Words Count

[NanceGreggs]

If you don’t believe in a woman’s right to choose, you are not pro-life, you are anti-choice.

If you believe a woman should be forced to carry a child full-term, regardless of the circumstances she finds herself in, or the quality of life that child would be subject to once brought into the world, you are not merely anti-choice, you are anti-life.

If you think any woman’s dominion over her own body is subject to the whims, religious beliefs, or alleged “morals” of others, you are anti-equality.

If you are arrogant enough to hold that your God, your religion, your church’s doctrine should be foisted on others, whether they adhere to the same doctrine or not, you are laughable in the eyes of whatever god it is you think you worship and revere.

If you decry abortion but cling to capital punishment, unprovoked war, the use of torture, or the justification of death in any form, you are not pro-life in any sense of the word – you are pro-hypocrisy.

If you assert that your opinion on the topic of abortion, whether based on your religious beliefs or your political bent, is somehow superior to all other opinions and should be deferred to by everyone, you are not pro-life for all, you are pro-ME – and just how arrogant is THAT?

It has not escaped my attention, nor that of the citizenry of our country, that the same people who maintain that adoption is always a viable option think homosexual couples should not be allowed to adopt – pro-child? No, anti-child – because if you would deny the love and care a same-sex couple would happily bestow, you are denying love to a child desperately in want and need of it - something you vociferously advocate, as long as it is your idea of suitable love and care, the child's needs suddenly being of lesser importance.

It has also not escaped my attention, nor that of the people of the world, that while the alleged pro-life crowd talks a good game when it comes to women being forced to birth unwanted children, children born into poverty are dismissed out-of-hand as the offspring of “welfare queens”, and are automatically perceived as undeserving of basic needs – like nutritious meals, an education, and medical care that comes at the expense of tax dollars.

The very people who brag about their pro-life position are the same people, more often than not, who get their respective knickers in a twist over things like sex education and the use of contraception. They’re not anti-awareness, they are pro-ignorance – and the consequences of that position be damned.

Words are powerful tools; they can often sway the opinions of others, influence political policy, change attitudes, correct misconceptions (pun very much intended).

But when words are deliberately mis-used, one can’t help but wonder at the weakness of the underpinnings of arguments that must inevitably rely on said mis-use, misinterpretation, misappropriation of phrases meant to misdirect, misinform, disengage.

Finally, when a group touting themselves as pro-life lauds the death of someone – anyone – whose views or beliefs are different than their own, whose life was dedicated to the quality of life a pregnant woman considered in terms of an unborn, as-yet-unfulfilled life that she chose to terminate – for reasons that should be personal and left forever unquestioned – the abject stupidity, hypocrisy, and lack of morals of said group should be put on public display as often as possible - and, in this case, as necessary as is warranted to get the truth out there, as opposed to the "talking points" of those who DO nothing but talk.

Pro-life means just THAT – pro-choice, pro-education, pro-meaningful-options, pro-caring for every child born, not just those born into families with the financial means to care for them, or the emotional wherewithal to deal with their birth into our society as it IS, and not what some wish to PRETEND it is.

Every child a wanted child. Every child a cared-for child. Every child a coddled, looked-after child with every opportunity before them, as well as before their parents, nothing withheld, nothing denied – nothing predicated on the “good intentions” of those who say that a child should be brought into the world regardless of prospects, then squawk like stuck pigs when their tax dollars are involved. Nothing reliant on those who grab the megaphone outside an abortion-provider’s clinic and rant about the sanctity of life, who then slink off in their “good Christian silence” when said provider is left in a pool of their own blood.

Pro-life? No, pro-death – and like it or not, that IS the name of that tune.

Rest in eternal peace, Dr. Tiller. Your principles will not go unnoticed, your song will not go unsung, and your true compassion for others will never be forgotten.

[bertman]

1. WORD!!

"Pro-life" also known as Pro Compulsory Pregnancy.

Excellent post, Nance.

