George Tiller Killed

[Sir Squid Diddimus]

what's wrong with people 

[Adios]

what's wrong with people 

It's the water.

[Jenne]

Wow.  People are such scumbuckets.

[Bebek Sincap Ratatosk]

what's wrong with people 

They're people... this is how people behave. We can dream about a world where people are sane and driven by thinking and considering... but its just not the way we monkeys are wired. If someone says "THAT GUYS IS AN ENEMY OF OUR TRIBE" some monkey is probably gonna go gunning for the guy. Especially, if its easy and there isn't much likelihood that the guy will gun back. For example, almost no red-blooded pickup driving, flag waving mook went running off to Afghanistan to take out Bin Laden for us... but they're more than happy to shoot some schmuck in the head while he's at Church.

That kind of thing is what the Sicilians used to do... you know to maintain the "We are batshit crazy motherfuckers" kind of vibe.

Evangelical Christians, the Sicilians of the 21st century.  

[Cain]

"Never go in against a Sicilian when death is on the line!"

Just remember that, like Vizzini, most Christian fundamentalists are not as smart as they like to think.

[Iason Ouabache]

BTW, you might not want to click this link either: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2261924/posts

[Iason Ouabache]

Or this one:  hxxp://rr-bb.com/showthread.php?p=1268132#post1268132

[Iason Ouabache]

And so that it's not all bad news:

Christ Kills Two, Injures Seven In Abortion-Clinic Attack

http://www.theonion.com/content/news/christ_kills_two_injures_seven_in

HUNTSVILLE, AL–Jesus Christ, son of God and noted pro-life activist, killed two and critically wounded seven others when He opened fire in the waiting room of a Huntsville abortion clinic Tuesday.

Security guards at the Women's Medical Clinic of Huntsville were able to disarm the Messiah before He could reload His weapon, a secondhand Glock 9mm pistol that authorities said He purchased legally at a Jackson, MS, sporting-goods store. "Abortion is a sin," said Christ as He was led away in handcuffs. "It is an abomination in the eyes of Me." Witnesses said the attack, which took the lives of Dr. Nelson Woodring, 51, and clinic nurse Danielle Costa, 29, came from "out of nowhere."

"He walked up to the admissions desk and asked if He could see Dr. Woodring," receptionist Iris Reid said. "The next thing I knew, He was shouting Biblical verses and opening fire on everything moving."

"It was horrible," said injured clinic nurse Jessica Combs, recovering at a local hospital with bullet wounds to the leg and abdomen. "He put his hands over Dr. Woodring's head and told him He forgave him for his sins, and then He shot him right in the face." Huntsville police officials are not certain how the Messiah was able to bypass clinic guards and proceed undetected past security cameras and into the clinic waiting room, where He produced the gun from its hiding place in the folds of His robe. Federal investigators are similarly baffled, saying that the heavily armed Christ had moved in "mysterious ways."

[Jenne]

You know what's sad about that?  There's so many Bible-thumping fuckers who would "FUCK YEAH!" that to death.  Hippie Jesus is NOT their Jesus.

Nah, this is their Jesus:

[Iason Ouabache]

Just in case someone pulls the "Not a True Christian^tm" Card:

http://www.mcclatchydc.com/homepage/story/69151.html

Scott P. Roeder, 51, of Merriam, Kan., a Kansas City suburb, was arrested on Interstate 35 near Gardner in suburban Johnson County, Kan., about three hours after the shooting. Tiller was shot to death around 10 a.m. inside Reformation Lutheran Church in Wichita.

In the rear window of the 1993 blue Ford Taurus that he was driving was a red rose, a symbol often used by abortion opponents. On the rear of his car was a Christian fish symbol with the word "Jesus" inside.

Those who know Roeder said he believed that killing abortion doctors was an act of justifiable homicide.

[Sir Squid Diddimus]

what's wrong with people 

They're people... this is how people behave. We can dream about a world where people are sane and driven by thinking and considering... but its just not the way we monkeys are wired. If someone says "THAT GUYS IS AN ENEMY OF OUR TRIBE" some monkey is probably gonna go gunning for the guy. Especially, if its easy and there isn't much likelihood that the guy will gun back. For example, almost no red-blooded pickup driving, flag waving mook went running off to Afghanistan to take out Bin Laden for us... but they're more than happy to shoot some schmuck in the head while he's at Church.

That kind of thing is what the Sicilians used to do... you know to maintain the "We are batshit crazy motherfuckers" kind of vibe.

Evangelical Christians, the Sicilians of the 21st century.  

motherfucking bullshit.
I'M people, and this is NOT how i behave.
these are not people, they're "god's robots" or somesuch shit.

