1 Boring Old Man

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1

I know what’s coming… all the liberals and pro-choice people now have their "case" to back up their belief that all pro-life and/or conservative and/or Republican and/or Christian people have the same mindset of Roeder or that they are extremists or terrorists. They will stereotype them all based on this one man.

There have been MANY people in this world who were affiliated with some sort of organization and then committed some crime [even murder]. Just because they were a part of an organization does not mean that it is because of that organization that they chose to take a life or commit a crime.

But liberals are going to have a great time with this and use it as one more excuse to blast the "right." They seem to live for that.

It appears that the murderer will indeed turn out to be the kind of case this commenter describes. But I’m not having a "great time" nor am I interested in blasting the "right." People like this assassin or Eric Rudolph represent a small subset of people. But the commenter’s fallacy is greater than thinking we are people who hold the "belief that all pro-life and/or conservative and/or Republican and/or Christian people have the same mindset of Roeder or that they are extremists or terrorists." I don’t think that. But he, and many of his colleagues also think that we are all "pro-abortion." I’m not that either. Most of us aren’t.

I understand the pro-life sentiment. It is closer to my own personal feelings than the alternative. But I’m not a pregnant teen-aged girl desparately facing a life that I never planned. And I am a Physician that has seen too many children die from illicit abortions. And I am a Psychiatrist who knows that the fate of unwanted children is marred from the start in too many ways. And I am a citizen of the earth who knows that overpopulation lies at the root of many of our modern woes – climate change, hunger, disease, war.  And it is not lost on me that centuries of calls for abstinence have failed. So, until birth control is the norm, abortion will be with us, whether it is in a sanitary clinic setting or in a filthy backroom like it used to be.

And I said a prayer that night that I might extend the same presumption of good faith to others that the doctor had extended to me. Because when we do that – when we open our hearts and our minds to those who may not think like we do or believe what we do – that’s when we discover at least the possibility of common ground. That’s when we begin to say, "Maybe we won’t agree on abortion, but we can still agree that this is a heart-wrenching decision for any woman to make, with both moral and spiritual dimensions.

So let’s work together to reduce the number of women seeking abortions by reducing unintended pregnancies, and making adoption more available, and providing care and support for women who do carry their child to term. Let’s honor the conscience of those who disagree with abortion, and draft a sensible conscience clause, and make sure that all of our health care policies are grounded in clear ethics and sound science, as well as respect for the equality of women.

Understand – I do not suggest that the debate surrounding abortion can or should go away. No matter how much we may want to fudge it – indeed, while we know that the views of most Americans on the subject are complex and even contradictory – the fact is that at some level, the views of the two camps are irreconcilable. Each side will continue to make its case to the public with passion and conviction. But surely we can do so without reducing those with differing views to caricature.

Open hearts. Open minds. Fair-minded words.