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Frank Schaeffer: Pro-Life? Prove it.

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From The Rachel Maddow Show, June 8, 2009.

Author Frank Schaeffer, former anti-abortion activist, challenges members of the anti-abortion movement to salvage their reputation for caring about life by turning in to the FBI and Justice Department the violent extremists within their ranks.

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62 Comments
Sierra Matt's picture

Very well put. Coming from a former religious nut, this should hold some weight with the powers that be. (Whether it WILL hold some weight, I'm not holding my breath over.)

But the right wing nuts will simply dismiss him or ignore him altogether. In their mind, he's "turned away from God."

ralfeemambo's picture
[Comment Deleted By Administration For Violation Of Terms Of Service]
CafeenMan's picture

The same extremists who don't want the government in their lives, do want the government in everyone else's.

All the while they're doing things that pretty much compel any government to intervene.

Here's a tip: If you don't want the government in your lives then don't make death threats.

JohnnyBravo's picture

"If you don't want the government in your lives then don't make death threats."

Easy and simple to follow. Unfortunately, many in the religious right wing have trouble with these simple things. For them, violence is next to godliness :-(


NOBODY 2012

AngryGus's picture

The world has been falling apart for decades, and these clueless clowns only care about some poor womens utereus!?!
New rule....You can protest abortion clinics only after all of the REAL problems of the world have been solved!


Cue the Kabuki....

ysbaddaden's picture
)O(

They're remaking the Merchant/Ivory movie A Room with a View, to A Womb With a View, starring Madonna.


Diabolus est Deus Inversus

Truth_Critic's picture

"A Womb With a View", was what they refer to as a "Test Tube" baby? :-P


Study the symptoms not the virus...

nathan123's picture

what exactly is a REAL problem? i would argue that the taking of innocent life is a very real problem that needs to be addressed. or do you not think that embryos and fetus are human beings?

Please hear this: i do not in any support violence in order to advance the pro-life movement! Nor does 99.999% of other pro-lifers.

This is what is so ridiculous. One man who was diagnosed with schizophrenia kills a man and now all pro-lifers are labeled killers. do you think that is a fair characterization?

liberalNmoderation's picture

I have mad respect for him...but I'm worried that his former comrades might not take too kindly to his calling them out...
I hope like hell he's got bodyguards.

Truth_Critic's picture

the thoughtful people, that have insight to the problem... helped out and I agree with your comment as well. :)

Thanks, liberalNmoderation


Study the symptoms not the virus...

ronnie dobbs's picture

i doubt his ex-collegues will.

miss_kitty's picture

is to join the call for a Single Payer healthcare system.

In their eyes you have the right to be born, but you don't have the right to a happy, healthy life.


I've never seen change without a fire

Truth_Critic's picture

That's suppose to come later? :-)


Study the symptoms not the virus...

accept Jesus, and then maybe when we die we can be happy. :(


I've never seen change without a fire

Truth_Critic's picture

I could have said, (I believe They Think), in case your not familiar with my previous comments?

Thanks for your time :)

Amended: By the way, I almost forgot... your reply was complementary! Thanks again ♥


Study the symptoms not the virus...

Tom_Hussein_Paine's picture

Who needs healthcare when you have Jesus as your primary healthcare provider? I think He would want all of us,
including the least of us,(and not just zygotes,
embryoes and fetuses) to be healthy.

ysbaddaden's picture
)O(

I suppose this is a positive step in the right direction,

But I'd hate to see the day, we're all surveilling and turning our associates and compadres in to the authorities because of a suspicion.


Diabolus est Deus Inversus

notKeith's picture

They're not talking about surveilling and turning in people because of suspicions. If those in the so-called pro-life movement are aware of actions committed by individuals in their group - actions that are already deemed illegal, like petty theft, or gluing locks, or firebombing, or whatever - then stop looking the other way; turn these fringe lunatics in.


notKeith
Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose.

boocilla69's picture

for the strong of stomach, they could always infiltrate these
groups.

Loath_GOP's picture

If this kook they refer to in jail MIGHT KNOW about others who could snap... perhaps we should be water-boarding him like we have done those of other nations? Oh right... he is a US citizen and only THEY have human rights....

Sierra Matt's picture

I'd love to see a debate between him and one of those asshole Operation Rescue types. Of course, they would just try to shout over him, so the moderator would need the courage to cut the interrupter's mike to let one side finish its comments.

Why don't any of these moderators have the balls to say, "Hold it. You've had you chance to talk. If you insist on interrupting, I will cut your mike until the other person is finished." How friggin' hard is that??

