Dr. George Tiller shot and killed at his church in Witchita
Way to go, antis. You’ve been gunning (pun intended) for this guy for decades, and your perseverance paid off. Spare me the pious denunciations–I couldn’t help but notice that Operation Rescue immediately came flailing with the OMGWTFBBQ WE DON’T CONDOOOOONE THIS WE VALUE ALLLLL LIFE shit. Forums and boards are filled with thousands who share your views gloating over Tiller’s murder, doing everything but dancing down the hallway singing Ding Dong The Witch Is Dead. And guess what? They’re going to be the public faces of your movement. They ARE the public faces of your movement. It’s true that the majority doesn’t like abortion, but they damn well don’t like someone getting shot over it either.
I have always had the utmost respect for Dr. Tiller and the service he provided to women when no one else would. I salute his refusal to cave to the antis even after his first shooting–and how much does it suck to write that, “first shooting”–and the clinic bombing. It’s sad that his life ended as it did … and even sadder that it came as no surprise.
INS contributor Elena wrote of her experience at Dr. Tiller’s clinic; it can be read here.
Thank you, Dr. Tiller. You won’t be forgotten for your honesty and bravery. May your murderer be brought swiftly to justice.
ETA: A suspect is in custody. Also the Wichita Eagle has set up a guestbook at which you may leave condolences for the Tiller family.
This is a sad day. Sad for Dr. Tiller. Sad for the women of Kansas.
Fuck you Operation Rescue and your crocodile tears.
F***
I just found out a few minutes ago as I was logging into my yahoo email account.
To say I’m angry would be an understatement.
I’ve been escorting at clincis before, I’m going to see if I can volunteer at a local one. I’m also signed up to help NARAL gather petitions at an event in D.C.
They’re not scaring me.
Unfortunately, while I am shocked, disgusted and frightened by Dr. Tiller’s murder, I am not really surprised given the inflammatory tactics/speech by pro-lifers or whatever they call themselves.
I live outside of Buffalo, NY, where Dr. Slepian was murdered, and he had written a letter to the editor warning people they should not be surprised when another abortion provider was murdered because of the tactics the “pro-lifers” were using to rally support for their cause. Guess what? Dr. Slepian was the next provider to be killed.
I found this statement from Priests for Life to be interesting (okay, nauseating):
Father Frank Pavone: “I am saddened to hear of the killing of George Tiller this morning. At this point, we do not know the motives of this act, or who is behind it, whether an angry post-abortive man or woman, or a misguided activist, or an enemy within the abortion industry, or a political enemy frustrated with the way Tiller has escaped prosecution. We should not jump to conclusions or rush to judgment.” This statement coming from a man who when point blank asked if he condemned the murder of abortion providers, did not say “no.” (this was in a documentary I saw).
At least Randall Terry isn’t crying crocodile tears and throwing out hypocritical platitudes. He has been the only one with enough balls to publically say what all the other lifers are thinking.
I just found out about this twenty minutes ago and I’m in shock. The last time an abortion provider was killed, I was only 16 or 17 – long before I had my abortion.
I was foolish and thought our country had moved past this – even though there was a warning earlier this year about potential right-wing terrorist attacks of any kind.
My heart goes out to Dr. Tiller’s family, friends, colleges, and everyone else hurt by this – no matter how remotely.
The Focus on the Family daily radio fundie fest actually had the nerve to run an “abortion update” today.
Dr. James Dobson’s “statement” is also wildly offensive. With this kind of language, it’s all but inciting another whack job to pick up a rifle.
I also find it fascinating that these people are normall all over a church shooting, but this time they don’t even mention it.
Read on, if you really want to get pissed off…….
Focus on the Family founder and chairman emeritus James C. Dobson, Ph.D., issued the following statement Sunday on the slaying of late-term abortionist George Tiller:
“We are shocked by the murder of George Tiller, and we categorically condemn the act of vigilantism and violence that took his life. America has from its foundation respected the rule of law, by which every citizen is guaranteed life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Those constitutional rights are forfeited only when crimes have been committed, and the perpetrator is charged and found guilty by a jury of his or her peers in a court of law.
