Abortion Doctor Murderer Martyr?

Great Debates
1

Paul Hill, a former minister, is scheduled to die tomorrow for the 1994 murder of Dr. John Britton and his driver. He also wounded Britton’s wife. A few articles can be found here, here, and here.

Now, the reason I wanted to discuss this wasn’t to debate the morality of being either pro-choice or pro-life or any of the other myriad off-shoot issues pertaining to abortion. What I was curious about is what the various articles seem to posit… that fanatics, those already way far out there on the fringe, will hold this man up as an example and try to emulate him. I realize that when people are zealots, be it of whatever stripe (political [left or right], religious, you name it), they are a different animal than the rest of the species. But saying that we can actually address that element out there, WILL they take up arms and follow suit? Does anyone see many nutjob copycats ‘in the field’ so to speak, killing off abortion doctors all in the name of what they believe to be a mandate from on high? Is this guy going to be memorialized by this contingency?

And no, I’m not the least bit worried about your average pro-life advocates or others who oppose abortion on religious, moral or ethical grounds peacefully ever condoning this man’s actions or hoping to be like him in deed. However, if there are those out there who’d feel compelled to do the same in response or in duplication, is there a way to reach them? Should there be concern, fear, mobilizing of resources for prevention, or is it like other elements that seem frightening but that no one appears to take seriously, a la the KKK and should simply be somewhat watched but overall ignored? Or am I overreacting?

Lastly, for the guidelines of this discussion, please everyone no ad hominem attacks on people’s personal beliefs or the person themselves. I think we can talk about even this hot topic with out denigrating the poster behind the opinion. And if I’m missing anything from the articles I’ve posted, or someone has something better/less biased/more in-depth, please bring it to all our attention. I just did some cursory searching for these, so I’m sure there’s more online with more than just one point of view and I’d love to hear it.

Thanks. Oh, and I don’t venture that much into GD territory, so please be kind to the unitiated and uncertain. I’m just a newbie on this turf. Please don’t eat me alive too much, I still gotta be able to type here. :wink:

2

So sorry for the duplicate post. I’ve already reported my faux pas to the forum moderator via email to lock one of the duplicates. Stupid computers hanging up!

::: hangs head shame-facedly for fouling up in Great Debates :::

3

I think there will be people who will hold him up as a martyr but I don’t think most of them would have the sack to actually follow his lead.

4

It seems to me that killing abortion doctors is the logical end result of the “abortion is murder” position. I’d like to see someone who truly believes that abortion is murder explain why Hill’s actions should NOT be defended, even applauded

5

I hope it is just you overreacting. :frowning:

I don’t see a lot of copycat killings happening. There may be more killings, but maybe they would have happened anyway. I could be wrong of course. There’s no way to tell what people will do, is there.

In the end, Hill’s just another sad, sick, deluded individual. His hypocrisy would be laughable if it wasn’t so freaking scary. That he is utterly unrepentant still seems a fair indication of the depths of his dissociation, if you will. (IANA psychiatrist but, c’mon.) Surely at least a majority his colleagues in the pro-life fringe see this also. I don’t think much can be done for those who will or do see a martyr in Hill in any case.

Wouldn’t it be nice if we could help some of these people find a way out of their twisted fantasies before they hurt someone…but it hardly ever seems to work out thay way.

Sorry I don’t have more to add. The whole thing is just unspeakably sad, if you ask me.

6

The fact that there aren’t more of these killers implies to me that few pro-life people really take their own arguments seriously. If killing a fetus is really morally equivalent to killing a person, then abortion really IS a holocaust, going on right under our noses. If so, then peaceful protest is a pretty laughable and inappropriate response. It would be like holding an anti-genocide sit-in in the midst of the Rwandan bloodshed. The fact that pro-life people don’t react to ongoing abortions the way they’d react to someone going around town rounding up a minority group to be taken out to a crematory to be shot suggests to me that they do recognize that the killing of a fetus is, at the very least, not as serious as the killing of a child.

7

Apos: If those folks really believed that they would then demand for an investigation of every mense to determine if there were any zygotes in the discharge and, if there were, then an investigation into why the pregnancy did not run to term.

8

You can only get to your proposed position by imagining (as the nutcases do) that murder justifies murder. If abortion is murder, the appropriate response is legal punishment for the murderer, not vengeance extracted by vigilante.

9

While I disagree with Mr. Hill, I think I can understand why he has done what he’s done. All of this is speculation, so please take this for what it’s worth.

I think to Mr. Hill, killing a doctor who performs abortions is little different from killing a serial killer. Yes, one man dies, but that saves the lives of countless others. Killing him is bad; allowing him to kill others is worse. From what I’ve read, Mr. Hill has strong religious beliefs and does what he believes God commands him to do. So do I. One reason I am firmly political choice is because I believe that if one woman dies because she cannot obtain a legal abortion, that is one person too many. Mr. Hill, I gather, believes that if one child is aborted, that is one person too many.

