Saturday, February 4, 2012

Pro-life should mean Pro-life. Period

"Only in America can you be Pro-Death Penalty, Pro-War, Pro-Unmanned Drone Bombs, Pro-Nuclear Weapons, Pro-Guns, Pro-Torture, Pro-Land Mines, and STILL call yourself 'Pro-Life'." ~ John Fugelsang

Today, in response to a discussion about the recent reversal of the Komen Foundation’s decision to stop supporting Planned Parenthood and the idea that pro-life should include defending all life, I was told by a “pro-life” Christian:
 
I will not agree that the murder of innocent babies is comparable to the death penalty. Whereas those who have been legally convicted of a crime that is legally punishable by death, innocent babies are legally sentenced to death simply for the crime of being. There is no moral equivalency at all here.

This has caused me to reflect.

I suspect (and I have no researched statistics to prove this) that the majority of men and women on death row were once an un-wanted fetus. Probably conceived under difficult and un-planned circumstances, abused while still in the womb by alcohol and drugs that were being pumped into their unformed bodies and brains, and born into horrid worlds that we cannot even imagine. At what point did their life become less valuable than it was when he/she was a fetus?

Was it when their mother dragged them by one arm up to the grocery check out counter where she paid for Coke and Twinkies and chips with food-stamps? Or perhaps it was when they sat down next to one of our clean and cheery daughters in first grade and said “Fuck-you,” because that is the language they were used to hearing day and night at home.

Maybe their life became less valuable when they showed up dirty, without breakfast, not having done their homework, with head lice in the second grade. Or was it when they were suspended for having a fist-fight in the hallway at school because someone had made fun of their dirty clothing?

Maybe it was when they couldn’t go on the sixth grade class trip because mom didn’t sign the permission slip since she was passed out drunk the night before.

Did their life become less valuable than that of a fetus the day they started dealing drugs or turning tricks – having dropped out of school without anyone noticing or caring; now left to find acceptance, perhaps love, in any way possible?

Or was it the day that they used a gun and killed someone? Had they now reached the point where their life was worth less than that of a fetus?

Now on death row having lived a life of neglect, abuse and rejection – never having been asked how their day was or what they were learning at school, or whom they wanted to be when they grew up. Having lived a life where the only affection they ever experienced came from mom’s boyfriend or a stranger who was there to take away any innocence they had rather than to offer love. Now; now as they sit in a cell a horrible angry animal. Now their life is worth less than when they were a fetus.

The final human interaction they will experience is being strapped to a gurney where someone will give them the injection that frees them from the life of pain they have lived and caused.

That is much more moral than abortion?