[MadMaddie]

2. Well done Nance !!

They are selfish, hypocritical and un-Christian (no matter how loud they yell it) Americans.

They truely do not love children as they profess, the spend millions in ads walking the streets when they could help children in foster care or a poor family in need of help.

And the virulant ones like the man that assasinated Dr. Tiller they are a threat to the general public. We need to demand that the law looks upon these groups as Terrorist Groups.

RIP Mr. Tiller!

[ejpoeta]

28. i tend to find that those that have to keep telling you they are something...

aren't. a christian wouldn't have to tell you they are... it would show by their actions. and these folks don't act like christians. but somehow they get deference, as when they vandalize and harrass and threaten, no one does anything about it. the people who are charged with protecting clinics and its patients who were obviously NOT doing that are partially to blame. They, by their inaction, are condoning this behavior and by it's allowance it tends to ramp up until it ends in something like what happened to dr. tiller.

[Jackpine Radical]

38. The problem is that it's pretty hard to tell a Good Christian from a Good Buddhist

or a Good Moslem or a Good Jew or a Good Pagan just based on their actions. Human decency is not bounded in that way. But Good Christians don't care a whole about whether you know they're Christians. That's how you tell "Good Christians" from just plain good Christians without the quotes.

[csziggy]

57. Or even a good Secular Humanist ;) n/t

[MadMaddie]

63. I agree with you!

I blame the media for that too!! The media does not address them as "Terrorist", they are suspects. But did you notice the Muslim man that killed the soldiars, he's a "Terrorist"!

The real tradgedy is Dr. Tiller thought that he would be safe in his church, these "Terrorists" are the Christian Taliban in this country and until Americans acknowledge this fact and treat them as such the murders and assasinations will not end.

[handmade34]

3. yes, yes, yes

[sendero]

4. You...

.... rock pure and simple.

What she said.

[ccharles000]

5. ...

[dem629]

6. I was wondering who was responsible for definitions.

Thank you.

[Flying Dream Blues]

7. Thank you!!

I find myself often wishing I could find the words to express all the outraged thoughts that go banging around in my head half-formed, a sputtering mess, and then you write one of these exquisite pieces that leaves me stunned with admiration and gratitude. I just had to say it, it happens so often.

[ladym55]

8. I read somewhere else "pro-birth"

The right MUST have the baby born, but after THAT, well, that kid is on its own. (Can't be "supporting a life-style," you know, especially with MY tax dollars!)

I'm tired of the right setting the language. Pro-LIFE would value ALL life ... fight against hunger, fight for universal health care, work for peace, work to end poverty, oppose the death penalty ...

Screaming Christians (and my do they SCREAM!!) value "life" from conception to birth. They don't like poor people or women or family planning. They also apparently don't "get" the tenets of their own supposed faith. That Sermon on the Mount? I think Jesus might have MEANT all that stuff about loving each other and caring for the least among us. Just sayin'.

[tavalon]

24. They know that birth is painful

It makes a great punishment to women who have had sex.

[Mira]

9. Words count immensely. It is so sad that those who live by slogans don't examine

words and their power, and discount them with just more slogans.
Thank you for writing this. I needed it. When it comes to putting things I feel into words, you are magnificent at the task.

[rosesaylavee]

10. Yes. You hit it again.

K & R

[saltpoint]

11. Agree on points but am more impressed with the wallop this

packs against rightwing lurkers.

And we know they're here.

Each paragraph of this piece bludgeons the fundies. It rocks them on their sorry butts. They drop reeling like drunks to the latrine floor.

They know they ain't feelin' too good but they don't even know what hit them. An informed argument hit them, and it was all over in the first round. The OP is clear and persuasive versus the fundie lurkers' stupid and angry.

The momentum has shifted now and is increasingly running stronger against the fundamentalists' claim that women should not have domain over their own bodies.

