Abortion & Religion

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September 26, 2012

Abortion and the Single Issue Voter

Posted by DrK8 under Abortion, Abortion & Religion, GOP, ProLife, Romney, Vote
[156] Comments 

You have heard, no doubt, people saying that their choice for president is based on sentiments such as “we have shared values” or “he’s authentic” or “he’s prolife.” Political scientist Samuel Popkin of the University of California, San Diego, calls this kind of reasoning “gut rationality.” Essentially, people vote by heuristics and go with their gut, with whom they most identify, or with how the candidates make them feel. But such a vote, while rational sounding, tells us that voters often vote with their heart and not their head.

For most prolife voters (and other single-issue voters), emotional voting is a substitute for their cognitive-processing limitations. Most voters simply do not know all that there is to know about a candidate. The information available on the candidate’s record, the assessment of the veracity of the information and prognostications for what the candidate might do if voted into office, is a daunting task for political pundits. For ordinary citizens, sifting through this data, if available, could cause an overload for even the most studious.

The average citizen is woefully ignorant of facts and, thus, relies on sound bytes and obfuscatory God terms like family values, patriotism, freedom and progress. In fact, according to political voting behavior expert, Drew Westen, PhD, when given empirical data that pushed voters one way or the other, that had no impact, those facts only hardened their emotionally biased views. In politics, Westen claims, “when reason and emotion collide, emotion invariably wins.” It’s a sad reality for our democracy when reason and facts lose to emotions, when politicians’ sound bytes reign over the complexities within the platform of each candidate aspiring to lead our country.

  Not surprising, for most prolife voters, abortion, couched as the all-encompassing prolife moniker, is their single issue vote looking for a prolife candidate. So, if you are that voter, ask yourself how ending legal abortion will improve the lives of single mothers, homeless and hungry families or unemployed parents. Ask yourself how your prolife candidate will address the astronomical rise in sexually transmitted infections in teens (one out of four) in spite of the failed conservative-embraced abstinence-only education in school districts. Ask how ending legal abortion will help the woman carrying a dead fetus at 14 weeks or help the woman with a hydranencephalic fetus. Ask how ending legal abortion will help the woman who is forced to continue her pregnancy despite suffering from affective psychosis and serious hyperemesis gravidurum.  Ask how ending legal abortion will help the pregnant woman who does not want to continue the pregnancy, does not want to be a mother, does not want the fetus to be inside her, has no emotional attachment to this thing growing inside her and does not want any outsiders telling her what she can or cannot do with her body. These questions are just about abortion. They’re not about the larger issues that support women and their families. They’re not about the very real issues that families face as they try to put food on the table, tutor children with their homework, juggle work and family, and juggle finances to pay the rent or buy the groceries. Some say that it’s a matter of conscience. They say they cannot support someone who agrees with taking innocent life. OK. But does your prolife candidate support the military’s taking of innocent lives in the many U.S. invasions? Does your candidate support capital punishment? Does your candidate support budgetary cuts that break the lifelines for the poor, the disenfranchised and our veterans? And after you’ve pondered your answers to these questions, issues that the Congress and the president can impact, remember that the president doesn’t decide the abortion issue. The only role the president has in that regard is through his judicial appointments, primarily to the Supreme Court.

To sum things up, consider two more questions. First, if you’re an antiabortion single-issue voter making your bet on the prolife candidate, ask yourself if abortion is something that is paramount to the safety, prosperity, to the very existence of all in this nation. Second, ask yourself if the end of legal abortion will save the nation from destruction in the long run. I’m betting you cannot answer in the affirmative to either question, if you are truthful.

 

August 2, 2012

A Closer Look at Anti Abortion Activists

Posted by DrK8 under Abortion, Abortion & Religion, Abortion Information, Abortion lies, Cancer, Christian Terrorism
[31] Comments 

Anti abortion activists are against abortion. Period. But there’s more to their rhetoric than merely proclaiming that abortion is morally wrong. Yes, there is more than simply being against a legal, safe medical procedure. In fact, it is through an examination of symbolic acts and artifacts that the activists use (literature, images, performances and verbal messages), that we can more fully flesh out the personae known as anti abortion activists.

Oppositional – Their lives are bound by ancient superstitions that stand as an impediment to science and progress. Relying on faith, they view the world in oppositional and controlled ways. For example, consider the archetypal metaphor of day and night. Antis are to day what pro choicers are to night. They are the ones who wear white, while others wear black. Their worldview accommodates no shades of grey. Nuances do not factor into their tightly bound world.  So, for example, to clinic clients, they say things like:

They want your baby to die. We want your baby to live.

With them, you’ll have a lifetime of regrets with a dead baby. With us, you will no regrets, a lifetime of happiness and a beautiful baby.

Your daughter deserves better than abortion. She’s going to mourn for this child for the rest of her life.

Make the right choice and not destroy life.

And to volunteer and clinic staff, the antis are fond of oppositional comments such as:

Get a job where you don’t have to kill for a living.

Why don’t you cross over to our side?

When you laugh at me, you’re laughing at God.

To make their point more visually punctuated and to signify their sacredness, they wear and carrying crosses and crucifixes, decorate the adjacent lawn with ornaments such as white crosses and white coffins, and chant prayers and spells to exorcise the evil spirits.

Another aspect of this oppositional thinking is their proclivity toward discriminating between the sacred and the profane. For example, offers of money to help women carry their pregnancy to term is sacred while offers of money to help women defray the cost of an abortion is profane. While doctors who earn money performing general surgery are sacred, doctors who earn money performing abortions are profane. While dental clinics are sacred, abortion clinics are profane. The say things like:

Their bread and butter comes from killing babies.

