Abortion and the rise of political violence
When pro-abortion arguments inevitably fail, the only thing left is to silence opposition.
On Thursday, Savannah Craven Antoa of the pro-life group Live Action was conducting man-on-the-street interviews asking passersby, “Do you know what Planned Parenthood does?”
One woman answered immediately – and supportively – “Abortions.” Next came the shocking part. After speaking with her for about 20 minutes, the woman inexplicably hit Savannah straight in the face twice, leaving her bloodied. Police were called; Savannah went to the hospital and required stitches.
A woman came forward on social media as the attacker, but continued to point the finger outward, claiming without evidence that she was “railroaded” and “defamed” and that “unedited footage” would vindicate her side. (Nothing justifies what we can clearly see happened.)
About a week before that, an angry young man destroyed a Students for Life display at UNC Asheville, saying repeatedly, “I [expletive] hate you.”
These assaults took place just as Nicholas Roske was set to formally plead guilty to attempting to assassinate Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh following the leak of the draft Dobbs decision. At a pro-abortion rally at the Supreme Court in 2020, Chuck Schumer threatened: “I want to tell you, Justice Kavanaugh and Justice Gorsuch, you have unleashed a whirlwind, and you will pay the price…you won’t know what hit you if you go forward.” Roske reportedly confessed that he was upset about the impending reversal of Roe v. Wade, among other grievances.
It also comes alongside an alarming new report on the rise of an “assassination culture” on the Left – via The Federalist:
Murder Justification: 31% and 38% of respondents stated it would be at least somewhat justified to murder Elon Musk and President Trump, respectively. (These effects were largely driven by respondents that self-identified as left of center, with 48% and 55% at least somewhat justifying murder for Elon Musk and President Trump, respectively, indicating significantly higher justification for violence against these figures.)
Three years after Dobbs, five years after Schumer’s rant, after scores of attacks on pregnancy centers, pro-life groups and churches, we know – and ex-FBI Director Christopher Wray admitted – the overwhelming majority of abortion-related violence and threats post-Dobbs were directed toward pro-life advocates, not done by them. But many leading Democrats not only balked at condemning the attacks, they doubled down on vilifying pregnancy centers and attempted to deny them critical funds. Under Biden, nonviolent protestors of abortion like Lauren Handy went to prison while pro-abortion vandals did no time.
We see no coincidence in the rising criminalization of speech in the U.K., where 64-year-old Livia Tossici-Bolt was recently convicted and ordered to pay the equivalent of nearly 26,000 U.S. dollars for standing within 500 feet of an abortion facility holding a sign that simply said, “Here to talk if you want.” Major pro-abortion groups do not call themselves “pro-choice” anymore; the abortion movement has revealed its deep illiberalism.
Abortion is inherently violent. In their honest moments, abortionists know it. Take Dr. Lisa Harris, medical director of Planned Parenthood of Michigan: “Let’s just give them [pro-lifers] all the violence, it’s a person, it’s killing, let’s just give them all that.” Or the late LeRoy Carhart: “I have no problem” killing a baby “if it’s in the mother’s uterus”…”The baby has no input in this as far as I’m concerned.”
Abortion does not spare women from its inherent violence. When the procedure itself does not severely injure or kill them, an epidemic of coercion to abort is frequently backed up by violence and threats of violence.
Faced with the beauty of life in the womb versus the stark sight of, for example, the brutalized bodies of the D.C. Five babies, freedom and autonomy arguments fail. The only thing left is to try to silence us.
But this seems like as appropriate a time as ever to remember, as our Vice President of Communications Emily Davis (formerly Osment) wrote, the leaker and even the subsequent violence have failed. They failed to stop Dobbs. They failed to halt the march of justice for the unborn and their mothers. They’ve failed to deter pregnancy centers from serving their communities. They will not stop the pro-life movement.
We reject violence as a tactic for achieving our aims. Many in the pro-life movement are here because of persuasion, because the arguments for abortion stopped making sense. Many have themselves been wounded by abortion. We firmly agree with Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.: “Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.”
Savannah, mercifully, was quickly back to sharing the truth about the violence of abortion. We stand with Savannah and all our allies and wish her a speedy recovery, and we reiterate what we said a year after the Dobbs leak:
Here is our message to those who use violence to impose their violent pro-abortion ideology: You will not win. Love is stronger than hate. The overwhelming majority of Americans are on the side of life. Threats and intimidation will not deter us from our mission. We will not rest until every child in America is protected and all mothers are free from abortion coercion.