“Tiller recently faced serious charges related to the killing of babies in violation of the law, by the most grotesque procedures administered without anesthetics or compassion. We profoundly regretted the outcome of his legal case, believing the doctor had the blood of countless babies on his hands. Nevertheless, he was acquitted by the court and declared ‘not guilty’ in the eyes of the law. That is our system, and we honor it.
“Our condolences are extended to the Tiller family. The person or persons responsible for his death should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.”
It is a tragedy that people are killed in our society. But we must remember that the fine line of when the fetus has rights and should be protected is extremely fuzzy. Everyone thinks differently. Dr. Tiller was under investigation for the abortions he was performing. But was it someone’s right to murder him because he killed fetuses that were capable of being viable? That he killed fetuses/babies who would have survived outside the womb had their mother’s decided that they didn’t want them to live? Of corse it is in the laws hands, it should not be in our hands. No one should take another persons life.
Sara, I very strongly suggest you visit the website “A Heartbreaking Choice,” read the “Kansas stories” which tell of experiences at Dr. Tiller’s clinic … and then have the nerve to contact those women and say to them the same sanctimonious ignorant crap you just spewed here. Your e-mail address is one of those “mommy2″ ones. Well, you seem to be one of the lucky ones who don’t have something go catastrophically wrong with the pregnancy or the fetus. Way to be compassionate about those who do. Until you walk in their shoes, shut the hell up about something you know nothing about.
Tiller’s murder presents the opportunity to raise the abortion debate to a different level in the mainstream media. The anti-abortion mantra of “life begins at conception” is not as it seems. It is explained to the public as being about the “sanctity of human life,” but is really about ensoulment. The reason why the Christian-dominated “Pro-Life” crowd defines the destruction of a zygote as murder is because it believes that, at conception, a living soul enters and indwells the zygote. I am an award-winning, nonreligious, independent scholar of the Bible and my work proves that, per scripture, the soul does not enter into the physical temple (human body) until after it is “built” and birthed into the world.
The abortion debate would drastically change if this knowledge was lifted into the mainstream. Corporate Christianity is a hypocritical big-business soaked in more blood than can ever be measured. My work here is not intended to encourage abortions, but expose the fundamentally corrupt teachings of preachers, priests, popes and other pulpit-people.
My newest book, “Selfless Spirit, Selfish Ego: The Way to Everlasting Peace for Judaism, Christianity and Islam” includes a section on abortion and was recently and unexpectedly awarded “Book of the Month for May, 2009” by ReligiousTolerance.org.
JohnCord.com
A friend from high school had to choose between a late term abortion, a hysterectomy, or death. She chose the late term abortion. I’m certain the kids she has now are as grateful to her doctor as she is. What will happen in the future when pregnant women are ill, or something is wrong with the fetus, or the state they live in puts up so many obstacles to a first trimester abortion that they’re in their second trimesters by the time they meet all the requirements? Will DIY abortion become widespread again?
Thank you for this post. I am enraged.
If the right to lifers are so much for human life and religious, why then gun down a man while he was in service at church? I do not understand that at all. The abortion debate is soo bad now the that antis now condemn this type of violence, yet the hypocrits continue to say that the person charged in Tiller’s murder is a hero to an extent? I don’t think so. It was a choice of the women to go to the late Dr. Tiller’s clinic for the procedure. Those pregnancies were planned, not forced upon any woman.
Dr. Tiller should not have been gunned down the way he was due to the fact that the antis believed that he killed human fetuses. Most of the late term abortions performed were the result of severe complications that took place and sometimes the women had no other choice.
Now there are few doctors that will perform late term abortions, and soon none. It will be difficult for another doctor brave enough to take his place because the antis will have another line of defense, as it is sad to say. I pray that we do not go back to the days of the “back street” abortions. There will be more tragedies if it does. The abortion debate lingers…..