There are those who believe Mr. Hill is a courageous person who did a heroic thing. I don’t know how to reach such people. The whole issue of abortion raises a very thorny issue: how do we value the life of one person over another? Babies are often perceived as innocent. A woman who’s pregnant, less so. I do not believe in killing. Nevertheless, if I saw someone trying to kill others, I think I would try to stop them and would kill them if necessary, even if it cost me my own life. To Mr. Hill, not only was the doctor he killed killing others, he was doing so irrepentently and, it may well have seemed, bragging about it.

CJ

10

My own rather luke-warm opposition to abortion (I don’t want it made illegal. I want proper sex education and reliable, readily available, methods of contraception, so that people can take control of their own fertility enough to make abortion, in all but extreme circumstances, unnecessary) is based on the principle that it’s wrong to kill people. (Are unborn foetuses “people”? Dunno, but would rather err on the side of caution when excluding entities from the possession of human rights … ) My opposition to the death penalty is, essentially, based on the same idea. And so is my opposition to murder.

CJ’s point, that it may be defensible, in some cases, to kill someone in order to save another’s life, is certainly valid, but I don’t see how it applies to Mr. Hill. Did he actually save any lives? Or did the women who would have gone to Dr. Britton for abortions simply make appointments with other doctors instead? And was this the only way to stop Dr. Britton? I hardly think so.

No. I am prepared to say that Mr. Hill’s action was unequivocally, indefensibly, wrong. And I will refer anyone who wants to treat Hill as a martyr to that bit in the Bible where it says “Thou shalt not kill.” Killing people is wrong. Seems to me that’s simple enough, and a reasonably good rule to live by.

11

I hope this isn’t too much of a hijack, but I also was moved to start a thread based on these news articles. What kind of struck me was, why is this man being given this forum? As I understood it, he was given a 2-hour long news conference. What are the mechanics by which this happens?

Let me acknowledge that I am opposed to capital punishment, and to the extent I am a bright-liner on anything, it would have to be free speech. And I need look no further than Illinois recent commutation of all death sentences to see the merits of prisoners having some access to the press. But a 2-hour press conference for an admittedly guilty man?

It seems as though the press is gleefully allowing itself to be a vehicle for this despicable creature to spew his venom. Should his execution cause him to be martyred and emulated, I might consider that yet another count against state execution.

12

I disagree. Only kooks and crazies like this bastard’s supporters would honor vigilante-ism.

I’m not an evangelical Protestant, but my best friend from childhood is (he’s a Baptist minister). Interestingly, we discussed one of his sermons a few weeks ago, involving capital punishment (which, incidentaly, I don’t support). One of the concepts I understood him to communicate was: Government punishment (as proxy for victim) is Okay; Viligante punishment is Bad. [Obviously, as long as abortion is legal, there is no government punishment, but that’s beside the point.]

IOW, you don’t go around killing abortion doctors . . .

13

Being from Pensacola, I feel obligated to chime in. There are plenty of people here who think of Hill as a hero, and wish they had the guts to do likewise. Fortunately, the violent protests have subsided, thanks mostly to the revulsion normal people feel after the killings by Hill and the guy who inspired him, Micheal Griffith who killed Dr. Gunn. The steam went completely out of the movement, according to local activist Vicki Conroy. Basically, Hill damaged his cause immeasurably. We also had Christmas day bombings a few years earlier, as “a birthday present to baby Jesus.”

Don’t think of Pensacola as a haven for nuts, tho. A study of the violence said that there really are two Pensacolas; the northern with scads of fundamentalist churches of every stripe you can imagine, and the southern, populated by more educated urbane types with lots of influence by the large Navy presence.

I’ve read that when a movement resorts to violence, it usually means that it is a losing proposition, since all reasonable means have been exhausted, and all you have left are the extreme diehards who refuse to give up.

On a side note, another local activist, John Burt, was recently arrested for molesting young pregnant women that he had taken in. Nice folks, huh?

Also, be sure to read Carl Sagan: http://www.2think.org/abortion.shtml

14

(Disclaimer: I am pro-choice. I am only here to explore the mind set of those who claim that abortion = murder. )

tomndebb and HumanStromboli:

I’m talking about people who truly believe that abortion = murder. I know a lot of people who make that claim who are not “kooks and crazies”. I can’t tell whether they see that as bumper-sticker hyperbole or whether they truly believe it since I rarely engage them in substantive conversation much less debate.

Nevertheless, if someone whole-heartedly accepts the abortion = murder position, then it seems to me that they are morally obligated to do everything in their power to fight such an evil – even if that means going outside the law. The legal system has spoken on the matter and has decided against them.

I suspect all of us would acknowledge that there are situations that call for nothing less than revolution, and we applaud those who take the first steps. In fact almost every country I can think of has a national holiday in celebration of those brave fighters™.

It seems to me that Paul Hill has simply taken the abortion = murder position to its logical conclusion. Those who claim to believe that abortion = murder and don’t support Hill appear to be hypocrites at best and gutless little shits at worst.

