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Pro-Lifer Links Movement to MLK, Damns Slain Abortion Doc
What does the pro-life movement have in common with the '60s-era civil rights movement led by Dr. Martin Luther King?
According to Randall Terry—the fiery pro-lifer who founded the anti-abortion group Operation Rescue—they're both "peaceful" crusades. At a press conference on Monday at the National Press Club, Terry responded to criticism that the pro-life movement's highly charged rhetoric was partly responsible for the murder of Dr. George Tiller, the Wichita abortion provider shot dead at his church on Sunday morning. The suspect in the murder, Scott Roeder, reportedly had ties to Operation Rescue.
"We train [pro-life activists] to be peaceful and nonviolent, just like Dr. King trained people in the civil rights movement," Terry said. Terry said Roeder "wasn't working with us" before adding: "Pro-life leaders and the pro-life movement are not responsible for George Tiller's death. George Tiller was a mass murderer and, horrifically, he reaped what he sowed."
Asked to clarify, Terry responded, "He sowed death, and then he reaped death in a horrifying way."
Terry said that he held the press conference as a way to signal to pro-lifers that they "must not lose focus"—that is, dial down their rhetoric—in the wake of the murder of Dr. Tiller, one of the few doctors in the US who provided late-term abortions, and who was a frequent target of protests by pro-lifers.
In fact, the prospect that pro-lifers might tone down their campaign against abortion seemed to annoy Terry more than the shooting itself. "Tiller's death poses a great problem for the pro-life movement because there are many political leaders who are going to be intimidated, and keep saying 'Oh, we're peaceful, we're peaceful, we won't use highly-charged rhetoric," Terry said. "That's a problem."
Terry repeatedly called Tiller a "mass murderer" who died with "blood on his hands." That's probably not how Martin Luther King would have responded to the killing. Asked if those kinds of remarks could cause some to link Terry and his followers to violence, Terry responded, "We run that risk, but that is the cost of saying the truth."
Yeah, well
Over at the Beast, Max Blumenthal pointed out that Terry said Moses is to blame for the first example of heated rhetoric, Thou Shalt Not Kill. One might ask the Midianites who was the first mass murderer, at least in their point of view.
"You signed the papers. You wanted to be here!" -Drill Sgt. Leach, 1971
Anti-abortion is *NOT* "pro-life"
I for one am sick and tired of hearing the anti-abortion movement as "pro-life". Do they oppose capital punishment? From the tone of this article they really don't seem to have much of a problem with even extra-judicial capital punishment. Do they oppose the wars in which 10's of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, of innocents have been slaughtered? Although I am sure that many of them really do value human life (and not just fetuses), as a movement they seem to me to place little value on human life other than the unborn.
A fetus is *not* a baby; it more accurately meets the definition of parasite.
Re A Fetus is more like a parasite than a child
Re A Fetus is more like a parasite than a child: I have three small children and their physical condition also meets the definition of "parasite" in most respects. They too would die without the provisions of nutrients and shelter from their hosts. In either case the analogy falls apart in the sense that parasites choose their host.
Randall Terry is a liar...in addition to inciting murder
I have personally witnessed Operation Rescue and their terrorist punch, shove, kick and hit women and escorts outside of abortion clinics. Their movement is anything but nonviolent. It's time to expose these terrorist for who they really are.
Heated rhetoric
Last I heard, this abortionist was killed by bullets, not harsh words. You can argue that the anti-abortion rhetoric stirred Roeder up. But the present day US is a culture flooded with messages and graphic images of violence for which it wears the label "the culture of death", if that's what turns people's minds the anti-abortion lobby is the least of these voices among the babble. What's on TV tonight?
The shooter is obviously a guy who's way beyond the norm. He could have latched onto practically anything that gave him an excuse to exercise personal power and get himself in the papers. Thank God he only took one person and didn't plant a bomb somewhere or get in a plane.
BTW I am 'liberal' in many ways and also pro-life and am horrified by any murder including this one. You cannot push in two directions at once, promote life with one hand and take it with the other.
But this nutcase bears no resemblance to the gentle and actively caring people I know who are pro-life.
P.S. DaveD: you were a 'parasite' once too. Aren't you still, in many ways? If you were dumped naked, with no artifacts of our culture, out in the desert would you thrive? If so, would you be someone that others could stand to be around?