Why no violence against abortion providers?

[vern_humphrey]

Maybe the real value put on both is zero. If a child is seen being cast into a cement mixer they will step in to help, because it is socially expected and there is reasonable expectation of plaudits from the press and maybe a medal when the Lady Mayoress comes round. However thousands of children can starve in Africa, and they will not give up use of their automobile for as much as one day to help them, unless there is a corresponding social benefit.

A good example of how a bogus “scenario” will produce bogus results.

 

[Gottle_of_Geer]

Please help me to understand this.

If Joe decides that he is going to kill anyone that walks onto his property and begins to do so, the police are going to stop him and they will use force to do so. They will NOT stand outside his house and say, “let us wait until he tries to do this again and then we will stop him.”

Instead, they say, “this man has killed people that walked onto his property and we must go to stop him now before he does this again.” And they will use violence if necessary.

But if there is an abortion clinic next door to Joe, and they kill a steady stream of unborn babies every day, we are forbidden to use violence to stop them.

Why? Help me to understand the difference.

1. “Two wrongs don’t make a right”.
2. If violence solved anything, He had the opportunity to be a Zealot & overthrow the Romans in Palestine by force. He rejected this course of action as a temptation of satan - twice.
3. Violence breeds violence.
4. Temptations always put on a pretty face, & hide their fangs; if they did not, no one would ever be taken in by them. This is a temptation, & it needs to be resisted. Give in to it, & it only leads to further evil. And how would that further the mission of the Church ?
5. Jesus did not commission His disciples to commit violence and to blow their fellow-men to shreds with explosives, but to “make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you”. One might as well ask, “Why no massacres of Protestants ?”
6. Not all the actions of Christ can be imitated: violence by men - whether in act ot word or thought - is all too often no more than a form of self-assertion, & thus, sinful. This is not true of His behaviour.
7. The whole tendency of His behaviour was to avoid taking the easy way path - instead of self-assertion, He chose self-emptying, self-denial, forgetfulness of self, by preaching & living love of enemies, love of those who were unlovable. The Crucifixion is the most complete expression of this - it cost God His own Life to do this. To blow up abortionists is wrong no matter what they do, because it is totally opposed to that way of life. If we want to imitate Him, we are safe & harm no one if we crucify our egos: we are allowed to, & are commanded to. People like that do not break the second great commandment in order to fulfil the first - for as we treat others, so we treat Christ Himself.
8. If the Apostles had used violence against Saul the persecutor, we would have had no Paul the Apostle. Violence implies lack of hope that others may be converted.
9. It also attempts to force God’s hand, by bringing in His Kingdom of Righteousness & Peace in a way He has not chosen, but rejected: which is what Judas Iscariot seems to have tried to do. Do we really want to imitate Judas instead of Christ ?

 

[SoCalRC]

Now, do you prefer clover or alfalfa? Don’t dodge the question – answer straight out.

I’m Irish Catholic by descent, so I prefer clover.

I couldn’t resist - from Wikipedia:

A parable is a brief, succinct story, in prose or verse, that illustrates a moral or religious lesson. It differs from a fable in that fables use animals, plants, inanimate objects, and forces of nature as actors while parables generally are stories featuring human actors or agents.

Are we to take your comments to mean that you have utter disdain for all parables? After all Malcom McLean’s point pretty closely expressed in parable form in Matthew 25.

Do you find those verses to be “bogus nonsense”?

 

[Elric]

Part of me believes that I am no better the the Germans who stood by and watched 6 million Jews be killed.

As someone whose spouse is half German with her father and Grandparents living through the part of history you are refering to, I find this comment to be offensive and uneducated. Such comments are uncalled for and detract from the cause that you support.

 

[blackiron1]

I am not advocating violence against abortion providers and intuitively I know it would be wrong.

But if someone were routinely killing three-year old kids, many of us would use any means (including violence) to stop it.

So why do we say it is wrong to use violence against abortion providers when we can use it in the above example or in other, everyday situations (like protecting our family)?

