Jury Convicts Pro-Life Murderer

Overheal

Remember George Tiller? Not that I'm going to bump that thread. Helll no.

Well, the Jury is out and it only took them 37 minutes to deliberate. Murder in the 1st degree.

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=123126980

It took a Kansas jury on Friday just 37 minutes to find Scott Roeder guilty of first-degree murder and aggravated assault in the shooting of George Tiller, an abortion provider.
The prosecution said all along that this was a clear-cut murder case, and the defendant even admitted the crime. The defense wanted the jury to consider a voluntary manslaughter charge, which carries a much lighter sentence than murder. But the judge ruled against that.
Roeder testified that he believed abortion was murder and said he needed to stop it by killing Tiller, one of the few doctors who provided abortions later in pregnancy. Roeder did not deny any of the facts surrounding the May 31 shooting.



Kim Parker, one of the prosecutors, says she hoped the judge's decision to not allow the jury to consider second-degree murder or voluntary manslaughter resonated.
"Hopefully it sends a clear message that this type of conduct is clearly not justified under the law," Parker said. "There is no place for this. There are no medals to be given for those who violate the rules."
Mark Rudy, Roeder's defense attorney, was clearly dejected after the verdict. He said Roeder made so many admissions that there was no hope without the voluntary manslaughter defense.
"The jury was not presented with any options obviously. He was either guilty of first-degree murder or let go…and we were not allowed to argue lesser," Rudy said. "Other things had been ruled out . So we were left with not much to argue frankly."
Some anti-abortion activists who attended the trial, including David Leach from Iowa and Michael Bray from Ohio, signed a petition arguing Roeder should be able to use a justifiable homicide defense. Randall Terry, founder of Operation Rescue, was also in court, and he said he didn't think that justice was served since the jury didn't get to consider Roeder's motive at preventing abortion.
"And it showed to me that they never got a chance to get inside of Scott Roeder's head. The babies who died at Tiller's hand deserved their day in court, and it should have been this trial and it wasn't," Terry said.
But for abortion rights groups, the guilty verdict is a big victory. Planned Parenthood of Kansas and Mid-Missouri said Roeder's conviction sends a clear message that domestic terrorists will be held accountable in Kansas and elsewhere.
"The evidence is so overwhelming I don't see how the jury could have arrived at any other decision. And I appreciate that ordinary citizens can sit through this kind of a trial and come to a conclusion of guilty beyond a reasonable doubt, in fact beyond any doubt," says Kathy Spillar, with the Feminists Majority Foundation.
Spillar says abortion rights groups want the Justice Department to file federal charges against Roeder for Tiller's murder and are asking federal officials to further investigate anti-abortion extremists, including those who spent time with Roeder.
In a statement , the family of George Tiller said they hope he will be remembered for his service to women and for the help he provided to those who needed it.
The first-degree murder conviction carries a sentence of life in prison with the possibility of parole after 25 years. Sentencing is set for March 9.

Lesson learned kids: Pro-Life activists should not go around killing people. Oddly enough. God apparently doesnt smile much on the Irony.

whadabouchasir

Overheal wrote: »

Remember George Tiller? Not that I'm going to bump that thread. Helll no.

.

Ok,i'm fine with that.I'm not fine with your spelling though.

Spanish Eyes

Overheal wrote: »

Remember George Tiller? Not that I'm going to bump that thread. Helll no.

Well, the Jury is out and it only took them 37 minutes to deliberate. Murder in the 1st degree.

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=123126980

Lesson learned kids: Pro-Life activists should not go around killing people. Oddly enough. God apparently doesnt smile much on the Irony.

Indeed. Be pro life as long as it is an embryo or a foetus, but it doesn't matter if you kill a person for doing their job that is legal in that country.

Pro life my big feckin ass.

You cannot be pro life and be a murderer, End of.

starbelgrade

whadabouchasir wrote: »

Ok, I'm fine with that. I'm not fine with your spelling though.

FYP (including the punctuation).

whadabouchasir

starbelgrade wrote: »

FYP (including the punctuation).

I can't help it I often forget to shift.

starbelgrade

whadabouchasir wrote: »

I can't help it I often forget to shift.

Well, don't be pulling people up on their spelling then - people who live in glasshouses, and all that.

Pompey Magnus

whadabouchasir wrote: »

I can't help it, I often forget to shift.

FYP

kaydence

Thank goodness they saw sense.

stovelid

whadabouchasir wrote: »

I can't help it I often forget to shift.

Nobody cares?

Biggins

...anyway back on topic, the killer paid the penalty for his own actions.
He has no one to blame but himself.

SubrbanOblivion

Too bad his mother wasn't pro-choice.

Mrmoe

It was the correct decision but I have no doubt that the killer can still morally justify his actions. Thankfully the vast majority of people who are against abortion could never justify something like this.

lugha

In a way, isn't that guy only being consistent with his expressed opinion. If he really did believe abortion was murder then he was just putting a stop to a child killer. If you knew a Thomas Hamilton type character was making his way to your local primary school and for some reason the Gardai couldn't respond quickly enough, I would say few people would see anything wrong with you using lethal force to stop him.

seanybiker

He killed 1 person and stopped that fella from killing loads more. Good man I say.

Biggins

The law is the law and it is written so that it might apply to all.

Just because one man "thought" that he felt it was his calling to kill another because of his religious ideas - that does NOT give him justification in the eyes of the legal state law.

If we as humans are going to start claiming in a court that "O' your honour, he/she felt justified because..."
That will leave a ruddy big door open for Mr "X" and others to kill maybe (for example) their next door neighbour (Mr "Y") because maybe it was felt such a killing would save other lives. In return, the person that is killed, a family member (of Mr "Y") might claim again in return later, that they were justified too in further killing the original killer (Mr "X") because they felt they were justified to possibly save later lives!
...where does it all end?

Faith or religious beliefs do not justify murder. If so, what the difference between us and the likes of the Taliban, their methods of justice and handing out subsequent penalties based on "faith" or their "written scripture"?
This is a prime example why church and state are kept separate (but that's a topic for another thread and I don't wish to digress this one).

Irregardless of what a doctor is instructed to do, the killing of him was illegal - now - you either have to accept that in the eyes of the law or you might be saying that "well its possibly ok to kill someone because of ones thinking based on religious creed or personal thinking!"
That thinking will just bring on anarchy and a never ending cycle of violence.

One can't be on both sides of the law when its just convenient to suit ones purpose, faith or idea.
Are we indeed saying now that personal ideas/faith/etc can provide when convenient, justification for further killing?
You either have to accept the adopted laws of the state and public or your stepping outside them because of ones own personal issues.
...and even if you do that, the laws of the state still apply to you too! Go figure!

The moral of the sad story is: if the killer that might get life was so incensed about what the doc' was doing and he felt it might be illegal, he could have reported the doc.
But no, just because of what he "felt" - he went ahead and killed him! That is no legal justification in the eyes of the law.
He broke it - he is now paying the price for his personal issues!

kaydence

seanybiker wrote: »

He killed 1 person and stopped that fella from killing loads more. Good man I say.

:eek:
Speechless.

Choke

It's kinds like slavery, or the Holocaust in a way.

You have a difference of opinion as to someone's humanity, being used to justify poor treatment/murder of a certain kind of people, which is perfectly legal in a country.
The problem is that not everyone thinks that the unborn aren't people, and if a person genuinely believe hat the unborn is a person, then you can't tell someone "it's legal so STFU and ignore what's happening".

