Infamous Abortionist Murdered in Kansas (with Updates and Unhinged Reactions from the Left)
There’s a story breaking today in Kansas that abortion doctor George Tiller was shot and killed outside his church this morning. Stacy McCain is the go-to guy for updates and blogospheric reactions on the story as it continues to develop.
My opinion on this is, unfortunately, complicated. George Tiller was, to my thinking, a monster who willfully killed babies whose only “crime” is that they didn’t make it all the way out of the womb before he got hold of them. I can not see late-term or partial-birth abortions (both of which Tiller performed, and fought very hard to keep performing) as anything but infanticide. He was a reprehensible human being whose arrogance at coming within 100 feet of a house of worship is staggering.
However, that does not excuse his killer. The person who shot Tiller is a cold-blooded murderer and is every bit as monstrous a killer as Tiller himself. I don’t care how the killer rationalized his killing (I’m using the generic “him” here). He had no right to take Tiller’s life. He assumed the power of judgment that didn’t belong to him and he should pay for that very dearly. It wouldn’t sadden me at all if he were given the death sentence (assuming they have that in Missouri Kansas). I am very sorry for Tiller’s family and friends, who have lost someone they loved.
The other part of my thinking bears directly on what Stacy had to say about it.
One reason I so despise such criminal idiocy is that, as a student of history, I cannot think of a single instance in which assassination has produced anything good, no matter how evil or misguided the victim, nor how well-intentioned or malevolent the assassin.
From Brutus and the other republican Senators who slew Julius Caesar to Charlotte Corday, from John Wilkes Booth to Gavrilo Princip, and so onto Lee Harvey Oswald, Sirhan Sirhan and James Earl Ray, assassination seems inevitably to work against the purposes of its practitioners.
Those who slew Caesar did not save the Roman republic. Marat’s death only incited the Jacobins to greater terror. Booth’s pistol conjured up a spirit of vengeance against the South more terrible than war itself. Assassination is an act of nihilism. Whatever the motive of the crime, the horror it evokes always inspires a draconian response, and involves other consequences never intended by the criminal.
Tiller’s murder is going to be a very bad thing for the pro-life movement. He has undone years of patient, reasonable work. Tiller’s murderer is responsible now for the thousands of abortions that will be committed because of how far his actions today set back the pro-life movement. As Stacy said, assassinations spin off unintended consequences that never work in the favor of the assassin’s cause.
You will see some of those consequences almost immediately. I would be very surprised to find any pro-life group cheering Tiller’s death with the expected and rather boring example of Randall Terry. In fact, I expect the condemnations of the killer to be unequivocal. However, that won’t stop the pro-abortion left from tying every pro-life person in America to Tiller’s murder whether they find evidence of approval or not.
As a matter of fact, they won’t even bother to look. They’ll just ignore the condemnations from among the pro-lifers and let the ignorant, poisonous bile fly. Their reactions are dishonest, unfair, and purposefully ignorant. But that’s who they are. I feel very sorry indeed for the lives that will be damaged by the actions of this one person.
UPDATE: More news updates here.
Other Posts of Interest:
Category: The Social Issues
As a matter of fact, they won’t even bother to look. They’ll just ignore the condemnations from among the pro-lifers and let the ignorant, poisonous bile fly.
You people don't even read the posts you link to, do you?
I read enough to know that "clean your own house" isn't particularly sage advice when the pro-life groups have already come out with ringing condemnation.
And what's with the "you people"?
You can justify the actions of any or all of your "right to lifer" natzis. The fact remains that it is CONSISTENTLY the right-to-lifer groups that commit these heinous crimes. You may appear to be appalled on the outside but I would bet doloars to doughnuts that you sit around commening the shooter amongst eachother.
You misspelled "Nazis". Next time you want to bring your ill-informed crap in here, at least try to spell your slurs correctly.
I hope someone retaliates against pro-lifers.
Very nice.
Okay guys. We've had one Nazi slur and one outright call for murder. This is the one warning. If it continues, I'm going to start deleting comments and call out the leftist blog from which the comments are coming.
While Missouri does indeed have a death penalty this crime occurred in the state of Kansas. Sheesh!
Corrected. Thank you for catching that.
What is "commening?" Or Doloars?
Man, I've been hearing about thousands of abortion doctors being murdered! Its always plastered all over the news! I can't go a day without hearing about another doctor getting shot/stabbed/beaten! /sarcasm
This stuff does NOT happen often because nobody on the right condones this kind of action. But, I suppose you just ignore it. Its the easiest thing to do when you have indignation to maintain. Besides, by the sound of it you already believe it to be true, so why waste our time trying to prove you wrong?
Also, Jimmie, you shouldn't threaten to call out the lefty blog: just do it. There really isn't any reason to fight clean with these folks.
I'm giving them a chance to "clean up their own house".