For one we are called to be Disciples of Christ and Christ did not advocate violence even though there was plenty of innocent blood being shed in his day.

A second reason is that it is not to Pro-Lifers political advantage to be cast as terrorist in the Legislatures.

Third, Prayer and Sidewalk Counseling are much more effective than violent actions.

Most women are not 100% sure they want an abortion when they go to the clinic. Many feel pressured by family, boyfriends etc. Counselors are sometimes able to counsel them and get them to go to places like Birthright.etc

In my city we have a Pro-Life Medical Clinic right next door to an abortion clinic. Many women have been referred to it and babies and women have been saved.

 

[SoCalRC]

As someone whose spouse is half German with her father and Grandparents living through the part of history you are refering to, I find this comment to be offensive and uneducated. Such comments are uncalled for and detract from the cause that you support.

I understand that we are all sensitive about certain things, but the point still seems relevant to me. Clearly the comment was constrained to a portion of the German population.

Since German soldiers wore belt buckles that said “God with Us” in WWI, one would think that some segment of the population realized that forced ghettoization, labor camps, and genocide were travesties against God. And of that segment, some undoubtedly chose silence to save their own hides.

God calls us to do what is right, not what is easy or safe. So the moral example remains relevant, regardless of how close it cuts to someone’s heritage.

The same point could be raised about the genocide of Native Americans, internment of Japanese Americans, and even, arguably, pre-emptive war in Iraq. It was certainly not easy to speak out against the war when over 70% of Americans supported it and dissent was being blatantly labelled as treason. But my heart foresaw not a 6 month romp with oil revenue and flowers, but death and chaos raging for years, so I had no choice. Had I not stood up, and accepted the hate and ridicule in response, I would have been breaking the same moral principle.

 

[vern_humphrey]

I’m Irish Catholic by descent, so I prefer clover.

Does the phrase" troncar and cannula" mean anything to you?

Are we to take your comments to mean that you have utter disdain for all parables? After all Malcom McLean’s point pretty closely expressed in parable form in Matthew 25.

Do you find those verses to be “bogus nonsense”?

Whoop! Whoop! Whoop! Deliberate smoke attack!

First it was a “war game” and now it’s a “parable?” Talk about a change in direction!!

Followed by a claim to be so Christ-like that you have the authority that your parables have the same holiness His had?

 

[Ani_Ibi]

Rats, I just noticed this thread on the way out the door and, if I am late, I will be charged a late fee.

I haven’t had a chance to read the whole thread, but will when I get back. It is a very interesting topic, particularly for those of us who have experienced the deep frustration of being on the front lines of this battle for unborn lives.

Funny thing is that, only yesterday, I was reading up on Negligence Law. The term ‘Duty to Rescue’ pops up in my mind. I’ll read up on it some more and get back to ya all. That is if I don’t forget completely about it.

Hugs, Ani

 

[DocQuark]

So why do we say it is wrong to use violence against abortion providers when we can use it in the above example or in other, everyday situations (like protecting our family)?

Hello,

Oh, man. Here we go again! This is my first post ever in this forum. I came here trying to get away from this pro-violence stuff in pro-life. I’m not saying you’re a terrorist or anything. I’m just raw from encountering some militant Protestants and other pro-lifers very close to it.

I was helping them set up and magnify their pro-baby campaign, and then realized there’s a much darker agenda and culture around it all.

There are several problems with the temptation, obsession, and partial possession that results when we think murder of abortionists is justified under the argument above:

