Tiller's Killer Claims Justifiable Homicide
Quoted from my blog.
Dr George Tiller was shot last year on Sunday, May 31st, while he was handing out bulletins as a church usher.
He was shot because he performed late term abortions, one of only three (now two) US practitioners who will do so.
The event was widely reported. Tiller had received death threats previously - like any doctor who performs abortions in the US - and had been attacked before the fatal shooting. His information was posted on anti-abortion websites, which often encouraged people to attack him.
His killer, Scott Roeder, has been charged with murder in the first degree. However, he is attempting to have this charge reduced to manslaughter, which, in the state of Kansas is defined as "an unreasonable but honest belief that circumstances existed that justified deadly force".
Roeder claims that he believed that Tiller must be killed, in order to save the lives of 'unborn babies'.
Let's talk about those babies.
A late term abortion is one which is carried out after the pregnancy has reached a certain point. This definition varies, between after twelve weeks, to after twenty weeks. Generally speaking, they are abortions carried out in unusual circumstances, in most cases after the usual legal abortion limit. This limit is twenty-four weeks, in the UK and US, as, after this point, the foetus is considered viable and capable of surviving outside of the womb.
However, late term abortion happens when it is discovered that the foetus is not viable - that it has a severe health defect, or that it will seriously harm or kill the mother if it is carried to term.
To be fair to Roeder, I'm going to quote the findings of the Alan Guttmacher Institute. In 1987, the institute conducted a survey in the US of 1900 women who sought an abortion after the 16th week of pregnancy. The findings were as follows (the numbers given are percentages);
WHY WOMEN HAVE ABORTIONS
Source: 1987 survey of 1900 abortion patients
by the Alan Guttmacher Institute.
Published in the LA Times, Mon 17-Apr-89, Part I page 16
Each woman was allowed to cite more than one reason.
76 Concern about how having a baby could change her life
68 Can't afford a baby now
51 Problems with relationship or desire to avoid single parenthood
31 Not ready for responsibility
31 Doesn't want others to know she has had sex or is pregnant
30 Not mature enough, or is too young to have a child
26 Has all the children she wanted, or has all grown-up children
23 Husband or partner wants her to have abortion
13 Fetus has possible health problem
7 Woman has health problem
7 Woman's parents want her to have abortion
1 Woman was victim of rape or incest
6 Other
You can read the details of the study for yourself here.
Incidentally, there's a fairly good argument for the US to adopt a healthcare similar to that of the UK in there, but that's not the issue we're discussing.
From these figures, it would be hard to argue that each foetus aborted by Dr Tiller was completely non-viable. However, bear in mind that this survey was conducted on women after their 16th week of pregnancy, not their 24th. In other words, it is fully possible that Dr Tiller's patients consisted of those 7% of women with health problems, or those 13% of foetuses with possible health problems. Indeed, it's quite probable considering that Kansas requires a second opinion on whether a foetus is viable or not before allowing a late-term abortion. You can read the personal stories of women who required late-term abortions here. Here's a quote from one of them (this one, if you want to read the rest);
The next morning there were throngs of protesters. They had graphic posters. They yelled at us and aimed a video camera at our car. I was shaking all over as I had to show ID and go through a metal detector before I was admitted. All the time I was thinking, "How can those people be yelling at me? I don't want to be here. I don't have a choice. Don't they understand?"
There's no evidence that Roeder made any effort to find this information.
If we make the distinction between late-term and 'normal' abortions, then, in my opinion, Roeder should have made the effort to find out about Tiller's patients. What were their specific reasons for seeking a late-term abortion? In many cases, the lack of one would have resulted in the death of mother or child anyway, so Roeder wasn't actually saving any lives when he pulled that trigger - instead, he condemned twice as many.
If we do not make the distinction between late-term and 'normal' abortions, then can Roeder argue that deadly force was 'necessary'? In my opinion, no.
