Never Again: It's Time to Trust Women

More tragic news today. The Tiller family does not have plans to immediately reopen the Women's Health Care Services Clinic in the wake of George Tiller's murder. While I am hopeful that they will re-open the clinic quietly, this leaves two clinics that will provide late-term abortions left in the entire United States. Whether you agree or not with late-term abortion practices, it is important to recognize the dangerous scare tactics that are actively preventing this legal medical operation from being performed for women who may need it. And in the words of Dr. Tiller himself, no matter your opinion about abortion, it's time to "Trust Women."

In light of this tragedy, it is important that we continue to detail the actions by the anti-choice movement that brought us to this challenging moment in history.

For historical understanding, I'd recommend reading this Rolling Stone article and watching "Who Owns a Woman?",  a documentary about the struggle for reproductive rights in Wichita, Kansas. This documentary was made in 2003 and won first place in the Kansas Film Festival. It chronicles the events surrounding the George Tiller clinic including Operation Rescue's "Summer of Mercy", when thousands of people from around the country converged in Wichita in 1991, blocking clinics and being arrested, and made the city a hot spot for the nation’s abortion debate and for an ever-shifting array of organization names, leaders, protesters and preferred tactics according to the New York Times.

This film tells a more complete story of how the anti-choice movement has been organizing against George Tiller for several years. I encourage you to watch all three parts on YouTube and understand the actions that brought this tragic event to fruition.

Part One:

Part Two:

Part Three:

Tiller's death is just one of many in the past decade motivated by the anti-choice movement. As written by the Washington Post, "Mr. Tiller is the fourth abortion provider to be killed since 1993; the attacks he and his Wichita clinic endured are not isolated events. The National Abortion Federation has catalogued 6,143 such incidents of violence in the United States and Canada between 1977 and 2009, including arson, bombings and butyric acid attacks."

Also, from CNN - a listing of other tragedies:

During the 1990s, three doctors who performed abortions were slain in high-profile cases. See all abortion-related attacks since 1993 »

In 1998, a sniper killed Dr. Barnett Slepian in his Amherst, New York, home. Anti-abortion activist James Kopp was later arrested in France and is serving life in prison.

In 1994, Dr. John Bayard Britton and a volunteer escort were shot and killed outside an abortion clinic in Pensacola, Florida. Paul Hill, a former minister, was convicted in the killings and executed in 2003.

In 1993, another doctor, David Gunn, was shot and killed outside another Pensacola clinic. His killer, Michael Griffin, is serving a life sentence.
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In addition, a nurse at a Birmingham, Alabama, clinic was maimed and an off-duty police officer was killed in a 1998 bombing by Eric Rudolph, who included abortion among his list of anti-government grievances.

Never again should we have to mourn the loss of a United States citizen for performing a legal medical procedure. Never again should we have to look back at history and think - if only we had done something sooner. Never again. It's time to trust women.

Photo credit: h-angele