I wouldn't agree with what he did, but just telling someone "it's legal so it's ok" doesn't cut it.

amacachi

Biggins wrote: »

The law is the law and it is written so that it might apply to all.

Just because one man "thought" that he felt it was his calling to kill another because of his religious ideas - that does NOT give him justification in the eyes of the legal state law.

If we as humans are going to start claiming in a court that "O' your honour, he/she felt justified because..."
That will leave a ruddy big door open for Mr "X" and others to kill maybe (for example) their next door neighbour (Mr "Y") because maybe it was felt such a killing would save other lives. In return, the person that is killed, a family member (of Mr "Y") might claim again in return later, that they were justified too in further killing the original killer (Mr "X") because they felt they were justified to possibly save later lives!
...where does it all end?

Faith or religious beliefs do not justify murder. If so, what the difference between us and the likes of the Taliban, their methods of justice and handing out subsequent penalties based on "faith" or their "written scripture"?
This is a prime example why church and state are kept separate (but that's a topic for another thread and I don't wish to digress this one).

Irregardless of what a doctor is instructed to do, the killing of him was illegal - now - you either have to accept that in the eyes of the law or you might be saying that "well its possibly ok to kill someone because of ones thinking based on religious creed or personal thinking!"
That thinking will just bring on anarchy and a never ending cycle of violence.

One can't be on both sides of the law when its just convenient to suit ones purpose, faith or idea.
Are we indeed saying now that personal ideas/faith/etc can provide when convenient, justification for further killing?
You either have to accept the adopted laws of the state and public or your stepping outside them because of ones own personal issues.
...and even if you do that, the laws of the state still apply to you too! Go figure!

The moral of the sad story is: if the killer that might get life was so incensed about what the doc' was doing and he felt it might be illegal, he could have reported the doc.
But no, just because of what he "felt" - he went ahead and killed him! That is no legal justification in the eyes of the law.
He broke it - he is now paying the price for his personal issues!

Never mind the law, it's in his eyes what he did was consistent and logical. How mental or not that makes him is another thing.

lugha

Biggins wrote: »

The law is the law and it is written so that it might apply to all.

more stuff .....

He broke it - he is now paying the price for his personal issues!

Woh, big post!

First the appeal to religion is a bit of a red herring. Whilst those with strong Christian convictions tend to be pro-life, I have never personally heard anybody make a pro-life stance because of their religion. For many of them the argument is simple. Abortion is the willful taking of human life, and that therefore is murder. Just as the deliberate taking of human life in other cases would be. I don't share this view BTW, my post was directed at the many who would insist that abortion is murder but also argue that killing an abortionist is irredeemably wrong.

As for your point about our obligation to abide by the law of the state in which we live, you hold our way of life up as being more desirable and more civilized that one where the Taliban hold sway, which it is. But for the “abortion is murder” crew, there is a gaping in-congruency in facilitating abortion. If they really did believe abortion was the same as murder (and my overall point is that I don't think they do, in spite of what they insist) then they should regard this as being equivalent to what the Nazis did in the last century. Would you chastise someone for helping another evade persecution under Hitler or Saddam or Stalin, even if there actions were breaking the law of that state? Or would you intervene, if you could, to stop a rape victim being whipped for her immoral behavior if the “learned” leaders of her society deemed it appropriate? I would have no moral qualms about someone breaking the rules of society when society had got the rules so badly wrong. If you really believe abortion is murder then I don't see how you could have any either, when an abortionist is attacked.

hooradiation

seanybiker wrote: »

He killed 1 person and stopped that fella from killing loads more. Good man I say.

And here we have a prime example of how if you over simplify and ignore inconvenient things like reality you can spin pretty much anything in order to suit whatever you would prefer the truth to be.

Biggins

lugha wrote: »

Woh, big post!

First the appeal to religion is a bit of a red herring. Whilst those with strong Christian convictions tend to be pro-life, I have never personally heard anybody make a pro-life stance because of their religion. For many of them the argument is simple. (1) Abortion is the wilful taking of human life, and that (2) therefore is murder. (3)Just as the deliberate taking of human life in other cases would be. I don't share this view BTW, my post was directed at the many who would insist that abortion is murder but also argue that killing an abortionist is irredeemably wrong.

As for your point about our obligation to abide by the law of the state in which we live, you hold our way of life up as being more desirable and more civilized that one where the Taliban hold sway, which it is. But for the “abortion is murder” crew, there is a gaping in-congruency in facilitating abortion. If they really did believe abortion was the same as murder (and my overall point is that I don't think they do, in spite of what they insist) then they should regard this as being equivalent to what the Nazis did in the last century. (4) Would you chastise someone for helping another evade persecution under Hitler or Saddam or Stalin, even if there actions were breaking the law of that state? Or (5) would you intervene, if you could, to stop a rape victim being whipped for her immoral behavior if the “learned” leaders of her society deemed it appropriate? I would have no moral qualms about someone breaking the rules of society when society had got the rules so badly wrong. (6) If you really believe abortion is murder then I don't see how you could have any either, when an abortionist is attacked.

Firstly it a serious contradiction that the convicted killer supposedly respects all forms of life that STILL he goes and kills another anyway!
Advocating one thing - then doing the exact opposite to another!
"Hey, I respect all forms of life (and that includes my definition of life) but if you don't believe that too, I will kill you!" Talk about hypocrisy!

There are times when killing is sadly necessary in order to save many other lives. Our modern society has moved on and defines a set of rules for when such things are legally justified and these rules although not perfect, were introduced to us after many years of thinking, legal arguments and deep discussion.

(1): "Abortion is the wilful taking of human life" - thats an idea, belief or a creed a personal individual is free to think or live by. HOWEVER that don't make it legal and further killing a right to do just - because one personally thinks so!

(2) + (3): "therefore is murder." AND "Just as the deliberate taking of human life in other cases would be."
- again, they are points of view, not basis in legal fact. Others think different as is their right. That don't make them "right" either by the way.
Whats "right" society thinks as a whole has been defined within its laws.
To stray outside those laws due to ones faith/creed/belief system, is to step out side those community/state laws.
...and thats that the present killer did when the matter is stripped down to the bone.

(4): "Would you chastise someone for helping another evade persecution under Hitler or Saddam or Stalin, even if there actions were breaking the law of that state"
- absolutely not. However how can you compare someone trying to evade persecution to supposed murder of a doctor in this argument?
I'm not sure or don't see where the connection is between these two areas! No idea how this is relevant to the topic.
All I can say is that, thats what lawyers/solicitors are for. If we all find ourselves in a court room under some charge, we all are trying to prove our innocence and thus "evade persecution". End of story.

(5): "would you intervene, if you could, to stop a rape victim being whipped for her immoral behaviour if the “learned” leaders of her society deemed it appropriate?"
- I would hope I would intervene. That intervention however does not automatically entitle me to additionally kill too just because I feel my cause is right and I am "justified" in my eyes anyway!

(6): If you (OR someone, I don't) really believe abortion is murder then I don't see how you could have any either, when an abortionist is attacked.
- Again not sure of the point your trying to get across here.

Let me state the following in case my position is misconstrued.
* I hold no religious belief's.
* I feel abortion is an individuals right to decide if to have or not - as within the law of the country they have such a procedure done.

