{"id":532,"date":"2009-05-31T21:17:34","date_gmt":"2009-05-31T21:17:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/progressiverevival\/2009\/05\/the-rhetoric-of-death-from-the.html"},"modified":"2009-05-31T21:17:34","modified_gmt":"2009-05-31T21:17:34","slug":"the-rhetoric-of-death-from-the","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/2009\/05\/the-rhetoric-of-death-from-the.html","title":{"rendered":"The Rhetoric of Death from the Pro-Life Movement"},"content":{"rendered":"

“Obama is a murderer!!!” shouted the all male anti-abortion activists as they disrupted both the worship service and the faith panels at the DNC in Denver.  “Obama kills babies!” they yelled as they were escorted from the room, one after another.  <\/p>\n

This is a common framing of the abortion question by the pro-life movement.  Abortion is murder, anyone who has an abortion, provides abortion services, or is pro-choice like our President is a murderer.  And now we see how this rhetoric ends, in the assassination <\/span>of Dr. George Tiller in Wichita.
<\/a><\/p>\n

\n

In a statement issued through Tiller’s lawyers, his family <\/a>— a
\nwife, four children and 10 grandchildren — said their loss “is also a
\nloss for the City of Wichita and women across America.”<\/p>\n

“George
\ndedicated his life to providing women with high-quality health care
\ndespite frequent threats and violence,” his family said in a written
\nstatement. “We ask that he be remembered as a good husband, father and
\ngrandfather and a dedicated servant on behalf of the rights of women
\neverywhere.”<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

The question is – what next? How can we have a serious debate about abortion in this country when the primary rallying call of the pro-life movement is that people who are pro-choice are murderers?  Randall Terry, of Operation Rescue continued this rhetoric in his comments after the shooting of Dr. Tiller:<\/a><\/p>\n

“George Tiller was a mass-murderer. We grieve for him that he did not
\nhave time to properly prepare his soul to face God. I am more concerned
\nthat the Obama Administration will use Tiller’s killing to intimidate
\npro-lifers into surrendering our most effective rhetoric and actions.
\nAbortion is still murder. And we still must call abortion by its proper
\nname; murder.<\/p>\n

Those men and women who slaughter the unborn are murderers
\naccording to the Law of God. We must continue to expose them in our
\ncommunities and peacefully protest them at their offices and homes, and
\nyes, even their churches.”<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Other pro-life group have responded to the killing of Dr. Tiller with condemnation.  But will they adjust their rhetoric in a way that allows them to remain true to their core beliefs, while not inciting violence against those who disagree.  The men who were calling Obama a murderer were egged on by these same organizations who are shocked today.  The pro-life movement must respond with more than condolences for Dr. Tiller’s death, they must change the way the talk about those who disagree.  <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

“Obama is a murderer!!!” shouted the all male anti-abortion activists as they disrupted both the worship service and the faith panels at the DNC in Denver.  “Obama kills babies!” they yelled as they were escorted from the room, one after another.  This is a common framing of the abortion question by the pro-life movement.  Abortion…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":51,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[25],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-532","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-abortion"],"yoast_head":"\nThe Rhetoric of Death from the Pro-Life Movement - Progressive Revival<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/2009\/05\/the-rhetoric-of-death-from-the.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The Rhetoric of Death from the Pro-Life Movement - Progressive Revival\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"“Obama is a murderer!!!” shouted the all male anti-abortion activists as they disrupted both the worship service and the faith panels at the DNC in Denver.  “Obama kills babies!” they yelled as they were escorted from the room, one after another.  This is a common framing of the abortion question by the pro-life movement.  Abortion…\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/2009\/05\/the-rhetoric-of-death-from-the.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Progressive Revival\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2009-05-31T21:17:34+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Paul Raushenbush\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"The Rhetoric of Death from the Pro-Life Movement - Progressive Revival","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/2009\/05\/the-rhetoric-of-death-from-the.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"The Rhetoric of Death from the Pro-Life Movement - Progressive Revival","og_description":"“Obama is a murderer!!!” shouted the all male anti-abortion activists as they disrupted both the worship service and the faith panels at the DNC in Denver.  “Obama kills babies!” they yelled as they were escorted from the room, one after another.  This is a common framing of the abortion question by the pro-life movement.  Abortion…","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/2009\/05\/the-rhetoric-of-death-from-the.html","og_site_name":"Progressive Revival","article_published_time":"2009-05-31T21:17:34+00:00","author":"Paul Raushenbush","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/2009\/05\/the-rhetoric-of-death-from-the.html","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/2009\/05\/the-rhetoric-of-death-from-the.html","name":"The Rhetoric of Death from the Pro-Life Movement - 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Paul B. Raushenbush is the moderator of the Progressive Revival blog and the Associate Dean of Religious Life at Princeton University. .An ordained American Baptist minister, Rev. Raushenbush speaks and preaches at colleges, churches and institutes around the country including the College of Preachers at the National Cathedral in Washington D.C., The Chautauqua Institute in upstate New York, and the New America Foundation. Rev. Raushenbush has served at Seattle First Baptist Church, the Presbyterian Chaplaincy at Columbia University and as College and Young Adult Minister at The Riverside Church in New York City. He has appeared on ABC World News Tonight and is a repeated guest on CNN. He has been quoted in The New York Times and The Washington Post and is a contributing editor for Beliefnet.com. His first book, Teen Spirit: One World, Many Faiths (HCI) was released in the Fall of 2004. He is the editor of the 100th Anniversary edition of Walter Rauschenbusch\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s book Christianity and the Social Crisis \u00e2\u20ac\u201c In the 21st Century (HarperOne). His work at Princeton includes strengthening the interfaith community on campus. He is the Co-Director of the Program on Religion, Diplomacy and International Relations at The Liechtenstein Institute on Self Determination at Princeton University. Rev. Raushenbush studied religion at Macalester College before attending Union Theological Seminary in New York City where he graduated with distinction.","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/author\/praushenbush"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/532","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/51"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=532"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/532\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=532"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=532"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=532"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}