[SeattleGirl]

12. Nance, this has to be my favorite of all the pieces you have written.

The hyprocracy of the "pro-lifers" should be pointed out at every chance, as well as their shortcomings where children born into less-than nurturing environments are concerned. They need to be called out every time they turn their backs on women and their children.

And the people who work in women's health care should be left alone to do the work they do so well. They are there to help, educate, inform, support, provide for, and take care of. What is the harm in THAT? There IS none! The harm comes from those who protest, who refuse to give a flying fig about these women and children, and especially from those who would celebrate the brutal murder of a man such as Dr. Tiller.

Thank you, Nance.

You took the words right out of my heart.

[NanceGreggs]

13. "The harm comes from those who protest ...

... who refuse to give a flying fig about these women and children, and especially from those who would celebrate the brutal murder of a man such as Dr. Tiller."

You just took the words out of my heart, and gave them more importance and meaning.

For which I thank you - as do, I am sure, all of us here.

What is most encouraging these days is our ability to encourage each other.

"Yes, we can." And we can, not because a president said so, but because we have come to believe it.

Slogans, despite how inspiring they might be, are now irrelevant. Our ability and capacity to do what is right, and stand up for what we believe in, is all that really matters.

[madamesilverspurs]

14. This will be sent to everyone on my list,

just as soon as I can stop crying long enough to do it.

Breathtaking and life-affirming. Thank you!

[lupinella]

15. K & R !!

Thank you for the soap box speech. I now am going to use this as my go-to for my arguments on the subject, which tend less towards logical and impassioned and veer off into screaming invectives. This is everything I feel, said with the voice of civility.

[NanceGreggs]

16. Welcome to DU, lupinella ...

[mindwalker_i]

17. That was a damn fine post

Well said and well articulated.

And you did it all without calling anybody a dick.
Even though you should have.

[BlueMTexpat]

18. Thank you, Nance!

What the pro-hyprocrisy anti-choice US Taliban just don't want to get is that the overwhelming majority of women will continue to CHOOSE to give birth. They don't need Big Brother in any form looking over their shoulders.

The comparative few who don't choose to give birth make that choice for a variety of reasons, many of which are heartbreakingly sad, and those reasons should not need to be justified to anyone else. Those woman have to walk in their shoes alone. They have every right to expect and to receive legal and safe medical procedures from qualified and competent medical personnel. As many of us remember, abortion was indeed available even before Roe v. Wade, just not safe or legal. The rich hypocrites could travel outside the US while the desperate poor had to rely on back-alley butchers or coat-hangers, etc. Yes, abortion should be safe, legal and ... rare. With good sex education and family planning available, its rarity will increase. But common sense is certainly lacking among the US Taliban. Decency is also lacking.

Yes, every child should be wanted, cared-for, loved and looked-after with every opportunity before them. Those are basic human rights.

Those courageous individuals such as Dr. Tiller, who continue to guarantee a woman's right to ALL safe, legal and competent medical procedures, are true heroes.

[NanceGreggs]

19. Welcome to the DU discussion, BlueMTexpat ...

... well said, and I couldn't agree more.

[bjobotts]

20. I am so angry and outraged. Your words are meaningless to these fanatic radicals

[bjobotts]

21. They are terrorists, cultivated by Beck, Hannity and O'Reilly and filled with hate

[bjobotts]

22. They shame America with their lies.Tiller saved mother's lives but they don't care.Madmen

[tavalon]

23. Magnificent rant

You didn't hit as hard on the part that I think is true - that they are not pro-fetus except as that fetus can be used as a tool to punish the wicked whore, I mean, mother.

[secondwind]

25. I love this, and will save it! n/t K&R

[FraDon]

26. Bingo, Nance! • Another worthy rant.

Keep holding that big mirror up to the hypocrites.

[SalmonChantedEvening]

27. Brilliant Nance. K&R.

Thank you.