Again to reiterate: The convicted killer KILLED himself despite supposedly holding a belief system that espouses "all life is sacred".
- For the sake of HIS ideas, he though he was "right" even to over look his own contradictory actions - convenient or what!
- He killed within a county that - despite if you like it or not - has legal guidelines setup that allow abortion to take place.

If we all just got up tomorrow and thought "hell, I believe in something and that automatically justifies me to kill and I should get away with it because I feel I should, where's my weapon and lets start the killing!" - a country would decent into a state of madness.

He killed outside the legal confines of the law (no matter how wrong others may think those laws are).

Son Of A Vidic

I'm not a holy Joe and I certainly wouldn't listen to the dictates of the Holy roman Emperor - Benedict. But from a Humanity perspective it is savage and horrific to see an abortion firsthand. No one has the authority to take ANY human life, people can look at all the abortion pictures and videos they want. But it is nothing compared to being physically part of it. I do not want to elaborate but my username might give a hint to my background and my experiences occurred in the U.K. I have seen many horrific sights in my life, but nothing comes close to the savagery I've witnessed during abortions. It will haunt me and even the smell is still with me.
The guy who killed the abortion provider had no right to take a life, but I think he should have been charged with Diminished Responsibility. I think he obviously acted in a highly emotive and passionate state, so I think a homicide charge was wrong. Personally I feel no sympathy for the victim, because he obviously had no sympathy or compassion for the countless lives he facilitated in ending in his abattoir.

hooradiation

medicman2009 wrote: »

Personally I feel no sympathy for the victim, because he obviously had no sympathy or compassion for the countless lives he facilitated in ending in his abattoir.

Protip - have a quick look at exactly what George Tiller ACTUALLY did before getting on your soapbox.

You'll look less foolish.

Biggins

medicman2009 wrote: »

Personally I feel no sympathy for the victim, because he obviously had no sympathy or compassion for the countless lives he facilitated in ending in his abattoir.

You perhaps imply (mistakenly) a tight portrait of the victim, the doctor.
Saying "he obviously had no sympathy or compassion for the countless lives he facilitate" advocates that he had no respect for life at all!

He could have been previously also removing fetuses that might have been detrimental to the health of a expectant mother. There are many hundreds of cases of this alone daily in the world.
He could have also been removing fetuses that can into existence due to a rape, etc.
There are many life respecting reasons for a suffering fetus holder, why he did what he legally did under state mandate laid down.

To paint a doctor in one absolute tight way that fits ones personal held ideas, is like a horse wearing blinkers, unwilling or unable to seen a bigger picture.
- but then its easier (for ones argument) to just paint a doctor in darker terms than show a doctor in the fuller extent of his duties and what causes those duties to come about.

hooradiation

Biggins wrote: »

You perhaps imply (mistakenly) a tight portrait of the victim, the doctor.
Saying "he obviously had no sympathy or compassion for the countless lives he facilitate" advocates that he had no respect for life at all!

He could have been previously also removing fetuses that might have been detrimental to the health of a expectant mother. There are many hundreds of cases of this alone daily in the world.
He could have also been removing fetuses that can into existence due to a rape, etc.
There are many life respecting reasons for a suffering fetus holder, why he did what he legally did under state mandate laid down.

To paint a doctor in one absolute tight way that fits ones personal held ideas, is like a horse wearing blinkers, unwilling or unable to seen a bigger picture.
- but then its easier (for ones argument) to just paint a doctor in darker terms than show a doctor in the fuller extent of his duties and what causes those duties to come about.

George Tiller was one of three doctors in the states that perform late term abortions (after the 21st week of pregnancy) which is why he was often the target of so called pro-life groups.

The important point is that Tiller only performed these in one of two sets of circumstances
1 ] where patients discovered late in pregnancy that their fetuses had severe or fatal birth defects.

2] healthy late-term fetuses, in cases where two doctors certified that carrying the fetus to term would cause the woman "substantial and irreversible impairment of a major bodily function"

All here in the WSJ

Goddamit people, google. USE IT.

ColaBeDamned

I read this in the Guardian during the week. It's worth reading


The last abortionist

Warren Hern is no ordinary doctor. He has lived under siege for 25 years, and seen eight of his colleagues assassinated. Even some of his own patients want him dead. John H Richardson meets the last late-term abortionist in America

John H Richardson
The Observer, Sunday 24 January 2010
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/jan/24/warren-hern-america-late-abortion

The young couple flew into Wichita bearing, in the lovely swell of the wife's belly, a burden of grief. They came from a religious tradition where large families are celebrated and they wanted this baby, and it was very late in her pregnancy. But the doctors recommended abortion. They said that with her complications, there were only two men skilled enough to pull it off. One was George Tiller, a Wichita doctor who specialised in late abortions.

They arrived on Sunday, 31 May last year. As they drove to their hotel, a Holiday Inn just two blocks from the Reformation Lutheran Church, they saw television cameras. They wondered what was going on, a passing curiosity quickly forgotten. But when they got to their room, the phone was ringing. Her father was on the line. "There was some doctor who was shot who does abortions," he said. They turned on CNN. Dr Tiller had just been killed, shot in the head as he passed out church leaflets.

Now there is only one doctor left.

After the first two doors of bulletproof glass, a sign at Dr Warren Hern's Boulder Abortion Clinic warns that mobile phones and cameras will be confiscated. The receptionist hits the buzzer that opens the third bulletproof door. In the waiting room, a sad woman with a tight perm waits for her daughter. The receptionist lets you through a fourth bulletproof door and leads you down a green hall decorated with lovely pictures of nature, leaving you in a small room stocked with tissues and free condoms.

Twenty minutes later, the abortionist enters. Dr Hern is a tall man in green surgical scrubs, remarkably vigorous at 70, emphatic in speech and impatient in manner. He has a long face and no lips, which gives him a severe look. He apologises for having very little time. This is the day he sees patients for the first of three visits, giving them the seaweed Laminaria, which slowly dilates the cervix, and his normal caseload has been doubled by Dr Tiller's patients – including two with catastrophic foetal abnormalities and a 15-year-old who was raped, all in the second trimester, all traumatised by the assassin who calls himself pro-life, a phrase he cannot utter without air quotes and contempt. "They hate freedom," he says. He says it again. He warns me not to use anyone's name or it will put them at risk.

Walking out, he leaves the door open. You hear voices drifting down the hall. "The worst picture of an abortion doctor ever," someone says. "Is that Fox?" "Yes, Bill O'Reilly." "Supposedly they were there to protect us." You see a nurse you cannot name leading a middle-aged Indian woman to an examining room. "You'll need to undress from the waist down." You hear one of the receptionists you cannot name speaking in the carefully modulated voice the doctor prescribed in his first book, Abortion Practice, a classic in the field. Steps come down the hall. "I'm Dr Hern. Where are you from? Lie down now. Put your hand on your chest."

The phone rings. "Did you have an ultrasound? And they referred you here?"

Yesterday, the man arrested for Tiller's murder warned that more killings were on the way. All last week, the anti-abortion groups put out statements denouncing the murder and praising the result. One called the killer a hero. As a result, a squad of US marshals rushed out here last week on orders from the attorney general. One of them paces the hall. The second receptionist you cannot name asks him, "Did you see that guy out there smoking a cigarette?"

"Yeah, I saw him."

The first receptionist keeps talking. "If you can fax us the amnio. We don't know, we'll have to wait to see what your body tells us. Do you want us to run your Amex now?"