Annaleigh's picture

She hosts To the Contrary, a news show on PBS oriented towards women. She wouldn't let a conservative commentator named Star Parker dominate the discussion about the Tiller assasination. She (Parker) came very close to condoning Scott Roeder's actions and even compared him to Nat Turner (although she cowardly tried to pass it off as the beliefs of other extremists). Another African-American (but progressive) panelist, I think her name is Avis Jones, IIRC, got her in her face for daring to do that.


I've never seen change without a fire

AngryGus's picture

stupid, ignorant, out-of-touch, close-minded, uneducated, hate filled fuckheads......every one of em'!


Cue the Kabuki....

sassafra's picture

hm, "put up or shut up"? a novel exercise in moral and ethical thresholds for the oh so religious pro-life/anti-abortion crowd. while he's at it, just to clear the rest of the possible hypocracy up, in addition he should also be asking most of them to justify their having pro-death sentence and pro-war stances.
what? too much at once?

Shadowgm's picture

... that we're the PROgressives, and they're the CONservatives, when they're 'pro-life' (read, 'only while it's a fetus, then mommy is a trollop on welfare'), pro-war, pro-death penalty (okay, I agree with that as long as it's subject to strict judicial review), pro-torture?

AngryGus's picture

pro death penalty!
pro WAR!
pro torture!

pro life!?!

pro......Yup, Professional hypocrites...You betcha!


Cue the Kabuki....

nathan123's picture

can you explain to me how being an advocate of death penalty (protecting society from individuals who have taken innocent human life) and opposing abortion (stopping the taking of innocent life) is contradictory? im a little confused here. how does that make one a hypocrite? it seems consistent to me.

Liberal AND Proud's picture

An excellent spokesman and obviously a good person. Quite a nice breath of fresh air in a political atmosphere filled with demogogues, egomaniacs and lunatics.


"Anyone that makes less than $150K in this country, has no business voting Republican."

iirc...

I wouldn't have turned him in had I known where he was (and, as we later learned, he was waiting and bussing tables at a restaurant in which I and many members of our newspaper news staff ate on a regular basis, in Santa Fe, circa '75 or '76...

JustMyWords's picture

Hoffman wasn't known for violence, either his own actions or the actions of others. The charge of "incitement to riot" was bogus, based mostly on the idea that the riots at the 1968 Democratic Convention were caused in part by his protests - protests that were non-violent.

pissed off patricia's picture

What the fu*k would these anti abortion nuts do if abortion was made illegal? I mean this seems to be their only interest in the world.


Say what you mean. Mean what you say. But don't say it mean.

Liberalicious's picture

They still have us homos to torture.

boocilla69's picture
Not

while I'm around. I always ask them why they really care what
you lovely people do. They never have a good answer.
If it wasn't for my gay friends I would not have met the love of my life and I would be like Mary Bailey in "It's a Wonderful Life," without George.

Liberal AND Proud's picture

the conservatives are afraid that divorce rates for homosexual couples will be lower than divorce rates for heterosexual couple...which would destroy the "homosexual marriage will destroy marriage" diatribe.


"Anyone that makes less than $150K in this country, has no business voting Republican."

Shadowgm's picture

... would set them to punishing gays or burning witches at the stake.

There's no shortage of sin to correct for those who think God is whispering in their ear.

savannah43's picture

"Vengeance is mine, saith the Lord?"

southernman748's picture
[Comment Deleted By Administration For Violation Of Terms Of Service]
Liberal AND Proud's picture

dip dip dip dip dip dip GET A JOB.

Oh...that's right...these conservatives live in those anti gubmint states that draw in more gubmint funds then they pay out, so they's don't have to work. They use their free time savin' 'Murica.

Their like superheroes living in their Doublewide of Solitude.


"Anyone that makes less than $150K in this country, has no business voting Republican."

southernman748's picture

oops sorry ...inhanced interrograte Randall Terry and whatever that Cheryl biyutches name is. I bet we could get all kinds of names and that truly would be a patriotic use of torture..darn it.. inhanced interrogration

JustMyWords's picture

Because people like that insulate themselves from the actual "wet work" that they're so fond of calling for. They don't know because they don't WANT to know.

After all, what no one tells you, you don't have to admit to at the grand jury hearing.

woody's picture

and had killed a radical, Zionist rabbi instead of a conscientious Lutheran abortion doctor, and Mustaffa had said he was not alone, and that there were others out there with plans of their own, the country would by now be being torn apart the FBI (and probably Mossad, too).

Moral relativism, much?

Big Boppa's picture

on the bright side, at least duct tape sales would increase.


I think I'm turning Japanese, I think I'm turning Japanese, I really think so.....

