dr. tiller

I have been trying to work all afternoon on another post, but I’m having trouble maintaining my concentration because of the news about the murder of Dr. George Tiller, the abortion provider in Wichita who has been at the center of the abortion firestorm here in Kansas ever since I was old enough to decide for myself that I believed in a woman’s right to choose. This morning, he was gunned down in the lobby of his church. As of the last time I checked, it seems that police have already arrested a suspect. I’m relieved, and I hope they got the right man.

I remember the first time Dr. Tiller was shot, in 1993. In college, during one of the anti-abortion group Operation Rescue’s relentless assaults on Wichita, I stood with other pro-choice demonstrators in front of an abortion clinic to help shield patients from the harassment of the protestors that surrounded it. I can’t remember if it was Tiller’s clinic—it may have been. I remember that the experience left me with the foulest adrenalin rush I’ve ever gotten from political action. Hate was everywhere. I felt it coming from the protestors, and I felt it in almost equal measure from my cohorts, some of whom screamed “When your daughters are raped, send them to us!” over the fence that separated us. I felt it, too—I hated every one of those Operation Rescue people with a virulent passion that I felt again today when I read their statement denouncing Tiller’s murder, a statement that ended with the words, “We pray for Mr. Tiller’s family that they will find comfort and healing that can only be found in Jesus Christ.” Their inability to extend comfort to the victims of a violent murder without making an exclusivist religious statement turns my stomach. But I’m sorry for the hatred that I feel, because I know that it doesn’t help, because I know that a never-ending cycle of hatred is responsible for this man’s death.

In recent years, Tiller had been the subject of endless legal harassment from our former state attorney general, Phil Kline, a man who essentially sought his office with the express purpose of tormenting Tiller. In the process, Kline has undermined the medical privacy of many of Tiller’s patients, not to mention the entire cause of women’s health in this state.

Tiller was especially reviled in the anti-abortion movement for performing late-term abortions. I realize these are controversial procedures, and my intent here is certainly not to provoke a discussion or debate about them. I only say this: Dr. Tiller helped many women whose lives were at stake, when no one else would help them. He helped many young girls who were the victims of rape, some of whom faced additional trauma at the hands of anti-choice protestors who swarmed them at the gates of his clinic. He helped these women in the face of grave personal danger, in the face of terrorism, in the face of endless hatred and demonization. He was a brave man, and I mourn his passing, not to mention the incredible brutality by which he died.

I know that it isn’t right to lay the blame for this act on the anti-abortion movement. (I refuse to use the term “pro-life.” It clouds the issue, and its inaccuracy is doubly apparent after an act such as this.) I know and (sometimes) respect a number of people who consider themselves to be part of this movement, and I know that they would revile an act such as this. Part of me wants to shake all of them, to say, “This is what your ‘culture of life’ has wrought.” But I know I can’t hold them accountable for this, any more than I want to be held accountable for the violent actions of someone with whom I might share a political viewpoint. Mostly I just feel despair at the way this is unfolding—I feared, after Obama’s election, that Kansas would turn yet again into a flashpoint for anti-abortion extremists, and with this act, I can only reach the miserable conclusion that my fears are being realized. I don’t know how to make it better. I know my rage doesn’t improve matters. I just don’t know how to stop feeling it.

If you are a praying person, please pray for Dr. Tiller’s family, for his church, for his patients, and for the Wichita community. And pray that we find a better way forward on abortion issues than that from whence we have come.