[Bu🤠ns]

what's wrong with people 

They're people... this is how people behave. We can dream about a world where people are sane and driven by thinking and considering... but its just not the way we monkeys are wired. If someone says "THAT GUYS IS AN ENEMY OF OUR TRIBE" some monkey is probably gonna go gunning for the guy. Especially, if its easy and there isn't much likelihood that the guy will gun back. For example, almost no red-blooded pickup driving, flag waving mook went running off to Afghanistan to take out Bin Laden for us... but they're more than happy to shoot some schmuck in the head while he's at Church.

That kind of thing is what the Sicilians used to do... you know to maintain the "We are batshit crazy motherfuckers" kind of vibe.

Evangelical Christians, the Sicilians of the 21st century.  

motherfucking bullshit.
I'M people, and this is NOT how i behave.
these are not people, they're "god's robots" or somesuch shit.

Different day, same old script.

[P3nT4gR4m]

* UPDATE... Doctor George Tiller was aborted today in his 204th trimester

I lolled. Tried not to but my spirit is weak 

[Cain]

US journalist and expert on the far-right David Neiwert's co-writer, Sara Robinson, has a post up about Tiller on his blog:

http://dneiwert.blogspot.com/2009/05/jesuss-jihadis.html

I arrived in DC for the America's Future Now! conference, kicked back in my hotel room, and was greeted with the news that Dr. George Tiller -- the Kansas gynecologist who has endured shootings, state investigations, public harassment, and more death threats than any thousand of us together can imagine in 20 years of standing up to that state's anti-abortion thugs -- was shot to death in his own Lutheran church this morning.

I don't have a lot of time to think through an elaborate post on this (I'm leading a panel with Tom Frank, Rick Perlstein, and James Rucker that will be televised in full on C-SPAN tomorrow), but there are several quick things that spring to mind.

1. Tiller was one of the great heroes in the fight for a woman's right to choose safe, legal abortion. Late-term abortions are a terrible business for everyone concerned. Despite anti-abortion distortions to the contrary, they are very rare -- and almost never chosen for anything but the most heartbreaking of reasons, usually having to do with the life of the mother or the viability of the fetus. It's a life-changing choice for everyone concerned, and not one anybody takes lightly.

By all accounts, Tiller dealt with these horrific situations with dignity, compassion, and grace, helping women and their families deal with the loss and grief that always come with being faced with such a traumatic decision. He didn't just tend to their physical condition; he tended to their psychological and spiritual well-being, too.  Most of us will be backed into life-or-death corners regarding serious medical conditions (a family member's, or our own) at some point in our lives. In those times, we are fortunate when we can find doctors with that kind of ability to understand the nuances, and help us deal with the ambiguities, and come to terms with the hard decisions we must make. Tiller was, according to his patients, one of those doctors.

2. The Terrorists Win. Tiller was one of just three doctors in the entire US who performed late-term abortions. Now, there are just two. Which means that 36 years of anti-choice terrorism is now just two assassinations away from completely ending late-term abortion in America. [emphasis mine -Cain] Violence has won out -- over the will of the people, over the courts, over the horrific logic of medical necessity. And whenever terrorists win, democracy has lost -- and is lost.

3. Churches. First Knoxville, then this. I once made the point that lynchings typically occurred on courthouse lawns as a symbol that the mob had overridden the authority of the state and taken justice into its own hands. So what does it mean when right-wing terrorists start gunning down progressives in the pews of their own churches? Two events do not a pattern make -- but if this keeps happening, it'll be clear that there's a message being sent.

As I write this, police have a suspect in custody for Dr. Tiller's murder. There's no word yet on who the perpetrator is, or what motivated him; but it's a pretty sure bet that as the story comes out, he'll be found to be an anti-abortion True Believer. The fact that this killing happened on the sixth anniversary of Eric Rudolph's capture bears this out. The date was chosen with a message in mind. It seems very likely that the venue was, too.

I've often said that fundamentalism begins the minute you decide you have the One True Right and Only Way -- and that you have a God-given duty to impose that way on the rest of the world. Because of this, fundamentalists have never been willing to recognize the legitimacy of other faiths. And certain factions on the far right have never had qualms about vandalizing mosques or synagogues in order to harass Muslims and Jews into political and social silence.

