White Coat Underground

A Kansas doctor who performs abortions was murdered today at his church. I’ll leave it to others to discuss the long history of this doctor’s part in the abortion debate; what I want to show you today is the transparent lies told by the murderous group Operation Rescue.

“We are shocked at this morning’s disturbing news that Mr. (sic) Tiller was gunned down,” anti-abortion group Operation Rescue said in a statement on its Web site. “Operation Rescue has worked for years through peaceful, legal means, and through the proper channels to see him brought to justice. We denounce vigilantism and the cowardly act that took place this morning. We pray for Mr. Tiller’s family that they will find comfort and healing that can only be found in Jesus Christ.”

What a steaming pile of crap. What do they mean, “see him brought to justice?” Did he violate any laws? If OR really wanted to “work through…legal means” they would focus on legislation, rather than bringing to justice someone who has not broken any laws. This type of rhetoric shows the violent, murderous thinking behind OR. Oh, I’m so glad they pray for Dr. Tiller’s family to find peace in their Lord, the one who they say is the only route to comfort, the one they think would approve of murdering a doctor.

Anyone who can’t see through the transparent approval of this murder, justified by a “greater cause” and the belief in a vengeful god and an afterlife is being intentionally blind. OR is a domestic terrorist group and should be treated as such.

(h/t khan)

Comments

#1 Denice Walter
May 31, 2009

Freudian slip? “Generation” Rescue?.Well, I don’t like either group either.
#2 Kate
May 31, 2009

*sigh* Operation Rescue…the PETA of the so-called Pro-Life (at least until you’re born, and then who the fuck cares) Movement…
#3 Bob O'H
May 31, 2009

Freudian slip? “Generation” Rescue?

PalMD has sniffing the thimerosal again. it has this effect, you know.
#4 PalMD
May 31, 2009

hold on, peeps, correcting it now. I sometimes confuse various murderous groups.
#5 albud@usa.com
May 31, 2009

Ahh, hot topics… Hot assumptions.

Next time how ’bout a little logic before you shoot off your pen?

1) ‘Tiller’s killer was an abortion opponent.’ how do you know? Maybe it was one of the other few ‘late term’ abortion docs in the country. Then not only does he (1) ramp up sympathy for abortion docs, (2) set the abortion opponents back 10 years, and (3) get all his future late term customers! Don’t judge people.

2) ‘O.R. should try to bring him to justice by changing legislation.’ (a) they do that. (b) they tried to get him for breaking laws too. Don’t write about whom you know nothing.

P.S. – To the wise commenter who says ‘at least until you’re born, and then who the f*ck cares’. Ever hear of the million$ that ‘crisis pregancy’ centers spend to help mothers of troubled pregnancies? And if it’s Christians you’re blaming for this, what about the billions they’ve given to fight hunger, disease, poverty, slavery, injustice, etc. in the last decade alone?

Think. Please. Our country’s future is at stake.
#6 MonkeyPox
May 31, 2009

Yo, read for comprehension, assface. Where did he say ‘Tiller’s killer was an abortion opponent.’?

Assholes like OR create an environment friendly to killing their enemies. They are religio-fascist terrorists and should be in Gitmo.
#7 jj stokes
May 31, 2009

*sigh* Operation Rescue…the PETA of the so-called Pro-Life (at least until you’re born, and then who the fuck cares) Movement…

true to some extent, but while groups like the animal and earth liberation front are considered the biggest domestic terrorist threat, they as a rule do not harm life, including human life. they engage in property destruction, arson and threats, but they do not shoot people.
#8 MonkeyPox
May 31, 2009

true to some extent, but while groups like the animal and earth liberation front are considered the biggest domestic terrorist threat, they as a rule do not harm life, including human life. they engage in property destruction, arson and threats, but they do not shoot people.

What the fuck have you been smoking?? The animal rights idiots regularly threaten, bomb, and otherwise terrorize researchers.
#9 jj stokes
May 31, 2009

What the fuck have you been smoking?? The animal rights idiots regularly threaten, bomb, and otherwise terrorize researchers.

like i said, property destruction, arson, threats, but not murder. there is a difference.
#10 charfles
May 31, 2009

like i said, property destruction, arson, threats, but not murder. there is a difference.