Look at the reasons for why women seek abortion. Many of these could be helped by better information about contraception, as well as better availability. In the UK, contraception is free, while, in the US it must be paid for by the patient, or, occasionally, by their insurance. I'd also like to make a point about the fallacy of abstinence only education here.
Abstinence only education consists of telling children to just say no, usually until marriage. The problem is that children learn this in a 'cold' state, where it's easy. However, they'll be called upon to use the information while in a state of arousal. A study by D. Ariely and G. Loewenstein indicates that we make very different decisions while in a state of arousal and that, furthermore, we frequently underestimate just how different our decisions will be. You can read the entire study here, but I'm going to reproduce a section of it below to make a point.
Now, I've purposefully chosen a more dramatic example, but similar differences were recorded in such decisions as whether to use a condom or not.
My point is that we are often unaware of just how hard it make the same decisions when aroused as we would when not aroused. Merely teaching people to say no doesn't work, because, once that's fallen by the wayside, they're left with nothing.
So there's one thing Roeder could have done to lower the abortion rate - help these girls before they reach that point, by improving access to contraception and sexual education. Murdering one of their only sources of aid doesn't help anyone, let alone the unborn children. It condemns their mothers to a life of resentment, unhappiness, and, in some cases, to severe physical injury or death, none of which are good for the child, assuming the foetus is even viable - which, for many of Dr Tiller's patients, would not have been the case.
Is there any evidence anywhere that Roeder worked with women, to help prevent unwanted pregnancies, to help them raise children they couldn't cope with, or to discuss their reasons for wanting an abortion? Tiller didn't go out and advertise his services as a lifestyle choice. An abortion is a last resort, and is a very difficult decision to make. It's not something that will be prevented by murdering one of the few practitioners that women requiring late-term abortions can go to.
When doctors are not available, desperate women will perform self-abortions, or go to illegal practitioners. I'm going to quote part of an article written by an anonymous doctor below, and you can read the full version here.
I had been there for about 3 hours when a woman was brought into the ER - it was a very busy day. Everyone running here and there.it was a hot day. I helplessly watched in disbelief. A woman had tried to abort her pregnancy at home. She had gotten some hollow tubing into her cervix and - and she had put turpentine down the tube into her uterus. It - It had literally cooked the lining of her uterus. She was in and out of consciousness, in and out of screaming in horrible pain. Screams I still hear. They took her to surgery right away and they removed her uterus. I had never seen anything like that - had never heard of anything so brutal.
If Roeder claims that he truly believed that deadly force was his best, or only option, I suspect that an insanity bid might work better. All he's done is narrow women's options even more, and caused at least one more death. Those aren't things that he couldn't have known ahead of time - it's all very predictable.
You can read more about Tiller's death here, and more about the case here. You can read about Dr Tiller's patients memories of him here. Two quotes are below;
To the Tiller family;
When I was 6, my mom was pregnant with a child she really wanted. The doctors told her, abut 4 or 5 months in, that if she carried the child to term, she had a 90 percent chance of not surviving. She of course, got an abortion, and I got my mom for an extra 14 years. Mom died when I was 20, and I have such gratitude for doctors like your husband who gave me my mom for those 14 extra, precious years. My heart goes out to you. May you find healing and may his memory live on in those that he loved and those that he saved.
In 2002 I found out I was carrying triplets. My husband did not want me to have them. The day of my appointment I was scared and not sure this was the right decision. They took me back and did an ultrasound. I asked if they all had heartbeats and the nurse said yes. I asked if I would have the chance to talk to the doctor and right away she went and got Dr Tiller. He came in and looked at my babies on the screen. Then he looked at me and said “God gave you these babies, it’s not my job to take them away.” He asked if I agreed and I immediately said yes. He told the nurse to take me to the counter and have them give me my money. You know that day was a turning point for me. I ended up having a great pregnancy and three healthy baby girls. I can never thank Dr. Tiller enough for sending me away that day.
