“And I have a sneaking suspicion that more people oppose him because of his race and background than because of his views on the right to life and the unborn.”

There are parts of the pro-life movement that are in need of criticism.

We can do the a hard work of focusing on them and criticizing them, or we can just toss a granade at “hateful right-wing pro-lifers,” and accept the collateral damage.

Mark,

Here’s the post in question. It includes the quote, “

“More people are voting for McCain because of racism than pro-life beliefs ” does not equal or yield “More pro-lifers are voting for McCain because they are racist then because of their pro-life beliefs.”

Morning didn’t just say that some people might be voting for McCain out of racist feelings towards Obama. That’s certainly true. What he said was far more dramatic, insulting, and completely without evidentiary support: That there were MORE people voting for McCain out of racism than out of genuine pro-life beliefs. He was trying to insinuate that the majority of the pro-life movement is basically insincere and racist. That’s way more insulting than anything that has been said about Kmiec.

This is nonsense on stilts.

There hasn’t been an abortion clinic bombing in a dozen years, yet the stereotype of pro-life clinic bombers remains.

There will always be kooks and uncivil people as part of the pro-life movement. Just like there were as part of the civil rights movement, the abolition movement, the anti-war movement, and every other movement people gave damn about. And with an issue as hot as the legal killing of babies, yes, some people will let their rhetoric get away from them. That is not going to change.

And it will continue to be the case that pro-choicers and the media will attempt to discredit the pro-life movement by presenting the pro-life movement as a band of hypocritical religous fanatics. And you and Kmiec are helping them do it.

Yes, you couldn’t do it if there weren’t material provided, but there will always be such material so long as the pro-life movement is populated with fallible human beings. So there will always be an opportunity for you to gain “strange new respect” by lambasting the extermists and kooks in the pro-life movement. But I don’t think it’s worth it.

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As for Wiegel:

1.) He can probably speak for himself.
2.) I agree that the tone of the quoted comments was probably ill-considered.

Not naming names shielded Kmiec from being accountable for what he wrote. He can just claim that he wasn’t referring to his more civil critics, and if you’re not hateful, then you shouldn’t be upset about it, so you being upset about it is kind of telling, isnt’ it?

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I do not believe that the pro-life movement is perfect, and couldn’t stand for some criticsim. It does often seem more interested in punishing pro-choice people than saving lives.

The defeat you might have been wishing for has happened. You can either throw more dirt on the pro-life movement’s face, or help build it up. I suggest we do the latter.

It is valid if you believe that to be the case. Such is often an act of bad faith. That I didn’t offer a comment on MM’s statement means nothing. I don’t comment on a lot the posts here. Despite some contrary claims, VN has never had an editorial opinion that its authors were to subscribe. As to the actual substance of MM’s statement, I don’t see what’s unreasonable about stating others may do something for an unstated reason when some have explicitly said their reason was due to racism. This is different than the allegation repeated numerous times that Kmiec offered his endorsement to secure a court appointment.

Hear, hear! And the way those silly Christians keep repeating the one about specks-in-the-eye vs. beams-in-the-eye… it’s as if God himself came up with it.  

The meaness kind of misses the point. I’ve gotten messages from outright kooks before; I’m not talking about them. The people I’m criticizing allege that they want to bring people together for the cause of ending abortion. One would hope that the goal of such of movement is to persuade people to fight against abortion. How are they going to persuade people for the cause if they can’t dampen their level of contempt for people that deviated from their agenda over the relatively inconsequential of who is the President for the next four years? People that brought the BAIPA to you did a lot worse things than voted for Obama for President. A number of them supported 1st trimester abortions even. But that piece of legislation actually amounted to some progress in the fight against abortion. Call it a character defect if you would like, but the only thing keeping me from wishing that the boisterous opposers of abortion would lose and lose badly is that abortion is so evil itself. At a time when the movement should be mending fences and figuring out what they should be doing going forward, they are out actively shooing people away.