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What scares me is, while I normally have this flood of emotion when I hear about someone dying, especially in this way, while ushering at church, I really don't know how to feel. My ambivalence scares me. It also scares me that I'm somewhat proud that anti-abortionists are standing their ground in their criticisms of Tiller, even in his death.

redface sweatdrop

Law is irrelevant? Sure, I remember slavery. Does that mean I think that every slave owner deserved to die? Absolutely not. Some truly great Americans were slave owners, starting with the greatest American of them all, George Washington.


I disagree about capital punishment, but other than that I agree. Except in every case of abortion.

That is not, however, the current law.


While your heart is in the right place, you take a sad turn for the dark side there at the end. In fact, you kind of disgust me. You relish the idea? You're worse than Tiller was. At least he didn't relish the death of people that he knew were people.

It's not just a question of belief. But that is certainly part of it.

What Hitler and Dahmer, etc, did was widely known to be wrong by everyone who was sane. Whether what Tiller did was wrong is still up in the air for many sane and intelligent people. Even people who disagree with what he did on a moral level support it on a legal level, under the grounds of bodily integrity.

You find me someone, besides yourself, who thinks that this cold blooded murder is justifiable, and we'll talk. But mostly just so that I can explain to them why they are also kind of despicable.

xd I knew you'd bring that up, which is why I avoided bringing it up first but now I'll show you the difference, at least when it comes to me:

Me and civilian deaths in war: Inevitable in any war, which is one reason everything needs to be weighed so carefully before war starts. But it's a very sad thing and they should do all they can to reduce the deaths of innocents.

You and Tiller: a death to be relished and enjoyed because it was his just desserts.

Do you see the difference there? You enjoy death. I do not. I may accept, heavily on my conscience, that when I support any war, I am supporting something which will inevitably kill innocent people. But it brings me no enjoyment. It is a necessary evil, in my opinion. We've been over that and you accused me of lacking compassion; then you say you relish death. Talk about a lack of compassion.


And I guess that's why I find your reaction disgusting. That you actually relish it. It's a bit repulsive.

I personally believe in judgment for the wicked, but I believe that only God has that right.

Also, no, a third-trimester baby is still a fetus, go back to biology. Perhaps you place a different value on fetuses than you do on born babies, which is fine, but you can't deny that a third-trimester baby in the womb is a fetus.

Also, for your last comment, one of the first things that struck me about Tiller's death was that the guy who shot him probably thought he was going to hell for killing babies. To hate someone enough to want them to be forever tormented in hell? That goes beyond not being pro-life. That's not Christian. That is specifically an evil thing. And perhaps I should be praying for the shooter as well as Tiller.

Sad acceptance of the pain of the innocent is a part of daily life. When people die or suffer from natural causes, when people are killed in car crashes, when a bystander dies in a shootout between police and a gang, that's the way of it. Someone is dead and it's even more of a shame because someone innocent is dead. You see it as more repulsive to accept the reality of life than to relish the death of a human being? Why? I'm curious. One is pretty normal. One is what serial killers do.

Once it is born, yes, it is a baby, but before that, it is scientifically a fetus so you can't say that it isn't. You'd be wrong, and acting on emotions. For me, it's a baby all the way through, not just in the third trimester, but again, if you place a different value on a fetus in the third trimester, it's not like that's a problem, I just disagree. So for me, it is "the same ******** thing" from the first trimester so the distinction is not as great for me.

I'm just wondering, how much of the Bible have you read?

You used the "irrelevance" of law to justify relishing the death of someone who did something you find morally despicable. The only way to compare that to slavery is to say that it would be justified to relish the deaths of slave owners.

You know damn well that I find abortion to be morally despicable. You know god damn well that I don't think the legality of abortion makes it moral. But that in no way means that it is okay to relish the death of anyone, even if they are someone who performed the worst kind of abortion.


I am? That's news to me. Thanks for informing me, since apparently I'm too stupid to know my own opinions.


The irony is that, if I defy your bet, I'm "doing anything to disagree with you." That's pretty hilarious.

Anyways, it's not my fault you're an a*****e with emotionally charged, irrational opinions that are damaging to every cause you associate yourself with.

Innocents are not killed en masse in war. Not by our side anyways. Which is really all the more reason to get the other side out of power. And do you even listen to yourself? Are you seriously comparing the accidental deaths of innocents in war, which the United States goes to excessive lengths to prevent, to singling out and murdering a single man, who could also be considered an innocent, in cold blood, in the middle of a church? And suggesting that the first is a horrible bad thing, and the second is a good thing?

You're more messed up than I thought.


Yeah... I think I'll stay on the light side, where our associates aren't mass murderers.