I can’t talk about this enough. I’m so sad and angry. I’m angry that this has happened and angry that this hasn’t been loudly and definitely condemned as an act of terrorism.
Dr Tiller wasn’t performing abortions for reasons that antis term “convenience”. People don’t get to 20 weeks pregnant and suddenly change their mind, there are some truly heartbreaking stories behind late abortions. So many of the antis who are rejoicing don’t know that Tiller was performing the kind of abortions that they wouldn’t condemn.
I’m just so sad for Tiller and for American women.
How am I just now hearing about this???
Wow, this is disheartening, disgusting, and just wrong.
Dr.Tiller was shot down by a cold-blooded killer while inside his church. Dr.Tiller has been a target of Operation Rescue, the American Life League, and other anti-choice organizations. He and his staff and his family have lived with death threats, vandalism, harassment for the past 25 years — all because he insisted on continuing to provide late term, legal abortions to women who needed them. Killing a man in church is nothing less than terrorism. Even though the leaders of the anti-choice organizations have come out to denounce this heinous murder, their denunciations are hollow in the face of the actions they have committed to encourage a so-called “lone wolf” assassin.
I was with two women, longtime NOW leaders who knew Dr. Tiller, when we first heard the shocking, sickening news yesterday afternoon. Their sobs were anguishing as they absorbed the impact of the loss of their friend and a stalwart advocate for women’s reproductive rights. They have fought their entire lives for equality and are now feeling tired, worried and wondering what will happen to their life’s work. Will we fight on for them? For ourselves? Can we step up to take the baton that our sisters have carried this far?
The murder of Dr. Tiller is a stark reminder that our rights are under siege. Dr. Tiller is not the first abortion provider to be cut down by the anti-choice terrorists. Clinics have been bombed and staff and patients have been harassed and threatened with violence. We cannot afford to be complacent. Please, each one us needs to commit to redoubling our energy and talents to preserve the rights we have, to extend the assurance that women are included in the Constitution, and that we, not the government, will have the undeniable right to decide what should happen to our own bodies.
I spent time last night looking at the blogs of the the anti-choice groups, to see the reader comments. Why did I think there would be anything different than people writing that they thought Dr. Tiller got what he deserved, that he “lived by the sword, died by the sword,” justification of murder for a “mass murderer,” prayers for the assassin and his family but no sympathy for Dr. Tiller and his family, calling Tiller’s church a “fake church” and so on ad nauseum. There was more concern about how this brutal killing would make the anti-choice movement look to the rest of the world, concern that their agenda would be set back, even some speculation that the killing was done by a pro-choice “operative” to make the anti-choicers look bad (!) and how increased security would curtail their “methods” around women’s health clinics.
I had to read. I want to know what goes through the minds of those who are so fanatical they can support this terrorism
This is what we are up against.
One of the favorite ways I get my blood pressure up in the morning is by watching “Morning Joe” or “MoJo” on MSNBC. I like the fact that many DEMs make appearances there — I can’t stand the bombastic hosts, but put up with it to see Arriana Huffington, Jonathan Capehart, Valerie Jarrett, Robert Gibbs, Hillary Clinton, etc.
I wanted to hear the discussion on Monday about the assassination of Dr. Tiller, but there was no such discussion. It was as if the murder never even happened! Then I found out that Joe Scarborough is an advocate for anti-choice terrorists — and even acted as a pro bono attorney for the killer of Dr. David Gunn in Pensacola, FL.
Here is the rest of the story: http://blogs.villagevoice.com/runninscared/archives/2009/06/keith_olbermann_1.php
I don’t understand why any pro-choice person would want to appear on Joe Scarborough’s morning program. Considering his history — which he wants to bury in the name of a new TV career — Joe Scarborough is certainly the “moderate GOP” he claims to be.
Oooohhhhh, poor Dr. Tiller….didn’t learn his lesson the first time. Not only did he provide third term abortions for women in life threatening situations, he provided them for any woman and that’s sick dude. Even someone here once told me it’s all about viability, but now you’re defending one of the most depraved acts of humanity?