Another phone rings and the second receptionist answers. "It's basically a three-day process. We require that you stay here in Colorado."

The voices begin to overlap. "Are you on any medication?" "Have you had surgery in the last year?" "No, we don't have any genetics counsellors to interpret that for you." "We don't get a lot of protesters. It's a liberal and tolerant community." "If that changes, we will contact you." "No, you'll get up and get in your car and drive home. And, if you have a change of heart, please call us – our schedule is completely full and you'll be taking someone else's place." After another silence, a soft voice gets softer: "I also want you to know, we don't care what your reasons are. We're not going to judge you."

In the kitchen at the clinic, Dr Hern bolts down two microwave tamales. He talks fast and doesn't smile. "It is my view that we are dealing with a fascist movement. It's a terrorist, violent terrorist movement, and they have a fascist ideology…" Dr Hern goes on like that for some time. Long before the first doctor got shot back in 1993, he was warning that it would happen. He was getting hate mail and death threats way back in 1970, just for working in family planning. They started up again in 1973, two weeks after he helped start the first non-profit abortion clinic in Boulder. "I started sleeping with a rifle by my bed. I expected to get shot." In 1985, someone threw a brick through his window during a protest by the quote unquote Pro-Life Action League. He put up a sign that said THIS WINDOW WAS BROKEN BY THOSE WHO HATE FREEDOM. In 1988, somebody fired five bullets through his window. In 1995, the American Coalition of quote unquote Life Activists put out a hit list with his (and Tiller's) name on it. The feds gave them protection for about six months, then left them on their own.

"People don't get it," he says. "After eight murders, 17 attempted murders, 406 death threats, 179 assaults, and four kidnappings, people are still in denial. They say, 'Well, this was just some wingnut guy who just decided to go blow up somebody.' Wrong. This was a cold-blooded, brutal, political assassination that is the logical consequence of 35 years of hate speech and incitement to violence by people from the highest levels of American society, including but in no way limited to George Bush, Ronald Reagan, Jesse Helms, Bill O'Reilly, Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson. Reagan may not have been a fascist, but he was a tool of the fascists. Bush was most certainly a tool of the fascists. They use this issue to get power. They seem civilised, but underneath you have this seething mass of rabid anger and hatred of freedom that is really frightening, and they support people like the guy who shot George – they're all pretending to be upset, issuing statements about how much they deplore violence, but it's just bull****. This is exactly what they wanted to happen."

He goes on about TV host Bill O'Reilly for a while. Over the course of 29 shows, O'Reilly accused "Tiller the Baby Killer" of performing a late abortion for any reason at all, even so that a girl could attend a rock concert – a charge that is blatantly untrue. "O'Reilly is a disgrace to American society," he says.

But O'Reilly says he's just exercising his right to engage in vigorous debate, you point out.

"He's full of ****. This is not a debate, it's a civil war. And the other people are using bullets and bombs. I think O'Reilly is a fascist."

It's odd, you say, trying to be agreeable. They always go after the doctors, never the mums.

His eyes snap up. "What mums? The patients? They're not mums until they have a baby."

Late that night, Dr Hern calls you at your hotel. You are reading one of his many scientific publications. This one argues that man is a "malignant ecotumour" laying waste to the planet. A cancerous growth resists regulation. A cancer cell is a cell that reproduces without limits.

He's sorry, he says, but he must turn down your request to ride in his car to the Tiller memorial in Denver. He has to go with four US marshals in an armoured car. Even his wife can't ride with him. Same with dinner in a restaurant. "I will never be safe," Dr Hern says. "I'm always looking over my shoulder."

You use the term "partial-birth abortion" and he bristles. "It's a barbaric term for a procedure that was described at National Abortion Federation meetings in the early 90s by two doctors who didn't take the deadliness of the psychological warfare seriously." And then the Republicans took it up "and it became this obscene anti-abortion pornography". And when he tried to tell his colleagues, No, this is not the safest way to perform a delayed abortion, they accused him of working with the anti-abortion people and basically rode him out on a rail. "The whole thing turned into a tortured witch hunt – an incredibly painful experience."

Nothing pains him more than the disdain of other doctors. Sometimes the young ones ask to come in for an afternoon so they can learn to make a little money while their careers get started – they think it's as simple as changing a tyre. "There's no sense that this is an important operation that has to be done well, that a person's life depends on it." But let's face it, abortion is the lowest-status activity in medicine. That's why they always call their clinics Family Planning Centres or Women's Wellness Facilities, or some crap like that. Not his place: it's had the same name since 1975. "Because I felt that performing abortions was the most important thing I could do in medicine."

The patients can be upsetting, too. They're under terrible stress, of course, but sometimes they come in very angry. One had conjoined twins and would have died giving birth, but she exploded when told she couldn't smoke in the office. Some treat him with contempt: usually those who have been directly involved in anti-abortion activities. They hate all abortion except for their special case. One even said they should all be killed. Only 14, she came with her mother. "What brings you here?" Dr Hern asked. "I have to have an abortion." "Why?" "I'm not old enough to have a baby." "But you told the counsellor we should all be killed?" "Yes, you should all be killed." "Why?" "Because you do abortions." "Me too?" "Yes, you should be killed, too." "Do you want me killed before or after I do your abortion?" "Before."

He told her to leave. Her mother was very upset. But he isn't an abortion-dispensing machine. He's a physician. He's a person.

When Dr Hern takes his family home, he's escorted by the US marshals. When you come in, his mother is sitting in an easy chair surrounded by her family. She is 92, but she still has a girlish smile and twinkling eyes that summon gingham skirts and radio serials. You bend down to shake her grandson's hand. "So you want to be a pirate?" He nods and adds in a shy voice: "Or maybe a doctor."

The phone rings and Dr Hern goes to answer. He speaks in a heated voice. Hanging up, he's visibly agitated. "That guy got your number off the internet. He's a reporter.You have to change your number."

Dr Hern's mother explains that her number hasn't been listed for almost 40 years, because the anti-abortion people used to make nasty calls at two in the morning. Then there was a mix-up and it appeared in the phone book. Now she doesn't tell him about most of the calls. He's got enough to worry about.

As a boy? Always helpful. When he was just three, she'd give him a rag and let him dust. He sang in the choir. They got involved in church activities. But politically, they were always on the liberal side. He loved to go camping and fishing, and played the clarinet. His father was a carpenter, so they didn't have much money and couldn't afford to travel. But they always had exchange students from all over the world – Germany, Brazil, Italy, France, Pakistan, Japan, 13 countries in all. That was a way the kids could learn how other people lived. And he won second prize in Kodak's national contest for high school photography.

One thing that's probably important, she says, she had terrible migraines from as far back as she could remember. She'd get up in the morning and feel like her head was gonna roll down the hall. And one day she asked Warren what he wanted to be and he said, I really want to be a doctor, Mother. "He thought he'd be a neuro brain surgeon and maybe he could figure out what to do about my headaches."

That same year, he read a book about Albert Schweitzer healing the sick in Africa and announced, Mother, I'm going to go to Africa before I go to medical school. And he did, raising money so he could be a community ambassador with the Experiment in International Living. At college, he worked three jobs to pay his tuition. He learned ancient Greek and studied the Bible in the original. Then he sat her down and said, "I don't believe in this stuff any more." She said, "Well, you don't have to believe in it. Maybe I don't believe in all of it either."