Right, they would never try to harm human life: http://www.animalliberationpressoffice.org/communiques/2009/2009-03-26_uclavivers.htm

Sounds like nice people to me.
#11 D. C. Sessions
May 31, 2009

like i said, property destruction, arson, threats, but not murder. there is a difference.

I suppose that there is a difference between firebombing an occupied house and attacking a person. Sort of like blowing up Don Bolles’ car instead of attacking Don.
#12 Donna B.
May 31, 2009

I know nothing about Operation Rescue and knew nothing about Dr. Tiller until this morning but since apparently Dr. Tiller and his family are Christians, I don’t find the reference to praying for his family offensive.

If he were openly an atheist, it would be insulting.
#13 Mike Haubrich, FCD
May 31, 2009

Kristjan Wager of Denmark caught a screenshot of the Operation Rescue site, with a banner depicting Tiller as “America’s Doctor Death.” It was clearly visible on the page at which they expressed their Shock and Dismay. Alli-fucking-gator tears.
#14 DLC
May 31, 2009

Gunned down outside his church.
No doubt they’ll be partying at Operation Rescue tonight.
#15 Whitecoat Tales
May 31, 2009

Ahh, hot topics… Hot assumptions.

Any time someone starts a comment here with “ahh”, you know the bullshit is about to come fast and furious.

Next time how ’bout a little logic before you shoot off your pen?

I’m ready for logic, are you capable of it?

1) ‘Tiller’s killer was an abortion opponent.’ how do you know? Maybe it was one of the other few ‘late term’ abortion docs in the country. Then not only does he (1) ramp up sympathy for abortion docs, (2) set the abortion opponents back 10 years, and (3) get all his future late term customers!

Wow, thats amazing, poison the well, accuse a movement of murdering one of their own, claim that Tiller was in it for the money, instad of as an advocate, all at the same time!

Well, they’ve arrested a suspect. Wanna place bets on whether he’s prolife or prochoice?

Don’t judge people.

Isn’t the entire pro-life movement about judging people’s private behavior?

2) ‘O.R. should try to bring him to justice by changing legislation.’ (a) they do that. (b) they tried to get him for breaking laws too. Don’t write about whom you know nothing.

See, he was acquitted. Apparently you’re unclear on how our justice system works. When you are acquitted, it means you didn’t break the law. Don’t write about what you know nothing.

P.S. – To the wise commenter who says ‘at least until you’re born, and then who the f*ck cares’. Ever hear of the million$ that ‘crisis pregancy’ centers spend to help mothers of troubled pregnancies?

So? The vast majority of pro-life individuals are also against welfare, WIC, and a variety of other initiatives we use to help young mothers who don’t have resources. Saying otherwise is just a blatant lie.

And if it’s Christians you’re blaming for this, what about the billions they’ve given to fight hunger, disease, poverty, slavery, injustice, etc. in the last decade alone?

Ah, so pro life is identical with Christian is it? As a pro-choice Christian, I’d just like to tell you to shove it. Stop staining my good name with your gibberish. Stop acting like you represent everyone who shares your religion. You don’t.
#16 daedalus2u
May 31, 2009

25 years ago I lived a few doors away from a women’s health clinic in Brookline MA on Beacon Street. One night I woke up to the sounds of breaking glass and saw flames out of my window. Someone had lit the back of the next door apartment building on fire. The flames had gone up and started breaking the glass. That was what I heard and what woke me up from a sound sleep. This was the residential apartment next to the women’s health clinic and next to my apartment. The apartments were all contiguous there, if one went up in flames, they all would.

This is the same clinic where a 25 year old receptionist was shot and killed in 1994.
#17 khan
May 31, 2009

Arson & murder are OK when done by devout Xtians.
#18 datsneefa
May 31, 2009

The killer of Dr. Tiller is now the greatest justification of abortion ever now. Wow I wonder if the dumbass zealot christians realize that. Wichita its like the negative of Detroit
#19 Liz Ditz
May 31, 2009

Earlier in the day (I’ve lost the link) people who were in the church’s vestibule where Dr. Tiller was assassinated said that they recognized the shooter from previous anti-abortion demonstrations at Tiller’s church.

Scott P. Roeder, the man who is being held in connection with Tiller’s assassination, is reported to have had the phone number of Operation Rescue in his car.