[Blue Gardener]

29. When the anti choice crowd talk about "Welfare Queens"

They often mean "black people", or "Mexicans". Of course, they would never admit to this in public, but we all know they are much more concerned with white women having abortions than they are with minority women having abortions.

[DeeDeeNY]

30. Better than anything William Safire ever said about words!

[Raster]

31. YES! YES! YES! Words have power. Every time we use the term "pro life"...

...we enable the disingenuous ANTI-CHOICE message by giving it positive characteristics it does not possess.

We are pro-choice and pro-life. They are anti-choice misogynists.

[Stump]

32. You gave me the words I cannot find sometimes.

Thanks Nance. K&R

[BlancheSplanchnik]

33. usually you make me laugh. This time, you made me cry.

Bravo.

K&R

[Aviation Pro]

34. They are in fact, Nance...

...The Eternal Stupid.

[Richard D]

35. We really should raise some quick money and put this in the NYT.

Full page.

[yy4me]

49. I'm in for $10. Wish it could be more. This rant was pure genius.

Well articulated. Could not have been better. I'm behind it 100%.

If I had monet, I'd pay for the ad myself. How about on the Editorial pages?

[cascadiance]

36. Yup! "Pro-abortion" and "abortion advocate" that they throw out describes the Chinese...

... who FORCE a woman to have an abortion *AGAINST* their choice if they try to have more than one kid.

That is just as ANTI-CHOICE as these so-called "pro-life" folks that want the state to prevent women from getting abortions when they want them. It is forcing the woman to do what the state wants rather than allowing her to make her own decision over what happens with her body. It is just as wrong!

Personally, I might be more agreeable to not providing tax exemptions for every family with more than two kids (EXCEPT when they adopt kids beyond their two kids) to help with encouraging less population growth, but the fundamental choice of how a pregnancy comes to term should be the woman's choice. They aren't baby factories!

[indepat]

37. How elegantly you shoot rockets up the arses of all true-believing "Christian" hypocrites

who in fact are the antithesis of actual Christian precepts.

[pipi_k]

39. It was all great, but...

My favorite paragraph was this:

Finally, when a group touting themselves as pro-life lauds the death of someone – anyone – whose views or beliefs are different than their own, whose life was dedicated to the quality of life a pregnant woman considered in terms of an unborn, as-yet-unfulfilled life that she chose to terminate – for reasons that should be personal and left forever unquestioned –

As always, when trying to talk sense (hah) with the Anti choice nitwits, the point can be made that it's fine that they don't believe in abortion. They don't have to have one.

But, as you pointed out, a woman's choice should always be personal and left forever unquestioned.

In other words, it's none of their fucking business.

Only they don't get it. Ever.

and the hypocrisy just kills me. Convince women to bring children into the world that they can't support, then deny funding to programs that would help those women support the lives the anti-choice crowd thought were so precious before they actually got themselves born.

Sometimes it's a gargantuan act of willpower to refrain from slapping them silly.

[grantcart]

40. Brilliant absolutely brilliant

I do think that the following line:

If you decry abortion but cling to capital punishment, unprovoked war, the use of torture, or the justification of death in any form, you are not pro-life in any sense of the word – you are pro-hypocrisy.


can also be stated as . . . you are not pro-life in any sense of the word - you are simply pro-birth, and if you are not for universal health care your support for the viability of that life to become an adult is pro-human-lottery.

[dothemath]

41. Protestant popes ...............

At least the roman catholics only have one pope. It appears to me there is room for numerous popes in Christendom, if you believe the garbage that is spewed regularly from many quarters.

Demagogues like Randall Terry are self-anointed. They claim they are messengers from God. They claim to K N O W what God demands, under penalty of death, from each of us. They claim to know God has made a law that says certain people have dominion over the 'body of Christ' - that would be all of us, to the uninitiated, and these self-anointed ones claim the power of life or death over me, over you, over your wife, over your children - over everyone. Their provenance comes from special knowledge of God's will. Leave Jesus out of it. All Jesus does is suggest. Jesus didn't/doesn't have the balls to 'dish it out' in ways that satisfy psychopaths like Terry and his minions.