In medical school, he saw his first botched abortions. Then he spent two years as a doctor for the Peace Corps in a Brazilian town so desperately poor, it wasn't unusual to see a dead baby on a rubbish heap. After that, he worked as a family-planning chief for the Nixon administration and spent some time in Appalachia, where he saw unintended pregnancies dragging families deeper and deeper into poverty.

But even after all that, there are still some family members who can't accept what he does. And other doctors, too. It really hurts him terribly, she says. "In his mind, he's trying to help women who desperately need help. And why can't these doctors, of all people…"

In his mother's opinion, he needs to retire.

The shooting? He called her as soon as it happened. He was trying to stay calm, but it was all he could do to keep from losing it. "I could hear the terror in his voice."

Has she ever tried to get him to stop? Especially now that he's kind of making himself a target. "I know that," she answers. "But that wouldn't do any good. He's got a mind of his own." The rims of her eyes are getting red. She moves her glasses and dabs at them.

Warren Hern's wife likes good coffee, so you meet at an espresso bar. She has a strong Roman nose and black hair that breaks against her cheeks in an ebony wave. In a charming mixture of English and Spanish, she tells you about growing up in Cuba, happy, sun-filled days and good medical training, until she started ducking the weekly "discussion" meetings and they told her she wasn't a good communist.

Later, working in a hospital, she saw women who tried to induce their own miscarriages bleed to death. Then she got pregnant. At 18 weeks, she went to her gynaecologist for the blood test. "They said, 'The baby's no good. You have a real problem.'" She went to a geneticist and a specialist in prenatal diagnosis. The geneticist suggested an abortion, "but the prenatal diagnoser, he said, 'What do you think about the baby?' And I said, 'I think he is good. I feel it in my soul, and I want to take him.' He said, 'Go and take your baby.'"

Labour lasted 36 hours, intensive care a month. The specialists told her the baby might have lifelong seizures or learning disabilities. To lighten her workload, she moved to Barcelona and took a job in an abortion clinic. She sees no contradiction in this. "I know that many women don't feel anything when they're pregnant and many women feel sad, feel angry. In this situation, you never can judge who's God. You need to respect women."

All that led to the man who would become her husband. She was at a medical conference in 2003 when Dr Hern came up to her and said, You are so beautiful. He was 64, she was 37. She was struck by his confidence. They began to send letters across the ocean and talk for hours on the phone. And he always showed her his fears and the loneliness of a life under siege by fanatics. She could relate: "When I was aborting in Spain, I finished the abortion of a young woman, first trimester. When I finished this procedure, she sat on the table, and said, 'Oh, doctor, you are really nice, you are such an angel, how do you kill babies?' I said, 'I'm sorry, I don't kill babies. I aspirate gestational sacs. You kill your baby.'"

But most important, Dr Hern always asked about her son. Other men did not do that. In the summer of 2006, they were married.But that was not their happy ending. At the end of May, when they were just back from a rafting trip in Utah, the phone rang. Warren took the call in his office, "and he didn't have any colour in his face. I said, 'What happened?' He said, 'A shooter shot George Tiller.' I thought it was crazy people, and he said, 'No Amor, these people killed him.'" Since that day, he has not relaxed one second.

Dr Hern barely has time to eat. Reporters come and go, the phone rings constantly, he disappears to the hidden rooms where no outsider is allowed to go. Every so often he snatches a minute or two to drop into the counselling room. You squeeze in a question. This idea about mankind being a "malignant eco-tumour". Doesn't it just invite the hate?

"I'm not inviting people to do anything. I'd like them to think. I do think that helping people control their fertility is highly consistent with helping people be responsible citizens of the planet. If somebody misunderstands it or tries to distort it, I don't give a ****. I'm sorry, I'm living in this country because I can say what I think."

But you're 70. You have ideas for a dozen books. Why not retire?

"I have important work to do here."

You want to cosy up to the next question, but there's no time, you blurt it out: What are your limits? When would you tell a woman no?

"There's no specific answer to that. I'm in the process of turning down somebody who's going to be 34, 35 weeks, with an important reason for doing abortion. I'm not going to do it." The phone rings. "OK. I'll be right there," and he's gone.

Hours pass. You've been moved to the nurses' office, where a soft felt sunflower weaves through the metal in-box. You are staring at a flyer advertising the clinic's services: "Specialising in late abortion for foetal disorders. Outpatient abortion over 26 menstrual weeks for selected patients with documented foetal anomaly, foetal demise, or medical indications."

The opponents of legal abortion often use the phrase "abortion on demand", implying there are no restrictions at all. This characterisation is untrue. It has always been illegal in the US to perform abortions after viability without a compelling medical reason. In Kansas, for example, where Dr Tiller practised medicine, the law for any abortion after 22 weeks requires two doctors to agree that failure to abort would put the mother at risk of "substantial and irreversible harm". But Dr Hern's long list of foetal abnormalities that have led women to his clinic ranges from anencephaly to dwarfism, and you know a few dwarfs. You like to think you'd be happy with a dwarf child.

He comes in, remembers that the US marshals don't like him to use this room because the window is too exposed, and walks right back out. You follow, asking about the patients who were supposed to see Dr Tiller.

"The patient I just finished was very unhappy to see me. I think they are very anti-abortion. She had a foetal abnormality, and she and her husband are just devastated. Stuff like that."

What kind of foetal abnormalities are we talking about? "One was Down's syndrome, another was a lethal brain abnormality along with a lethal heart abnormality. Another one had a catastrophic… we're not talking about cleft lip, we are talking about cleft face. There was no face."

He goes home, riding in the bulletproof car with three US marshals. You follow in a separate car. At home, there's a beautiful Bösendorfer piano with Beethoven on the stand and a primitive bow and arrow from the Amazon rainforest, where Dr Hern has cured diseases and conducted ethnographic studies for over 40 years. There are books everywhere, and many of the nature photographs he has published in environmental books and magazines. Then he leads you to his office. He sits down to bang out a letter to President Obama. "As you know, Dr Tiller was unarmed, vulnerable, and acting as an usher for his fellow worshippers."

It's four in the afternoon and he still hasn't eaten his miserable microwave tamales. Is he the abstemious type? "I enjoy food when I have a chance. I love to cook. Grown men lie down on the floor and cry with ecstasy over my paella."

What do the women do?

"They watch the men."

It's the first light thing you've heard him say. So you try to reach the emotional core everyone keeps telling you about. This woman you refused to treat, what was her reason?

"She was raped. I'm sympathetic, but I can't risk my medical licence for someone who just didn't get around to doing anything about it. I've done some cases over 36 weeks, but very few."

For what cause? "Catastrophic problems – anencephaly or lack of kidneys, you know. Lack of a brain."

The anti-abortionists say that in those cases, the woman should just give birth naturally and let God take the baby.

The sharp tone comes back. "Having a delivery is not a benign procedure. When you are trying to keep the baby alive, that increases the risk for the woman. And Reagan put in a bunch of rules about requiring to keep babies alive no matter how hopeless it is. You have people going to Europe to get away from that."

You mean the hospital requires them to save the baby?

"The hospital requires full resuscitation measures, no matter what."

Also, his seaweed procedure is very slow and gentle on the cervix. The tissue dehydrates, the collagen starts to pull apart, the uterus gets softer. If you do a forceful dilation, you're going to tear the cervix. All around, his way is safer.

Safer for the mum?

"Not for the mum," he snaps, "for the woman. Till she's had a baby, she's not a mum."