Here's an interesting research assignment. How many abortion doctors or workers have been killed because of their work? I can't find more than seven. Total.
Not that seven is an acceptable number. Clearly, murder in the service of any ideology is entirely unacceptable. However, this killing will be shown as emblematic of the pro-life movement no matter that the assertion is born of extreme ignorance.
Ah, keeping the kid gloves on. Gotcha.
Hard to substantively argue with a guy that can't even spell "dollar" correctly. They need to hire better trolls.
Was John Brown wrong?
And if so, then why did the Union Army often sing John Brown's Body?
When law becomes lawlessness, what resort is there but self-help?
When decade after decade of work on this abomination in our midst yields nothing but additional setbacks, when Obama is intent on making all of us taxpayers share in blood guilt, —————— what's left but self-help?
And before you start running off on some hysterics, ——————- explain the action of our founding colonists, who were private citizens, and took matters into their own hands. They rarely numbered beyond 35% of the whole population of the colonies, but nonetheless they took matters into their hands, took up arms, and started shooting people, and shot often enough and long enough for their political will to dominate.
Isn't that what they did?
Read again the duties of a man in the face of lawlessness, articulated for all of you by Jefferson himself, in the Declaration of Independence.
If you've a prob with some guy taking out an out-in-out-mass-murderer, then guess what, the founders would have a prob with YOU.
I wouldn't have done it, wouldn't even have thought about it, ————– but I'm not about to fall all over myself pretending that I really give two damns whether this mass-murderer got it or not.
Q, the problem with your logic is that Tiller was not, in the legal sense, a murderer. No one has the right to act on what they think the law is or what it should be. The fact is, whether you like it or not, what Tiller was doing was legal and protected by the laws of our land. The proper action is to change the law, to persuade and cajole and press hard.
There is no excuse for murder.
Ha! Okay, so you will tell us sometime tomorrow when they don't?
You are right about the numbers…I've been arguing that for years. They always make it sound like it is one per week. And to be fair, they do contend with their share of false threats & stuff like that. But I don't expect the left to react rationally. They always make stuff up or stretch the truth in order to rally even more ignoramuses to their side.
Cheesestick, I think an interesting study would be to compare how many threats per week the average abortion clinic has received over the past eight years to similar threats to military recruiters over the same period of time.
So where's the "unhinged reactions" from the left? I don't see any. All you did was link to two posts, one from a blog I've never even heard of, in an attempt to claim the left is acting "unhinged".
Why didn't you link to Kos or Sullivan or any of the big left-wing blogs covering this, to illustrate how "unhinged" they are?
Oh, that's right. Because they're busily quoting the lunatics at Free Republic and various right-wing blog celebrating Tiller's murder.
The typical conservative blog reader/commenter is a raving maniac. Michelle Malkin's website, Hot Air, hasn't even mentioned Tiller's murder in its headlines, greenroom or front page.
Gee, I wonder why. Maybe because the administrators don't want to be embarrassed by the reaction from their readers.
Tom, actually, a secondhand link to Sullivan's reactions are in my post.
Oh, and there is a Hot Air post on the murder as well.
And do check the link to American Power blog where you will find all the unhinged reactions you could ever want. They're sure to keep you nice and warm.
"And do check the link to American Power blog where you will find all the unhinged reactions you could ever want. They’re sure to keep you nice and warm."
Pathetic. Your definition of an "unhinged reaction" is anyone claiming that the pro-life movement incites murder against abortion doctors.
It's a matter of record that segments of the pro-life do. Randall Terry has ritualistically held prayer rallies outside of Tiller's office asking for God to kill Tiller, as well as other abortion doctors. And this is not someone the pro-life movement has been afraid to associate with. The parents of Terri Schiavo used Terry as their spokesman, he was a favorite on Fox News and has been a favorite of the Religious Right for a long time.
Your pathetic attempt to turn the murder of an abortion doctor by a pro-life fanatic against the left is as transparent as it is weak.
Once again, the difference between the "Far right" and the "Far left" is best illustrated.
The Far Right KILLS PEOPLE. Oklahoma City. Waco. Abortion doctors. Countless blacks and gays and lesbians.
The Far Left? As demonstrated by Bill Ayers, the far left calls ahead of time to let you know they're going to set a pipe bomb off near a police statue, so please make sure nobody gets hurt. The far left is for show.
The far right is for real.
really??? and where do you live?
hey jimmie,by your way of thinking the nazi party didnt murder 6 million jews either as it was "legal" then to kill them.see the corollation?
Actually, it wasn't "legal" to kill them, ken. So, there's no correlation.