1. It is the will of the selfish People and the laws they establish to murder babies in the womb. You cannot apply force against the will of this new Roman Empire. Will is an idea, a dream; Something in the heart which dominates the mind. That’s something for killing babies or anything is straight from Hell… It’s a carnal lust, selfishness, Vanity. But, you just cannot change will of the people by force. Only ideas, propaganda war, politics, litigation, and legislative motions can change public opinions and behavior. Forces can always engage forces, but ideas are immune to all but psychological warfare.
2. People don’t like being told what to do. It is America’s CHOICE to abort, and they establish their laws accordingly. The war is with the People of the United States – their minds and hearts, not their bodies and not the bodies of the abortionists. There is nothing you can do as men engaged in violence to change the CHOICE of the People and how they draft their laws. All you do is further entrench the People in pro-choice, and detest of kooky Christians. You have to crack open their minds and hearts. Destroy their will to abort and you win the war. We are doing that.
3. Nothing you do to kill an abortionist or bomb a clinic changes anything. ** If it could change anything, I would be all for it, certainly. At best, in the death of an abortion doctor, you maybe save a few thousand babies he’d have killed, but most of those customers would abort elsewhere. The inconvenience to women would only save maybe a couple hundred babies per abortion doc and clinic destroyed. However, in turning public opinion against pro-life – at a time when the scales could tip either way for many more years to come – you help kill around 1 million babies per year in this country.** A couple hundred saved among your vanity and surrender to carnal lusts versus a million lost? It takes at least around 4 years just to change pro-life politics you’d help cement, so you help kill around 4 million like that.
4. Man is created in the image of God. What you do to man, you do to God. There is a time and place for killing, but it is too serious a matter to be carried out without deliberation and moral clarity. And especially without it serving a good purpose overall. It is to waste life even if an abortionist. It is to forget that our cause also profits by the converted abortionists. It is to play God and is not even in the class of organized, sanction killing. And those who often push this doctrine tend to be militia kooky, Christian kooky, nuts, and totally incapable of commanding their way out of a paper bag – let alone any kind of organized rebellion against this New Rome. If they had a General Lee, yeah, I’d be tempted to follow but they don’t. They tend to be just gun happy Christians angry over the babies. Undisciplined armies do not fight well. They break formation. They mutiny. They do not know how to follow orders even when they don’t like it, and so are unfit to command anything.

 

[DocQuark]

1. **Allowing lynch mob justice is morally wrong. It allows too much power into the hands of outlaws who are not sanctioned by the People as judge, jury, and executioner. It is un-American. ** It puts you against the People, the laws, the government, the military, judiciary…Everything you can still exploit to save babies and turn to pointing guns at abortionists you have turned on yourself. We are trying to make the abortionist and outlaw, not prolifers!
2. Many other arguments against it. Another is that all you are doing is going the path of Judas who also wanted armed rebellion; The path of Barabas; Or, the way of St. Peter when Christ kept telling him to put down his sword. It is not Christ-like defiance of the state’s imperial murder.
3. If you would ask the People and the judges to turn against Abortion, you must respect the law – yes, even as babies are being murdered all around you. Some laws are fun to break – blocking clinics (which I disagree with). There are a variety of other more trivial forms of defiance and protest law-breaking – blocking traffic, disturbing the peace, etc. No big deal. Okay there. You might even transform from shouting at abortionists, to verbal altercation, to breaking some noses among heated arguments in the street. But, when it comes to killing and conspiring to kill…that’s gone too far. And you won’t really get anywhere by raising hell in angry fashion as pro-life radicals.
4. **In the end, none of those courses develop a prolife culture of defiance, resistance, and political power in this country capable of making a difference. ** It has to be more than prayer, pacifism, wussy pooh candelight vigils and all that. Prolifers have to get more involved and do something, but not immorally. Not too criminal.
5. **Once you take on this ends justifies the means bankrupt logic and philosophy while trying to tie it to womb-child personhood, all you do is open up a wide subsidiary of organization and individual unethical behavior. ** Lies, cheating, stealing, manipulation, money laundering, excess tactics in trying to force your will upon the nation. It all leads to nothing because it is based in fanatical emotion, not cold and deliberate marching on despite any loss of babies. You become nothing more than an Irish Republican Army kind of rebel – maybe with many legit gripes, but crossed the line and having no power. IRA didn’t become powerful until going less violent and more political. A certain degree of violence was probably useful in the larger scheme of things there to secure negotiations, but it was at least organized, disciplined, and not with a kooky lynch mob mentality. Meanwhile, they were fighting for their own reasons within their culture. Here, you are thinking you can fight to keep some other culture and woman from aborting her baby. Doesn’t work. You gotta crack open her mind and heart first, and the men who pressure her into it. Know thy enemy! First rule of war. The abortionist Planned Barrenhood, and government are not the enemy. The minds and hearts of the People are! Win that peacefully and you win the babies!