While you wait, you try to chat up his staff. Most don't want to talk on the record, but one says she's been working here for 13 years. Dr Hern is very caring with all of them, she says. He pays them well. He gives them insurance and a retirement savings plan, which is not routine in the abortion trade. Once, he took them all rafting down the Green River.

So what brings out his emotions?

"Well, I think it is difficult for him when women are experiencing pain and he's not able to control that for them."

Have you ever seen him cry?

"That's a question for Dr Hern."

Does it bother him when the patients show disgust? "That's a question for Dr Hern."

He is on the phone, talking with the editor of a scientific journal. "Well, I went to George's funeral in Wichita, and I was probably the most heavily protected son of a bitch in the state. I was surrounded by rings of marshals and they might've been able to get me with a shoulder-mounted rocket or something. But the grief of this situation was pretty hard."

The phone rings again. This time it's the president of the National Society of Genetic Counsellors, Steven Keiles. Dr Hern wants him to issue a statement denouncing the murder, the sooner the better. "I'm sorry, this is not very complicated. You make a statement and you issue it to the press, a one-page statement condemning the brutal assassination of a conscientious and dedicated doctor who helped tens of thousands of women." He slams down the receiver. "That guy is a ****ing clerk. I have no patience for this kind of bull****. George gave them so much money and so much help."

He starts ranting about the time the militant anti-abortion activist Randall Terry prayed for his death on national Christian radio. "These guys are just despicable. If anyone wants hope for the human species, don't talk to me."

A receptionist comes to close the door so the patients don't hear him. Later, he says, "You can never get used to this. I think we're hardwired, biologically, to protect small, vulnerable creatures, especially babies. The foetuses may not be babies, but some of them are pretty close." He suggests you read an essay called What About Us? Staff Reactions to D&E (Dilation and Evacuation). "The anti-abortion people quote the **** out of it. It's kind of anti-abortion porn for them. But the pro-choice people don't like it either. They don't like it when you talk about how it really feels to do this work." His voice is somewhere between bitter and proud.

So why did he write it? And what about this theory that man is a cancer? "I wrote it because, A, I'm a human being, and B, I'm a writer, and C and D, I'm a physician and I'm trying to understand what we're doing here."

You read the paper. He describes the reactions members of his staff have when they see residue of late abortions, which include "shock, dismay, amazement, disgust, fear and sadness". The later the pregnancy, the harder it is to accept. One assistant resented the patients for putting them through such a horrible experience. Two others described dreams where they vomited foetuses. Common coping mechanisms were denial, projection and rationalisation. The paper ends with the passage the anti-abortionists love to quote, always out of context; words so honest they are almost as painful to read as they must have been to write: "We have reached a point in this particular technology where there is no possibility of denying an act of destruction. It is before one's eyes. The sensations of dismemberment flow through the forceps like an electric current. It is the crucible of a raging controversy, the confrontation of a modern existential dilemma. The more we seem to solve the problem, the more intractable it becomes."

Dr Hern is in the basement doing an abortion. Today is Thursday, operating day. It's just after 8am, and very quiet. The waiting room is empty. So are the examining rooms. A receptionist tells you he just got done with a patient and should be back shortly.

A woman comes to the door. "Is it OK if I go outside for a minute?" "Sure. Knock on the door if you're starting to feel bad."

The phone keeps ringing. "If you have tissue samples," says the receptionist you cannot name, "That makes it logistically easier. Can I put you on hold one second?" She opens the door for the sad woman and her daughter. "Thank you," the daughter says in an emphatic tone that suggests she's not just talking about the door.

A few minutes pass and the phone rings again. "Good morning, Dr Hern's office. OK, did you get any measurements from the ultrasound? OK. And where was this done? OK."

When the calls slow down, the receptionist tells you about the time a pro-life reporter pretended to be looking for information and then quoted her by name. "They do these things to scare you."

The US marshals keep walking up and down the hall, carrying black bags that look ominously tactical. The receptionist opens the door again. It's a woman in an ankle-length Amish dress. "You've seen her before," she tells Dr Hern. "She was with another woman in the same kind of dress."

While you wait, you read another one of the doctor's essays. "It has been my practice to rupture membranes with ring forceps," it says.

At 11:30, the doctor comes up in a cheerful mood. "I have to go check the level of molecular degeneration in my tamales."

It's the second lighthearted thing you've heard him say. And when he comes back from the kitchen, he says another. "I identified a new species in my tamales. But I think with a gastroenterologist standing by…"

The receptionist smiles. "It's your risk."

The Amish women leave. He walks them to the door and says, "Give my regards to Dr H –"

In the nurses' office, the soft felt sunflower weaves through the metal in-box. A young woman wearing a 1920s flapper scarf comes up the stairs alone. At that very moment, you are reading page 83 of Abortion Practice, the section called Isolation: "One of the loneliest persons in the world is the woman who has not told anyone she is pregnant or considering an abortion. Some women have no one to whom they can turn; others insist on suffering alone as a form of self-punishment. The individual abortion counsellor may, and frequently does, fill that gap for both kinds of patients."

The woman in the flapper scarf stops at the receptionist's office. "Thank you so much," she says. "You're so helpful. You're wonderful ladies." Another woman stops at the desk. She's a Latina, here for her sister. "Can I wait? I want to say goodbye to everyone."

The phone rings. "Well, have you had an ultrasound? OK. If it's between 19 weeks and 24 weeks, it'll be between $5,000 and $7,500."

Five minutes later, it rings again. "No, we need to know what the measurements are before you travel. It's a measurement in millimetres and centimetres. Fax it to us. Everything is based on the measurement."

Now it's 1:47, and you're sitting down in the counselling room with the young couple who arrived in Wichita just in time to see the news cameras that surrounded the Reformation Lutheran Church. The woman has light brown hair and wears conservative glasses. She is calm, sombre and depleted.

As gently as you can, you ask her to tell you why she chose abortion.

"We had found out something was wrong at 28 weeks, seriously wrong. And they found out that it was going to put me, my health, perhaps in danger if I carried through to the end."

And it was a planned pregnancy?

"Oh yes. Absolutely."

And when you arrived in Wichita?

"We were caught between grieving about going through this and this awful situation."

You couldn't find a doctor closer to home?

"They do these kinds of procedures in Canada, where we come from, but because I was a very complicated case, and because I didn't feel comfortable with the way they wanted to do it, it was very high risk, I wanted to come to someone who is an expert."

Do you mind explaining why it was so complicated?

"The child had severe abnormalities."

You change the subject, asking what was wrong with the Canadian doctors.

"They do it very fast. They don't use the seaweed, they don't take their time, and it puts the woman at risk. And you're at risk of losing your uterus. I would like to have children, so I didn't want to have that risk."

And how did it go, the surgery?

"Well, Dr Tiller said that…"

Hern.

"Oh, sorry, sorry, sorry. Dr Hern said I was a very complicated case. He said it went well, but it wasn't an easy thing to do. It was painful physically and mentally."

You ask if there's anything else they want to say. The husband answers. "It's important that people have a choice. At the end of the day, when things go bad, you know? I mean, God forbid something happens to Dr Hern, where are we going to go next? Australia? China?"

Five minutes later, you catch Dr Hern in the nurses' office. Did their procedure take long?

"Yeah, it was 45 minutes. The average is five minutes. She was very far along. It was the position of the uterus, and she had a previous C-section, poor dilation, it was very difficult. I think any other procedure would have been very, very dangerous for her."