But they used to leave Christian churches pretty much alone. The fact that this shooting occurred in a church (again) suggests that this tactic is now being tried out on more closely related faith groups whose views don't comport with the fundamentalist party line. As Dave has often pointed out, bringing violence to houses of worship is usually an overtly eliminationist act.  They are trying to terrify liberals by making us feel at risk and unsafe inside our own spiritual sanctuaries -- the very places we go to feel the most security and peace. This is terrorism, plain and simple -- Christian fundamentalist terrorism, committed by people Sam Smith has started referring to as "Jesus's Jihadis."

4. I told you so? My mailbox is full of notes from friends pointing out the irony of this happening just days after Andrew Sullivan accused me of being over-the-top and shrill for suggesting that the right wing was moving into a more violent gear -- and that in the worst case, this is the kind of thing that brings on civil wars. I'm not entirely sure that's warranted. I was specifically worried about anti-gay violence in the wake of Prop 8 being overturned in the California Supreme Court, which didn't happen. But the larger point I've been writing about for the past few weeks now --  about the increased agitation we're seeing on the right, and the likelihood that we're in for a long, hot summer of this kind of acting-out -- is definitely borne out here.

I don't like being right about this kind of thing, but yeah, I did tell you so -- though not so much here as here.

5. Then, they fight you. Gandhi famously said: First, they ignore you. Then, they ridicule you. Then, they fight you. Then, you win.

I think the ridicule part is over, and the fighting part has started in earnest. And this is not (as many of us seemed to hope) going to be a metaphorical fight, but a real one -- with guns and bombs and death involved. The fact is: In America, whatever liberties we win and keep have all been bought in blood, and that's a historical truth that we are not going to get past any time soon.

In the meantime, our deepest condolences to Dr. Tiller's family and employees. If you want to put your money where your heart is, find your local Planned Parenthood clinic's website, and drop them a few bucks. Without George Tiller around, we're down one hero on our side -- and are going to need to give that much more support to everybody who's still around carrying on the work.

[Bebek Sincap Ratatosk]

what's wrong with people 

They're people... this is how people behave. We can dream about a world where people are sane and driven by thinking and considering... but its just not the way we monkeys are wired. If someone says "THAT GUYS IS AN ENEMY OF OUR TRIBE" some monkey is probably gonna go gunning for the guy. Especially, if its easy and there isn't much likelihood that the guy will gun back. For example, almost no red-blooded pickup driving, flag waving mook went running off to Afghanistan to take out Bin Laden for us... but they're more than happy to shoot some schmuck in the head while he's at Church.

That kind of thing is what the Sicilians used to do... you know to maintain the "We are batshit crazy motherfuckers" kind of vibe.

Evangelical Christians, the Sicilians of the 21st century.  

motherfucking bullshit.
I'M people, and this is NOT how i behave.
these are not people, they're "god's robots" or somesuch shit.

Pffft, you're not a people, you're Discordian.



Allow me to restate:

Mosbunal humans behave this way at least sombunal of the time when it comes to their self-identified tribe. Since the days of the One True God, Gathexixa who lived in the lake, humans have fought each other over His Will. Sure, these days some call him YHVH, some call him Adoni, some call him Allah, some call him Jesus... but some very scary number of them still have no issue with sending the unbelievers to the bottom of the lake to meet Gathexixa personally.

The idiot that shot Tiller was part of a very hate filled tribe, a tribe that uses words like mass murder and "Nazi" to demonize their enemies. Once a truly faithful member of the tribe recognizes that the tribe is threatened by a DEMON/NAZI/COMMIE/PINKO/ABORTION DOCTOR they no longer see the enemy as anything other than a DEMON/NAZI/COMMIE/PINKO/ABORTION DOCTOR... then its easy to kill them because they aren't HUMAN. Governments do this shit all the time... Jap, Gook, Kraut, Commie, any term to make the enemy something less than human... then you make sure that the tribe's safety/security/freedoms/way of life are being threatened by this evil 'not human" and BAM a few hundred thousand people, who would normally act sane, go running off to kill.

The methods and psychology are the same, just on a much smaller scale.

It's still horrifying though. I can't imagine anyone reading the Bible and thinking that God would want them to shoot anyone. Random acts of violence, perpetrated by a vigilante is not supported anywhere, even in the most violent and disturbing bits of the Bible. It seems obvious that the Religious Leaders that manipulate the message bear a great responsibility for these sorts of actions. It reminds me of what Jesus supposedly saw in Israel during the 1st century. The Pharisees and Saducees had warped the Law to the point that it had become a heavy burden on the people... they made a big show of prayers and piety, while those who followed their teachings were confused, stressed and often broke out in random acts of stupid violence. Sort of like a dog that you have no consistent training with, it never knows when its being good or bad, it just gets random treatings or beatings and everyone is surprised in it suddenly mauls a baby.