Culture of Violence 2

Following my post on the "Culture of Violence," which was published as a letter in the Kokomo Tribune, a column by Stephen Dick entitled "Conservative Voices Promote Violence" motivated me to offer a reasoned response because, once again, this perspective and logic fail at every turn.

Mr. Dick blasts conservatives for promoting violence. How do they do that? Well, by telling the truth. Mr. Dick is angry with conservatives because of their audacity to declare that abortion kills human life. Is this not the truth, though? Mr. George Tiller’s daily occupation was to destroy human life just as certainly as his own life was destroyed in an alleged murder. In order to paint conservatives with his broad brush of culpability, Mr. Dick has to set up a completely fabricated foundation upon which to build his fanciful accusations. He does this early in his column: “…but deep down right-wing true believers agree with the violence.” Making such an indictment would lead one to believe that his column would be filled with the empirical evidence to substantiate his audacious claim. He provides none.

Instead, Mr. Dick attempts to equate an incident involving willful armed robbery and subsequent self defense with support for pre-meditated murder and turn that into his basis for declaring that conservatives promote violence. Does that not strike you as one of the most ludicrous arguments you have ever heard? The alleged murder of Mr. Tiller had nothing to do with self defense. No conservative he cites, and no conservative I have read or heard, has come anywhere close to condoning the shooting death of Mr. Tiller. The simple truth is that conservative ideology honors the rule of law. In one of the few statements of pseudo-fact in his column, Mr. Dick writes, “Whatever your point of view, Tiller was operating under protection of the law.” Conservatives recognize this. We also recognize that it is bad law and are motivated to correct it by legitimately petitioning our government as provided in our federal and state constitutions. The truth is that abortion is currently protected by court ruling, not by properly legislated law. Nevertheless, it is currently protected. But even that truth cannot mask the reality that the action protected is one that cruelly and violently tears asunder in the womb a human life in the fetal stage of development. The closer the innocent life is to the time of birth, the more cruel and violent the abortion procedure becomes. Operating under the protection of law though he was, Mr. Tiller specialized in the cruelest of abortion procedures.

Not only did Mr. Dick not see fit to mention the violent cruelty inherent in the act of abortion, he goes so far as to write that “to many women, Tiller had been a savior.” How very interesting that the act of dismembering a human life in the womb should result in sainthood for the perpetrator of such violence. Following this line of logic, then, Mr. Dick should have no problem accepting the coronation of Jerome Ersland as “savior” as well. After all, Mr. Ersland’s action resulted in the protection of an unknown number of innocent victims from the deadly danger of further armed robberies by the criminal he shot in self defense. If the world is so much better off because of the dismembering of an innocent human life in the womb, then how much better off is the world by the eradication of one who willfully and purposefully endangered other’s lives through armed robbery? Simply applying Mr. Dick’s logic leads both liberals and conservatives to only one conclusion.

From start to finish, Mr. Dick sets himself up as judge, jury, and executioner of conservatism. Only through his incredibly flawed indictment of what “true right-wingers” believe can he even begin to tie the actions of a lone gunman to an entire ideology that respects our constitutional rule of law. Only through his flawed indictment can he suggest that shining the light of truth on the vicious actions of a cruel industry is a promotion of violent behavior. If Mr. Dick is so concerned about a rising level of violence in our culture, then perhaps he needs to do what I do: actually address one of its principle sources. Pro-abortion advocates want us to believe that they are concerned about eliminating acts of violence in our culture. This is difficult to accept given that they espouse foundational ideologies and actions that have handed our culture the license to treat other human beings without respect, without compassion, and without justice.