They’re banking on your daughter to forget to take her birth control pills so she gets pregnant and has to have an abortion.

This doctor doesn’t care about you. All he wants is your money.

In an attempt at amending what they view at evil, antis sprinkle holy water on the ground outside the abortion clinic, chant prayers and spike the lawn with white crosses and images of a white Jesus (who was, without a doubt, not white).

Authoritarian – From the strict doctrines binding them in their faith, antis are like the dragons that guard the door to progressive thinking. For them, their faith is absolutely true and completely adequate to explain everything. In their worldview, absolute conformity to the doctrine is mandatory. They learn from authoritarian teachers and preachers. Hence, they learn to be authoritarian toward others. In fiery, white-hot lightening, they lash out toward volunteer escorts:

You need to examine your motives for being so happy here at an abortion center.

You should be ashamed of yourself. You know in your heart that abortion is wrong.

Keep in mind that the antis do not know the women and their companions who enter the clinics. Nevertheless, they’ve singed total strangers, with comments like:

You don’t want your daughter to be hurting for the rest of your life

Don’t kill your baby today. Your baby deserves a birthday

Abortion is not the answer to the problem you’re facing today.

You’ve had your fun sleeping with her. Now be man and take care of her.

If your daughter conceived in rape, it’s the way God wanted it to be.

Ask God to forgive you.

In an effort to make their point, they often resort to finger-pointing, to shoving their signs in people’s faces telling them they “need to see this” and posting signs with straight forward pronouncement “Babies killed here” or “Be Gone Satan” or “Abortion is the Holocaust.”

Fear Mongering – Imagine living amongst humans where their nature has been programmed by magical thinking and heapum powerful juju. Using words created by humans and printed in man-made books, they declare their programming to be the Hocus Pocus of the Great Sky God. Lacking wisdom, they demand you too turn your life over to their GSG. They warn that if you don’t do as they say, because they know what is best, you will live in eternal flames. At abortion clinics, they spread their fear mongering words, often marinated in magical thinking, with comments like:

Abortion is associated with a 400% increase in breast cancer.

They love to talk about dead babies, stopping a beating heart.

The child you kill will haunt you at night.

Your baby has a heartbeat and brain waves and feels excruciating pain when the doctor tears his little body apart.

They’re going to turn your baby into baby road-kill.

They’re going to tear your uterus apart.

My girlfriend died in this clinic two weeks ago.

You’re going to cry for the rest of your life.

They’re going to suck your baby’s brains out.

The blood of that child is on your hands.

Mommy, please don’t let them tear my arms and legs off.

And if the words don’t scare the living hell out someone, these folks resort to gruesome images of a bloody full term fetus in pieces, Auschwitz signs with each letter of the word dripping with blood or spill red paint wherever they can.

Pro Fetus Anti Woman – Anti abortion activists call themselves prolife but that’s a misnomer. They’re really pro fetus. Taking the pro fetus position symbolically annihilates the woman carry the fetus, which is a pretty damn difficult place to be, if you ask me. In their magical thinking, the fetus is at the top of their value hierarchy while the aged humans are near the bottom. It’s no wonder that the average age of an anti abortion activist qualifies for senior citizen discounts. This older generation was socialized to believe that women were subservient to men, that people were heterosexual, that marriage meant children, that motherhood defined a woman and that young children were more valuable than old people. You can hear how this misogyny plays out when activists make comments like:

Let your baby live.

Your baby loves you and is innocent.

Your baby has the right to life.

Your baby has the right to have a birthday.

Anti woman comments are evident when the anti abortion activists say comments like:

Women use abortion as the easy way out.

Abortion is a selfish choice.

What gives you the right to kill your child?

Think about your baby’s soft, soft heart and your hard, hard heart.

You’re the mother of a dead baby now.

Even a cursory inventory of images used in the antiabortion industry reveals an obsession with the fetus and with babies. From microscopic fetal images to full color photography of children smiling, the antis are fixated. In their artifacts, the fetus figures prominently in rosaries sporting fetal dolls floating in the beads, in poster-sized baby announcements, in empty manger scenes (as if all babies are Jesus?), in baby dolls they carry in infant carriers and in the live babies they borrow from friends as props. While the fetus is foremost in their visual world, women are relegated to the occasional incubator status in the objectified form of a swollen, pregnant belly.

In Sum – A closer look at the personae of anti abortion activists provides a glimpse into their beliefs. They often claim that prochoicers have a hardened heart but the reality is that they are projecting their own ossified head and heart. Unable to moderate, unwilling to recant, and unable to see their own aggressivity, they hold fervently to the belief that what they do outside abortion clinics, on the Internet and at rallies is the right thing to do and is the right way to do things. And despite millions of people who share their faith, it is in name only. The anti abortion activists have their own special interpretations of how their faith is to be performed. And it’s quite the unbelievable performance!

 

July 25, 2012

Symbolically Annihilated

Posted by DrK8 under Abortion, Abortion & Religion, Lies | Tags: , , , |
[84] Comments 

A common sentiment from antiabortion activists is the juxtaposition of what they want versus what the clinic staff and volunteers want. For example, Gerry McWilliams, an incorrigible protester at Allentown Womens Center, is fond of saying to women as they cross the parking lot with clinic escorts (who wear green AWC vests), “We want your baby to live. Those people in the green vests want your baby to die.” It’s a perfect example of a logical fallacy in public debates on politics, ethics, and religion. As a straw man, this protester attacks a position not held by the other side (in fact, staff and escorts respect what women want), then acts as though the other side’s (the escorts in the vests) position has been refuted. This straw man is easy to defeat and is a sign of a weak, desperate man who knows he is losing. It’s also an indication that the woman is symbolically dismissed.