Here's what you have to understand. Unborn babies are not, legally, "persons". So long as that's true, they are property. I don't like it and I'm sure you don't either. But that is the situation. Now, we live in a nation of laws. You do not have the right to decide which laws you want to disregard. You have three options: 1) go somewhere else; 2) get the laws changed; or 3) overthrow the government. I won't fight you if you choose either (1) or (2).
hey tom you moron,waco and ruby ridge came courtesy of you left wing,fag lovin clinton and janet"the dyke"reno
"hey tom you moron,waco and ruby ridge came courtesy of you left wing,fag lovin clinton and janet”the dyke”reno"
Oh, really? So the religious psychopaths who boarded themselves up in that compound after spending years molesting innocent children and then shot ATF/FBI agents trying to break-in–I guess they were the victims, right?
Ruby Ridge, there's a laugh. The conservative movement siding with a man who was admittedly a member of a Neo-Nazi church.
Gotta love the "FAG" and "DYKE" comments, though. Truly, when liberals talk about conservatives as anti-gay bigots, it's all just rhetoric.
Scum.
I could be wrong, Tom, but there weren't any serious accusations of child molesting against the Branch Dividians. What caused the barricade is that the authorities attempted to serve an arrest warrant against the leader for weapons violations (as I recall, he had been modifying semi-automatic weapons to fire in full auto mode). I do recall reading that the FBI/ATF had Kouresh under surveillance that entire day and could have arrested him at any point outside the compound while he was unarmed, but didn't.
Also, as I recall, the general protest against what happened at Ruby Ridge had nothing at all to do with the defendant but with how the federal agencies acted very improperly during the standoff. Freedom, liberty, reasonable restrictions on government power. You should be familiar with all that stuff even if it's never been a key part of the progressive movement.
And this is the admonition for both of you, Tom and ken, to dial it back a notch.
You right-wing extremists just never stop projecting, do you? A fully paid-up, card carrying member of your conspiracy just committed murder in cold blood and somehow it's those of us who believe in a woman's right to control her own body who are unhinged. Right, keep telling yourself that. What puzzles me is how you're able to stomach your sanctimonious hypocrisy, which frankly makes me sick. Once again you have managed to demonstrate that how the so-called right to life is reserved for those who agree with you politically. Anyone else may be murdered with impunity. Doctor Tiller was operating within the law and with the informed consent of those unfortunate women who required his services. But then again, you'd like nothing more than to be able to execute those as well. You don’t like abortions? Fine. Don’t have one. But do not presume to dictate to women what they may or may not do with their own bodies. But it’s never enough for you people that you’re free to live according to your own ideas. You absolutely have to insist on the power to control everyone else as well. There’s a term to describe the sort of society where the state regulate even the most intimate and personal aspects of life. It’s fascism. Like Romania under Ceausescu, where all women of child-bearing age were subjected to regular examinations by doctors to determine if they had deprived the great leader of another worker bee by having an illegal abortion. But don’t despair just yet: if the international economy collapses completely and we have a second great depression you may be able to implement a similar regime right here in the US. Just imagine what fun you’ll have burning witches and heretics at the state again. Broadcast live on Fox News of course. You people disgust me.
Nice rant, Jesper. Most of it is crap, but I give you high marks for getting it all out in one belch.
One question, though. How do you know that the killer was a "member" of whatever "conspiracy" you think I have? My guess is that you don't even know the guy's name, which really does make you a bit of an idiot, doesn't it?
I know this because Scott Roeder has a record of posting on right-wing blogs and urging his fellow bigots and homicidal maniacs to take action against Doctor Tiller. So there. He's one of yours alright. Imagine that!
So what you're saying, Jesper, is that it's okay to impugn everyone on the right based on the writings and actions of one person whose opinions seems to be well out of the mainstream of the movement (insofar as pro-life groups, do not generally call for violence against abortion doctors)? I'm fairly sure you don't want that to happen, what with the assortment of freaks hanging out not terribly far from the center of the progressive movement.
And for the record Jimmie, I don't mean to imply that you personally are involved in any conspiracy. Let alone one to commit murder. You seem reasonable thoughtful for a right-winger. I used the term "you" generically to describe the religious, right-wing extremists who claim to be pro-life and would "never" condone violence. Except of course, you know, against anyone who dares to disagree with them. Wink, wink. Nudge, nudge. You have to admit there's a pattern here.
Actually, Jesper, I have to admit no such thing. Tell me, when was the last time an abortion doctor was killed? If there's a pattern, it should have been recently, yes?
"I could be wrong, Tom, but there weren’t any serious accusations of child molesting against the Branch Dividians."
No offense, Jimmie, but do you have any idea what you're talking about? That has to be the single most ignorant statements I have ever seen. Denying that the Branch Dividians molested children is one thing, foolish as it is, denying that there were ever any credible evidence of it is another. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Koresh#Accusat…
Koresh and many of the other men were sexual predators who abused the young girls at the compound. This was one of the primary reasons for the incursion by the federal government, not simply the weapons charges. One of the daughters of a Branch member claimed that Koresh had raped her at the age of 10, and Koresh's own lawyer, post-mortem, admitted that the allegation was probably true.