The pro-choice side is calling it “the ultimate hypocrisy” but some times you have to lower yourself to the bad guys level to deliver an effective blow. Tiller may not have deserved to die but he for damn sure didn’t deserve to be a doctor. And now, to the scum of America, he has become a martyr. HAHA, sorry for your loss…
(leaving Dave’s comments up in case a provider gets shot in his area so the cops will know where to go first)
The man accused of shooting Tiller left a very similar message online. Wanna rethink that statement, Dave? Or are you just being all edgy and provocative again?
Dr. Tiller is a hero! I hope they really look into the background of this anti-guy & his associations. The antis don’t act alone. He got his info somewhere. Wish they could give Tiller’s killer the death penalty, they could if they put him in a federal court & tried him under the FACE Act…
test message – it’s been so long since I’ve been here that I have no idea about my account, password, etc.
“[T]he fine line of when the fetus has rights and should be protected is extremely fuzzy.”
No it isn’t. It has certain rights after it’s born. For some it has to wait til age 16, 18,or 21.
The “personhood debate” is a distraction. I don’t care if the fetus got a doctorate and brought about world peace in utero, it _has no right_ to use my body if I don’t want to let it do so. A born person has no right to my blood, marrow or organs, even to save hir life; how can a fetus have a right to inhabit me?
Before it’s born, the woman in whose body it grows assigns it value. Any moral dilemma over whether it is born or terminated is hers to decide and hers alone. But legal rights? Nope.
You’re right to leave “anti” posts up where we can see them and know what we’re dealing with.
What this boils down to is religious extremism, brought on by the idea that the right to choose poses a threat to religion, to those of the fundamentalist, Biblical inerrancy mindset. The “ensoulment” mentioned further upthread is part of this (mostly on the part of Catholic belief I think, though I could be wrong). Remember the famous debate of how many angels could dance on the head of a pin? It was a serious theological problem at one time, though it seems ridiculous to us now.
I heard a commentator the other day (was it on NPR?) who said that if abortion is legal, if it’s not murder, then the Bible can’t be true, because if one little part of the foundation is based on a fallacy, the whole thing is subject to question. If God created human life, and all human life is sacred, then it must be sacred from the moment of conception… even if the blastocyst (the clump of cells formed soon after conception) doesn’t look human. Even if later on the embryo looks just like a chicken or fish or cow embryo, to the fundamentalist, *it’s still human.* It has to be, or the whole “anti” argument comes tumbling down (and the Bible becomes a collection of legends and religious essays).
But at certain early stages of development, we look just like chickens, fish, or cows. This inconvenient fact is rarely mentioned by the Religious Right, or we might all be forced to become strict vegetarians!
Dr Tiller died in church. His faith was apparently not as good or as righteous as the faith of his murderer; as mentioned upthread, the fundamentalist/anti blog commenters are justifying this act because it happened in a ‘fake church.’ My own church is sometimes described as straying far from ‘the faith of our fathers once received’ by fundamentalists bent on splitting away from us poor deluded neo-pagan Satanists. They really are… so very un-Christian in their Christianity. Also, they’re a bunch of disgruntled patriarchs grumbling about how the uppity women aren’t staying home having babies, but actually *running* things… and controlling their reproductive destiny, too. But that’s beside the point.
The fundamentalists cannot accept that people like Dr Tiller can be committed, faithful Christians, and in fact the good doctor seems to have relied on his faith (leavened with a lot of Star Trek) to form his axioms, many of which were mentioned in the news story linked above (which is about the memorial service for him).
