Process vs. Results

What about the guys who murder abortion doctors? Is that OK? If not, why not?

What about the guys who murder abortion doctors? Is that OK? If not, why not?

Those are stupid questions to which you already know the answers. Trying to change the subject won't help you win a debate.

I wrote about that here, and you commented. I also wrote a piece comparing Paul Hill with Salman Sharif, which you also commented on.

My impression that you believe that our ability to vote on the issue (except for that pesky Supreme Court) abrogates a pro-lifer from any responsibility that goes beyond the ballot box. However, I'm not convinced. There are plenty of unjust laws, and failing to resist millions of murders simply because the laws say they're ok seems pretty twisted.

Which is higher? Morality or law? The rule of law has value in and of itself, but that value can't trump every other moral consideration.

I'm really in a quandry over the issue, because my morality seems to be leading me in a direction I don't really want to go. That doesn't mean my morality is wrong, however.

Also, I think you may have missed the central part of my argument, which is that the use of phrases like "baby killer" or "oppressor of women" is not only rude and obnoxious, it's also more likely to backfire than it is to benefit the cause that it's intended to benefit.

S3: they're not stupid questions at all. If abortion is murder, how can it not be justiifed to use lethal force to prevent it?

Xrlq: It may alienate my staunch opponents, but the black & white perspective resonates with a lot of people who are otherwise indifferent.

And I agree, your question is important, and difficult to answer.

There is a serious problem with arguing that abortion is murder, especially if you are arguing it from an expressly Judeo-Christian point of view: The available Biblical evidence contradicts that view.

In the book of Exodus, the only place in the Bible where the killing of the unborn is specifically mentioned, God, as part of the Mosaic law, says that if a pregnant woman is struck and killed, the person who struck her would be guilty of murder, and executed. If, however, the woman was struck, and her unborne baby was killed, the offender would have to pay the family a penalty.

It follows from this that abortion may be deeply immoral, but even in the Old Testament, the killing of the unborn was not considered by God to constitute murder. So, to say that the scripture supports the idea that abortion is murder, is simply heresy.

And, of course, the other problem with the "abortion is murder" rhetoric is the one to which Xlrq refers: that if abortion is murder, then why aren't we justified in doing whatever is necessary to keep abortion doctors from practicing their craft.

It is not enough to say that the law authorizes abortion, and that we have to obey the law. The law in Nazi Germany authorized the wholesale genocide of Jews. Legality and morality are two entirely different, and sometimes completely unrelated, things.

I have serious problems with arguing that abortion is murder. It may be deeply immoral, but to argue that it is murder seems to me to be both factually wrong, and rhetorically dangerous.

Michael: alienating your staunch opponents is given. They'll hate you just for opposing abortion, no matter how nice or reasoned you may be about it. Hell, many of them hate me, for not supporting abortion rights enough (e.g., support for parental notification requirements and waiting periods, or opposition to Roe, public funding of abortions and late-term abortion). So needn't worry about them.

You should, however, worry about those of us in the middle, who could be won over by a well-reasoned argument, but who are almost universally put off by irresponsible ephithets like "murderer." Particularly now, when we all know that this slander has inspired a number of real murders, in response.

Dale,

Is your interpretation of ancient scripture the basis for your questioning whether "murder" is factually correct? That's a pretty fundamentalist view of scripture. It also puts aside all that stuff about God's forming us in the womb. Scripture could be similarly used to mitigate other forms of killing that we have long since ceased to allow, but it's unequivocal about the humanity of the unborn.

The "doctor killer" ploy takes a similarly literal and strict view of morality. Consider, for example, the damage that doctor killers have done simply by giving folks like Xrlq a rhetorical weapon, without the guarantee that a single child was saved.

Dale,

If the only possible way to prevent a given abortion is to kill the individual performing it, then you might have a point, that is a big if. We can make an allowance for killing in self defense and in defense of others, but would not allow a person to kill another even if they knew that person intended to kill somebody at some indefinite time in the future. I cannot figure out how anyone could conclude that killing an abortion provider isn't murder, there would always be an alternative path that wouldn't involve taking a life.

As to the notion that abortion cannot equal murder, well that is silly. You mave have (conveniently) defined the fetus as a non-person, some of us are uncomfortable making that decision and will by default assume that it qualifies as a person, or at the very least a potential person.

If abortion is murder, how can it not be justiifed to use lethal force to prevent it?

So if you kill some adult and a police officer sees you do it, how can it not be justified for that officer to draw his weapon and dispatch you on the spot?

Or would you rather he arrested you?

And if you do some research, you will find that until around 1600 or so, the Church said fetuses weren't ensouled until 40 days after conception for males, 80 days for females. Around 1660, the Pope issued a ruling moving the date up to conception, but it was widely ignored until the mid-1800s. It was the fledgling AMA that actually pushed originally for abortion restrictions, and that was mainly a matter of trying to take over the process for themselves. Laurence Tribe wrote a whole book on it; I did an essay on the subject in college.

Justin;

I did not intend to claim that saying "Abortion is murder" is factually incorrect. It is factually incorrect to say that the Bible asserts that abortion is murder.

As it happens, it's factually incorrect as a matter of law, as well.

John;

I did not say that I define the fetus as a non-person. I merely said that the Bible appears not to define a fetus as a person, since killing one is not considered murder in the only place in the Bible where it appears. The Bible mandates execution for even accidentally killing a pregnant woman, but if the fetus is killed, it mandates only a fine be paid to the family. Hence, the Bible itself implicitly defines the fetus as a non-person.

S3;
In point of fact, in a situation where a police officer sees you shoot someone, he is authorized to shoot you, unless you drop the gun and immediately surrender.