The notorious Flip Benham, Director of Operation Save America, writes about abortion in an ironic twist “there are no cheap political solutions to the holocaust presently ravaging our nation” (operationsaveamerica web site). Yet, outside the Hebron, NC clinic, he uses cheap political solutions that are grotesque, bordering on pornographic. Standing on a raised platform, he uses a bullhorn to broadcast to women entering the clinic “the devil inside that door will drink the blood of your child.” Again, the appeal is for the sensational and the want of the fetus. It’s not about what the woman wants. She is symbolically dismissed as unimportant.

When prolife pundit Abby Johnson tells her story on college campuses about why she resigned her position at Planned Parenthood, she appeals to emotions. Claiming to have witnessed an ultrasound-guided abortion that horrified her, she claims she was compelled to cross over to the prolife side. Of course, she obscures the fact that she was about to get fired. She also fails to mention the money she earns for her new-found celebrity status. But that’s another story. In telling her story over and over, she attempts to create a logically coherent narrative to convince her audiences that abortion is wrong. But, like others who just don’t get it, she ignores the very reality that abortion is right for one out of every three women of reproductive age. She, too, ignores these women.

Another common prolife sentiment, especially among the women, is talk about life being precious. A tender-hearted Lutheran minister in Allentown, PA, suggested these women just loved babies. They prattle on with what is essentially their own desires, “Love your baby” or “Life is precious. Don’t kill your baby” or “Give your baby up for adoption. It’s the selfless thing to do.” But their suggestion of adoption as a selfless option fails to consider the documented disadvantages of adoption. It fails to recognize that life’s preciousness can and should mean the concerns of the woman who is considering her options with an unplanned, unwanted pregnancy. But for these prolife women, symbolically dismissing the pregnant women, while favoring “the babies” is simply what they do best.

At clinics across the nation, antiabortion activists stand on sidewalks and streets with signs that 1) not only make it easy for women to locate the clinics (because they are warned about the trolls) but 2) illustrate their own obsessions and utter disregard for the very women they hope to attract. They use grotesque fetal images that exploit fetal death, that strip any human dignity from the fetus, and that turn death into leering pornography. These faux moralists cheapen their brand when they stigmatize women through grotesque imagery and powerful language of condemnation. Their monster talk is convenient. It frees them from thinking about the sacredness of women. And with predictable frequency, the protesters create a circus of the bizarre for women and their companions, with performances of religiosity, banal rituals of fear mongering, and social repudiation directed at women and their companions. And while they claim to direct their efforts toward women, in reality, they are simply performing acts of self-righteousness while ignoring what women want. In other words, they symbolically dismiss women in favor of what they want.

It was Gaye Tuchman (1978) who coined the phrase ‘symbolic annihilation’ when she was describing how women were underrepresented or misrepresented in media and society. She divided symbolic annihilation into three aspects: omission, trivialization and condemnation. It is within these aspects that symbolic annihilation is evident in the prolife industry. They omit women’s agency. They trivialize women’s reasons for wanting an abortion. And they certainly condemn women who consider abortion and who choose abortion.

Symbolic annihilation of women through omission, trivialization and condemnation: it’s the hallmark of the antiabortion zealots who care less about the rights of girls and women.

 

July 11, 2012

A Big Disconnect

Posted by DrK8 under Abortion & Religion, Abortion Information, Abortion lies, Abortion MisInformation, Bush, Obama, Planned Parenthood, Vote
[66] Comments 

People in the prolife movement are fond of saying they respect all life from womb to tomb. But I’m wondering if their talk is nothing but Christian confections like the sweet, gritty nothingness of cotton candy . I’m wondering about this because between saying and doing, there is an ocean of difference. Saying you’re prolife in polls, on blogs, on bumper stickers and in a house of worship is easy. Talk, as the saying goes, is cheap. But let’s face the possibility that being prolife is just code for being anti abortion. It is surely not about respecting all of life from womb to tomb. Recall the early presidential debates when prolife Governor Rick Perry (R-TX) made quite a show of being a conservative Christian. Yet under his watch he executed 234 prisoners, thus, raising questions about the big disconnect within conservative Christians and small government Tea Party libertarians in the Republican Party.  Let’s consider other examples of this questionable disconnect in the prolife movement.

First, let’s look at those mostly Republican legislators who promote cuts to WIC (education and nutrition supplements for women, infants and children). Their efforts give new meaning to putting women and children first as they place the nation’s fiscal concerns on the shoulders of babies. Economic analysis from the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the U.S. Office of Management and Budget has shown that every $1 spent on WIC results in a savings of $1.77 to $3.13 in health care costs, primarily attributed to reduced rates of low birth weight and improved rates of immunizations. Rather than saving money, cutting WIC services may ultimately result in increased health care costs due to low birth weight, iron deficiency and undernutrition. Again, it seems that the prolife moniker only means anti abortion.

As with WIC, there are cuts to Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP). SNAP is a lifeline for those in need, which includes children and senior citizens. Rather than respect all life from womb to tomb, and contrary to the very values we hold as Americans to treat those most in need, our prolife legislators have elected to slash SNAP funding. This funding cut will increase hunger for our most vulnerable and eliminate thousands of jobs, particularly in the food-related industries. According to current statistics 16.2 million children live in households that struggle to put food on the table while prolifers worry about fetuses being aborted. The Food Research and Action Center claim that the “most prolific and compelling research shows that the effects of food insecurity on children impact their health, development, learning and mental health.”  I would argue that feeding children and those adults in need, ensuring that they have adequate nutrition, aligns more thoughtfully and authentically to the meaning about prolife than fretting about abortion.