It’s no coincidence that the last spate of clinic violence and doctor killings took place during a time when a Democratic president was in office (though dealing with a more conservative Congress than now). There wasn’t much clinic violence in the Republican presidential terms preceding, even though Roe v. Wade was in place, and abortion was a big issue. It’s also no coincidence that there were no major incidents during the Bush years (and there were several Supreme Court justices named, all of which had to pass the abortion litmus test). Now we’re in a cycle when a new Supreme Court justice will be going through the inevitable wringer, and the old litmus test is back in play (along with the “wise Latina” stuff taken so enthusiastically out of context). The fundamentalists are ramping up the hateful rhetoric, even though they’re now politically hamstrung because their conservative allies lost so badly in the last few elections.
They’re outcasts, so we can expect more acting-out behavior, and the same few impassioned protestors at clinics, because they sense this is their last chance in a long time. They need to get the Supreme Court and the Constitution and local laws on “their side” while they still can.
I feel sorry for you that you couldn’t even post my reply to your post to me. You pro-abortion people are all alike… COWARDS! Your first page is a pool of vomit about “not being sorry”… bull shit. You DID kill your baby… Yes, fetus is the latin word for baby… and yes, you did kill him or her. And the fact that you aren’t sorry about it… now that you should take up with your psychiatrist.
Oh and one more quick thing… while I’m on this site… As far as pro-lifer’s wanting to take your “choices”… it’s not the woman’s choice or life we want to take away, if she wants to suck her body apart through a gigantic adult sized version of the vacuum that sucks up her baby, then she can. Or perhaps she wants to shoot a needle with poisen into her heart. Or burn her body with saline salt for 24 hours. Or be born, but then have a blunt scissor jammed into the base of her skull… go ahead…. it’s HER CHOICE.
HOWEVER (and this is key so LISTEN….) if she wants to do that to a DIFFERENT little boy or girl baby inside her own belly… she SHOULD NOT BE ABLE TO! GOT IT! That other little person in her belly IS society’s business! As a society it’s our role to look out for those who are being oppresed! GET A GRIP and GET EDUCATED. I know the ultrasound wasn’t invented until the mid 1970′s but PLEASE research FETAL DEVELOPMENT… NOT mommy developement… but that OTHER PERSON INSIDE THE WOMAN. SHE’S A CHILD NOT A CHOICE!
I think the most upsetting part of this is that they have decided not to reopen his clinic. Everything he fought for, everything he stood for will be lost. And this holy crusade made a martyr out of Roeder, since essentially, he won.
I have a question though. Though very pro choice, it seemed that Elena had a late term abortion for convenience reasons. I would like some clarifications on that if I’m to defend it.
And in other bad news the clinic is being closed.
No doubt the antis are counting this as a win.
Message: Terrorism works.
Sara-if it makes you feel better to think all pro-choicers are cowards, go for it. In your lexicon, I’ve killed three babies. And guess what? I’m not sorry ONE. BIT. If I’d had them they’d be orphans because I would have killed myself by now. Do you like the thought of motherless children? Do you consider women like that the ultimate martyrs, hmm? And way to go parroting the usual anti bullshit. INS has been online for over six years, there is literally NOTHING that’s been put online by your ilk that I haven’t seen. Try again, little sheep.
@Amanda–thanks for perpetrating the idea that abortion is only okay if it’s for a “good” reason. Way to go, back-handed “pro-choicer.” If you are pro-choice, you accept that one woman’s reason is hers and NONE OF YOUR BUSINESS.
Possibly more on the Tiller clinic closure, but I will say I’m not surprised.
Reading all these comments has made me realize that I don’t do enough to promote the right to choose. Writing my congresspersons and representatives is not enough.
It’s easy to forget how ignorant people can be and then you turn on the news and see this. If you’re protesting what you believe to be the taking of a life, perhaps you should refrain from taking a life to try to make your point. Seems like a simple concept to me.
I had an abortion 6 years ago. I’m still not sorry.
Some good news.
A doctor from Nebraska who performs 3rd trimester abortions will be moving to Kansas to set up practice in Dr. Tiller’s place.
I think the fact that I’m writing a damn book on the matter and spend two days a week listening to the screaming of crazy protesters while I escort at Planned Parenthood is enough to back up my stance.
