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Pastimes : Let's Talk About Our Feelings!!! -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Sidney Reilly who wrote (28361)	1/17/1999 1:14:00 PM
From: Father Terrence	Respond to of 108807

ON ABORTION AND THE "RIGHT" TO INCITE In 1977, when the American Nazi Party fought for the right to march through a Jewish neighborhood of Skokie IL, it outraged the nation and polarized the American Civil Liberties Union. Today, when the likes of Khalid Muhammad are preaching vicious anti-Semitism to audiences who might be inclined to act on their suggestions, all this concern about a bunch of men who wanted to play dress-up and have a little parade seems almost quaint. Our commitment to the First Amendment, it seems, requires constant testing -- and the stakes keep getting higher. Over the past few years, some anti-abortion groups have become much bolder in their efforts: A Florida organization has been using CompuServe and a research organization affiliated with them to identify abortion clinic customers from their license plate numbers -- and then harassing them. The clinic recently filed suit. But the bigger case, which began January 7, concerns tactics such as the Abortionists on Trial page, which lists (among others) abortion doctors (or "baby butchers"), and compares them to Nuremberg defendants. (Perfectly legal, of course.) And gives out personal information about many of the doctors. (Not nice, but not a crime.) They crossed the line, so to speak, by putting a line through the names of every abortion doctor who was killed. When Dr. Barnett Slepian was murdered in October, the line (reportedly) appeared through his name within minutes. I happened to have come upon the list that same day, before the national media knew it existed. I posted it on the CrimeWeek Daily Page, referring to it as a "hit list". I'm sure many people thought this was hyperbole until they saw it for themselves. As you can imagine, doctors are feeling a bit intimidated by this -- so Planned Parenthood, a local woman's clinic, and five doctors are suing the website and its sponsors under a federal law that prohibits violence or threats against abortion doctors (does this special legislation put abortion doctors on an equal footing with with blacks, women and other selected minorities protected by "hate crime" legislation? -- but I digress). Is this a legitimate attempt by the doctors to keep from being harassed? Or, as co-defendant Michael Bray (a Reformed Lutheran minister) claims, an attempt to stifle debate? Of course, Mr. Bray goes on to say "If you are blocked of public protests [by which he means the webpage], then people are left saying, 'What are we going to do?' It leaves only one option: the covert use of force -- vandalism, blowing up places and terminating doctors." (This is actually nowhere near as ominous as a BBC interview given by the Rev. Donald Spitz, Director of Pro-Life Virginia -- not a defendant in this case -- on the subject of Dr. Slepian's murder. If you have RealAudio check out "He Deserved To Die".) The question here is a difficult one: A First Amendment "purist" pretty much has to side with the anti-abortion groups: If they're not actually calling out for the harassment or murder of abortion doctors, then their speech should be protected. But you've got a "slippery slope" on both sides of the issue: If you side with the doctors, then what ugly speech will be banned next? And who gets to define "ugly"? Yet if you side with the defendants, what comes next? We've gone from Neo-Nazis marching through town, upsetting people but not threatening anybody... to bigots suggesting the Jews deserve to be eliminated... to websites actually naming dozens of "baby butchers", giving out their addresses, describing their children, and invoking the Christian equivalent of a jihad. Can the First Amendment be this absolute? ------------------ Yes it can. The free speech of the anti-abortionists must not be stifled unless that speech begins to directly violate the individual rights of others, e.g. publishing a "hit list", advocating terrorism, murder, destruction of property. That is a blatant call to subvert or destroy the rights of others and must be stopped with the swiftest, harshest means possible. Father Terrence