More importantly--and this is, I think, a more analogous situation, since it involves a pre-emptive killing, where your example does not--if the officer merely sees you draw a gun and point it at someone, he is authorized to shoot you before you pull the trigger. There is a general requirement that the officer, if possible, identify himself and give you a verbal warning before capping you, but the key words here are if possible.

But police officers are authorized to commit a pre-emptive killing if the subject is an imminent danger to others.

Actually, in some circumstances, anyone may commit a pre-emptive killing. If someone breaks into your home, and you reasonably believe your life, or the life of your family to be in danger, you may kill the intruder, before you or your family suffers any harm at all.

Pre-emptive killing in self-defense or the defense of others is perfectly justified in several context in criminal law.

By making the argument that abortion is murder, you have to at least admit the possibility that pre-emptive killing is authorized in the case of abortion doctors.

If certain people were identified by the state as being legally allowed to kill 20-year old girls, then wouldn't killing members of that class who are actively involved in killing young women be fair game for pre-emptive killing?

If so, and if abortion is muder in the same way that killing a 20-year old communications major is murder, then why aren't the killers of the unborn equally liable to be pre-emptively killed?

Again, let's return to Nazi Germany. The law allowed SS members and their auxiliarys to kill Jews at their discretion, either through mass executions, or through working them to death through hard labor and starvation. SO, isn't bumping off the members of SS einsatzgruppen perfectly justifiable?

In our case the law allows doctors to legally kill the unborn. If killing the unborn is every bit as much of a murder as shooting jews in the back of the neck, then why isn't the murder of abortion doctors every bit as morally justified as the legally authorized murderers of Jews?

If you wish to make moral equivalence argument such as abortion is murder, then you have to explain why that equivalence does not hold all across the board.

It seems to me that pro-life advocates want to make the argument that abortion is murder in one breath, but then in the next, assert that it isn't moral to kill abortion doctors to stop it. That's simply nonsensical, and it isn't an argument they'd make if it were attractive young women being butchered on the street.

In point of fact, in a situation where a police officer sees you shoot someone, he is authorized to shoot you, unless you drop the gun and immediately surrender.

This, and all the rest that you wrote about what police officers are legally allowed to do has no bearing on what I said or the situation that I described. You know as well as I do that I was implying that the officer was murdering the perpetrator of the crime instead of arresting him, and was, in fact, committing a murder himself in the manner of a vigilante.

By making the argument that abortion is murder, you have to at least admit the possibility that pre-emptive killing is authorized in the case of abortion doctors.

If so, and if abortion is muder in the same way that killing a 20-year old communications major is murder, then why aren't the killers of the unborn equally liable to be pre-emptively killed?

If you wish to make moral equivalence argument such as abortion is murder, then you have to explain why that equivalence does not hold all across the board.

The answer, no matter how you put it, is that vigilante justice is against the law. It is as simple as that. As for having to explain some idea about moral equivalence that you have...No! I don't.

DF: I agree with you that I can't think of a reason not to kill abortion doctors in order to prevent future abortions, given my belief that abortions of convenience are murder. Thus, my quandry.

Although I don't remember claiming that the Bible equates abortion with murder, I wrote a response to your Biblical claim here.

S3: I'd like to agree with you, but the conclusion seems inescapable to me.

The only conclusion you can come to is that to prevent murder you must, yourself, murder? How about changing the law to recognize the murder(s) that you are trying to prevent as murders? By advocating murder you lose all moral standing that you may have had. I, for one, can have no respect for anyone that takes the law into his own hands in the name of so called "moral superiority". You are no better than the "murderer" that you murder.

S3: But that's the point. Logically, killing an abortion doctor in the process of committing an abortion would be exactly the same as killing a lunatic with a gun in a shopping mall.

Not according to the law as it now stands. The two are not equivalent. Until the law is changed, your argument is specious.

"The only conclusion you can come to is that to prevent murder you must, yourself, murder? How about changing the law to recognize the murder(s) that you are trying to prevent as murders?

That's a nice long-term solution, but it allows a lot of "murders" to go forward in the meantime. Until the law changes, you got to do what you can to deter as many "murders" as possible. Perhaps the most effective way to accomplish that is to scare the crap out of anyone who might want to provide or obtain an abortion? I don't doubt for a minute that Paul Hill's murderous rampage deterred somebody from getting an abortion. It had to. So if abortion really is murder, Paul Hill is a lifesaver, whose only "victims" were killed in defense of others. If it's not, he's a murderous scum.

"You are no better than the "murderer" that you murder."

Only because the "murderer" (abortionist or woman seeking an abortion) is not really a murderer, while the self-styled "hero" (murderous fanatic who follows the "abortion is murder" meme to its logical conclusion) is.

S3;

The trouble with your legalistic argument is that it implies that if the state authorizes the wholesale killing of Jews, we cannot bump off SS officers, because killing Jews, after all, is perfectly legal.

Aren't you troubled by that reasoning?

No.

So, then, presumably you feel it was improper of the Allies to execute Nazi war criminals, since their activities were legal.

I on the other hand, regret that we didn't manage to kill them all.

Certainly not. The one has nothing to do with the other is all. How about you stick to one discussion at a time?

Here's a better idea: how about we not stick to one discussion at a time. The underlying principle is the same.

The underlying principle is not the same. Not being able to stick to the discussion at hand indicates that you can't stick to it because you have no facts. In any case, advocating murder of abortion clinic doctors and personnel is nothing but lunacy and puts you out on the fringes of society. It is pathetic and indicates that you prefer anarchy to the rule of law. It is no wonder that Christianity becomes more marginal in this country every day.

I have to say that while I agree with your principles, i.e. abortion is murder, your method won't stand the light of day. Especially if you try to equate the United States of America with NAZI Germany. Your credibility with rational people flies out the window.