Second, let’s ponder how those in the prolife movement claim that abortion providers, including Planned Parenthood, target minorities by locating their clinics in their minority neighborhoods as a means for eliminating undesirables from society. But the fly in the ointment is the Guttmacher factoid that 63% of abortion providers are in predominantly non-Hispanic white neighborhoods. That hardly looks like targeting. Further, prolifers also argue that African Americans account for higher rates of abortion, a fact provided by the CDC. Disingenuously, prolifers fail to mention that numerous factors such as poverty, lack of health care, cultural practices, family size and lack of reliable birth control can contribute to higher abortion rates. More to the point is the fact that while the prolifers are wringing their hands about targeting minorities, they conveniently ignore the minorities who are being targeted by police and the judicial system and executed in our prison systems. In fact, despite a clear majority of voters (61%) who would choose a punishment other than execution, our nation retains the death penalty, a fact shared by difficult countries such as Libya, Chad, and Sierra Leone. So the hypocrisy of Governors Rick Perry (R-TX) and Phil Bryant (R-MS), both conservative Christians who claim the prolife label, but take the lead on the number of executions, is quite remarkable. On a related note, according to the Bureau of Justice Statistics, the homicide victimization rate for blacks (19.6 homicides per 100,000) was 6 times higher than the rate for whites (3.3 homicides per 100,000). Making outrageous claims about Planned Parenthood targeting black women is an absurd waste of time particularly with respect to the genuine, far larger, more life-threatening issues that impact blacks in our nation.

A final example of the big disconnect among prolifers is drawn from the synergistic impact of the government, the military and corporatism. Corporatism— whether through direct handouts, corporate bailouts, eminent domain, licensing laws, antitrust regulations, or environmental edicts — inflicts a measurable degree of harm on Americans. For example, measurable levels of hundreds of corporate manufactured chemicals are routinely found in the bodies of all Americans, including newborns. Many of the toxins found in baby bottles and toys have been linked to developmental and reproductive disorders. Even Presidents Bush and Obama aggressively supported harmful genetically modified food policies from corporations like Monsanto while they plant organic gardens in the White House and have organic kitchen policies. And while our nation’s poorest are subjected to harmful environmental contaminants, nearby industries are afforded lenient policies to protect their bottom line. But these contaminants create the perfect health storm for mostly African American children living nearby. For black children, one out of every six (CDC) has asthma due to pollution, poverty, and being people of color. So, worrying about abortion seems rather petty in comparison to the misery that children and adults endure.

During wartime, the politically connected corporations derive high profits and cushy contracts. But war has its share of collateral damage. Where was the moral outcry for approximately 90,000 civilians who were killed in Iraq and Afghanistan by our “freedom loving” military forced into service by George W. Bush? Where was the moral outrage when prolife, Christian conservative Republican President George W. Bush along with Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, Alberto Gonzales, David Addington, William Haynes, Jay Bybee and John Yoo were tried in absentia in Malaysia and found guilty of war crimes for torture and cruel, inhumane and degrading treatment? While many patriotic types believe in American capitalism and our mighty military as a good for humanity, most are blind to the inherent savage, destructive nihilism of our country’s actions. Wringing hands and waving cardboard “End Abortion” signs seem frivolous compared to the tens of thousands who die, who are maimed or who are chronically ill because of policies and actions of the government, the military and corporatism.

While prolifers are forever worrying about the vast sums of money doctors earn from providing abortions, they’re not concerned at all about the vast sums of money that orthopedic surgeons or orthodontists earn. It can’t be about the money because many of them file frivolous lawsuits for handsome sums of compensation. And it surely isn’t their claim to respect all life at all ages because they’re apparently not concerned at all about their votes for candidates who support military actions that kill civilians. And while funding cuts to nutrition programs are touted as necessary to reduce the deficit and as important to ensure that we don’t create a welfare state, prolifers seem little concerned with the politicians’ decisions. In truth, they’re not prolife in any meaningful way. They’re just against abortion. And that, dear readers, is what I see as a Big Disconnect.

 

July 4, 2012

The Abortion-Holocaust Comparison

Posted by DrK8 under Abortion, Abortion & Religion, Abortion Advocates, Abortion Information, Abortion lies, history, Pro Life Lies, Pro Life Terrorism | Tags: |
[84] Comments 

The United States Holocaust Museum, defines the holocaust as “the state-sponsored systematic persecution and annihilation of European Jewry by Nazi Germany and its collaborators between 1933 and 1945”. The Nazis’ unspeakable horrors were inflicted on six million Jews. Millions more were targeted for destruction including Roma and Sinti (Gypsies), people with mental and physical disabilities, Poles, homosexuals, Jehovah’s Witnesses, Soviet prisoners of war, and political dissidents.

So when the culturally insensitive, U.S. anti abortion cartel compares the Nazi holocaust to the legalization of abortion, I would suggest that they are being intellectually dishonest. Abortion in the United States is not a state-sponsored, systematic mandate to require women to abort. In fact, the only thing that is systematic about abortion is the anti abortion cartel’s relentless persecution of abortion clinics and their clients and staff and their ruthless legislative and prosecutorial activities making access to abortion difficult, if not impossible, and increasingly more expensive. And on a local level across the nation, though not systematic, there remains the ever-present anti abortion protesters’ dogged efforts at shaming, disrespecting and terrorizing women at abortion clinics. So, let’s face the facts. These rancorous protesters, in claiming that abortion is like the holocaust, are claiming that the United States deserves the same fate as Nazi Germany–namely, to be overthrown, to be shamed, and to acknowledge a very dark past.