 

[DocQuark]

9)** The infants belong to God, not us. ** As Christians, we believe in a just God. No just God would be letting babies be MARTYRED like this if they were not part of some larger, better plan for mankind’s future. The blood of martyrs has always been what builds the Church and great nations. Someday, all this butchery and evil will transform to something equally bright and good – all built upon that infant carnage as the foundation. There is nothing to be sad about when infants die. We all have to die sometime. Many people die horribly in the world. Soldiers, civilians, casualties of war. It’s sad, but there is life beyond just life in the body. What happens to the body is irrelevant. I’m not saying murder of children in the womb is no big deal, but you cannot let emotion govern one’s path – particularly into murder. Yes, there are times when murder is morally justified, but it must at least serve a higher moral purpose of Grand Strategy and benefit to the cause… For example, it perfectly acceptable (within the law, not the Church) to murder an American engaged in treason if that issue has a high enough national security priority. That’s killing, actually, not murder. It’s sanctioned. There are times when special forces operatives may have to kill an innocent civilian – even a child – all to preserve the mission. Maybe they’re spotted? You can’t have some farm boy running home to warn enemy camps, so you cut his throat. Ugly. Ugly to God. Ugly to a nation and diplomacy. Murder? Nope. Sanctioned killing. The boy’s soul and life are God’s problem. His quasi-immoral murder there serves the higher morality of the mission (presuming the cause of war his honorable and just). Most modern Americans aren’t prepared to deal with those truths, but you cannot secure a nation without being that cold. And we must be cold in regard to the dying infants in order to win this war. Say a prayer for them and move right along. Never get boggled up in weeping over those who die among a cause. Emotionalism leads only to madness.

1. **Lastly, this argument about extending lethal force to defend against the murder of an infant in the womb does have some merit. That’s why the terrorist pro-lifers are so militant about pushing it. **It’s a good way to recruit people to their cause. They lurk the forums and you might even be one of their operatives! I hope not! They like to argue that it is moral to murder abortionists on these grounds, but the other arguments against that dwarf the consideration. There are times in the world of cold-hearted strategic affairs that you must stand by and watch the innocent slaughtered for the greater good of the mission. Loss of discipline does not win a war.

 

[DocQuark]

Is this long-winded posting rude or what?!

I have already posted pages and pages of heated argument and rant elsewhere against this kind of thinking and I don’t wish to rehash all that here. **Just remember, we live in a country that demands that even the abortion doctor – even if outlawed someday – has a right to a fair trial by jury. **

The argument you proposed is a good one and does fit under the lethal force requirements in preventing a felony (if the child had protection by the state). It certainly fits under the moral considerations. The infant is an human being. Anyone trying to kill him should be shot dead is the argument and I would almost agree.

Problem there is that killing infants is sanctioned by the state. ** Your argument for that infant’s life is with the state, not the doctor**. Killing the doctor does not change the state. I does not cut off the demand by the selfish People. Supply of abortionists will continue long after you’re lethally injected. And the abortion rates will skyrocket all the more – as a direct function of pro-lifer transition to violence. It is simply madness and the devil’s way!

…The lesser moral right here cannot be used as an argument to justify trashing the far greater moral cause of ending Abortion. Even if you could kill every single abortionist in the United States in a day by an organized assembly of riflemen, the demand for their service is still there. Someone else will take up the job somewhere. The state will hunt you down as terrorists. Abortion will be cemented for years to come long after force is used to squash force; Long after one’s merry little militia is crushed into the ground by the Roman legions. You would die for nothing, help kill more babies, and cement baby killing all the more while being just another fool in the ash heap of history who believed too much in the power of the sword. **Only ideas can engage other ideas. Ideas, philosophy, and propaganda warfare are the highest planes of war. Killing is the lowest level of strategic operations.
**
…All done. Sorry to make it so long, but maybe someone in here is tempted to kill and the issue is too critical and too potentially damaging to pro-life to be concise on it. Please don’t challenge me. I’m tired of arguing with people fanatic on that justification to murder. Their logic breaks down eventually because it is rooted in insanity.

