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DUBLIN, IRELAND, June 22, 2012, (LifeSiteNews.com) – In the midst of what organizers describe as the biggest pro-life advertising and awareness campaign ever seen in Ireland, Youth Defence has said that attempts by abortion supporters to vandalize pro-life billboards were “pathetic and smacked of desperation.”

The Irish pro-life group said that “after two weeks of blustering, threats, and hot air, a small group of left-wing activists had eventually caused minimal damage to just two or three of more than 300 pro-life adverts around Dublin.”

“We actually went along to their organizational meeting, and were not surprised to see just over a dozen people there, full of swagger and bravado but not actually amounting to anything significant,” Rebecca Roughneen of Youth Defence told LifeSiteNews.com.

“Their actions are pretty lame, and their attempts to censor the pro-life message had an absolutely negligible effect on this campaign, which will reach more than 2.1 million people over the summer,” she said.

Ms Roughneen said that the opposition to Youth Defence’s pro-life billboards did not enjoy public support, as shown by the miniscule support for a Facebook page opposing the “Better Answer” campaign which has only garnered 130 likes, despite feverish attempts by abortion supporters to publicize their efforts.

The Better Answer advertising and awareness campaign is co-sponsored by Youth Defence and the Life Institute. It will utilize more than 600 advertising sites during the summer to carry a striking pro-life message that explains how “abortion tears lives apart” and reassures women that “there is always a better answer.”

The powerful images and message will be seen on billboards, buses, trams, and train stations throughout the country.

The ad campaign will be reinforced by a grassroots information campaign, and an online outreach using Facebook, YouTube and other online venues.

The nationwide information campaign has already signed up almost 2,000 pro-life volunteers, organizers report. They are going door to door to inform voters and encourage them to call Fine Gael (the ruling party in a coalition government with the pro-abortion Labour party) to keep the pro-life promise it made during the 2011 election.

“Labour continue to slide in the polls as their support for abortion grows more strident,” said Ms Roughneen. “Fine Gael needed to stop hiding behind ‘expert committees’ and European Court rulings and remember their obligation to the Irish people, who would be asking them to keep the commitment they made not to legalize abortion in election 2011.”

“The Irish people know that we can do better for mothers and babies than the medieval solution of abortion,” Ms Roughneen said. “The UN has shown that Ireland, without abortion, is the safest place in the world for a mother to have a baby. Let’s keep it that way.”

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Niamh Ui Bhriain of the Life Institute said the pro-life awareness campaign was inspired by one woman’s experience with abortion and its aftermath.

“Last year I had a very moving conversation with an Irish woman who underwent an abortion while living in Britain years before,” said Ms Ui Bhriain. “She told me that she felt her life was torn apart by the abortion, and that her baby’s life was torn apart, as well. I thought it was a powerful description of the reality of abortion, which is all too often glossed over in the debate on the issue.”

The central message of the pro-life campaign that sprang from this conversation is that abortion is never the answer to any crisis that arises in pregnancy.

“The truth is that abortion kills babies and harms women, and we’re using this campaign to put that reality back into the debate,” Ms Ui Bhriain said. “This campaign will be rolled out over the entire summer and will also feature a major pro-life Rally and Roadshow. Mothers and babies deserve better than abortion, and we need to raise up the pro-life majority to ensure that abortion is not foisted on the Irish people by the European Court or abortion advocates in the Labour Party.”

Ms Ui Bhriain said that the extreme reaction of abortion advocates against the campaign was indicative of the mindset of people who did not want to debate the issue but preferred to resort to vandalism.

“They’ve failed to win over the Irish people and want to censor the pro-life message instead,” she said. “They won’t succeed.”

Photos of the Better Answer campaign are available on Facebook here.

For more information about the Better Answer campaign visit the websites of Youth Defence and the Life Institute.