More to the point, if the comparison was taken to a logical conclusion, to the equivalent of the Nuremberg trials, we could say that just as Adolf Eichmann was found guilty, so too would Bernard Nathanson be found guilty. Instead of the typical hero-worshipping at prolife dinner parties where Nathanson gets paid to tell his abortion stories (and where gushing admirers would open their wallets), he would be found guilty of engineering the American version of the final solution.  Clearly, the anti-abortion movement is far too quick to forgive and forget. Linking abortion (and not Dr. Nathanson) to the abortion-holocaust can only mean that its comparison is nothing more than a propaganda campaign.

Further, the  abortion-holocaust comparison conveniently overlooks the fact that the Nazis desired births to serve as proverbial “fodder” for the rearming of the military. The desired births concept was frightening then as it is now. I’ve read that  Bob Pawson, NJ coordinator for prolife educators and students wrote, “Abortion is the primary factor causing America’s economic recession. America is suffering the consequences for killing fifty-million people who are supposed to be among us today as teachers, producers, consumers, taxpayers, leaders, inventors, and problem-solvers. It’s no surprise that a nation which slaughters nearly twenty percent of its future customers, investors, and entrepreneurs also kills its own economy. Wrong moral choices have negative consequences. Evil acts generate their own punishment.” This type of thinking is akin the the Nazi mindset that believed that desired births would serve as proverbial “fodder” for the rearming of the military. What can I say? We’re still dealing with a tiny minority whose vestigial thinking and financial support  make them either dangerous or annoying or both. So sad.

But, let me return to my article. Heinrich Himmler, head of the SS, one of the chief architects of the Holocaust, and personal friend of Adolph Hitler, stated that the evil of abortion lay not in the loss of an individual life, but more in the fact that many women through abortion lost their ability to have children later. Fortunately, today’s abortion techniques very rarely leave women incapable of subsequent pregnancies. And, as a noteworthy aside, abortion is not an evil. It is an essential, safe, legal medical procedure for millions of women and their families.

On a more personal note, the holocaust-abortion comparison is genuinely offensive to the relatives and descendants of those families who died at the hands of Nazi German troops. Critics like Holocaust survivor Elie Wiesel said those who compare the Holocaust to abortion prove that they do not understand the Holocaust. This offense reminds me of the many graphic, grotesque and, frankly, incongruous tactics used by the anti abortion cartel. Their tactics capitalize on the monstrous by creating a macabre circus but fail miserably to compassionately respect and understand the women who must wrestle with an unplanned pregnancy.

For those who have flunked the logic test when using this glib and immoral comparison, they should recall that the Nazis cracked down on anyone who agitated on behalf of the Jews or took steps to help them. In contrast, the anti abortion cartel in the United States has a strong political voice. Ongoing efforts to convince women to carry their pregnancies to term, and to give those women assistance in doing so, are entirely legal and legitimate, and often effective. Let’s not forget that crisis pregnancy centers are not analogous to the “secret annex” in The Diary of Anne Frank. They should also recall that the Nazis believed once a Jew, always a Jew. The unborn are not like the Jews. They don’t stay unborn for long. It seems to me that those in the anti abortion movement have a morally relevant reason for distinguishing between Nazi Germany’s treatment of the Jews and the treatment of the unborn under U.S. law. But we will likely wait quite some time before some find their way to their logic textbooks.

Another flaw in the abortion-holocaust comparison is the shaky premise that fetuses are full human beings with the same status and rights thereof. This fails to recognize that fetuses are completely dependent on a woman’s body to survive and that the fetal mode of growth and survival fits the technical definition of parasite.

This shaky premise also fails to recognize that pregnant women would be forced to forfeit their own human rights in exchange for fetal rights. In the view of many in the anti abortion movement, fetuses are vulnerable persons being exterminated because they’ve gotten in the way of selfish women. What these folks conveniently forget is making abortion illegal would be a serious infringement on women’s human rights. Abortion is a universal practice, occurring in every society and throughout history, regardless of laws. Therefore, the anti-abortion movement’s naive opposition to it may be a far stronger indication of misogyny than of a concern for unborn babies. And outlawing abortion doesn’t just kill women, it also negates their moral autonomy, cripples their economic independence, criminalizes them for their biology, and generally turns them into all-around second-class citizens.

But perhaps these sentiments reflect the ugly truth within the anti abortion cartel–that the unborn are more valuable than the women who house them. Viewing women as animals with an obligation to reproduce for the state sounds eerily like the Third Reich and the anti abortion cartel.

 

May 10, 2012

State of Refuge creates a State of Refusal

Posted by DrK8 under Abortion & Religion, Abortion Terrorism, Lies, Pro Life Lies, Pro Life Terrorism
[19] Comments 

Flip Benham and his anti abortion cohorts have developed a loose coalition of like-minded street preachers to save five states from abortion. In what he imagines as a “national vision to expand a concept discovered in the Old Testament,” Benham believes they will be successful in closing the one remaining abortion clinic in Arkansas, North Dakota, South Dakota, Wyoming and Mississippi. Launching this campaign in Fargo North Dakota to create what he imagines as a “state of refuge” from abortion, Benham’s vision was like a catechism for draconian righteousness of the regime of reproduction. Imagining himself as the high priest for moral order, Flip has been waging a war on abortion by breaking the law when threatening the lives of physicians, misinterpreting the bible to suit his agenda and wasting municipal resources when his ill-conceived protests require police coverage. Like the war on terror that mixes allegory with actuality, Benham’s war on abortion is a dyslexic moniker for a war on good women who need the services of the targeted clinics. He and his apostles of perpetual psychosis think it is socially, morally and politically acceptable to chant vicious and demented assertions in a public arena.

But the Fargo community response to the State of Refuge campaign was typical. People were outraged at the grotesque images that protesters trot out, inconvenienced by the crowded sidewalks and disgusted by the group’s use of small children tasked with leafleting in traffic. Reports from the only clinic were also typical. No woman changed her mind to keep her appointment for an abortion. Rather than a state of refuge, Fargo became a state of refusal—refusing to give in to Christo-fascists bullies, evangelistic thugs, and shame-mongering dogs.