I don’t consider myself so much “pro choice” as “pro reality. I don’t do the politics thing, nor do I believe everything just because it’s categorized into the political stance I tend to lean more toward (in this case pro choice.)
I’m all for abortion for whatever reasons. Hell, I had one myself (and am on this site.) I’m only saying…..it has been constantly repeated that abortion on demand (or abortion for “convenience”, though that term is subjective) is not available for late term women. I’m not saying it’s my business per say, but I do find it rather disturbing when a woman can trot in 8 months pregnant, yawn, and say “hmm, I’m tired of being pregnant” and have it sucked out of her. That’s not how I thought the regulations were set up, and definitely not a system I agree with.
So I’m not saying I give a damn as to why people obtain abortions. I am merely curious as to how one would obtain a late term abortion for something that didn’t seem medically necessary. Especially when everyone always says that is not the case.
I really wasn’t looking for a debate or trying to bash your convictions.
Jesus Christ…you people are just completely rediculous. Yeah, that would be enough evidence to have me convicted of murder hahahahaha for fucks sake…. Tiller was a piece of shit who is now rotting in a grave just like all the babies he killed. If they didn’t deserve to be here then neither does he, or me, or you!
You’re succeeding in making an idiot of yourself, Dave.
You’ll be rotting in a grave too one day. Whats your point?
“it’s not the woman’s choice or life we want to take away, if she wants to suck her body apart through a gigantic adult sized version of the vacuum that sucks up her baby, then she can. Or perhaps she wants to shoot a needle with poisen into her heart. Or burn her body with saline salt for 24 hours. Or be born, but then have a blunt scissor jammed into the base of her skull… go ahead…. it’s HER CHOICE.”
Sign me up if I get pregnant. Better dead than some brood mare, IMO.
Also, next time you try to win an argument with an appeal to emotion, use something that you didn’t pull out of a textbook from 1970s America.
I found out sometime afterward that my (now ex)girlfriend was pregnant and had aborted. I was devastated, and I still have bad feelings about her “choice”. I would have liked to have had a say in the matter, but it seems the law doesn’t give me one. None of you who chortle so gleefully about your abortions seems to give much of a damn that there were TWO of you who created that child, yet only YOU get to determine what will become of him/her. And further, here are a couple questions for you: first, can you defend the woman who, finding out she was pregnant with three children, decided she could only live with having one (because she didn’t want to lose her fashionable New York apartment, which having three would have “forced” her to do) and had the other two aborted? How’s that for convenience? And also, if you call people who describe themselves as pro-life “anti-choicers”, then doesn’t that give them the right to call you pro-choicers “anti-lifers”?
You can call me whatever floats your boat. And considering that you didn’t learn until after the fact that your girlfriend had an abortion I’d venture to guess she had her reasons for not telling you. Like it or not until medical science figures out a way to implant embryoes into men or petri dishes it is the woman and ONLY the woman who will go through the pregnancy.
I have previously discussed the Amy Richards situation, which was not about keeping her apartment, but carrying three fetuses that would have compromised her health. You think having triplets is easy? Oh, that’s right, you’re a man who will never be pregnant! Childbirth is all sunshine and puppy kisses to you guys!
This shit would stop if they were treated like what they really are and that’s domestic terrorists. Anyone who shoots people and blows shit up because of a specific belief is a terrorist in my book.
Oh my God…
“You think having triplets is easy? Oh, that’s right, you’re a man who will never be pregnant! Childbirth is all sunshine and puppy kisses to you guys!”
Oh my FUCKING GOD! You have no idea how happy it makes me (this miserable pregnant lady) to see that! YES! YES!!! They DO think it’s easy, and FUN, and AWESOME! They also think with just plain, old, fun exercise we just get whipped back in to our old bodies! If only they knew a thing or two about the elasticity of skin.. but why would a man need to know that?
I regret my decision to NOT choose this time around almost every other day because there is nothing WORSE than being pregnant,unappreciated, and alone, and I’m sorry, as long as it takes a man to make a child it will ALWAYS be that way.