Waco is an example of conservatives trying to make martyrs and victims out of pure scum. Obviously the deaths of the children involved were horrible, but no one can say the same for the parents. They were sexual abusers, and the ones who weren't allowed it to happen and did nothing about it because of their fanatical religious beliefs.
Interestingly enough, Tom, your own source says the allegations were by no means certain. The local Sheriff said there wasn't enough proof of the charges to go to court. So, your certainty seems out of place.
However, using the same source as you, the evidence is that the search warrant was only related to weapons charges. I'd be careful of throwing around charges of ignorance, lest you be caught up in it yourself. Then again, I'm fairly sure I've warned you of that before.
I read enough to know that “clean your own house” isn’t particularly sage advice when the pro-life groups have already come out with ringing condemnation.
So you didn't read my post. Do me a couple favors:
1) At least be honest when you're called out for the BS you spew
2) Don't link to another one of my posts unless you've read the whole thing.
I quote:
The truth is, you provided no evidence at all that the "rightwing culture of hate" actually caused any murders. What you do have are two killers who used words you want to hang on half the country but you can't tell whether the words caused the killing or were merely another symptom of a mind gone rotten with hatred.
See, here's the problem when you go down that road. You'll find, if you even the least bit objective, that the left contains more than its share of violent people as well. I need not remind you of the rampant violence committed by the left during the last two Presidential elections where people were injured and property was destroyed. Anti-Semitism, a progressive mainstay, is back in vogue. Al Sharpton still gets invited to Democratic functions.
When you start accusing people of being responsible for murder based on nothing more than what they say, well, you're putting yourself in a very bad position. So, seriously, drop the sanctimonious crap. It's not impressing anyone capable of thinking.
[...] preceding post has been disparately received, with Jimmie using it as an example of unequivocal condemnation, while Roy Edroso, who seems to have something stuck in his craw regarding this blog trotting it [...]
What I am saying Jimmie, is that everyone who’s been out there in the public square comparing abortion to murder must accept some responsibility for the actions of Scott Roeder. These acts of violence don’t occur in a vacuum. “I don’t condone violence, but….” Guess what, you just did. If you participate in stoking a fire like this you just can’t claim to be innocent when people get burned. And whether you care to admit it or not Jimmie, there is a direct line and pattern from John Salvi and Eric Rudolph to Scott Roeder. How many clinics have been bombed and/or vandalized over these past twenty years or so? Liberals don’t kill people who disagree with us. We just make fun of them, pitiful backwards losers that they are. Right-wing extremists on the other hand are so firmly convinced of their own moral superiority they don’t feel the need to observe niceties like common decency or legality. And as for impugning guilt by association, that’s just about all right-wingers ever do. Disagree with any of their positions and you are per definition un-American and a bad person. Why is it that bullies have no trouble dishing it out, yet start crying like little girls whenever they get a bit of their own back?
Oh, I think you want to be very careful with that statement. Very, very careful.
You don't even need to go back into history to see the graves full of people who disagreed with progressive ideology. You may just have some proof in this afternoon's headlines.
The person who did this was not a group. He/she was one individual and if he/she was representing a group they are not true pro-lifers. Pro-abortionists are more likely to justify the murder of living human beings based on their own "opinion" and "defintion" of what makes a life worth living and worth while. Pro-lifers are just that: pro-life! I do not condone nor rejoice in murder!
Jesper, you can't even see what you are saying. Liberals don't kill people who disagree with them- I guess that's true because they aren't even given a chance. When I was concieved at that very moment I was a living human being and that is a fact and no one can dispute that! Science fully confirms that. It is mere opinion that life is not yet valuable and there for the mothers body is more valuable than that of the unborn. When I was concieved I WAS alive and MY LIFE was and is MY LIFE and fully worth all of MY rights. Librals do kill by every vote and word of acceptance concerning abortion. Pro-lifers are the ones who believe all human life is equal and pro-abortionists who believe they are superior!
See, the issue here is that leftists have the delusion he's "one of us."
Lessee… one side has been consistently Pro "ending-a-life-when-that-life-is-inconvenient-for-your-own" … which side is that again?
No matter what he thinks he was doing, by deed he is proven to be "one of you." And as if to press the point, it seems some leftist killed a recruiter today. You know, "because of the hatred and violence you always preach. You are all murderers and have his blood on your hands no matter how much you might condemn one lone whacko."
You all need to STFU, admit murder is always wrong, and direct your anger at the ONE person responsible.
"Anti-Semitism, a progressive mainstay, is back in vogue."
ROFL. This coming from a member of the conservative movement? The same conservative movement that claims that a secret cabal of liberal Jews, including the INFAMOUSLY EVIL GEORGE SOROS, secretly controls the media, the Democratic Party and the banks?