After Fargo, the klavern of counterfeit prophets will move their altars of hatred to the remaining states. And, I suspect, they will once again demonstrate that their sacred delusions and rabid theology will create yet another state of refusal.

 

May 3, 2012

The War on Women

Posted by DrK8 under Abortion, Abortion & Religion, Abortion Information, Abortion Rights, Birth Control, Republican Party, Vote, War on Birth Control
[31] Comments 

Mainstream media is so predictable with their binary framing of controversial issues (as either pro or con), their proclivity toward sensationalism and their power to set the agenda for what they think is important. A cursory review of news sources frames the war on women as an exercise in finger pointing. Obama, Democrats and feminists accuse the Republicans of starting the war. Republicans counter by accusing the Democrats of making up the war for political gain. That’s the binary framing that the media promotes. Regardless of who started the battle, the sensationalism is highly entertaining.

One Charleston Gazette editorial claimed that “the current Republican presidential campaign contains a weird assault on rights of American women.” Another post from the Progressive asserted “The Republicans are on a rampage. Like a bunch of drunken frat boys, egged on by their leader — that big, fat, bullying lout Rush Limbaugh — they’re taunting women, calling us “sluts,” and suggesting policies like forced vaginal probes for abortion patients and letting a woman’s boss decide what kind of birth control coverage she should get.” And from politcususa, Jason Easley called the Republican war on women “a poltical affirmation of misogyny.” Kellie Overbey (asisfor.org) claims that this viral power grab from a misogynistic cultish, maniacal lust for power” threatens women at their very core. But my all time favorite comes from Charlotte Taft, Abortion Care Network, when she wrote “My observation is that if the Republican Taliban has its way only corporations and fertilized eggs will be recognized as people with any rights!”

Beyond the sensationalism is the utterly egregious assault on women’s reproductive health. The Republican pandering to the religious right and to less educated and lower income white men, codifies the GOP as womb warriors. From attempts at state-mandated transvaginal ultrasounds to fetal personhood laws, from actual defunding Planned Parenthood to justifiable homicide law to a killing committed in the defense of an unborn child, the war has been an attack on women, their agency, and their legal and reproductive rights. Ruth Conniff, Editor of the Progressive wrote “It’s one thing to drive a wedge between Americans over issues like regulating late-term abortion. But it’s quite another to pivot to an all-out campaign to control, intimidate, and humiliate women as a group.” I’m not sure I’d call it a campaign. It’s more like a 21st century Inquisition. But modern women aren’t taking this battle sitting down.

In a call to action to defend women’s rights and the pursuit of equality, UniteWomen.org women gathered in state capitals across the nation this past weekend to shout “Enough is Enough!”  Angry with Congress, the White House, Democrats and Republicans, the outrage expressed by young and old alike points to one clear message: The men running this country are out of touch. As half of the nation’s population, women know more about what is in their best interest than a handful of men, mostly religious, many playing cheap political games and orchestrating a war against women. Their messages went right to the heart of their concerns. One woman carried a sign with an image of a uterus and text that listed things that belong is a uterus (hormones, baby, IUD) and things that don’t belong in a uterus (government, ‘persons’, religion, misplace moral outrage). Another sign read “women’s rights are human rights.” Or one I found particularly funny was an e-card “Ever notice when the Muslims suppress women’s rights, we call them terrorists, but when Catholics do it, we call them Bishops? ROFL” And then there is the elegance of simplicity, “I have the uterus. I make the rules.”

So, did the media provide much coverage for UniteWomen rallies? Nope. That’s how it goes. While bloggers and journalists posted editorials, commentaries and cartoons, mainstream media chose to avoid the fuss. But that didn’t stop thousands of women and men from rallying in state capitals from Austin, Sacramento, Denver, and Atlanta to Harrisburg, Richmond, Juneau and Montgomery.

 

And in cyberspace, women continue to rally. When women are pissed, they will find a way to get their messages known, mainstream media or not. I strongly suspect that the good ole boys, particularly the GOP, will finally realize in November that women have had enough.

Women know, as Andy Ostroy writes, if the Republicans “truly cared about women as much as they contend, they’d stay out of their bedrooms and vaginas and stop trying to cut everything that supports them and their families. Don’t think women won’t go to the polls in November remembering who’s on their side and who isn’t.”

 

April 18, 2012

The Celebrated Anti Abortion Priest

Posted by DrK8 under Abortion & Religion, Abortion Heroes, Abortion Information
[41] Comments 