She was in danger of her life?

"Oh yeah. She would have risked having a ruptured uterus in an induction procedure."

In surgery, or in birth?

"Well, she's at risk, at this point, no matter what she decides to do. That's why I'm quite sure this was the safest option for her."

Later that evening, you will drive with Dr Hern's wife and son to the Temple Emanuel in Denver. He'll choke up when he ascends to the dais to say that George Tiller was "gentle, considerate and compassionate", then recover and roll into the refuge of his annealing anger: "This brutal, cold-blooded, premeditated political assassination is the inevitable and predictable result of over 35 years of rabid anti-abortion harassment, hate rhetoric, violence..."

When he comes off the stage to embrace the wife, he will break down in racking sobs. His son will stroke his shoulder. You will be standing right next to them, close enough to hear him say, "Amor, Amor, Amor," close enough to hear members of the audience – who came by word of mouth, because the rabbi considered it too dangerous to advertise publicly – whisper their gratitude. "Thank you for your courage." One woman squeezes his hand. "It's because of people like you that my relatives survived the 1940s."

Three weeks later, the woman from Canada calls you. She has some things she wants to tell you. It was the most tragic and terrible experience of my life, she begins. She has a son almost ready to start kindergarten, she was afraid she wouldn't survive to raise him, and she wants to have a big family, and the situation was so crazy with the marshals and the bulletproof glass and the constant fear of a mad killer with a gun. Dr Hern was under so much pressure. She could see the stress in his face. "Now I'm still recovering, and still sad and still mourning, and I realise how grateful I am that Dr Hern was able to take me under such quick and terrible circumstances. That's what gets me so upset. He's a doctor who is trying to help people. It's shocking that people want to hurt him."

Without Dr Hern, she says, she doesn't know what she would have done. It's crazy he's the only one left. She is grateful, so grateful that she will be here to raise her son. And as the words tumble you hear, in the urgency unleashed by her deliverance, a love too sad for sermons, too personal for headlines, a private benediction, the abortionist's reward, the love song of Warren Martin Hern, MD.★

• Copyright John H Richardson. A longer version of this article originally appeared in US Esquire.

lugha

Biggins wrote: »

He killed outside the legal confines of the law (no matter how wrong others may think those laws are).

I am afraid you miss the nub of my gist entirely. I am not in any way defending the murder of this doctor. What I am saying, is that it is however, perfectly reasonable, indeed consistent, to defend it, if you really do think abortion truly does equate with murder.

And distinguishing between what is and is not legal or within the confines of the law isn't relevant. The maddest of despots would be in a position to decide what it and is not legal. They might initiate a campaign of genocide against sections of the population but do so “legally”. By your reasoning, there would be no ethical grounds to take the law in to your own hands. Now for me and you, as you say, such scenarios have to relation to the abortion question. But if you really believe abortion is murder, as I and presumably you do not, then legalized abortion is morally equivalent to legalizing genocide. And it is perfectly proper and ethical to violate the laws of any state which did this. Of course, very few do actually believe such an equivalence, but lots of people persist with the inconsistency of asserting that abortion is murder.

Biggins

lugha wrote: »

I am afraid you miss the nub of my gist entirely. I am not in any way defending the murder of this doctor. What I am saying, is that it is however, perfectly reasonable, indeed consistent, to defend it, if you really do think abortion truly does equate with murder.

And distinguishing between what is and is not legal or within the confines of the law isn't relevant. The maddest of despots would be in a position to decide what it and is not legal. They might initiate a campaign of genocide against sections of the population but do so “legally”. By your reasoning, there would be no ethical grounds to take the law in to your own hands. Now for me and you, as you say, such scenarios have to relation to the abortion question. But if you really believe abortion is murder, as I and presumably you do not, then legalized abortion is morally equivalent to legalizing genocide. And it is perfectly proper and ethical to violate the laws of any state which did this. Of course, very few do actually believe such an equivalence, but lots of people persist with the inconsistency of asserting that abortion is murder.

Forgive me (me being stupid probably), the following is unclear to me what you saying. Is it a question or statement? The wording is confusing.

What I am saying, is that it is however, perfectly reasonable, indeed consistent, to defend it, if you really do think abortion truly does equate with murder.

"distinguishing between what is and is not legal or within the confines of the law isn't relevant."
- Apparently the presiding judge does otherwise he wouldn't be sending him down for years to come!

"if you really believe abortion is murder, as I and presumably you do not, then legalized abortion is morally equivalent to legalizing genocide."
- again, thats an opinion - not a fact. Previous or future killings might be justified based upon facts such as a person wiping out thousands by gas attack (Sadam) and bodies lying in the streets. Churchill might have been justified in trying to kill Hitler due to the wiping out of the jews by the hundreds of thousands.
..but to use one's opinion only to justify a killing - thats where the line is being crossed.
That is my point.

"... it is perfectly proper and ethical to violate the laws of any state which did this"
- O' well just because one thinks they are right, that makes it ok then! Crikey!!!

"but lots of people persist with the inconsistency of asserting that abortion is murder."
- absolutely true. However the vast majority of them, don't say they respect life - then go kill some one!

Likewise, you have missed the nub of some of my points.

1. He broke the law within the state he did his actions. He will pay a price for it.
2. One can't claim to respect life, then turn around and kill someone!
...And then to top that hypocrisy off, laughably try to claim that they don't deserve to answer to the laws of the land due to their own version of moral grounds!

People have killed other people before. They have landed in court and judgement has been rendered. Some have got off due to diminished responsibility, insanity, cruelness done to them over a period of time thus self-defence - and innocence of course to name a few classifications recognised in law.
HOWEVER this killer planned exactly what he was going to do, he knew why he was doing it and who, where and when he was going to commit murder.
I personally don't see why he should get off - thats all.

lugha

Biggins wrote: »

Thats an opinion - not a fact. Previous or future killings might be justified based upon facts such as a person wiping out thousands by gas attack (Sadam) and bodies lying in the streets. Churchill might have been justified in trying to kill Hitler due to the wiping out of the jews by the hundreds of thousands.
..but to use one's opinion only to justify a killing - thats where the line is being crossed.

The distinction between opinion and fact isn’t as clear as you suggest. A despot might be of the opinion that what you saw as the victims of genocide were in fact active combatants in a properly constituted war. Conversely, many pro-lifers can and do assert as a fact that thousands of fully fledged human beings are being murdered by abortion.

Biggins wrote: »

O' well just because one thinks they are right, that makes it ok then! Crikey!!!

So on what grounds would you justify say, coming to the assistance of a victim of a state organized genocide campaign, other than “thinking you are right”. If the law of the land (however barbaric) says so, then is this the Rubicon not to be crossed?

Biggins wrote: »

One can't claim to respect life, then turn around and kill someone!

"but lots of people persist with the inconsistency of asserting that abortion is murder."
- absolutely true. However the vast majority of them, don't say they respect life - then go kill some one!

I think you have already conceded that you would, presumably reluctantly, take lethal action against someone like Thomas Hamilton if it were necessary to preserve the lives of a classroom of children. I think you would be less than impressed if someone subsequently questioned your respect for life on the basis that you had taken a life. So yes, you can respect life but also be prepared to sometimes kill someone. Police forces have to do this all the time.

Biggins wrote: »

He broke the law within the state he did his actions. He will pay a price for it.