Anti-semitism, a progressive mainstay, huh? I guess that explains why the Democratic Party won a whopping 78% of the Jewish vote last year and the Republicans were left with a pathetic 22%. Last time I checked, it was the Religious Right who was busily telling Jews that they're all going to burn in hell, not liberals.
Yeah, it's the right that holds that view. Sure, Keep believing that.
Nah. Left wingers wouldn't do anything nasty like shooting people they disagree with…
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,523860,00.htm…
Oops.
/sarc
So, Captain Obvious, you get to exercise your right to freedom of expression and all the rest of us get to STFU? I'm not entirely surprised. This is exactly the kind of intolerant and authoritarian bigotry we've come to expect from you right-wing extremists. There can be only one truth; one way of looking at the world. Anyone who says differently is free game to be bullied, demonized and, yes, murdered in cold blood. Proving once again just how superior you are to the rest of us. Irony truly is wasted on you people.
For the record Jan, I consider abortion a tragedy for all parties involved. And I absolutely respect your views on the subject. But please don't compare a legal medical procedure, desperate women chose to undergo for reasons you can't know about, to the ultimate crime of taking someone's life. It's not the same and suggesting it is helps to cultivate a climate where violent sociopaths like Scott Roeder feel entitled to commit murder. In a church no less.
Jesper, I dig what you're trying to say, but there's a problem with the first part of your statement. We know that abortion ends the life of a human being. The science on whether a fetus is a human being is not in doubt. What is in doubt is at what point that occurs and the line moves closer and closer to conception the more scientists look at the question.
What is in doubt is whether that human being is a person. Right now, the law says "no", which makes that human being property. However, public opinion is moving away from that belief and toward the belief that an unborn human is also a person. At some point, we're going to have to have that conversation. Until then, it's as reasonable for someone to believe that abortion kills a person as it is to believe that it doesn't.
Seriously Jimmie, do you really think women put themselves through the trauma of abortion (let alone late-term abortion) just for the fun of it? And who are you to substitute your judgment for that of the women actually involved in making these decisions? Also I can't help noticing, that the same social "conservatives" who oppose abortion mostly oppose universal health care as well. And why is this an issue, you might wonder? Because the US has an infant mortality rate of 0.7 percent, meaning that seven out of every 1000 children born in the US die before reaching their first birthday. The corresponding rate in Canada, Scandinavia and Northern Europe ranges between 4 and 5. In other words: right-wingers don't care about the survival of children actually born in this country, many of whom die unnecessarily because they and their mothers are denied access to adequate health care. The issue here isn't about protection the unborn; it's about power and control over women.
No, they don't do it for fun. They do it for any number of reasons. The reasons are entirely irrelevant, though.
And I may substitute my judgment because I am a rational human being capable of doing so. I'm sure you realize that we ask thousands of people to do that very thing every day. We call them jurists.
You are correct that the issue is power, but it's not the power you think. See, women do indeed have a choice. they choose whether to have sex and what level of protection against pregnancy to employ. After that, to my thinking, they are choosing to kill another person who has no say in the matter.
As for the health care, slur, well, that was well beneath you. You're losing your dignified tone, it seems.
Generally, committed “progressives” sincerely believe their ideology, at it core, is pure; and become indignant when the entire movement is tainted by the actions of a few extremists. Conservatives do the same.
Progressives claim that conservative extremists perform more atrocities than they and vice versa. I suppose the idea is that if my side does fewer evil things per capita that would somehow prove my dogma to be the preferred view. But frankly, what would this really prove? I recently heard Wanda Sykes say that she hoped Rush Limbaugh’s kidneys failed after jokingly saying that Rush was probably one of the 9/11 terrorists but missed his flight because of being strung out on prescription drugs. “Too much” she quipped…“but you’re laughing on the inside.” Yes, there is catharsis in vilifying the opposition as objects of scorn rather than human beings and then laying low your caricature. Liberals do it and so do conservatives. I have heard many liberals spew out hate speech, call it a joke and somehow feel justified because, after all, the ones they excoriate and dehumanize have views not compatible with a diverse society. But conservatives forget their Christian roots. For example, some of us conservatives are “laughing on the inside” about the death of Tiller, but I am fighting it.
There is a proverb that goes like so:
“Do not rejoice when your enemy falls, and do not let your heart be glad when he stumbles; lest the LORD see it, and it displease Him, and He turn away His wrath from him. Proverbs 24:17,18.
Do not rejoice when your enemy falls. Get that stupid, lopsided grin off your face. Tiller was a human being with an eternal soul who will experience eternal consequences for what he did. That is a terrible reality that should shake us all as we ponder our own appointment with God.
In the war of words and ideals, fight for your position like good Christian soldiers, yet give honor and respect and love even where you do not think it is warranted. By the way, if anybody poisons Rush Limbaugh should we indict Wanda Sykes?
