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masterofmidgetsDr. George Tiller, pro-choice advocate and one of only a handful of doctors in the country who perform late-term abortions, was shot and killed today while attending church.
I'm horrified, and I'm disgusted, but I can't say I'm surprised. Not when all the right-wing rhetoric I've been hearing for the last 4 months has been a call to violent rebellion. Not when the "pro-life" movement has made a decades long history of using these kinds of tactics - assualts, attacks, bombings, murder - to scare doctors, and scare women, away from even medically necessary abortion. People like this are terrorists, plain and simple.
Dr. Tiller provided a vitally necessary service to thousands of women. Most women don't get late-term abortions for kicks - you don't carry a fetus for 7 months and then decide 'oh hey, I'm sick of this, abortion time!' Women get late-term abortions because their babies are dead, or dying, or have such severe birth defects they won't live after they leave the womb. Women get late-term abortions because THEIR PREGNANCY WILL KILL THEM. And even if they did do it because they just don't want to be bothered anymore...well, that is their choice. No one should be forced to have a child they don't want, and no child should be unwanted. But now those women have one less option. And since Dr. Tiller's clinic was in Wichita, Kansas, there are few enough options to begin with. What will happen to all those women? Why doesn't the pro-life movement care?
Dr. Tiller was a hero. He did a difficult job, despite the fact that he was harrassed, that he was sued, that he had to work in a clinic shielded by bullet-proof glass and hire a bodyguard to accompany him when he left. Despite the fact that he has been shot before, in 1993, by the same kind of person who killed him today - someone who doesn't really care about life, but about sex and controlling women. RIP, Dr. Tiller.
Abortion is murder? MURDER is murder, you ignorant bigoted hypocritical fucktards.
ETA: Feministe has a list of pro-choice charities you can donate money to here. I usually give to Planned Parenthood, but given the nature of this murder I'm donating to Medical Students For Choice, which funds the training of med students and residents in abortion and other reproductive health service, so that we actually have doctors who can perform the medical services we have a legal right to receive.
I'm horrified, and I'm disgusted, but I can't say I'm surprised. Not when all the right-wing rhetoric I've been hearing for the last 4 months has been a call to violent rebellion. Not when the "pro-life" movement has made a decades long history of using these kinds of tactics - assualts, attacks, bombings, murder - to scare doctors, and scare women, away from even medically necessary abortion. People like this are terrorists, plain and simple.
Dr. Tiller provided a vitally necessary service to thousands of women. Most women don't get late-term abortions for kicks - you don't carry a fetus for 7 months and then decide 'oh hey, I'm sick of this, abortion time!' Women get late-term abortions because their babies are dead, or dying, or have such severe birth defects they won't live after they leave the womb. Women get late-term abortions because THEIR PREGNANCY WILL KILL THEM. And even if they did do it because they just don't want to be bothered anymore...well, that is their choice. No one should be forced to have a child they don't want, and no child should be unwanted. But now those women have one less option. And since Dr. Tiller's clinic was in Wichita, Kansas, there are few enough options to begin with. What will happen to all those women? Why doesn't the pro-life movement care?
Dr. Tiller was a hero. He did a difficult job, despite the fact that he was harrassed, that he was sued, that he had to work in a clinic shielded by bullet-proof glass and hire a bodyguard to accompany him when he left. Despite the fact that he has been shot before, in 1993, by the same kind of person who killed him today - someone who doesn't really care about life, but about sex and controlling women. RIP, Dr. Tiller.
Abortion is murder? MURDER is murder, you ignorant bigoted hypocritical fucktards.
ETA: Feministe has a list of pro-choice charities you can donate money to here. I usually give to Planned Parenthood, but given the nature of this murder I'm donating to Medical Students For Choice, which funds the training of med students and residents in abortion and other reproductive health service, so that we actually have doctors who can perform the medical services we have a legal right to receive.
no subject
Date: 2009-05-31 10:13 pm (UTC)I just want to scream this out to the self-righteous, deluded fucking bastards over and over again until they get it.
no subject
Date: 2009-05-31 10:17 pm (UTC)