Does it not seem strange God would delegate the right to kill, or to tell someone else to kill, a fellow human being. Maybe the key is it is okay as long as the 'protestant pope' then says he didn't mean the sinner should be killed.

If God's greatest creation was a life form that could reason, he didn't think it through, in my opinion. Or, just maybe, He wants to see if we can evolve and become creatures of which He can be proud. Scientists tell us the universe is 14 billion years old, give or take, and humans, comparatively, just showed up a few minutes ago. Time will tell. Another 14 billion, maybe?

[defendandprotect]

42. You're noting the dueling "gods" of the Bible . . .

The warrior, murderous god of the Old Testament and the kinder, gentler, liberal Jesus

of the New Testament -- though doctored because much of that became inconvenient for

the elites.

[rhett o rick]

43. Once again, great post. I reposted bits at

http://watercoolerwars.blogspot.com/

[defendandprotect]

44. Beautiful, Nance . . . and thank you ---

[winyanstaz]

45. Once again you speak truth to power Nancy...

Great job..I am sending this out to everyone on my mailing list too.

[kleec]

46. yes

Yes, words do count. Thanks for putting so nicely the words that so neatly counter those rabid fundies and so-called pro-lifers.

[Pat Riot]

47. Let's keep at it

It's not that hard to change the English language these days.

A couple more: he was not a late term abortion doctor; he was a heroic OB/GYN.

The myth of the welfare queen was exposed years ago, but fearful bigots still cling to that one, geez. Right up there with the notion that women go get abortions like they get a whim to go to the beauty shop and get a haircut.

And this one is almost digressing onto another rant, but if some of these folks were not so allergic to SCIENCE, they'd be bombing fertility clinics instead of Planned Parenthood centers.(Many, many more embryos destroyed in these expensive quests to conceive one's "own" child.) To me it's proof that the "sanctity of life" only matters to them before it grows into a sentient being. Let the masses produce more cannon fodder to fight for greed, blood for oil.

[pacalo]

48. Beautifully said. Please send this to the Tiller family, Nance.

[colinmom71]

50. Thank you for stating so well what I believe...

I could not have said this as well and as succinctly as you have here... Again, thanks!

BTW, I am a woman whose life could be endangered by another pregnancy, so abortion rights are an intensely personal issue for me. I happen to be married to a man whose company's health insurance covers abortion services for whatever reason, so I'll be fine should our chosen surgical sterilization fail. But still, the idea that I might have to defend why I should be allowed to live beyond a doomed pregnancy is just a heart-breaking notion...

[Mad_Dem_X]

51. Amen and AMEN!

[Catherine Vincent]

52. Amen!

[Wednesdays]

53. K&R

[valerief]

54. Good, strong words here. Too bad your points will fly high over the heads of

the haters aka the 'judge-by-buzzword' crowd.

[TheCowsCameHome]

55. Excellent,

as usual, Nance.

[babsbunny]

56. Hope you don't mind if I pass this on to all the folks in my address book!

Well said!

[SusanaMontana41]

58. This should be our platform.

This is exactly the kind of speech we need to drown out the haters.

Rest in peace, Dr. Tiller.

[nichomachus]

59. Of course words can cause people to act

If they don't, then why the hell do hundreds of thousands of preachers get into the pulpit every Sunday?

They only claim that words don't bring about action when someone acts on their continual stream of hate speech.

[DearAbby]

60. !

[Mermaid7]

61. Incrediably Fabulous Post Nance! Thank you, Kick and Read!

[deaniac21]

62. I'm pro abortion and proud enough of it to not try to make it

sound nicer!

[BrklynLiberal]

64. A lesson in Eloquence. Thank you once again Nance.

[Coexist]

65. k&r

[Duer 157099]

66. Pro-Suffering is what they should really be called

I think that sums it all up.