Jesper it is not my opinion that a life is being taken. It is solid fact. Like I said before it is only opinion that, that life is not yet valuable. Things that lack life do not grow and develop nor do they have a complete set of DNA. I could keep going on the science of this but I don't think your interested in the facts. It is your opinion and so many others that have decided that that the mothers life and body and that of the unborn are not equal. In history there have been way to many lives lost based on the belief that we could define the value of a life. Do you not remember that it was legal to own another person in this country based on their skin color. You could pretty much do what you wanted with them like they were animals. Somehow that made complete sence to many people then even though it would never be politicaly correct or legal to do so now. A life is a life and we are in danger when we don't stand on that firmly. Did you know that many pro-abortionists, although rare I admit but are people of possible influence, believe in infacide up to a certain point. You may think it not possible but that is the direction we are going in. Near birth abortion is sick. There is no medical reason to ever perform this EVER. The woman has to go through labor to have it done. It's outragous!! What danger could she be in if she goes through the labor anyway? The baby is born feet first until just before the head. A scissor like instrument is then used to puncture the back of the baby's head and then the brain is suctioned out. Do you think that innocent baby did not feel being stabbed in the back of the head? I assure you they do. As far as the woman go (leaving out those raped) the mass majority have willingly had sex. If people want to have the right to do what they want, when they want, with who ever they want, they need to take responisbility. I don't care if they have used ever possible means of protection and it still happened. If you don't want a baby don't have sex. Hello!!! For the woman who have been raped and pregnancy has resulted, both baby and mother should be treated as innocent victoms. People get very defensive when I say that but I have known people who came from their mothers being raped. It would be very insulting to say that because of something they did not do that they are disposable. Our lives have all begun at conception. Your LIFE began at conception. you are either alive, or dead. You sure weren't dead. Is a 2 year old less valuable than a ten year old? Why do we think we can put a time-line on ones life only when their in the womb. It makes no sence!!! If you want to go by the facts good, if you want to go by your opinion then you are a supporter the ultamate gamble.
Jesper are you serious power and control over woman? It is because we have the freedom to choose that we are in that position. I will get a little personal here. I am a Christian but my stand can be shown without my beliefs as I have not brought it up until now. I cpmpletely believe in waiting until marraige. Unfortunatly that was not the case for me. I got pregnant while I was in college. I got married shortly after the birth of my precious son. I have only ever been with my husband but that was not so for my husband. I found out later that I had physical consequenses to the choice I had made. It was very hard to accept and though I am healthy I stand the chance for potental problems for the rest of my life. This is not what freedom is. I feel like I am in bondage to this thing. If I had waited and my husband had waited there would have been freedom. There is no chance of these issues if you don't have sex. Our bodies are rejecting this lifestyle!! We over eat- we get fat, we smoke- we could die of many types of cancer, you drink to much you can have medical problems and even die. We are free to do all of these things but that doesn't mean we are going to live with freedom. We become prisoners of food and addictive substances. Likewise with sex. If everyone waited until marriage would STD's exist? I know that is not likely for people to wait but it is still fact. This is not about control it's about having common sence and making good desicions and if we make bad ones taking responsibility for those choices. When it comes to creating lives we need to be very very careful!! We have taken freedom to far by leaving out responsibility.
The whole idea of personhood is crap. Complete crap. It is a theory with only opinion as evidence and follows a deffinition that could effect even babies outside of the womb and those who are handicap! It is outrageous that it can be treated as fact and be used as legitimate cause for abortion. Are we ever going to learn? History is being repeated over and over and over again. LIFE is LIFE and it seems we would rather follow in the footsteps of Hitler.
And yet, jan, it is the theory by which slaves were made free in this country. Personhood is the only issue that matters.
The truth is…
…you didn't read my post.
Here's your homework: Read my entire post, see where you have mischaracterized me, then give me the apology I deserve.
Or let it be known that you attack bloggers by linking to their posts without fully reading them, and placing words in their mouth that they haven't said.
Intellectual honesty or wingnut hackery, the choice is yours.
Nice fake choice. I did read your post. Twice. You're wrong, as you were in your original post. You jumped to a conclusion (the very thing you say I did, interestingly enough) that turned out to be incorrect. I can't help it if the accusation stings. Perhaps if you had take a bit more time and read your way around a bit more, you might have foung out that the right's house is pretty damned clean on this.
Cleaner, at least, than the left's when it comes to the anti-war crowd.
Dignity, schmignity! Please answer the question Jimmie: Do you support universal health care or not? Because if you don't, I can't take your opposition to abortion seriously. And saying that right-wingers who will deny childen access to health care — for whatever reason — don't care about the lives of children is not a slur. It's a fact.
Holy tangent, Jesper! You do know how to throw up strawmen, don't you?
