California Planned Parenthood Medical Center Firebombed

A Molotov cocktail was chucked through the window of a Madera, CA, Planned Parenthood medical center on Sept. 2nd, in the first incident of violence this particular office has seen during its 20 years of existence. (Thankfully, nobody was injured.) The area experienced similar vandalism one week prior when broken windows and signs bearing hate speech were discovered at a local mosque. A group calling themselves the American Nationalist Brotherhood (ANB) has claimed responsibility for both attacks, and the FBI is investigating.

Sheriff of Madera John Anderson rightly denounced these vile, anti-American hate crimes as terrorism and promised to show no mercy in punishing the responsible individuals to the fullest extent of the law … haha, just kidding. In the most laughably offensive, insulting, pandering statement I’ve ever read, Anderson basically pleads with the terrorists to set up a lunch with him so we can all hug it out: "The fact that there have been numerous messages directed at several organizations makes it difficult to interpret ANB's true message.  I would like for ANB or a representative to contact me directly by whatever means is most comfortable. ... I promise to listen to ANB's message.  This is the groundwork needed for us to have dialogue."

For realsies?! You can’t “interpret ANB’s true message”? Um, they’re racist, anti-choice, right-wing terrorists who hate Muslims and women. What’s the big mystery?

Let’s get one thing straight: anti-choice violence is not just “arson” and “vandalism.” It’s terrorism. And the terrorists don’t need to participate in a sugary “dialogue” so we can “understand” them, they need to be put in prison.  Jeez, is he going to give them a back rub and feed them chocolate-dipped fruit, too?

I wish I could say this reaction is an anomaly. Anti-choice violence is straight-up terrorism against American citizens in the name of religious extremism. But because the terrorists are typically white, the religion is Christianity, and the victims are women and practitioners who help them, nobody seems to give a tiny rat’s ass. Law enforcement officers offer up piddly statements, and news coverage, if it exists at all, is usually brief and local. This incident garnered only a few tiny blips: the Associated Press story was 79 words. 79!

Since 1977, there have been 6263 reported occurrences of violence committed against reproductive health centers and providers. (Granted, many weren’t severe enough to warrant a news story, but hundreds definitely were.) How many of those did you hear about? What would headlines say if bombs were thrown at a subway station, or a post office, or the Pentagon? How vehemently would Fox News shriek about our nation’s beeline to hell? Seriously, what’s it going to take to start calling this what it is?

During a time when America mourned the anniversary of the most heinous terrorist attack our country has ever experienced, anti-choice extremists were busy blaming abortion for terrorism, as well as inflicting some of their own. The irony is not lost on me.

Photo Credit: Ludovic Bertron