Celebrities are the lifeblood of the entertainment industry. Their fame, fortune and power to persuade, inform and entertain, however, extend beyond Hollywood. Unlike the entertainment celebrities, celebrated religious personalities from Tammy Faye Baker to Jimmy Swaggart, from Pat Robertson to Robert Schuller have used their fame and power to their own advantage, attracting millions in donations. But as with Hollywood celebrities, the religious superstars have fans and detractors. Just as some adore Lady Gaga while others despise her, there are those who worship the celebrated Fr. Frank Pavone while others think of him as a shameless, greedy imposter. Pavone began his early parish priest life in the Archdiocese of New York, and rose to fame and fortune following his 1993 appointment as the full-time director of Priests for Life. As a celebrity, Pavone embodies the outer trappings of a serious religious life with the all-consuming popularity of profane celebrity culture.  It might seem contradictory to consider the sacredness of religion with the sacrilegious nature of the celebrity world when describing one Catholic priest, especially a staunchly anti abortion leader. Yet, as celebrity scholar David Chidester notes, popular culture and religion operate in characteristically similar ways—both have their machinery, superstars and devotees. Like all entertainment celebrities, Pavone is both a name and a product. He is widely recognized across the U.S. as a television, radio, newspaper and Internet personality among the prolife glitterati and politicos. His fame has drawn nearly $12 million in donations yearly. As for his devotees, an encounter with the Executive Director of Priests for Life is no different than an encounter with the likes of George Clooney or Angelina Jolie. His groupies breathe in the air of the superhuman, sacred and transcendent. They pose for photographs, beg for autographs and grovel over his every word. One such encounter happened in an Allentown PA church where I interviewed Pavone, thanks to arrangements made by three female antiabortion protesters. On this particular evening, these three women, bedecked with jewels and voluptuous face painting were flushed with excitement. And despite his illogical arguments against abortion and his obvious disdain for women’s reproductive rights, these past-their-prime women cooed at his every word, undulated in ecstatic response to his touch. It was a sight to behold. Grown women being seduced by a charlatan in a collar—the sacred and the profane in one egotistical storyteller. Pavone’s narratives, following his bright moment in the media with the Terri Schiavo euthanasia debacle, have now been reduced from the inclusive prolife to exclusive anti abortion agenda as a venue for his celebrity. Priests for Life, thus, is a misleading term because the organization focuses solely on controversial, attention-grabbing topic of abortion. The death penalty, hunger, starvation and other ‘life’ issues just aren’t sexy enough for the antiabortion zealot known as Frank Pavone.

Curiously, his fan base reaches beyond the boundaries of Catholicism to other anti abortion institutions such as the aggressively misogynistic Operation Rescue and God-deluded Operation Save America. Pavone has also engaged in many secular activities include media-centric events like attending and being honored at the $500-a-plate the annual Proudly Pro Life Award dinner at the Waldorf-Astoria with Rush Limbaugh, Steve Forbes, Charlton Heston, and Ben Stein and 700 other guests. Like the celebrity Paris Hilton who sells perfume, jeans and herself, Pavone sells his abortion-related books, offers his services for scheduled talks, television appearances, and newspaper columns rather than adhere to a strictly clerical schedule. In many ways, Pavone’s work parallels that of Jimmy Swaggart. They both trafficked in the presentation of the charismatic self, the faithful servant living a meager existence. Yet, Pavone’s presentation as the devotee to the unborn appears to be a scam if ratings from independent charity evaluators have any credence. Charity Navigator gave his nonprofit industry an overall poor rating (46 out of 70 points) for lack of accountability and transparency. Further, in the fall of 2011, Fr. Frank was forced to stand down from his antiabortion mission to fulfill his role as a parish priest when he ran afoul of the church hierarchy. Like the celebrated Reverend Jimmy Swaggart who fell from grace, Pavone may be headed for a similar fate. His superior, Bishop Zurek of Amarillo, Texas, suspended him from his Priests for Life director position due to concerns over financial improprieties and a failure to be an obedient priest. In a Catholic Register article, Dorothy Cummings McLean argues that the worship of celebrities is the “hallmark of a powerful new paganism” that is dangerous for celebrity priests and Catholics because it diverts attention away from God. Like Fr.

Alberto Cutie and Fr. John Corapi, failed priests who basked in the profane magnificence of wealth and fame, McLean suggests that Frank Pavone is following a similar path. I’d agree. Pavone is a celebrity first, an anti abortion crusader second and a lowly priest only when obligated.

 

April 15, 2012

That Question Mark

Posted by Pat Richards under Abortion, Abortion & Religion, Abortion Doctor, Abortion Doctor Murder, Abortion Heroes, Abortion Information, Abortion Medical, Abortion Pill, Abortion Rights, Abortion Terrorism, Christian Murder, Christian Murderers, Christian Terrorism, David Gunn, FACE Act, FACE law, FBI, Paul Hill, Pro Life Terrorism, Terrorism | Tags: , , , , , |
[32] Comments 
Paul Hill Convicted Anti Abortion Pro Life Christian Murderer

Paul Hill Convicted Anti Abortion Pro Life Christian Murderer

It might have come down to a simple question mark.

On July 29, 1994  anti-abortion advocate Paul Hill killed Doctor John Britton and his body guard, James Barrett, as they pulled into the parking lot of the Ladies Center in Pensacola, Florida. Hill just calmly walked up to the pick-up truck, took out a shotgun and, aware that the Doctor was wearing a bullet proof vest, shot him in the face. Hill was quickly arrested, tried and convicted. He died by lethal injection on Sept 3, 2003.

Several months before the murders, I was at the White House when President Bill Clinton signed into law the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances (FACE) Act. That law prohibited the “use of physical force, threat of physical force, or physical obstruction to intentionally injure, intimidate, interfere with …any person who is obtaining reproductive health services or providing…such services.” That law also included language confirming that anti-abortion protestors could exercise their First Amendment rights without fear of prosecution. Of course, how one defined the right to protest was subject to interpretation.

Bill Clinton Abortion Rights Advocate

Bill Clinton Abortion Rights Advocate

Once the law became effective, pro-choice groups started lobbying the Department of Justice to use it against protestors who were considered particularly dangerous. Paul Hill, because he believed that it was “justifiable homicide” to kill an abortion doctor, was very high on the list.

A long-time presence at the Ladies Center, Hill was known for carrying with him a very large sign that read: “EXECUTE MURDERERS ABORTIONISTS ACCESSORIES?” The sign caught the attention of many in the media, it intimidated patients and it terrified the clinic staff. When the National Coalition of Abortion Providers held a memorial service for Doctor David Gunn at the site of his murder in March, 1994, Paul Hill was quietly walking back and forth with that very sign.