Supporting universal health care, or not, has nothing to do with "denying children access to health care" no matter what proponents of socializing our economy say.
As I said, the debate for me comes down to the issue of personhood. Either an unborn human being is a person deserving of rights or it is property. Right now, the prevailing view is for the latter. That view is changing.
Once again Jan, I respect your religiously based beliefs. But that's all they are: beliefs. And while you may chose to believe anything you want, you have no right to impose those beliefs on others. As far as I'm concerned, there is no God and the Bible is a work of literature. It contains much wisdom for sure, but nothing you'd want to base policy on. Also, to my way of thinking, a fetus is a lump of biological tissue. If a woman isn't free to control and decide over her own body we don't live in a free society anymore. As it happens, my own mother gave up two children for adoption because she couldn't afford to keep them and I respect her for making that difficult decision. But I also think that she woulh have been equally justified in chosing abortion instead.
For the record Mike, I completely agree with you on this point. We all need to make a good faith effert when dealing with these difficult issues. And being a bit of a smart-ass myself, I can testify to the fact, that sincerity and thoughtfulness don't always come easy. No matter which political side you're coming from.
So Jesper you just force your opinion on unborn. I get it. I am not forcing anything except stating facts. It is your choice to believe in God or not. I would never try to force that ever. Nor would I try to convince anyone. Jesus never did that so why would I. You believe or you don't. I usually leave my faith out of arguments like these and I do believe the true evidence speaks for itself without bringing up faith. As for just a lump of biological tissue I think you need to get out of 1973. (when abortion was legalized) Not even doctors who perform abortions would rightfully label it as such now. We know far to much medically to call it a bunch of tissue! You have no idea what you are saying. It is a FACT that it is a human being and that it is living!!! If you want to believe that it is less valuable I can't change that and I don't see the point in trying.
tas has a point, Jimmie–the actual wording you used with your link was "they won't even bother to look"; whereas in fact, tas did look, before he dismissed the condemnation as insufficient.
So here we have left and right, using condemnation on one hand, and tolerance on the other, yet both groups still have extremists who quote the party talking points as justification for their actions. And arguing with each other about it–'if your culture were more tolerant, like ours, there would not be extremists attacking us' — 'if you took a harder line against violence, the way we do, then there would not be extremists attacking _us_.' And the more you ramp up the rhetoric, the more extremists there seem to be…irony, anyone?
I can say he was technically correct (which, as we learned from Futurama, is the best kind of correct) but I have a hard time considering a couple perfunctory links as looking when just a few minutes on memeorandum revealed a wealth of ringing condemnation to me. The problem I had with tas' post is that he made it seem as if the right was split on the matter because he didn't really look.
Truth is, and I've said this before around here, we will always have extremists. The goal of any ideological movement is to keep the extremists on the fringes as much as possible. When it comes to abortion, I believe the right has done that. The pro-life movement, with the exception of Randall Terry, is loudly and forcefully non-violent. The extremists live on the edges of the debate. The left has not at all done that with the anti-war movement. Michael Moore, an open advocate of violence, had a seat of honor among the Democrats. There are plenty of others.
I'm tired of the hypocrisy from the left. I think conservatives have taken it for far too long. My perception is that tas' post was disingenuous and I haven't seen anything from him to suggest otherwise.
Personhood is not even in most dictonaries and the term was never used in ending slavery in this country. In fact the only place I found a dictionary definition for it it stated " the state of being human" which actually supports my claims. That is not however the definition pro-abortionists use. I understand what you are saying and ultimatly you are right in what you say. I should have a been a little more clear. Pro-abortionist have made a list of things they believe must be in place for a person to have reached personhood. I think they have to do this bacause they can no longer say that the unborn is not living human being so they had to come up with some other way of justifying their argument. Thank you for that correction.
No, the term was never used, but the concept was. Whatever you call it, the "person or property" argument is where we really need to be.
jimmie, it's been a privilege reading through your blog.
i can't quite understand your point here, though. you believe that late-term fetuses are fully human, right? there are so few doctors willing to abort them; george tiller's death has certainly spared many lives.
i see your point that the murder has set the pro-life cause back, but aren't you sympathetic to the man who took it upon himself to kill the man responsible for 'america's ongoing holocaust of the unborn?' he was short-sighted, maybe, but don't you think his heart was in the right place? i am sure the constitution says something about armed rebellion against unjust, tyrranical laws somewhere…
Adam, the humanity of the unborn is not a matter of belief, but science. They are humans. I believe that "late-term fetuses" are people, as is every other fetus.
And no, I'm not sympathetic toward him in the least. I was quite clear about that in my blog post, yes?
