A petition calling for the cancellation of a popular reality show was recently filed after one of its ‘stars’ compared America’s abortion industry to the Holocaust.

19 Kids and Counting airs weekly on TLC, with an average viewing audience of approximately 1.5 million. The broadcast follows the lives of Jim Bob and Michelle Duggar, as well as their 19 children, who range in age from 3 to 25 years. The Duggars are all unashamed Christians, and regularly speak at various events across the country.

However, remarks from Jim Bob Duggar at last month’s Values Voters Summit have now generated an outcry from abortion advocates. In his address, Duggar compared the United States’ abortion practices today with the Nazi Germany Holocaust during World War II.

“Back a few years ago,” Duggar said at the summit, “I heard Governor Huckabee speak and he was sharing about how he had taken his daughter Sarah over to one of the concentration camps where a lot of Jewish people were killed. And he said, as they were walking out of that concentration camp, … [Sarah] looked up at him and she said, ‘Daddy, why didn’t somebody do something?’”

“And, you know what?” Duggar continued. “That’s where we’re at in our nation. Do we want our children, when we’re going to tell them about how great America was, … [to] look at you and say, ‘Why didn’t somebody do something?’”

After the Values Voters Summit, Duggar reiterated his statements.

“Let me clarify,” he stated, according to the Daily Press. “We have since 1973 (when Roe v. Wade was decided) had 55 million abortions, so what we have going on is a baby holocaust.”

After the summit, abortion proponents decried Duggar’s comments, asserting that abortions should never be compared to the Holocaust. A petition was also filed on MoveOn.org, demanding the cancellation of 19 Kids and Counting. The petition’s author—identified as Tamar Fox—claims to be a “superfan” of the reality TV show, but also describes herself as “pro-choice.”

“[T]his time, [the Duggars’] right wing views have gone too far,” the petition reads. “In a recent speech at the Values Voter Summit Jim Bob Duggar compared America today to Nazi Germany. Why? Because of abortion. When asked to explain, he said that the millions of legal abortions that have occurred since Roe v. Wade was decided are an ongoing ‘baby holocaust.’”

“Let’s be clear: America today is nothing like Nazi Germany, and a woman who decides to have an abortion is not taking part in a Holocaust,” Fox’s petition argues. “Please join me in telling TLC and Discovery Media to cancel the Duggars’ show, ‘19 Kids and Counting,’ and stop rewarding people who misuse the history of the Holocaust to play politics with women’s rights.”

To date, the petition has received just over 200 signatures. Comments posted on the petition website echo similarly angry sentiments from the pro-abortion crowd.

“This show disgusts me on every possible level,” one commeter named Liz stated. “Here’s hoping that Duggar’s offensive, pig-ignorant comments constitute the last straw!”

Others condemned the Duggar family’s Christianity.

“Aside from the inherent stupidity of these types [of] shows in general, who thinks having 19 children is something to be proud of?” Brian asks. “Let me guess, these people are religious fanatics—c’mon people, it’s 2013; time to give up the silly superstitious nonsense and admit ALL religions are nothing more than ignorant ancient [expletive] with no place in today’s world.”

However, Jill Stanek with LifeNews.com argued in an article last week that the comparison between the 1940s Holocaust and modern abortion practices is tragically valid. Stanek points out that one of the definitions of “holocaust” is—according to the Merriam-Webster Dictionary—“a mass slaughter of people.”

“So,” Stanek writes, “the term ‘holocaust’ can be appropriately used to describe the mass genocide of babies via abortion, and it can also be used to compare abortion to the Jewish Holocaust, although as tragic as the latter was, its death toll pales in comparison to the former.”

Others shared similar sentiments on Facebook.

“Is [abortion] not a baby Holocaust?” one commenter asked. “Only the cold technical language that depicts abortion as a mere medical procedure allows pro-abortionists to conceal the reality of what it really is.”

“I finally watched an episode [of 19 Kids and Counting] today and loved it!” another stated. “You can see the goodness and love in every single member of that family. I pray that God continues to bless them!”

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