… I came here to hook up with other pro-lifers who believe as I do, but want to work on pro-life propaganda warfare matters non-violently (pro-baby raising awareness kind of stuff). I’ve been hanging around too much with the militant pro-lifer Protestants, and so had to run back to the Church’s sane pro-life crowd. I do realize that element and the occult love to put their operatives among Catholics and their forums. They love to infiltrated pro-life and I’m sure Catholic pro-life, too. See some possibles on this site already! Beware!! It’s of the Devil, indeed. No finger pointing or at the original poster, but my nose smells them here, too. Ditch the bankrupt philosophy or get out, ye sheep stealers and children of the Devil!

CSPB: CSSML-NDSMD-VRSNSMV-SMQLIVB!

 

[Valke2]

abortions were happening during Jesus’ time. He didn’t specifically address this?

 

[Steadfast_love]

Well, would you agree that the people would rise up and stop a clinic from stuffing ten-year-old girls into cement mixers and washing them down the sewer? I think that’s a valid supposition. What do you think?

Throughout history there are cultures where the people would and cultures where the people wouldn’t. So I’d only go so far as to say that it’s relative.

Firemen ran up the stairs of the World Trade Center to save people. The gave up their lives. We sure don’t see anything like that at abortion clinics. That’s why I propose that we really don’t see the fetus as one of us.

But firefighters did run up the stairs to save one of my cousins. She was in utero at the time and therefore a fetus and “not one of us” by your reconing.

I’d also suggest we don’t know much about how we think and how we develop the attitudes we have. We really don’t understand the processes by which we make decisions. We talk about logic and rationality, but then we lump whatever we don’t understand under emotion. We actually don’t know squat about our psychology. We like to think we do, and we try to shoe horn human behavior into the thimble of knowledge we have.

Sounds like an epistomological crisis. You won’t be able to decide anything until you clear that up.

So, I’d be interested in other ideas about why those firemen were so willing to run into the WTC, but abortion clinics get no such response? As I said, I think we really do see a basic difference between us and the fetus.

EMTs (a kind of fireman) routinely save fetuses. What’s at issue is which ones are they allowed to save? Currently the law is in a state of flux both regionaly and temporaly about how old a fetus needs to be before it can legaly be rescued or terminated but that doesn’t mean that the morality of the matter is in flux too.

And, there’s always the fun qustions. If you were in a burning bulding and could save a two-year-old child or a refrigerated cooler of embryos, which would you take? Why?

The cryogenetic fridge. Those things are H-E-A-V-Y! If I could carry one of those to safety I’d have super-powers!

But assuming I had some realistic way to pull the cryro-kids out of the burning building, they still have NO legal rights and slim chances for survival – even if they’re implanted. So I’d abandon the cryro-kids for the tot just like I’d let you die of a heart attack to save your friend choking on a rib-eye stake. I don’t mean to say that you’re “not one of us humans” it’s just that the heimlich seldom fails whereas CPR seldom succeeds.

But in any case, the desision to kill cryro-kids or the toasty-tot comes from your formulation of the question. It does not arise naturaly from the dignity of human life.

 

[Steadfast_love]

EDIT: Save twenty? No, off the top of my head (which is what I’d use in a burning building) only one in eight is implanted and of those only one in seven survive, so we’d need about sixty to have an expected value of one.

 

[cmiller1144]

WHY CAN’T WE USE JUST WAR THEORY ON THIS ONE?
WE KNOW THEY HAVE THE MEANS TO KILL.
WE KNOW THEY HAVE THE INTENTION TO KILL.
ALL THE CONDITIONS MATCH UP (don’t have time to print them all out)
If this is the genocide that we know it is , why are we treat it like it?
Who wouldn’t take a the sniper shot at Hitler in 1939?