JohnnyBravo's picture

You hit the nail on the head.


NOBODY 2012

Truth_Critic's picture

"Do as I say...


Study the symptoms not the virus...

matteo's picture

always been hard for me to understand how these pro-lifers square the logic of: a baby is precious and innocent and shouldn't be aborted even when it will live only minutes but then lionize murderes who were once little innocent precious babies themselves (because they kill physicians) . . . the killing of innocent children in wars. I guess the bible and the pulpit are shortcuts to thinking.

I had a religious nut once tell me (when I asked why does god not intervene when a child is about to be raped by a pedophile) that these children are being punished for sin. Which begs the question: is the pedophile being rewarded?

Shadowgm's picture

"I guess the bible and the pulpit are shortcuts to thinking."

*DING DING DING* We have a winner!*

Big Boppa's picture

replacements for thinking.

Why think when you've got Reverend Billy Bob Blowdry to tell you what you need to know. That frees up more time to shop at the Wall Mart.


I think I'm turning Japanese, I think I'm turning Japanese, I really think so.....

nathan123's picture

can you please explain to me "how is the Bible a shortcut to thinking??"

savannah43's picture

God is working through the pedophile. Right?

nathan123's picture

do you really think that all pro-lifers are advocates of murdering abortionists? i think you are making a gross generalization. this Roeder character was a schizophrenic and he does not represent all pro-lifers.

RickBeagle's picture

of the population is unemployed and desperate this is the kind of nonsense that you get. Don't get me wrong, the nut cases will always be out there, but they seem to come out of the wood work when times get tough.... Of course being egged on by their conservative idols does not help the situation one bit, but bah, there I go thinking again....

The amount of fuel it is feed or if I maybe sarcastic... Fed.

"We The People" will primarily continue to follow in circles in an attempt to address this issue. When at it's root(s)... the answer is as simple as 1+1=2. Upon honest reflection, one would figure this out. IMO ♥


Study the symptoms not the virus...

I like it better when she hits.

http://www.dailyhowler.com/


"The deal has to be negotiated in the real world, not on some idealized Aristotelian plane. We understand that. A 100-percent deal may be impossible."
Famous "Reality Based" Commentator

Truth_Critic's picture

As much I was not in the mood to digest that opinion, I did read it swiftly and found it well worth my time! My only wish, would have been, that they'd made a note of Roger Williams towards the later half of the article in the appropriate place and his relative bearing in relation to the subject matter.

PS. Boy... you get around :-P "aloha"


Study the symptoms not the virus...

Limp-Dick Blimpaugh's picture

It's not possible to change Reslug terrorist, nutcases back into normal people.

Truth_Critic's picture

It's just a matter of mind. √


Study the symptoms not the virus...

Occam's picture

There is a bomb out there ... you have a terrorist prisoner who might help you find and defuse the bomb... but he's not giving you the information you need... what do you do?

I have been hearing a lot lately that there is only one solution to this problem: You have to torture the prisoner to save lives.

Being a decent person I obviously oppose the use of torture against prisoners. But are we going to hear right wing idealogues demanding Roeder is "interogated enhancedly"?

veronicaf's picture

I doubt, however, many of the christian terrorists will take up his challenge.

rothgar's picture

They'd be embracing President Obama's initiatives to reduce abortion rates by 50% while keeping the procedures legal and as safe as possible. However, all real Pro-Lifer's want is to make these procedures illegal regardless of the damage to women suffrage, sovereignty and even the Christian Church in America.

They don't care if once they've made abortion illegal 1400 more (the difference between the 77% illegal rate vs. Obama's 50% target) abortions occur each month. All they care about is making sure that these abortions are illegal. Also, I've never seen any concern about the approximately 1300 women who will be sent to the emergency with life threatening internal bleeding or other wounds (approx 33% of the women who get illegal abortions end up in the hospital). They are afraid of allowing women equal rights and so push this stealth method of making women subordinate to their reproductive functions.

The Church will be hurt as people with lives irreparably changed (even the saved fetuses) to satisfy the Idolatry of Human Life espoused by "Pro-Lifers" increasingly reject the gospel message. Within 20 years of the final success of Pro-Life forces, the American Christian Church will be rapidly descending toward being a mere afterthought in our culture like, we see in Europe where hundreds of years of internal squabbling.g about which version rules has turned the people off.

nathan123's picture

How is making abortion illegal related to women suffrage?

And where did you get your statistics? How do you know that 1400 more abortions will occur each month if abortion is illegal?

How is abortion (the killing of an embryo) related to women's rights?

And one final question: what do you think a human embryo/fetus is?

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