Dr George Tiller was shot last year on Sunday, May 31st, while he was handing out bulletins as a church usher.
He was shot because he performed late term abortions, one of only three (now two) US practitioners who will do so.
The event was widely reported. Tiller had received death threats previously - like any doctor who performs abortions in the US - and had been attacked before the fatal shooting. His information was posted on anti-abortion websites, which often encouraged people to attack him.
His killer, Scott Roeder, has been charged with murder in the first degree. However, he is attempting to have this charge reduced to manslaughter, which, in the state of Kansas is defined as "an unreasonable but honest belief that circumstances existed that justified deadly force".
Roeder claims that he believed that Tiller must be killed, in order to save the lives of 'unborn babies'.
Let's talk about those babies.
A late term abortion is one which is carried out after the pregnancy has reached a certain point. This definition varies, between after twelve weeks, to after twenty weeks. Generally speaking, they are abortions carried out in unusual circumstances, in most cases after the usual legal abortion limit. This limit is twenty-four weeks, in the UK and US, as, after this point, the foetus is considered viable and capable of surviving outside of the womb.
However, late term abortion happens when it is discovered that the foetus is not viable - that it has a severe health defect, or that it will seriously harm or kill the mother if it is carried to term.
To be fair to Roeder, I'm going to quote the findings of the Alan Guttmacher Institute. In 1987, the institute conducted a survey in the US of 1900 women who sought an abortion after the 16th week of pregnancy. The findings were as follows (the numbers given are percentages);
WHY WOMEN HAVE ABORTIONS
Source: 1987 survey of 1900 abortion patients
by the Alan Guttmacher Institute.
Published in the LA Times, Mon 17-Apr-89, Part I page 16
Each woman was allowed to cite more than one reason.
76 Concern about how having a baby could change her life
68 Can't afford a baby now
51 Problems with relationship or desire to avoid single parenthood
31 Not ready for responsibility
31 Doesn't want others to know she has had sex or is pregnant
30 Not mature enough, or is too young to have a child
26 Has all the children she wanted, or has all grown-up children
23 Husband or partner wants her to have abortion
13 Fetus has possible health problem
7 Woman has health problem
7 Woman's parents want her to have abortion
1 Woman was victim of rape or incest
6 Other
You can read the details of the study for yourself here.
Incidentally, there's a fairly good argument for the US to adopt a healthcare similar to that of the UK in there, but that's not the issue we're discussing.
From these figures, it would be hard to argue that each foetus aborted by Dr Tiller was completely non-viable. However, bear in mind that this survey was conducted on women after their 16th week of pregnancy, not their 24th. In other words, it is fully possible that Dr Tiller's patients consisted of those 7% of women with health problems, or those 13% of foetuses with possible health problems. Indeed, it's quite probable considering that Kansas requires a second opinion on whether a foetus is viable or not before allowing a late-term abortion. You can read the personal stories of women who required late-term abortions here. Here's a quote from one of them (this one, if you want to read the rest);
The next morning there were throngs of protesters. They had graphic posters. They yelled at us and aimed a video camera at our car. I was shaking all over as I had to show ID and go through a metal detector before I was admitted. All the time I was thinking, "How can those people be yelling at me? I don't want to be here. I don't have a choice. Don't they understand?"
There's no evidence that Roeder made any effort to find this information.
If we make the distinction between late-term and 'normal' abortions, then, in my opinion, Roeder should have made the effort to find out about Tiller's patients. What were their specific reasons for seeking a late-term abortion? In many cases, the lack of one would have resulted in the death of mother or child anyway, so Roeder wasn't actually saving any lives when he pulled that trigger - instead, he condemned twice as many.
If we do not make the distinction between late-term and 'normal' abortions, then can Roeder argue that deadly force was 'necessary'? In my opinion, no.