Pro Lifer Murder Threat Today!

Pro Lifer Murder Threat Today!

Pro-choice groups were very concerned about Hill (as were some anti-abortion advocates), but the lawyers at the DOJ were not sure what they could do about him. In June, 1994 I had a conversation with one of their attorneys and he said that he had not crossed the Free Speech line because he was not saying out loud “I am going to kill a doctor.” Instead, he was “merely” expressing his views on the issue, i.e., saying that he thought it was “justified” to kill an abortion doctor. When I raised the issue of the sign, the attorney directed me to the question mark at the end of the sentence. I had never noticed it. Paul Hill was “merely” posing the question.

Department of Justice

Department of Justice

Was Paul Hill really that smart? Did he understand how far he could push the First Amendment? We’ll never know. We do know, however, that Hill was being watched very carefully by the authorities but that sign – and his very ugly speech – was not actionable.

I often wonder what the authorities might have done if there was no question mark on his sign.

I wonder if a case could have been made under the FACE law?

I wonder if the lives of two people could have been saved?

 

April 12, 2012

What motivates some anti abortion activists?

Posted by DrK8 under Aborticentrism, Abortion & Religion, Abortion Doctor Murder, Abortion Information, Abortion Terrorism, Abortion Violence, Christian Terrorism, Dr. Tiller, Terrorism
[71] Comments 

I think it’s safe to say that the more reactive and aggressive anti abortion activists are informed by some variation of formal religion. Their parochial focus on ‘thou shalt not murder’ ignores a host of other religious tenets including the purpose of religion.

His Holiness The Dalai Lama XIV said “The whole purpose of religion is to facilitate love and compassion, patience, tolerance, humility, and forgiveness.” From my vantage point, there are painfully few instances of love and compassion outside abortion clinics. Let me offer a few examples.

When a 2012 New Year’s day fire gutted a family planning clinic in Pensacola FL, was that an act of love and compassion? When the Planned Parenthood office in Grand Chute, Wisconsin was damaged recently by a small homemade explosive device placed on a building windowsill, was that an act driven by tolerance and humility?

It was difficult to identify love and compassion, patience, tolerance, humility and forgiveness when the Maryland Coalition for Life determined that protesting at a middle school was the perfect response to a landlord who refused to terminate an abortion clinic’s lease? Anti-abortion activists, trying to shut down an abortion clinic in Maryland, targeted the sixth grade daughter of the man who simply owns the office park where the clinic is located. Where is the love and compassion for children when the protesters stood at the entrance of Robert Frost Middle School with graphic posters of aborted fetuses?

Was it love and compassion, patience, tolerance, humility and forgiveness that motivated Scott Roeder to stalk George Tiller, eventually shooting him vigilante-style in church. Informed by the vitriol of Operation Rescue, Roeder compared the lawlessness in the Bible to Tiller’s lawlessness. In fact, he wrote that Tiller is the concentration camp Mengele of our day and needs to be stopped. Where was the humility in Scott Roeder?

In August 2011, where hundreds of clinic defenders gathered in peaceful support of Dr. LeRoy Carhart and in support of the care he provides to women in need of late abortions. One block away, amidst a small group of anti-choicers, Operation Rescue leader Troy Newman emerged, paraded down the street toward the clinic defenders. One of the defenders, a pregnant 20-something woman, sat on the curb in the heat and humidity.  A man darted across the street from her and started taking pictures.  He then darted back across the street toward her to take more.  Finally, he got down in the middle of the street in front of the pregnant woman, taking pictures of her. Startled at his actions, she asked who are you?

He said, “I’m Troy Newman, bitch.” How can this comment be interpreted as anything other that derision?

What drove an anti abortion protester, who recognized a friend entering an Allentown PA abortion clinic, to later drive to her friend’s place of work to publicly intimidate and harass her?

In all the outer trappings of her espoused Catholicism, rosary beads and membership in St. Joseph the Worker church in Orefield PA, where was this protester’s sense of tolerance, humility and love during the public humiliation?


What kind of love and compassion was evident when the Rev. Flip Benham was stalking a Charlotte, North Carolina abortion doctor and passing out hundreds of “wanted” posters with the physician’s name and photo on it, fliers that implicitly urge violence?

Benham knew that doctors in other places had been killed after similar posters were circulated. So how can this action remotely be considered religious or loving?

Where can you find love and compassion amongst the anti abortion terrorists as they scream at women with their bullhorns and use hateful language that diminishes human dignity? In what ways do they show love and compassion when telling a woman that the devil inside the clinic will drink the blood of her child or that the doctor will turn your child into baby road kill or your child will haunt you at night?

How can anyone claim to love both the woman and the fetus when, in truth, they value a woman’s fetus more than the woman? In the mind of the hubristic anti abortion activist, the fetus is a gift from God that they want to force on a woman, regardless of a woman’s wishes or circumstances. Organizations like Operation Rescue, Operation Save America and the Prolife Action League are singularly focused on ending abortion in America with absolutely no regard for the needs of women. There is little tolerance and certainly no humility within the leadership or their minions. Every time I hear an anti choicer invoke the name of Jesus, I cringe. There’s nothing Christ-like in that invocation, particularly because it lacks love and because it’s full of rage and contempt for every woman who enters a clinic.

The Dalai Lama XIV said the whole purpose of religion is to facilitate love and compassion, patience, tolerance, humility, and forgiveness. It’s clear to me that many anti abortion terrorists do not operate under loving and compassionate religious principles. They are driven by hate, anger and fear. They act out against strong, moral women who make decisions about when and if to bear children. And it is that female agency and morality that angers and scares the living hell out of these folks, that defies their personal sense of morality, and that drives them to act in heinous, immoral ways.

 

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