Little Green Footballs has more on Roeder’s background and connection to the anti-choice movement.

For those of you who think that parents’ decisions to terminate a pregnancy after 20 or 25 weeks is made lightly, I invite you to read the stories at A Heartbreaking Choice.

If you want to see a sample of what those opposed to Dr.Tiller have to say, go to http://www.dr-tiller.com/, which was put up by somebody named Stuart B.. Ugh.
#20 Stephanie Z
May 31, 2009

Then there’s the founder of Operation Rescue, who doesn’t have responsibility for the group currently, and so doesn’t have to be quite as diplomatic.

George Tiller was a mass-murderer. We grieve for him that he did not have time to properly prepare his soul to face God. I am more concerned that the Obama Administration will use Tiller’s killing to intimidate pro-lifers into surrendering our most effective rhetoric and actions. Abortion is still murder. And we still must call abortion by its proper name; murder.

Those men and women who slaughter the unborn are murderers according to the Law of God. We must continue to expose them in our communities and peacefully protest them at their offices and homes, and yes, even their churches.

Grrrr.
#21 TomH
May 31, 2009

So, do you read minds?
#22 kemibe
June 1, 2009

Operation Rescue consists of nothing but thugs and liars, and their spokespeople are not sophisticated enough to hide their true colors. Sick fucks.
#23 daedalus2u
June 1, 2009

The operationrescue.org website has gone offline and I was unable to see it yesterday. The google cache was still working fine. I suspect that they took the site offline to avoid media scrutiny, and possibly to give them time to scrub it of all incriminating evidence.

If you look through the google cache, some of what is there is clearly advocating terrorism (as I understand it). It is clearly advocating intimidation of those who worked with Tiller and those who do business with Tiller.

http://74.125.93.132/search?q=cache:http://www.operationrescue.org/top-tiller-abortion-collaborators/

If they are destroying records to try and hide any connections they have with the murderer, I hope they understand that is obstruction of justice. More important, I hope the Obama Justice Department understands it is obstruction of justice.
#24 Calli Arcale
June 1, 2009

Of course, it goes completely past the extremists that Tiller only performed late-term abortions of fetuses which were significantly deformed. Given that pregnancy does take a substantial toll on a woman, is it fair to expect her to shoulder that burden for a child which is not likely to survive long? Trouble is, most of the extremists seem to equate “late-term abortion” with “lady got knocked up and didn’t notice it for eight months, then had a viable baby murdered in her vagina”. That ain’t the case at all.

I don’t think very many of the extremists realize what “late-term” actually means. It means after 21 weeks*, which is halfway. (Actually, less than halfway, since babies are usually conceived at 2 weeks and born at 40. The 40 weeks counts from the first day of last menstrual period, after all, not from conception.)

*Usually. Note that definitions vary.

I don’t like abortion, but sometimes it is necessary, and on those sad, tragic cases, it is usually an edge case. Not something that can be legislated. There are the obvious cases; I think everybody can agree that if a mom is 30 weeks pregnant, everything’s going well, and she’s just sick of being pregnant and doesn’t want to be a mom, abortion is not the answer. And I think everybody can agree that if a mom gets eclampsia in the first trimester (very rare, also very dangerous, generally only resolves with the end of the pregnancy; fortunately, most eclampsia occurs only at the tail end of the pregnancy, so the usual treatment is induced labor or a c-section), then an abortion is necessary to save the mother’s life, since there’s no chance of saving the baby at that point. It’s the tricky ones in the middle where it’s going to have to be a decision between the parents, their doctor, and, if they’re religious, God.
#25 TomH
June 1, 2009

http://www.lifenews.com/state4189.html
#26 Whitecoat Tales
June 1, 2009

@albud
Scott roeder is the suspect, he is a known pro life extremist.
Also known to believe in “justifiable homicide”.

So again, shove it
#27 Molly, NYC
June 1, 2009

It’s astonishing how fast the trolls got on this story–particularly, how they absolutely rushed to help rationalize a good man’s murder, while insisting, even to themselves, that they’re “pro-life” (1) without the slightest shift of gears.

