike Schouten
50 Years of Missing Stories
By Rebecca Darwent with Mike Schouten
June 28, 2019
Convivium’s Rebecca Darwent talks to producer Mike Schouten about The Missing Project documentary, which fills in the blanks on the 50 years since Canada’s abortion law was overturned and then abandoned entirely.
MS: The primary one is that, through this project, Canadians – especially Canadians in the middle, Canadians who are indifferent, maybe haven't given abortion much thought or would likely call themselves pro-choice if someone asked them – to have them see that abortion since 1988, with its lack of straightforward medical procedure that some people avail themselves of and some people don't, and life goes on as normal RD: How long does it take for a culture and a society to be able to step forward and help women so that abortion isn't the solution? Fifty years of abortion and attempted legislation in Canada, and still abortion is viewed as the proper solution in many cases for women Look at the status quo in Canada – and we can get into my thoughts on why we have 50 years of legal abortion, 30-plus years with no law at all – a big part of the responsibility lies with the pro-life movement itself and its ineptness to think politically or think strategically Mike Schouten: The thought process started about 18 months ago when a number of us working in the pro-life movement were reflecting on the fact we were coming up to the 50-year anniversary of the original law that was brought into Canada that legalized abortion: May 14, 1969 They won't be successful in censoring this film, but I also expect some disagreement from some within the pro-life movement as to how the film, for example, portrays even that Bill C-43 time frame, and then the last part of the film talks about moving forward and why we're optimistic and what we're excited about But how has abortion impacted families who have taken in babies given up for adoption? How has it influenced pro-life legislators who wanted to change legal framework? How has it affected young women who found themselves in an unplanned pregnancy and weren't sure what to do?