Yes he will. Just as you would pay a price if you broke the law by assisting victims of a despotic regime. Do as the Romans in Rome is fine. But there are acts which you would assert are unquestionably wrong (murder, rape etc.), whatever the laws of the state you are in might say, and you would have no moral qualms about violating these laws. I say one such situation arise for those that really believe that abortion is murder. If you really believe that, then I think you are morally bound to use extreme measures to oppose it.

Biggins

lugha wrote: »

(1) The distinction between opinion and fact isn’t as clear as you suggest. A despot might be of the opinion that what you saw as the victims of genocide were in fact active combatants in a properly constituted war. Conversely, many pro-lifers can and do assert as a fact that thousands of fully fledged human beings are being murdered by abortion.

(2) So on what grounds would you justify say, coming to the assistance of a victim of a state organized genocide campaign, other than “thinking you are right”. If the law of the land (however barbaric) says so, then is this the Rubicon not to be crossed?

I think you have already conceded that you would, presumably reluctantly, take lethal action against someone like Thomas Hamilton if it were necessary to preserve the lives of a classroom of children. I think you would be less than impressed if someone subsequently questioned your respect for life on the basis that you had taken a life. (3) So yes, you can respect life but also be prepared to sometimes kill someone. Police forces have to do this all the time.

Yes he will. Just as you would pay a price if you broke the law by assisting victims of a despotic regime. Do as the Romans in Rome is fine. But there are acts which you would assert are unquestionably wrong (murder, rape etc.), whatever the laws of the state you are in might say, and you would have no moral qualms about violating these laws. I say one such situation arise for those that really believe that abortion is murder. (4) If you really believe that, then I think you are morally bound to use extreme measures to oppose it.

(1) You have a valid point and thankfully thats where we have the law to refer to for guidance sometimes.

(2) The grounds I would chose (as just one example) would be where they were peacefully and law abidingly standing up to be counted in protest.
A simple basic example - but its slightly off topic.
If I had such a grievance with a supposed killer doctor - I'd join a protest movement, annoy my politician, start a movement for change through and using the media to begin with. I just wouldn't plan to outright kill just as this convicted killer did - going back on his own belief that of "all have a right to life".

(3) No argument there. They have their fire arm/weapons rules and constituted laws to guide them.

(4) "Extreme measures" - now there is a phrase that can be debated till the cows come home. One mans "extreme measures" might be to publically protest within a legal law that let him - another mans "extreme measures" as is this case is to murder - others would go further to acts of mans "extreme measures" that some would call simply "terrorism" - where does the moral justifications end?
Thats why as in this particular case - there is the law to refer back to and by that law and the society that adopted it under a democratic system, found him guilty of murder.
Found guilty by the way by a jury of his peers.

Good debate

Overheal

ColaBeDamned wrote: »

• Copyright John H Richardson. A longer version of this article originally appeared in US Esquire.

*Faints*

Biggins

Overheal wrote: »

*Faints*

:pac:

lugha

Biggins wrote: »

Good debate

Yes, and surprisingly robust given that I think we are substantially on the same side.

In the whole sad abortion debate I accept that there are people of good conscience on both sides and I can respect that. But one thing that really sticks in my craw is the way some on the pro-life insist on describing abortion as murder. It’s not as if we need some additional terminology to come to grips with the issue, we know what abortion means so why not just call it abortion. But of course we also know what those that do, insist on using such language. It enables calm discussion with rationally made points to be reduced to a Goodwin-esqe type exchange. And it is pretty odious. It is implied by those who say such things that a frightened teenager making a journey to Britain is morally equivalent to someone like Catherine Nevin (an apt comparison, as she enlisted others to rid herself of an inconvenient person) which they plainly do not. And it is utterly dishonest of them to suggest so. Similarly if most of us were given an opportunity to permanently stop Thomas Hamilton, we wouldn’t be impeded by ethical consideration or what the law says or any of the things we discussed in out exchanges. He was setting out to commit murder which most of us assert is universally wrong and we’d have no qualms about stopping him. That those who cry “abortion is murder” clearly would not take similar actions against an abortion doctor further shows the dishonesty in their assertion. A perfectly good case can be made by those of pro-life leanings without resorting to such obnoxious sound bites. This is what I was huffing and puffing about.

Sir Oxman

.....

Sir Oxman

lugha wrote: »

Yes, and surprisingly robust given that I think we are substantially on the same side.

In the whole sad abortion debate I accept that there are people of good conscience on both sides and I can respect that. But one thing that really sticks in my craw is the way some on the pro-life insist on describing abortion as murder. It’s not as if we need some additional terminology to come to grips with the issue, we know what abortion means so why not just call it abortion. But of course we also know what those that do, insist on using such language. It enables calm discussion with rationally made points to be reduced to a Goodwin-esqe type exchange. And it is pretty odious. It is implied by those who say such things that a frightened teenager making a journey to Britain is morally equivalent to someone like Catherine Nevin (an apt comparison, as she enlisted others to rid herself of an inconvenient person) which they plainly do not. And it is utterly dishonest of them to suggest so. Similarly if most of us were given an opportunity to permanently stop Thomas Hamilton, we wouldn’t be impeded by ethical consideration or what the law says or any of the things we discussed in out exchanges. He was setting out to commit murder which most of us assert is universally wrong and we’d have no qualms about stopping him. That those who cry “abortion is murder” clearly would not take similar actions against an abortion doctor further shows the dishonesty in their assertion. A perfectly good case can be made by those of pro-life leanings without resorting to such obnoxious sound bites. This is what I was huffing and puffing about.

grand argument, a few paragraphs wouldn't go amiss and I take back my earlier post :0

ColaBeDamned

Overheal wrote: »

*Faints*

Biggins wrote: »

:pac:

Aw nuts

Biggins

ColaBeDamned wrote: »

Aw nuts

They might be found this way ---> http://boards.ie/vbulletin/forumdisplay.php?f=576

amandakola

medicman2009 wrote: »

No one has the authority to take ANY human life, people can look at all the abortion pictures and videos they want.

and of course here's the age old problem.
It's MY body.
MINE.
even if you do think life begins at conception, that life is in MY body. As long as it is inside me, it is MINE. It is not like I am taking something and hiding it up my sleeve -it is connected to my body with an umbilical cord, those cells are PART OF MY BODY. Those cells, that life, that is inside me, is not entitled to more rights than I am. It is not more important than me, it is just a tiny part of me.

i actually used to be really "pro-life" myself. until i realised that "pro-life" really means pro-babies lives. it's not pro-women's lives. anything that limits women's choices is anti-women. women should be trusted to make their own reproductive choices.

Choke

amandakola wrote: »

even if you do think life begins at conception, that life is in MY body. As long as it is inside me, it is MINE. It is not like I am taking something and hiding it up my sleeve -it is connected to my body with an umbilical cord, those cells are PART OF MY BODY. Those cells, that life, that is inside me, is not entitled to more rights than I am. It is not more important than me, it is just a tiny part of me.

Most people would agree that:
Mother (Life) > Baby (Life)

What some people have trouble with is:
Mother (convenience) > Baby (Life)

Most abortions don't involve a risk to the life of the mother, most are done to avoid the lifestyle and body changes that come with pregnancy.

hooradiation

Choke wrote: »

most are done to avoid the lifestyle and body changes that come with pregnancy.

Oh holy wow.

Tell me, do you write fiction for a living or are you just a hobbyist?