But that wasn’t what’s worrying me. It’s this: Apparently, Dr. Tiller was one of only three docs in the US who do late-term abortions. So now, we’re down to two. Do these guys have training programs? Can an aspiring OB-GYN do a rotation with either of them (or better yet, both)? If not, where is the next generation for this specialty coming from? (Also, if there are only two, they’re effectively wearing bull’s-eyes. If there were a few hundred, they’d all be safer.) If there isn’t a training program, how does one get set up?

(1) And what the hell does that even mean? Everybody’s “pro-life,” just as we’re all “pro-health” or “pro-freedom” or “pro-goodness.” But some of us can distinguish between real people’s lives and the continuum of human life as an abstract. Horses’ asses like albud@usa.com, jj stokes, and TomH (wombless wonders all, evidently) affect to think the latter is more important.
#28 catgirl
June 1, 2009

The saddest part of this is that even the most extremist anti-choice people claim to support abortion rights to save the life of a woman. Dr. Tiller saved many lives by providing therapeutic abortions. Now it is clear that “pro-life” people actually want real people to die, so long as those people are women or men who save women’s lives. What a bunch of hypocrites. A man can murder a hero who saved countless lives and still call himself pro-life. It’s sickening. OR pretends that they are shocked and disapproving of this murder, but I think many of the are rejoicing inside.
#29 catgirl
June 1, 2009

P.S. – To the wise commenter who says ‘at least until you’re born, and then who the f*ck cares’. Ever hear of the million$ that ‘crisis pregancy’ centers spend to help mothers of troubled pregnancies?

You’re wrong. I have heard of these crisis centers, and reality just doesn’t match up with what they pretend to do. It’s very common for women to be slut-shamed out of an abortion, only to fall through the numerous cracks once the baby is born.

And if it’s Christians you’re blaming for this, what about the billions they’ve given to fight hunger, disease, poverty, slavery, injustice, etc. in the last decade alone?

I’m certainly not blaming Christians for this, since the Bible makes it clear that abortion is not murder. The victim here was just as much a Christian as the murderer. In fact, the victim was murdered at his own church, the one place he should have been safest. Oddly enough, it’s often the pro-choice Christians who donate their time and money to fight hunger, disease, poverty, etc. Consider the Pope, who is strongly anti-choice. He has done nothing to stop the spread of AIDS in Africa, and has actually tried to make it worse.
#30 Kate
June 1, 2009

albud, exactly where did I mention Christianity in my statement? I’m speaking from direct experience where I escorted my older sister (or tried to, anyway) to a clinic to look into her options, since she really couldn’t afford to have a third child economically or physically, particularly given the problems she had carrying and delivering the first two. The behaviour of the protestors (and it was early enough in the pregnancy that she wasn’t showing or having any problems with morning sickness,) was execrable, one woman in particular* who shouted “We’ll leave your other two brats motherless, bitch!”

My problem is with the so-called pro-life attitude and protestors of this type, who so vehemently hate the people they see walking into clinics (not the idea of abortion, or the legality of abortion, but the people they see on their way to women’s clinics) that something like the murder of a doctor performing a necessary service like this man did seems not only rational and okay, but heroic.

*Because neither of us knew who the shouter was, or how she knew about my sister’s other kids, we ended up spending a lot of money to help her move, she even went so far as to pull her kids out of their old school and put them into another. These are the people that so love your fetus that they’d gladly blow up your doctor to prove it.
#31 Terrie
June 1, 2009

When I hear about these stories, I think about something my grandmother (an unrepentant neighborhood gossip) told me once. A woman in her home town was pregnant. She was into the second half of her pregnancy when an ultrasound showed that there were some serious deformities. The fetus could probably survive in utero to full term, but once born would die in a matter of minutes or hours. Doctors weren’t sure exactly how long, but there was no doubt that survival was not possible. The woman chose to have an abortion. My grandmother is very religious and pro-life. But she was shocked that some people thought that abortion was the wrong choice. To her, the idea of bringing a child into the world, knowing it would know only pain for it’s short life, was just wrong. A child, wife and mother of farmers, she knew that respecting life meant that you had to understand that death is a part of living. And her faith means that she believes that the child’s soul went straight to heaven, spared the agony of the death it otherwise would have faced.
#32 Right Winger
June 2, 2009

OR is a terrorist group? So is HAMAS and Hezbollah, yet our president just promised the Arabs that Jerusalem would be theirs. Actaully he hasn;t read his Bible. Christ will return and Jerusalem will belong to the Jews and Christ will rule over the entire earth from Jerusalem.