15

**

Well, my friend and I have never really framed the issue in such terms, but I suppose technically he would consider abortion = murder. He’s not a kook or crazy (stereotypical ultra-conservative type), either; he’s even a good little NPR listener and was against the war in Iraq.

**

Off-topic and not intended to be judgmental, but—assuming the person is not a kook or crazy—why?

**

This is where I think you’re wrong. Where would their moral obligation come from? The Bible, right? And that doesn’t preach vigilante-ism. It teaches that God exacts revenge/spite/smitings/whatever—Him or government as the agent, I suppose. Jesus taught to turn the other cheek and all that good stuff—and that’s for offenses against oneself.

People who somehow extrapolate that teaching into a moral obligation to kill an abortion doctor are IMHO decidedly kooky and crazy and, at least from a certain point of view, verily demon-possessed.

It seems to me that you’re painting such people into a very narrow box. Just because they believe abortion = murder, they have to go out and murder the “murderers”? Why would people against “murder” reverse themselves and support a murderer? That makes no sense to me.

16

BUt you also made the claim that it was the “logical conclusion.” It is not. There is certainly one mindset that would allow a person to rationalize their way to that position, but it is not a logical conclusion and it is certainly not an inescapable one. Many people who hold that abortion is murder would also consider the actions of the U.S. government in Central America (and numerous other places) throughout the 20th century to be, not merely murder, but mass murder and genocide. There has been no outpouring of sentiment that we should assassinate all the presidents sending those troops in to undefended countries.

Given that the murder of any individual doctor (itself a moral evil) is unlikely to prevent the deaths of any unborn babies (although it might delay the abortions scheduled for that morning), I would still consider the people who have rationalized their way to viewing murder as justified to be kooks. Their position is not logical (unless they are taking similarly extreme measures to prevent murders in many other venues); it is simply an emotional expression of frustrtion.

The quite simple reason that Hill’s actions cannot be defended may be as trite as “two wrongs do not make a right” or it may take the form of a more thorough and nuanced discussion of the nature of violence, but Hill’s actions are not logically defensible based solely on “abortion is murder.” One needs to throw in a number of other premises to construct a logical chain–and most foes of abortion will not accept those additional premises.

(I would also second the opinion that I see no reason for the state to allow Hill a forum for his rants. If he has some great message for the world, let him pass out a written statement via his family or his lawyer. He has forfeited a number of rights–apparently even the right to life–through his actions. The right to getting his mug on TV and spew nonsense is certainly not a right that I believe he maintains.)

17

Apparently ‘Thou Shalt Not Kill’ only applies if you’re not killing in the name of God.

18

I think to a small few, he’ll be seen as a Martyr. I think even the fact that he was brought to justice at all, let alone executed, has made him a Martyr.

I think others will follow suit, but not in droves. It will trickle, trickle, trickle. I also doubt that the next killing will be inspired by this man- just some person gone over the edge to express his beliefs.

19

HumanStromboli:

The reason I don’t engage these people in substantive conversation is simply because I don’t know them that well, and I have never really had a reason to get into a deep conversation with them much less stink up the whole room by talking about their views on a hot button topic like abortion.

Like hell it doesn’t! It’s not the sort of thing that Jesus would teach, but the Bible (OT especially) comes up with all sorts of reasons to kill people.

A lot of people are for capital punishment. That’s basically murdering the murderer, so it’s not that unusual.

I think that if it came right down to it, most of the abortion=murder crowd would admit that it doesn’t quite equal murder, and that’s why they don’t support Hill and his like.

** tomndebb**

Indeed I should qualify my statement that it is not the logical conclusion, but rather that it is a logical conclusion.

I don’t think you can say that. My guess is that assassinating an abortion doctor will effectively shut down a clinic for quite some time, scare the bejeesus out of a lot of women that were considering abortions, and ultimately result in at least some cancelled abortions. Perhaps someone can come up with a cite.

And while we’re waiting on that, perhaps someone from the “abortion=murder” camp can give us their own views on this issue.

20

Well, there would be a difference between assassinating the presidents and killing the people who are physically performing the tasks.

I know Nazi examples are overused, but I think this is a good opportunity for one. If you lived next door to a concentration camp where Jews, Gypsies, and other targeted groups were herded never to return, I think many people would say that it is not only justified but expected that you would attack and kill (if possible) the people running the camp. There would be some people, probably, who would say that “two wrongs don’t make a right! Don’t kill that German soldier!” but they would be seriously outnumbered, in my opinion, by the people who considered the actions justified.

So, what’s the difference? It’s not having the law against you since Nazi concentration camps would have been even more supported by the German government than abortion clinics are supported by the US government. It isn’t futility since killing guards at the concentration camp won’t protect those imprisoned from being caught again. That seems to leave two likely options:

  1. The number of abortions is greater, so the task appears insurmountable, or

  2. Killing a fetus isn’t viewed as the same thing as killing a Jew or Gypsy or homosexual or Jehovah’s Witness.

I’m absolutely willing to concede that there are other options, but these are the two that seem most likely to me.

Julie