Look at the reasons for why women seek abortion. Many of these could be helped by better information about contraception, as well as better availability. In the UK, contraception is free, while, in the US it must be paid for by the patient, or, occasionally, by their insurance. I'd also like to make a point about the fallacy of abstinence only education here.
Abstinence only education consists of telling children to just say no, usually until marriage. The problem is that children learn this in a 'cold' state, where it's easy. However, they'll be called upon to use the information while in a state of arousal. A study by D. Ariely and G. Loewenstein indicates that we make very different decisions while in a state of arousal and that, furthermore, we frequently underestimate just how different our decisions will be. You can read the entire study here, but I'm going to reproduce a section of it below to make a point.
Now, I've purposefully chosen a more dramatic example, but similar differences were recorded in such decisions as whether to use a condom or not.
My point is that we are often unaware of just how hard it make the same decisions when aroused as we would when not aroused. Merely teaching people to say no doesn't work, because, once that's fallen by the wayside, they're left with nothing.
So there's one thing Roeder could have done to lower the abortion rate - help these girls before they reach that point, by improving access to contraception and sexual education. Murdering one of their only sources of aid doesn't help anyone, let alone the unborn children. It condemns their mothers to a life of resentment, unhappiness, and, in some cases, to severe physical injury or death, none of which are good for the child, assuming the foetus is even viable - which, for many of Dr Tiller's patients, would not have been the case.
Is there any evidence anywhere that Roeder worked with women, to help prevent unwanted pregnancies, to help them raise children they couldn't cope with, or to discuss their reasons for wanting an abortion? Tiller didn't go out and advertise his services as a lifestyle choice. An abortion is a last resort, and is a very difficult decision to make. It's not something that will be prevented by murdering one of the few practitioners that women requiring late-term abortions can go to.
When doctors are not available, desperate women will perform self-abortions, or go to illegal practitioners. I'm going to quote part of an article written by an anonymous doctor below, and you can read the full version here.
I had been there for about 3 hours when a woman was brought into the ER - it was a very busy day. Everyone running here and there.it was a hot day. I helplessly watched in disbelief. A woman had tried to abort her pregnancy at home. She had gotten some hollow tubing into her cervix and - and she had put turpentine down the tube into her uterus. It - It had literally cooked the lining of her uterus. She was in and out of consciousness, in and out of screaming in horrible pain. Screams I still hear. They took her to surgery right away and they removed her uterus. I had never seen anything like that - had never heard of anything so brutal.
If Roeder claims that he truly believed that deadly force was his best, or only option, I suspect that an insanity bid might work better. All he's done is narrow women's options even more, and caused at least one more death. Those aren't things that he couldn't have known ahead of time - it's all very predictable.
You can read more about Tiller's death here, and more about the case here. You can read about Dr Tiller's patients memories of him here. Two quotes are below;
To the Tiller family;
When I was 6, my mom was pregnant with a child she really wanted. The doctors told her, abut 4 or 5 months in, that if she carried the child to term, she had a 90 percent chance of not surviving. She of course, got an abortion, and I got my mom for an extra 14 years. Mom died when I was 20, and I have such gratitude for doctors like your husband who gave me my mom for those 14 extra, precious years. My heart goes out to you. May you find healing and may his memory live on in those that he loved and those that he saved.
In 2002 I found out I was carrying triplets. My husband did not want me to have them. The day of my appointment I was scared and not sure this was the right decision. They took me back and did an ultrasound. I asked if they all had heartbeats and the nurse said yes. I asked if I would have the chance to talk to the doctor and right away she went and got Dr Tiller. He came in and looked at my babies on the screen. Then he looked at me and said “God gave you these babies, it’s not my job to take them away.” He asked if I agreed and I immediately said yes. He told the nurse to take me to the counter and have them give me my money. You know that day was a turning point for me. I ended up having a great pregnancy and three healthy baby girls. I can never thank Dr. Tiller enough for sending me away that day.