And thank you for the complement. I've enjoyed having you here, though we disagree. I hope you come back.
i imagine i'll be around for a while. where i'm from, there are so people with views like yours; i honestly feel lucky to explore them.
you did make it clear that you aren't sympathetic towards the murderer. i'm wondering why. it seems incommensurate with the idea that george tiller was himself a prolific, intractable murderer. if someone were marching around my neighborhood killing people, and the force of law refused to stop him, i think it would be an act of compassion to his thousands of potential, future victims to end his spree by any degree of force necessary. it would be negligent and dangerous to wait for the law to side with justice.
what is the second amendment for, if not the defense of the defenseless?
Don't worry about exploring them. Just get to know them and let them get to you know. You'd be surprised what you can learn without trying (and how much of you will rub off on them!).
As I see it, the personhood of the unborn isn't a certainty. I believe it is so, but I also understand my belief is entirely subjective. There is no way to prove personhood. Abortion is similar, in a lot of ways, to slavery, but different in that you can't just point to an unborn and say "How can you say that's not a person?" like you could with a slave in the 1860s and have that be a compelling argument.
I accept that enough of my fellow Americans believe the unborn are not people to keep the laws the way they are. I don't like that it is so, but that's how it works in a civilized society. Scott Roemer took power that didn't belong to him. We can't allow that to happen. If we do, our society crumbles and neither of us want that.
You may be interested in a post I'm going to write a little later. Another blogger wrote a very smart and introspective post on the personhood issue and I'm going to share it. I think you'll find food for thought in it.
"I don’t see the point in trying".
You just took the words right out of my mouth Jan.
There really isn’t much to be gained by arguing with people so convinced of their own divinely inspired righteousness, they can’t even consider the possibility of differing opinions.
That being the case, I shall hereby excuse myself from this blog and take my heretical views elsewhere.
I believe I have made my point here.
And next time a right-wing enforcer decides to overthrow the rule of law through violent terrorism, you will not be able to throw up your hands in mock horror while protesting your disbelief that relentless demonizing and incendiary hate speech could possibly have such deadly consequences.
You were warned; you just didn’t care.
Bye now.
i won't dissect that response; it's too muggy here, and i'm in too tender a mood.
i hope the post you're working on resolves whether you think the 'personhood' of the unborn is a matter of consensus, or whether it's an immutable, scientific truth. as i see it, you are stuck between siding with a murderer and acknowledging the consensual, relativistic nature of morality. i also hope you expand on your comparison of abortion to slavery. an analogy that controversial deserves more than a single sentence.
Of course personhood depends on consensus. That's how it worked with slavery. Slaves weren't people. They were property. It was that way until the consensus changed enough to change the law to grant them personhood.
If personhood were dependent solely on science, the unborn would be persons already. Like I said, science defines when a human is a human pretty clearly.
And don't mistake morality for civil law. There is a difference.
I think this might be it for me so I will try to make it brief.. This is to Adam : I can see the point that your making but the fact is that as much as I hate the act of abortion killing that doctor did not stop anything. As long as it is legal there will be another doctor in his place. It did not solve or stop abortions from happening. If he really wanted to save lives he would not have done it in a way that could jeopardize the work of pro-lifers.
jan, there are not many — i'm reluctant to say not any, though i think that's the case — doctors in the u.s. who are willing to perform abortions on fetuses as fully-formed as those that were george tiller's specialty. there are other abortion doctors, of course, but late-term abortions will be harder to obtain for a substantial length of time as a result of this murder.
killing george tiller may not stop abortions, but it will make a world of difference to those fetuses that will be brought to term in his absence. usually, defending the defenseless is considered brave, regardless of whether it accords with national policy; why is this case different?
jimmie:
'If personhood were dependent solely on science, the unborn would be persons already. Like I said, science defines when a human is a human pretty clearly.'
you are shooting yourself in the foot, jimmie. if science defines when a human is a human so clearly — and if morality has any sort of relationship with science — then popular consensus is out of line with objective truth, and our civil laws are allowing the bloodiest massacre in our country's history to continue to rage, unchecked and unpunished.
after so many unsuccessful years of trying to stop abortion through legal channels, assassinating george tiller seems like this battle's natural escalation, no? after all, the millions of babies that are legally murdered in america must be defended by any means necessary, right? how many babies die every second we waste in fruitless legislation?
sorry — i guess all those questions sound rhetorical. i would like to hear whether you agree with my reasoning, jimmie.
so, eagerly awaiting your response.
Adam, you're right. That was an unsupported appeal to authority. Science does not define when a human is a human clearly–in fact, science doesn't define it at all. If you have a complete definition in mind already, you don't need science to figure out whether a particular thing is human or not, and if your definition isn't complete, then science isn't going to help you fix it.
Erich, I don't know that I agree. Science is pretty clear that a fetus is a human being. It was that determination that aided SCOTUS in the Roe v Wade decision. Where the debate has been, legally, has been on the matter of viability (which doesn't speak to humanity, so far as I know, but personhood) but not whether the fetus was a human being or not.
Where am I wrong on the science angle?