As my lovely baby daddy put it, 90% of being a father is just showing up. Good for you. You can’t even imagine what 90% of being a mother is like.
Abortion is to our time what slavery was to the 1800s. All fundamentally bad things in this country are eradicated before long. The Anti-Life movement is as the southern plantation aristocrat, clinging to a status quo that the collective conscience of this nation will eventually rectify. The six signs of life are cells, organization, energy use, homeostasis, growth, and reproduction, all of which are inarguably present from the moment of conception. A single celled embryo is as alive as any human who’s murder merits prosecution, and on a purely scientific level, just as alive as Dr. Tiller was. His death, as any death, is tragic, but tragic in the same sense as was the death of Stonewall Jackson – an unfortunate murder, but of a man fighting in favor of slavery.
As the kids say, LOL WHUT? You think abortion just magically sprang up in 1973? Please. Abortion has existed ever since someone figured out babies were the result of sex. Roe vs. Wade just made the average mouthbreathing Murkin aware that it existed and that’s when the “pro life” movement got started–before that the only ones who cared were Catholic groups. Hell, even the Southern Baptist Convention advocated abortion rights in the seventies.
And it’s funny how antis always seem to forget that advocation of slavery is in the Bible. Have they taken that part out yet?
I’m pro-choice myself, for any reason, but I have to agree that Elena’s abortion, at 23 weeks of pregnancy, makes me uncomfortable. Not that I don’t think she shouldn’t have had the right to it or that I equate it to the murder of a born child, but I think wherever you stand on pro-life/pro-choice spectrum, her abortion is going to be more disturbing than that done during the first three months of pregnancy or during the later stages of pregnancy for health reasons.
And honestly, Patricia, your attack on Amanda for simply voicing her concerns doesn’t make you or your site look very good. That’s the reason why many people who do believe abortion should be legal are reluctant to embrace the organized pro-choice movement.
I’m not here to look good, to impress anybody or to do virtual back-patting and feelings validation. If you’re uncomfortable with a stranger’s decision that has absolutely nothing to do with you that’s your problem. What Amanda wrote is very typical of a lot of people who claim to be pro-choice but as long as it meets their criteria of a “good” reason and/or time frame. INS doesn’t exist to shock or titillate. It exists to tell the truth, even when it’s not pretty. Elena’s story hit a nerve with a lot of people; it was one of the stories I’ve received the most e-mail on even before I featured it here and it was due to the late term situation. Some even said that I should take the story down because it “didn’t put abortion in a good light,” e.g. it wasn’t a nice within-eight-weeks procedure. But Elena is far from the only woman who’s been in that situation and a story like hers is that much more powerful.
This is the first time i have come across this blog and so fisrlty to respond to the initial article about Dr. Tiller. I disagree with any murder of any human being despite thier age or lifestyle, and my sincere sympathies go to his family and friends.
Abortion is such a hugely debated topic that i am under no doubt that the matter will never be settled and will never be agreed upon. I believe that as soon as a baby is concieved it is an individual and that we as mothers (yes i am a mother who has experienced pregnancy’s and childbirth’s) are to protect and nourish.
After reading through these comments it does seem all too familiar that their is so much written about what the mother wants and what her rights are. What about the baby? When a baby is killed you are not just taking away an embryo or a feotus, you are taking away their first steps, their first words, their first day at school, their friendships, their first boyfriend/girlfriend. You are ending their chance at making a difference to the world, you are taking away their children. Yes this may sound really pathetic to some and that is fine, i am allowed my view as you are yours.
I am not pretending to know what degree of turmoil, if any, a woman must go through before deciding abortion is the only option. It saddens me that the most innocent of all human life is taken advantage of with such glee that some of you proclaim.
I try hard not to judge women who abort thier babies, i do accept that many of you are just as happy to accept it as i am not to.
I do , however, believe that you have no more of a right to murder your baby/s than than that person’s right to murder Dr. Tiller.