Saturday, September 1, 2012

Killing George


So George was fulfilling his church duties peacefully one Sunday morning as an usher in the church, greeting all warmly, helping them to their seats: a beacon of Christian love and warmth. In his day job George was a renowned physician, aiding women in great need from all over the country, and beyond. George had even baptized many babies himself. To many it seems almost inconsequential: the fact that George first killed all of these babies before baptizing them.We'll never know if George was thinking of the thousands of babies he had killed as the peaceful Sunday morning church service was suddenly interrupted by Scott Roeder who calmly walked up and shot George Tiller in the eye, removing all such musings from his mind forever, at least in this world.


This was not the first attempt to kill George Tiller. Shelly Shannon had shot him five times in 1993, wounding him; but he soldiered on. Shelly Shannon received an 11 year sentence for the attempted murder. In an ironic twist the same world view that arbitrarily devalues human life while protecting the industry that kills them gave her twenty years for torching an abortion clinic but only eleven years for gravely wounding a "doctor" in her attempts to kill him.

[Thanks George, for being hoisted on your own pitard - Not sure what a Pitard is, but it sounds like a bad thing to be hoisted on one, especially your own.]

So years ago I was asked what my thoughts were on the killing of abortion "doctors." I being a Christian gave the usual canned, and I thought reasoned response; "It is always wrong to do violence or to take human life." I of course followed this with the naive and ignorant: "God's Commandment is very clear - 'Thou shalt not kill.'" This of course is not what the commandment says. It more accurately commands that we not "Murder," which is any killing of humans not specifically commanded, authorized, or allowed by God. God specifically forbids certain killing [i.e. innocent babies] while specifically commanding killing in protection of innocent life. but I am getting ahead of myself.

To this response that I had thought so well reasoned and unassailable my friend gave me an Essay that completely demolished my presuppositions, my ideology, and my philosophical musings on the subject. To this day, some 15 years later I cannot refute what I learned on that day. I wish that I could. My soul would be much more at ease if I could refute it. I have longed that those that I have shared the thesis with or debated the issue could come up with the slightest intelligent refutation. Following is the main idea of the letter that I read on that day:

"If you saw a maniac on a school ground killing elementary school children, would you stop him if you were able? The answer to this is of course an unequivacal "absolutely" from virtually everyone. The next question is: "Would you stop him with lethal force? Again the answer is always, by any truthful person: "Yes I would, if able, but only as a last resort, and only if the police could not be summoned quickly enough." So virtually all would find it morally acceptable that the culprit die to protect the victims. Handing the killing off to the police does not alter this. Do we in fact have a duty to protect these school children with deadly force if necessary? Of course any reasonable person knows this to be an incontrovertible moral truth.

At this point the Christian / Religious argument and the secular diverge, but not as far as one might think. I will deal with the Christian apologetic first. Does your Bible teach that the fetus is human, alive, as cherished and protected by God as a third grader? The answer to this is of course an unequivocal yes. Only the most extreme religious apologists hold any other view, and then only by utilizing the most ridiculous of scriptural contortions and gymnastics. So the inevitable final question is: Do you as Christians have any less obligation to protect unborn children than to protect a third grader? At this point the Christian will begin a series of "yeah but's" followed by a series of arguments that have already been refuted by the previous apologetic and myriad scripture. Eventually they will end with the tired old dodge of: "Well we will just have to agree to disagree," thereby avoiding the unassailable argument altogether. My question to these is "How well did that work for Pontius Pilot?"

The secular argument is not dissimilar. The argument will zig and zag hither and yon as the person parrots various irrelevant arguments, usually becoming increasingly frustrated that 'you" are close minded and obtuse, all the while unwilling or unable to see the only relevant point, and it is this:

THE ONLY RELEVANT ISSUE IS WHETHER THE FETUS IS A LIVING HUMAN BEING IN THE SAME WAY THAT A THIRD GRADER IS A LIVING HUMAN BEING.

The pro-lifers and the Pro-Choicers can go round and round ad infinitum as long as they argue the countless red herrings. That is why they "will always disagree." It is not because they look to a different moral authority, or because they disagree philosophically about anything at all. The argument has nothing to do with morality, ethics, religion, or philosophy. The only issue that matters at all is the nature of the Fetus. The left knows this all to well and does anything they can to keep the arguments on the vast myriad distractions and off the only relevant issue. The Pro-choice crowd, and the obscenely complacent religionists are all really in bed together pretending that these are not really human beings dying. As long as these can continue hand-in-hand to "civilly debate" the "religious issue" of the "personhood" of the unborn while ignoring that science and medicine have irrefutably proven that the are as human and as alive as third graders, we will continue to arbitrarily label abortionists as "controversial" and those who do to protect these living human beings what any rational person would do to protect "children" as murderers and abominations.

To those who argue that regardless of the issue or anyone's firmly held beliefs on it we must adhere to the law or our civilization will crumble I say that you are too late. Any society that ignores the brutality and inhumanity of slavery or who allow and ignore the brutal murder of thousands of helpless children every day cannot with any credibility call itself civilized.

History has often changed it's view on who were the murderers, and who were the victims. When the pendulum inevitably swings back will we then all feign horror at the daily massacre that we ignored and say that we considered Scott Roeder a hero all along?

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