Washington, DC- As the country prepares for the first Supreme Court vacancy in the Internet age, NARAL Pro-Choice America launched a web site--blockroberts.com--and a "flash movie" that puts in real terms what the anti-choice record of President Bush’s Supreme Court nominee John Roberts means for ordinary Americans' lives.

Taking a page from Reality TV, the nation’s leading pro-choice organization unveiled "Extreme Makeover: the Supreme Court Edition," an online flash movie that outlines how having John Roberts on the Supreme Court underscores the threat President Bush and his allies pose to individual freedoms, including the right to privacy.

Nancy Keenan, president of NARAL Pro-Choice America, said this current Supreme Court vacancy is the first one in the age of online advocacy and demonstrates the new ways groups can communicate with supporters. Keenan said this form of online advocacy underscores her group's commitment to a strategic investment in nontraditional techniques to build the online advocacy program.

"We have known for a long time that, if we faced a fight to protect individual freedom and the right to privacy in a Supreme Court battle, our campaign would not look the same as it would have in 1994. Now that President Bush has nominated someone who has advocated the overturning of Roe v. Wade and ending the right to privacy, we are relying on innovative communication that goes directly to people's computers and allows them to take instant action," Keenan said. "'Extreme Makeover: The Supreme Court Edition' exposes the very groups that are celebrating the President's nomination and what their ‘extreme makeover’ of the Supreme Court means for Americans’ individual freedoms. Many participants in these reality shows invite outsiders to makeover their home or wardrobe. The point in our flash movie is that the Radical Right comes through the door uninvited in a strident way to impose their ideology in our daily lives--and from room to room, you see how this invasion could eliminate the right to privacy. Many people who'd never open a traditional action alert will view this movie and forward it to friends and family. That's the kind of online advocacy that will emerge from this battle."

The "Extreme Makeover" flash movie shows the rooms of a house and includes references to personal privacy, access to birth control, medically dishonest abstinence-only education, and individual freedom—all tied to issues that could come before John Roberts if he were confirmed for a lifetime position on the nation’s highest court.

Following the pattern of "Extreme Makeover," individuals may go to the site and click on rooms in the house to show which individual freedoms are threatened. They are given the option of "stopping the makeover" by going to an action page where they may send a personalized letter to their senators asking them to "stop Roberts." Browsers also may forward to the flash movie and accompanying information to their friends and family members.

Keenan said NARAL Pro-Choice America added 500 new members to its 800,000- member Choice Action Network in the first hour alone after President Bush announced his nomination of John Roberts.

"Our online advocacy network includes hundreds of thousands of Americans ready to contact their senators and ask them to oppose John Roberts," Keenan said. "This is the first vacancy on the Supreme Court in more than 10 years. Women’s freedom—including the right to choose—hangs in the balance. Using pop culture references to convey what’s at stake with this nomination shows how the political landscape has changed from traditional modes of communication like TV ads to a more targeted and selective online push."

The blockroberts.com site and flash movie are part of NARAL Pro-Choice America's extensive online campaign. The group also purchased online ads that appeared on sites like nytimes.com and salon.com minutes after President Bush announced that he had nominated John Roberts for the Supreme Court. It also recruited 30,000 rapid responders from all 50 states are who are getting action kits with materials on how to organize through online and traditional field efforts to oppose the Roberts nomination.