——————–

Bill Ayers is also a terrorist who killed people, but was ignored by the media as anything but a saint.

ELF is a terrorist group and should be treated as such too.

——————–

ACLU is not a terrorist group, but they support militant Islam more than their country.

——————-

Mr., OR is far from a terrorist group. Hippies wannabes like yourself are nuts.

All that heroine and pot made your parents’ brain fry in the 1960s. Looks like it rubbed off on the next generation.

I do not like it that the man was killed, but the media and lefties are not even considering the people that he killed. He murdered thousands of unborn babies. THOUSANDS.

Not a word was said. Unborn should have rights too. Don’t give that crap about the mother dying if the abortion isn’t don 6 minutes prior to birth either. That’s leftwing population control propoganda. Nothing more nothing less.
#33 MonkeyPox
June 2, 2009

Wow. Just…wow. I mean…wow. Shouldn’t you have saved some crazy for later, you know, just in case?
#34 LanceR, JSG
June 3, 2009

Wait, let me check…

Nope, looks like Dr. Tiller didn’t murder anyone.

Still fractally wrong, Mr. Winger. Insane, too.
#35 daedalus2u
June 3, 2009

Right Winger, murder is a specific legal term. It has a specific legal definition. According to that legal definition, abortion is not murder. You are allowed to think of abortion any way you like. When you call it things that it is not either you show your inability to think and articulate clearly or you show your deliberate decision to lie. To know that abortion is legal and to still call it murder is to lie.

If the anti-abortion camp can redefine murder to fit their idiosyncratic and unsupported beliefs, then for consistency they must grant that right to everyone else.

Anti-abortion extremists call people who simply work at a health clinic where abortions are performed guilty of murder, even though no murders have happened. When people lie (by equating abortion with murder) and use rhetoric designed to inflame and cause violence (as anti-abortion extremists have done), such as the murder of Dr. Tiller (yes, actual murder in the legal sense), it is less of a stretch to consider they share guilt in the murder of Dr Tiller.

People who lied to Scott Roeder and drove him to commit murder are not without guilt. Are they guilty of murder themselves? According to their own “logic” (in quotes because it is an idiosyncratic definition of “logic”) they are. They equate all those who are not active in trying to stop all abortion as murder as being complicit with abortion and by extension guilty of “murder”.

If anti-abortion extremists can call Dr. Tiller a “murderer”, then everyone who is not an anti-abortion extremist can use that same ”logic” and call those extremists “murderers” too.
#36 Right Winger
June 3, 2009

Your dictionary needs updating. Murder is the the act of one human killing another human.

In this case a “doctor” caves in the skull of an unborn human (baby) and sucks its brains out. Is that not murder?

The uborn human was alive and the “doctor” made it dead. Plain and simple. I am no anti-abortion extremist, but I do know a few anti-Christian extremists.
#37 PalMD
June 3, 2009

Murder is the the act of one human killing another human.

No, it is the act of killing another human being unlawfully.

You may be confusing it with “homicide”, and then “human being” becomes a problematic defn.
#38 Dianne
June 4, 2009

The uborn human was alive and the “doctor” made it dead. Plain and simple.

Why do you call the fetus an “unborn human” (or even a “uborn human”, a typo I love for no good reason)? Can you give a rigorous definition of “living human” that meets the following criteria:
1. Includes all concepti from single cell to birth
2. Does not define identical twins (who form from a single fertlized egg) as one person
3. Does not define chimeras (who form from the merging of two embryos) as two people
4. Defines “death” in a rigorous and clinically useful way. I assume you don’t want to use the standard definition of death, i.e. brain death, because then how do you justify calling something that has no brain a living person.
5. Defines as human or not human any people produced by non-standard methods, i.e. cloning. A theoretical problem currently, but human reproductive cloning is probably not intrinsically impossible.
6. Defines as human or not pluripotent tumors such as teratomas which not only have unique human chromosomes but can produce all of the basic tissue lineages.
7. (This is the tough one): Is consistent and based on sound biological principles, not simple prejudice.

Until I hear a definition that fits all of those criteria, I’m not going to be able to take any of the “pro-life” arguments seriously.