I believe in judgment for the wicked. I just believe that it is not the place of man to perform that judgment. And relishing death, even if you didn't cause it? That's judging. You are judging him, and finding him guilty and worthy of death. This is the place of God, not man.

The reason that justified wars are a different case is because you are not judging the people. You are killing them because they are killing others. That is it. With Tiller, you could say that he is a mass murderer... Except that what he is doing is not legally murder, and is believed by only a little less than 50% of the United States population to be not killing someone.


There is a difference between Hitler, Bundy, and Tiller. You know what it is? Fetuses are believed to not be people by almost 50% of the population. Meanwhile, Hitler, Bundy, and all those other mass murderers were killing fully grown, obvious human beings, clear to any sane person.


Ha! You don't have a scientific mind. You have an emotional, artist's mind. That's why you "relish" death. If you had a scientific mind, you may be able to agree with the murderer. But you would not relish the death, a sign of believing that what happened was divine or cosmic and justified retribution for what Tiller did for a living. Similarly your saying, "If I am truly evil for this, then I hope my place in hell is reserved to destroy people like this for eternity" is heavily and obviously emotionally charged. That is not a scientific mind's thought. That is an emotional mind's thought.


Kate already explained this.


Another emotional response. A scientist might say, "He will no longer do those terrible things." An emotional person would say, "May he burn in the lowest layer of Hell."

You really don't understand the idea behind logic, do you? That wasn't what I was arguing. Stop pretending that I was.

That was the joke. I bet I could get you to stop talking forever if I told you that you always disagreed with me. It would be an eternal loop of "No, I don't. Yes I do. No I don't." And it would really save me a lot of time.

And no, I am not comparing the two. Killing a mass murderer who holds no remorse for his actions is far preferable to accidentally bombing an innocent person. They are really nothing alike. And you seem to be the messed up one, caught between doublethink and stoic law abiding. "It's ok to kill an innocent if you're also trying to kill someone who is bad, but it's not ok to kill someone who is bad if the law protects them, unless they are from a different country and our laws go against their laws" seems pretty ******** up to me.

I am not a mass murderer, nor do I support them. Is Tiller on the "light" side because he abided by law? Were it illegal, would he still be on the light side? That's not a very objective moral code. That's not good. I judge people based on their actions, not where human law places them. Tiller killed thousands of innocents and did so in a painful manner when is was unnecessary. He is the worst of scum and has earned his ring of hell.

And 90% of germans apparently didn't believe Jews were fully human. Doesn't make it right. That, and a viable fetus is different from a first trimester fetus for several reasons. Third trimester abortion is something that is accepted by very few people. So is racial cleansing.

I have both a scientific mind and an artist's mind. I observe objectively and I form opinions based on it. I do not adhere strictly to current human values, as they are often wrong. If the law supports the murder of one group, it is no more moral right. If it denies a just or neutral act, it is no more wrong. Law, therefore, is irrelevant. My opinion that he deserved a painful death comes from my observation of his actions, which are objectively wrong.

I do not deny that I make emotional statements- A person who does not is being only half a person. But this is not pure emotional rage, this is rage based on a comparison to a measured objective standard.

Strawman. Try again.

So, scientifically, when does dough become bread? When it is half cooked? When it is all cooked? What if it's a tiny bit doughy on the inside? Is it bread? What if there is one particle of dough? What if the fetus has one TOE inside the mother? the answer is, obviously, bollocks. It is what it is regardless of it's location or point in the process. calling it something different is so that we can differentiate stages, but it does not change the objective reality. Call it a fetus or a person or an adult or a duck for all I care, it's still. The. Same. Thing.

I believe this also covers "scientific terms".

Soldiers who would willingly, knowingly kill civilians would be bad people, though, correct? Now, what you do later is an emotional appeal and a red herring. I'm not sure what your point was dragging your relatives into it.

Third trimester abortion is extreme. So is genocide, so were the crimes of the serial killers that have been mentioned previously. I'm defining extreme as repeat offenses with intent to harm others with no remorse for one's actions. And before you say that he had no intent to harm since he doesn't believe fetuses are people, this would mean that Hitler had no intent to harm either as he did not believe that Jews were people. Objective standard, remember.

As for Saddam, no, we should have never put him in power in the first place. We should stop making such mistakes and ending up with dictators rather than barreling on ahead and starting wars with them when they pop up. But this is not about war. Less red herring please, it's a bit dry.

Alright, I'm sitting back and reading this all, and as has happened in the past, things are heating up to a point where this is no longer the correct guild for this conversation. Let's just go continue this conversation in the usual place, and lest you think I'm running away from the argument, please continue it there because I'm very eager to continue it.

It's just getting off topic.

Please, anyone who would like to talk about Dr. Tiller's shooting, continue and ignore old squabbles that are popping up between some oldbies. Contributions to discussion are welcome.