When we were talking over the weekend, you mused about the connections between white supremacists groups and anti-choice groups. Such a linkage is real, and has been extensively documented:
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1295/is_n10_v58/ai_15783407/ .
..."More than ten million white babies have been murdered through Jewish-engineered legalized abortion since 1973 here in America and more than a million per year are being slaughtered this way," the Confederate Knights declared in a printed statement. "The Klan understands that this is just one of many tools used to destroy the white race and we know who it is."
...Before he became famous for allegedly murdering Britton, Paul Hill was well-known as an Orthodox Presbyterian minister whose book Should We Defend Born and Unborn Children with Force? was widely read in militant anti-abortion circles. Hill borrows the same story from the Bible which the racist and anti-Semitic Christian Identity movement uses to justify its violence--that of Phineas and Zimri. Phineas was a priest who murdered Zimri and her lover by driving a spear through them in the tent where they made love. The story has become symbolic to fanatics who believe they have orders from God to kill sinners. The Phineas Priesthood emerged in the 1990s as the primary white supremacist group that advocates murdering people for interracial mixing.
For his part, Hill envisions an underground of anti-abortion assassins who murder people for "disobeying God's laws" regarding abortion, homosexuality, and other "crimes." Hill's group, Defensive Action, issued a statement signed by twenty-nine well-known anti-abortion activists defending Griffin's actions:
"We, the undersigned, declare the justice of taking all godly action necessary to defend innocent life including the use of force.... We assert that if Michael Griffin did in fact kill David Gunn, his use of lethal force was justifiable provided it was carried out for the purpose of defending the lives of unborn children."
The question then becomes, does it matter? Every movement has undesirable,
radical elements associated with it. From a practical standpoint, would it
cause people to be more turned off from the movement if it were more widely
known? Perhaps...
What are your thoughts?
Emily: I'm not sure that it matters that the motivation is this crazy, racist view - in the long run. It is interesting to me. It's particularly interesting/bizarre that there are fringe right-wingers who want me to have more babies, even though my babies are pretty likely to be liberals. As long as they are white liberals, I guess they don't care?
I think it is worthwhile to try to understand people's motivations, because it helps general human understanding; but also because if you disagree with somebody, you may not get where they are coming from, and then it is harder to beat them.
This kind of a link means that as much as I tend to see all of these anti-abortion/anti-contraception bills/proposals/laws as purely anti-women, there is another aspect to them. That doesn't change my mind on them, or make me think they are any less anti-woman in effect. But it does explain why some conservatives are genuinely perplexed by the "War on Women" meme. Some Rs are full of it and know they are being anti-women. But some apparently are basing their goals more on racism. Which is bad, too, but different.
5/17/12 Update: The Census says there are now more minority babies than white ones. Cue the racist freakout.
Emily: I'm not sure that it matters that the motivation is this crazy, racist view - in the long run. It is interesting to me. It's particularly interesting/bizarre that there are fringe right-wingers who want me to have more babies, even though my babies are pretty likely to be liberals. As long as they are white liberals, I guess they don't care?
I think it is worthwhile to try to understand people's motivations, because it helps general human understanding; but also because if you disagree with somebody, you may not get where they are coming from, and then it is harder to beat them.
This kind of a link means that as much as I tend to see all of these anti-abortion/anti-contraception bills/proposals/laws as purely anti-women, there is another aspect to them. That doesn't change my mind on them, or make me think they are any less anti-woman in effect. But it does explain why some conservatives are genuinely perplexed by the "War on Women" meme. Some Rs are full of it and know they are being anti-women. But some apparently are basing their goals more on racism. Which is bad, too, but different.
5/17/12 Update: The Census says there are now more minority babies than white ones. Cue the racist freakout.
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